The unhappy youth, for he was not more
than twenty, advanced with a steady step to where the smith expected him.
He was resigned and tractable. When about to place his foot on the block,
he untied a band, which had passed round his body to sustain the weight of
his irons; and as he disengaged it, he let it carelessly fall, with an
expression in his countenance which told, so I fancied, that, in this
moment, reflecting he should never want it again, the immediate cause and
consequence of the miserable relief flashed full on his imagination, with
all their concomitant horrors. But with calmness he attended to the
workman, who directed him how to stand. He manifested great presence of
mind, and, I thought, seemed to gaze with something of curiosity on the
operation, which he contributed all in his power to facilitate. The heavy
blows echoed through the room, and rudely broke in on the low murmurs and
whispers which had for some little time been the only sounds heard there.
A singularly irrational feeling came over me. I could have reproved the
striker for indecorously breaking silence, and even have questioned his
humanity for being capable of such vigorous exertion at a moment when, as
it struck me, everything ought to have presented the coldness and
motionless stillness of the grave.
The rivet was knocked out, the fetters fell to the floor, and the prisoner
was passed from the anvil to the further extremity of the room.
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