The person who held the light proved to be the miller’s daughter, Dorothy, a blooming lass of eighteen, and at the other end of the chamber, seated on a bench before a turf fire, with an infant on her knees, was the miller’s wife.  The latter instantly arose on beholding the abbot, and, placing the child on a corn bin, advanced towards him, and dropped on her knees, while her daughter imitated her example.  The abbot extended his hands over them, and pronounced a solemn benediction.

“Bring your child also to me, that I may bless it,” he said, when he concluded.

“It’s nah my child, lort abbut,” replied the miller’s wife, taking up the infant and bringing it to him; “it wur brought to me this varry neet by Ebil.  Ey wish it wur far enough, ey’m sure, for it’s a deformed little urchon.  One o’ its een is lower set than t’ other; an t’ reet looks up, while t’ laft looks down.”

And as she spoke she pointed to the infant’s face, which was disfigured as she had stated, by a strange and unnatural disposition of the eyes, one of which was set much lower in the head than the other.  Awakened from sleep, the child uttered a feeble cry, and stretched out its tiny arms to Dorothy.

“You ought to pity it for its deformity, poor little creature, rather than reproach it, mother,” observed the young damsel.

“Marry kem eawt!” cried her mother, sharply, “yo’n getten fine feelings wi’ your larning fro t’ good feythers, Dolly.  Os ey said efore, ey wish t’ brat wur far enough.”

“You forget it has no mother,” suggested Dorothy, kindly.

“An naw great matter, if it hasn’t,” returned the miller’s wife.  “Bess Demdike’s neaw great loss.”

“Is this Bess Demdike’s child?” cried Paslew, recoiling.

“Yeigh,” exclaimed the miller’s wife.  And mistaking the cause of Paslew’s emotion, she added, triumphantly, to her daughter, “Ey towd te, wench, ot t’ lort abbut would be of my way o’ thinking.  T’ chilt has got the witch’s mark plain upon her.  Look, lort abbut, look!”

But Paslew heeded her not, but murmured to himself:—­

“Ever in my path, go where I will.  It is vain to struggle with my fate.  I will go back and surrender myself to the Earl of Derby.”

“Nah,—­nah!—­yo shanna do that,” replied Hal o’ Nabs, who, with the miller, was close beside him.  “Sit down o’ that stoo’ be t’ fire, and take a cup o’ wine t’ cheer yo, and then we’n set out to Pendle Forest, where ey’st find yo a safe hiding-place.  An t’ ony reward ey’n ever ask for t’ sarvice shan be, that yo’n perform a marriage sarvice fo’ me and Dolly one of these days.”  And he nudged the damsel’s elbow, who turned away, covered with blushes.

The abbot moved mechanically to the fire, and sat down, while the miller’s wife, surrendering the child with a shrug of the shoulders and a grimace to her daughter, went in search of some viands and a flask of wine, which she set before Paslew.  The miller then filled a drinking-horn, and presented it to his guest, who was about to raise it to his lips, when a loud knocking was heard at the door below.