's pride and courage, and
make her for very shame's sake brave the terrific scene. Lone and desolate,
she was led along by two brutal men, with taunt and execration; they,
dressed in the dark habits of their office: she, bare-footed, and clothed
in the yellow garment called a _san benito_, her beautiful jet locks cut
close, and her disfigured head and pallid face surmounted by the conical
cap in which the inquisition decked its victims for sacrifice. Four masked
men walked first in the procession, two carrying spades, and two bearing
the insignia of the Holy Office. Next followed the secretary, with a book
and materials for writing, ready to record the particulars of the
execution. Then came Beatrice, dragged onwards by her supporters, and
urged towards the closing scene by the odious voice of Dom Lupo, pouring a
strain of pious blasphemies into her reluctant ears. He stepped close in
her tract, and leant his head forward, determined that she should not have
a moment's respite till the damp earth closed those ears for ever. A dozen
armed men brought up the march; and no suspicion of the inquisitor's
proceeding aroused the citizens, in the narrow and unlit streets through
which it moved.

In less than half an hour, Beatrice's bruised and lacerated feet, felt a
sudden relief that spread up refreshingly through her whole frame, on
pressing a grass plot, moistened by the night dew. At the same moment, a
gleam from a lantern opened by one of the men close to her, showed that
she stood on the brink of a newly-dug grave. She started back at the
appalling sight--and was upheld from falling by her attendants, on whose
faces she saw a malignant grin; while the tones of Dom Lupo's voice seemed
to hiss in her ears, like the serpent triumph of a fiend.

"Erring daughter of the only true and most merciful church," gloomed he,
"unrepented sinner, on the verge of death--ere the grave close over thy
living agony--ere the arm of Almighty wrath shove thee into the pit of
hell, and eternal flames enfold thee--listen to the last offer of the
mother thou hast outraged, of the faith thou hast defiled. Recant thy
errors--renounce thy false Gods--confess thy crimes--and return into the
blessed bosom of the church!"

Beatrice, rousing the whole force of her latent energy, pushed the
inquisitor from her, with a look of scorn, burst from her keepers' arms,
and sprang into the open grave.

"Lost and condemned for ever and ever--let the earth lie