trong movable grate, between the bars of which might be
seen a yawning sort of chasm leading into the heart of the prison.

Again Mr. Cram's great keys were put in motion, and he opened the grate
to let them pass, eyeing John Ayliffe with considerable attention as he
did so. Locking the grate carefully behind him, he lighted them on with
his lantern, muttering as he went in the peculiar prison slang of those
days, various sentences not very complimentary to the tastes and habits
of young John Ayliffe, "Ay, ay," he said, "clerk be damned! One of Tom's
pals, for a pint and a boiled bone--droll I don't know him. He must be
twenty, and ought to have been in the stone pitcher often enough before
now. Dare say he's been sent to Mill Dol, for some minor. That's not in
my department, I shall have the darbies on him some day. He'd look
handsome under the tree."

John Ayliffe had a strong inclination to knock him down, but he
restrained himself, and at length a large plated iron door admitted the
two gentlemen into the penetralia of the temple.

A powerful smell of aqua vitae and other kinds of strong waters now
pervaded the atmosphere, mingled with that close sickly odor which is
felt where great numbers of uncleanly human beings are closely packed
together; and from some distance was heard the sounds of riotous
merriment, ribald song, and hoarse, unfeeling laugh, with curses and
execrations not a few. It was a time when the abominations of the prison
system were at their height.

"Here, you step in here," said Mr. Cram to the attorney and his
companion, "and I'll bring Tom to you in a minute. He's having a lush
with some of his pals; though I thought we were going to have a mill,
for Jack Perkins, who is to be hanged o' Monday, roused out his slack
jaw at him for some quarrel about a gal, and Tom don't bear such like
easily. Howsumdever, they made it up and clubbed a gallon. Stay, I'll
get you a candle end;" and leaving them in the dark, not much, if the
truth must be told, to the satisfaction of John Ayliffe, he rolled away
along the passage and remained absent several minutes.

When he returned, a clanking step followed him, as heavy irons were
dragged slowly on by unaccustomed limbs, and the moment after, Tom
Cutter stood in the presence of his two friends.

The jailer brought them in a piece of candle about two inches long,
which he stuck into a sort of socket attached to an iron bar projecting
straight from the wall;