For a short space, Mrs. Sheppard remained dissolved in tears.  She then dried her eyes, and laying her child gently upon the floor, knelt down beside him.  “Open my heart, Father of Mercy!” she murmured, in a humble tone, and with downcast looks, “and make me sensible of the error of my ways.  I have sinned deeply; but I have been sorely tried.  Spare me yet a little while, Father! not for my own sake, but for the sake of this poor babe.”  Her utterance was here choked by sobs.  “But if it is thy will to take me from him,” she continued, as soon as her emotion permitted her,—­“if he must be left an orphan amid strangers, implant, I beseech thee, a mother’s feelings in some other bosom, and raise up a friend, who shall be to him what I would have been.  Let him not bear the weight of my punishment.  Spare him!—­pity me!”

With this she arose, and, taking up the infant, was about to proceed down stairs, when she was alarmed by hearing the street-door opened, and the sound of heavy footsteps entering the house.

“Halloa, widow!” shouted a rough voice from below, “where the devil are you?”

Mrs. Sheppard returned no answer.

“I’ve got something to say to you,” continued the speaker, rather less harshly; “something to your advantage; so come out o’ your hiding-place, and let’s have some supper, for I’m infernally hungry.—­D’ye hear?”

Still the widow remained silent.

“Well, if you won’t come, I shall help myself, and that’s unsociable,” pursued the speaker, evidently, from the noise he made, suiting the action to the word.  “Devilish nice ham you’ve got here!—­capital pie!—­and, as I live, a flask of excellent canary.  You’re in luck to-night, widow.  Here’s your health in a bumper, and wishing you a better husband than your first.  It’ll be your own fault if you don’t soon get another and a proper young man into the bargain.  Here’s his health likewise.  What! mum still.  You’re the first widow I ever heard of who could withstand that lure.  I’ll try the effect of a jolly stave.”  And he struck up the following ballad:—­

SAINT GILES’S BOWL.[A]

[Music:  Transcribers note See HTML version for music]

    I.

Where Saint-Giles’ church stands, once a la-zar-house stood; And, chain’d to its gates, was a ves-sel of wood; A broad-bottom’d bowl, from which all the fine fellows, Who pass’d by that spot, on their way to the gallows, Might tipple strong beer, Their spirits to cheer, And drown, in a sea of good li-quor, all fear!  For nothing the tran-sit to Ty-burn beguiles, So well as a draught from the Bowl of Saint Giles!

    II.

    By many a highwayman many a draught
    Of nutty-brown ale at Saint Giles’s was quaft,
    Until the old lazar-house chanced to fall down,
    And the broad-bottom’d bowl was removed to the Crown.
        Where the robber may cheer
        His spirit with beer,
      And drown in a sea of good liquor all fear!
      For nothing the transit to Tyburn beguiles
      So well as a draught from the Bowl of Saint Giles!