some cord, occasionally pausing and measuring with his
eye the distance to the level of the platform. During this operation he
was favored with a running fire of comments and counsels, garnished with
infernal jokes and sallies of insane humor, from the mob who stood
nearest. Having made the necessary preparations he withdrew for a few
minutes, amidst the mock cheers and congratulations of some kindred
spirits below. The awful pause which ensued was but of brief duration. Too
soon a group of dark figures slowly emerged from the open door-way, among
which I could discern the chaplain reading the burial-service, and then
the quivering criminal, his hands clasped in prayer, yet bound together in
front of his breast: he was supported by two assistants, and was already,
to all appearance, more than half dead with mortal terror. These
demonstrations of insupportable anguish on the part of the principal
performer were received with evident and audible dissatisfaction by a
large portion of the spectators of the drama. Derisive sneers on the want
of "pluck" manifested by the poor, horror-stricken wretch were expressed
in language which can not be repeated; and in many a female but unfeminine
face, hardened by embruting vice and callous to every feeling of humanity,
I read a contemptuous scorn of the timorous sufferer and a proud and
fiend-like consciousness that they themselves would have dared the dark
ordeal with less shrinking. The very boy mounted on the old man's
shoulders at my side called his "grand-dad" to witness that "the cove as
was to be hanged wasn't game;" a declaration which was received with a
hoarse chuckle and a corroborative verdict by the standers-by, while the
repulsive ceremony went on with fearful rapidity. In less than a minute
the light of day was shut forever from his eyes, the last prayerful
accents from human lips were dumb to his ears, and the body of the
malefactor, sinking with a sudden fall until half concealed by the level
platform, struggled in the final throes of agony for a few
moments--mercifully abbreviated, as some well-experienced amateurs at my
side plainly pointed out, by the coadjutors of the hangman pulling heavily
at the feet in the inclosure below--and then swung senseless, veering
slowly round upon the now deserted stage.

The very instant the "drop" fell, and while the short gasping cry from a
thousand lips which hailed the close of the tragedy yet rung in the air,
the scene assumed