I might be said to hear it that night myself in the condemned cell! At length a fellow with a voice like a bull's began to roar out in the opposite thoroughfare: 'Past yin o'cloak, and a dark, haary moarnin'.' At which we were all silently afoot.
As I stole about the battlements towards the--gallows, I was about to write--the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of my resolution, kept close by me, and occasionally proffered the most indigestible reassurances in my ear.

At last I could bear them no longer.
'Be so obliging as to let me be!' said I.

'I am neither a coward nor a fool.

What do _you_ know of whether the rope be long enough?
But I shall know it in ten minutes!' The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted me.
It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper before a friend alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had to go handsomely.

It was then my time to come on the stage; and I hope I took it handsomely.
'Now, gentlemen,' said I, 'if the rope is ready, here is the criminal!' The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope extended.