was there murdered and his
dead body flung into the "Bowl." The inscription further states that
justice overtook his murderers, who were hanged on the selfsame spot,
the scene of their crime. The obelisk of stone, with its long record,
occupying the place where stood the gallows-tree.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

It is a morning in the month of June; the hour a little after daybreak.
A white fog is over the land of South Hampshire--so white that it might
be taken for snow. The resemblance is increased by the fact of its
being but a layer, so low that the crests of the hills and tree-tops of
copses appear as islets in the ocean, with shores well defined, though
constantly shifting. For, in truth, it is the effect of a mirage, a
phenomenon aught but rare in the region of the South Downs.

The youth who is wending his way up the slope leading to the Devil's
Punch Bowl takes no note of this illusion of nature. But he is not
unobservant of the fog itself; indeed, he seems pleased at having it
around him, as though it afforded concealment from pursuers. Some
evidence of this might be gathered from his now and then casting
suspicious glances rearward, and at intervals stopping to listen.
Neither seeing nor hearing anything, however, he continues up the hill
in a brisk walk, though apparently weary. That he is tired can be told
by his sitting down on a bank by the roadside as soon as he reaches the
summit, evidently to rest himself. What he carries could not be the
cause of his fatigue--only a small bundle done up in a silk
handkerchief. More likely it comes from his tramp along the hard road,
the thick dust over his clothes showing that it had been a long one.

Now, high up the ridge, where the fog is but a thin film, the solitary
wayfarer can be better observed, and a glance at his face forbids all
thought of his being a runaway from justice. Its expression is open,
frank, and manly; whatever of fear there is in it certainly cannot be
due to any consciousness of crime. It is a handsome face, moreover,
framed in a profusion of blonde hair, which falls curling down cheeks of
ruddy hue. An air of rusticity in the cut of his clothes would bespeak
him country bred, probably the son of a farmer. And just that he is,
his father being a yeoman-farmer near Godalming, some thirty miles back
along the road. Why the youth is so far from home at this early hour,
and afoot--wh