The crowd below might fancy that he lacked courage, that he was absorbed in prayer, or that his soul shrank from dealing the fateful blow to the great divinity; but she could see that he was bidding a silent farewell, as it were, to the sublime work of an inspired artist, which it pained and shocked him to destroy.

And this comforted her; it gave her views of the situation a new direction, and suggested the question whether he, a soldier and a Christian, when commanded by his superior to do this deed ought to shrink or hesitate, if he were indeed, heart and soul, what, after all, he was.

Her eyes clung to him, as a frightened child clings to its mother's neck; and the expectant thousands, in an agony of suspense, like her, saw nothing but him.
Stillness more profound never reigned in the heart of the desert than now in this vast and densely-crowded hall.

Of all man's five senses only one was active: that of sight; and that was concentrated on a single object a man's hand holding an axe.

The hearts of thousands stood still, their breath was suspended, there was a singing in their ears, a dazzling light in their eyes--eyes that longed to see, that must see--and that could not; thousands stood there like condemned criminals, whose heads are on the block, who hear the executioner behind them, and who still, on the very threshold of death, hope for respite and release.
Gorgo found no answer to her own questionings; but she, too, wanted to see--must see.