athomable world
within. The mute lip; the rigid brow; the downcast eye; a heavy and
dread stillness, brooding over every feature,--these are all we behold.

Is it that thought sleeps, locked in the torpor of a senseless and
rayless dream; or that an evil incubus weighs upon it, crushing its
risings, but deadening not its pangs? Does Memory fly to the green
fields and happy home of his childhood, or the lonely studies of his
daring and restless youth, or his earliest homage to that Spirit of
Freedom which shone bright and still and pure upon the solitary chamber
of him who sang of heaven [Milton]; or (dwelling on its last and most
fearful object) rolls it only through one tumultuous and convulsive
channel,--Despair? Whatever be within the silent and deep heart, pride,
or courage, or callousness, or that stubborn firmness, which, once
principle, has grown habit, cover all as with a pall; and the strung
nerves and the hard endurance of the human flesh sustain what the
immortal mind perhaps quails beneath, in its dark retreat, but once
dreamed that it would exult to bear.

The fatal hour had come! and, through the long dim passages of the
prison, four criminals were led forth to execution. The first was
Crauford's associate, Bradley. This man prayed fervently; and, though
he was trembling and pale, his mien and aspect bore something of the
calmness of resignation.

It has been said that there is no friendship among the wicked. I
have examined this maxim closely, and believe it, like most popular
proverbs,--false. In wickedness there is peril, and mutual terror is the
strongest of ties. At all events, the wicked can, not unoften, excite
an attachment in their followers denied to virtue. Habitually courteous,
caressing, and familiar, Crauford had, despite his own suspicions of
Bradley, really touched the heart of one whom weakness and want, not
nature, had gained to vice; and it was not till Crauford's guilt was by
other witnesses undeniably proved that Bradley could be tempted to make
any confession tending to implicate him.

He now crept close to his former partner, and frequently clasped his
hand, and besought him to take courage and to pray. But Crauford's eye
was glassy and dim, and his veins seemed filled with water: so
numbed and cold and white was his cheek. Fear, in him, had passed its
paroxysms, and was now insensibility; it was only when they urged him to
pray that a sort of benighted consciousness strayed over