Hastening from this heart-rending spectacle, Jack soon reached the grating that divided the men’s compartment from that appropriated to the women.  Inquiring for Mrs. Sheppard, a matron offered to conduct him to her cell.

“You’ll find her quiet enough to-day, Sir,” observed the woman, as they walked along; “but she has been very outrageous latterly.  Her nurse says she may live some time; but she seems to me to be sinking fast.”

“Heaven help her!” sighed Jack.  “I hope not.”

“Her release would be a mercy,” pursued the matron.  “Oh!  Sir, if you’d seen her as I’ve seen her, you’d not wish her a continuance of misery.”

As Jack made no reply, the woman proceeded.

“They say her son’s taken at last, and is to be hanged.  I’m glad of it, I’m sure; for it’s all owing to him his poor mother’s here.  See what crime does, Sir.  Those who act wickedly bring misery on all connected with them.  And so gentle as the poor creature is, when she’s not in her wild fits—­it would melt a heart of stone to see her.  She will cry for days and nights together.  If Jack Sheppard could behold his mother in this state, he’d have a lesson he’d never forget—­ay, and a severer one than even the hangman could read him.  Hardened as he may be, that would touch him.  But he has never been near her—­never.”

Rambling in this way, the matron at length came to a halt, and taking out a key, pointed to a door and said, “This is Mrs. Sheppard’s ward, Sir.”

“Leave us together, my good woman,” said Jack, putting a guinea into her hand.

“As long as you please, Sir,” answered the matron, dropping a curtsey.  “There, Sir,” she added, unlocking the door, “you can go in.  Don’t be frightened of her.  She’s not mischievous—­and besides she’s chained, and can’t reach you.”

So saying, she retired, and Jack entered the cell.

Prepared as he was for a dreadful shock, and with his nerves strung to endure it, Jack absolutely recoiled before the appalling object that met his gaze.  Cowering in a corner upon a heap of straw sat his unfortunate mother, the complete wreck of what she had been.  Her eyes glistened in the darkness—­for light was only admitted through a small grated window—­like flames, and, as she fixed them on him, their glances seemed to penetrate his very soul.  A piece of old blanket was fastened across her shoulders, and she had no other clothing except a petticoat.  Her arms and feet were uncovered, and of almost skeleton thinness.  Her features were meagre, and ghastly white, and had the fixed and horrible stamp of insanity.  Her head had been shaved, and around it was swathed a piece of rag, in which a few straws were stuck.  Her thin fingers were armed with nails as long as the talons of a bird.  A chain, riveted to an iron belt encircling her waist, bound her to the wall.  The cell in which she was confined was about six feet long and four wide; the walls were scored all over with fantastic designs, snatches of poetry, short sentences and names,—­the work of its former occupants, and of its present inmate.