At length a door was heard to open, and the footsteps of the jury, as they resumed their places, sounded through the court, and were heard by those without.

How heavily upon many a stout heart those footsteps fell! They had taken their seats--then came another pause -- after which the monotonous tones of the clerk of the court were heard, addressing the jury for their verdict.

As the foreman rises every ear is bent--every eye strained--every heart-string vibrates: his lips move, but he is not heard; he is desired by the judge to speak louder; the colour mounts to his before bloodless face; he appears to labour for a few seconds with a mighty effort, and, at last, pronounces the words, "Guilty, my Lord--all guilty!" I have heard the wild war-whoop of the red Indian, as, in his own pine forest, he has unexpectedly come upon the track of his foe, and the almost extinguished hope of vengeance has been kindled again in his cruel heart--I have listened to the scarcely less savage hurra of a storming party, as they have surmounted the crumbling ruins of a breach, and devoted to fire and sword, with that one yell, all who await them--and once in my life it has been my fortune to have heard the last yell of defiance from a pirate crew, as they sunk beneath the raking fire of a frigate, rather than surrender, and went down with a cheer of defiance that rose even above the red artillery that destroyed but could not subdue them;--but never, in any or all of these awful moments, did my heart vibrate to such sounds as rent the air when the fatal "Guilty" was heard by those within, and repeated to those without.

It was not grief -- it was not despair--neither was it the cry of sharp and irrepressible anguish, from a suddenly blighted hope--but it was the long pent-up and carefully-concealed burst of feeling which called aloud for vengeance -- red and reeking revenge upon all who had been instrumental in the sentence then delivered.

It ceased, and I looked towards the court-house, expecting that an immediate and desperate attack upon the building and those whom it contained would at once take place.