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The Judge, whose eyes had gone in the general direction, recalled

them, leaned back in his seat, and looked steadily at the man

whose life was in his hand, as Mr. Attorney-General rose to spin

the rope, grind the axe, and hammer the nails into the scaffold.

CHAPTER III. A Disappointment

Mr. Attorney-General had to inform the jury, that the prisoner

before them, though young in years, was old in the treasonable

practices which claimed the forfeit of his life. That this

correspondence with the public enemy was not a correspondence of

to-day, or of yesterday, or even of last year, or of the year

before. That, it was certain the prisoner had, for longer than

that, been in the habit of passing and repassing between France

and England, on secret business of which he could give no honest

account. That, if it were in the nature of traitorous ways to

thrive (which happily it never was), the real wickedness and

guilt of his business might have remained undiscovered. That

Providence, however, had put it into the heart of a person who

was beyond fear and beyond reproach, to ferret out the nature of

the prisoner's schemes, and, struck with horror, to disclose them

to his Majesty's Chief Secretary of State and most honourable

Privy Council.