, out of mere respect to consistency, to let the criminal suffer.
»If your Majesty,« he said, »would condescend to hear my poor countrywoman
herself, perhaps she may find an advocate in your own heart, more able than I
am, to combat the doubts suggested by your understanding.«
    The Queen seemed to acquiesce, and the Duke made a signal for Jeanie to
advance from the spot where she had hitherto remained watching countenances,
which were too long accustomed to suppress all apparent signs of emotion, to
convey to her any interesting intelligence. Her Majesty could not help smiling
at the awe-struck manner in which the quiet demure figure of the little
Scotchwoman advanced towards her, and yet more at the first sound of her broad
northern accent. But Jeanie had a voice low and sweetly toned, an admirable
thing in woman, and eke besought »her Leddyship to have pity on a poor misguided
young creature,« in tones so affecting, that, like the notes of some of her
native songs, provincial vulgarity was lost in pathos.
    »Stand up, young woman,« said the Queen, but in a kind tone, »and tell me
what sort of a barbarous people your country-folk are, where child-murder is
become so common as to require the restraint of laws like yours?«
    »If your Leddyship pleases,« answered Jeanie, »there are mony places besides
Scotland where mothers are unkind to their ain flesh and blood.«
    It must be observed, that the disputes between George the Second and
Frederick Prince of Wales were then at the highest, and that the good-natured
part of the public laid the blame on the Queen. She coloured highly, and darted
a glance of a most penetrating character first at Jeanie, and then at the Duke.
Both sustained it unmoved; Jeanie from total unconsciousness of the offence she
had given, and the Duke from his habitual composure. But in his heart he
thought, My unlucky protégée has with this luckless answer shot dead, by a kind
of chance-medley, her only hope of success.
    Lady Suffolk, good-humouredly and skilfully, interposed in this awkward
crisis. »You should tell this lady,« she said to Jeanie, »the particular causes
which render this crime common in your country.«
    »Some thinks it's the Kirk-session - that is - it's the - it's the
cutty-stool, if your Leddyship pleases,« said Jeanie, looking down and
courtesying.
    »The what?« said Lady Suffolk, to whom the