ished most particularly to avoid,
knowing that it opened on a part of the court which, from its commanding
a view of the scaffold, he justly feared would be crowded. He had paused
but to speak one word of encouragement to Agnes, who, with a calmness
appalling from the rigidity of feature which accompanied it, now stood
at his side; he bade her only hold by his cloak, and he hoped speedily
to lead her to a place of safety. She heard him and made a sign of
obedience. They passed the gate unquestioned, traversed an inner court,
and made for the great entrance of the castle; there, unhappily, their
progress was impeded. The scaffold, by order of Edward, had been erected
on the summit of a small green ascent exactly opposite the prison of the
Countess of Buchan, and extending in a direct line about half a quarter
of a mile to the right of the castle gates, which had been flung wide
open, that all the inhabitants of Berwick might witness the death of a
traitor. Already the courts and every vacant space was crowded. A sea of
human heads was alone visible, nay, the very buttresses and some
pinnacles of the castle, which admitted any footing, although of the
most precarious kind, had been appropriated. The youth, the
extraordinary beauty, and daring conduct of the prisoner had excited an
unusual sensation in the town, and the desire to mark how such a spirit
would meet his fate became irresistibly intense. Already it seemed as if
there could be no space for more, yet numbers were still pouring in, not
only most completely frustrating the intentions of the Earl of
Gloucester, but forcing him, by the pressure of multitudes, with them
towards the scaffold. In vain he struggled to free himself a passage;
in vain he haughtily declared his rank and bade the presumptuous serfs
give way. Some, indeed, fell back, but uselessly, for the crowds behind
pushed on those before, and there was no retreating, no possible means
of escaping from that sight of horror which Gloucester had designed so
completely to avoid. In the agony of disappointment, not a little mixed
with terror as to its effects, he looked on his companion. There was not
a particle of change upon her countenance; lips, cheek, brow, were
indeed bloodless as marble, and as coldly still; her eyes were
fascinated on the scaffold, and they moved not, quivered not. Even when
the figure of an aged minstrel, in the garb of Scotland, suddenly stood
between them and the dread object of the