sed in front and behind, with a cold, frightful glitter of
steel. Besides the foot soldiers, there were dragoons, and two pieces
of cannon; a whole little army, in fact. With a slenderer force
battles have been won which have made a mark in history. What did the
prisoners think of their strange importance, and of the tramp and
hurly-burly all around? When the procession moved out of the city, it
seemed to draw with it almost the entire population; and when once the
country roads were reached, the crowds spread over the fields on either
side, ruthlessly treading down the tender wheat braird. I got a
glimpse of the doomed, blanched faces which had haunted me so long, at
the turn of the road, where, for the first time, the black cross-beam
with its empty halters first became visible to them. Both turned and
regarded it with a long, steady look; that done, they again bent their
heads attentively to the words of the clergyman. I suppose in that
long, eager, fascinated gaze they practically _died_--that for them
death had no additional bitterness. When the mound was reached on
which the scaffold stood, there was immense confusion. Around it a
wide space was kept clear by the military; the cannon were placed in
position; out flashed the swords of the dragoons; beneath and around on
every side was the crowd. Between two brass helmets I could see the
scaffold clearly enough, and when in a little while the men, bareheaded
and with their attendants, appeared upon it, the surging crowd became
stiffened with fear and awe. And now it was that the incident so
simple, so natural, so much in the ordinary course of things, and yet
so frightful in its tragic suggestions, took place. Be it remembered
that the season was early May, that the day was fine, that the
wheat-fields were clothing themselves in the green of the young crop,
and that around the scaffold, standing on a sunny mound, a wide space
was kept clear. When the men appeared beneath the beam, each under his
proper halter, there was a dead silence,--every one was gazing too
intently to whisper to his neighbour even. Just then, out of the
grassy space at the foot of the scaffold, in the dead silence audible
to all, a lark rose from the side of its nest, and went singing upward
in its happy flight. O heaven! how did that song translate itself into
dying ears? Did it bring, in one wild burning moment, father and
mother, and poor Irish cabin, and prayers said at bed-ti