Some shook with superstitious dread; others, driven to atheistical despair, with horrible execrations, again strove to force a passage through the doors.

A second glance told De Valence whose was the hand which had launched the thunderbolt at his feet; and, turning to Sir Richard Arnuf, he cried, in a voice of horror, "My arch-enemy is there!" Thick smoke rising from within and without the building now obscured his terrific form.

The shouts of the Scots as the fire covered its walls, and the streaming flames licking the windows, and pouring into every opening of the building, raised such a terror in the breasts of the wretches within, that, with the most horrible cries, they again and again flew to the doors to escape.

Not an avenue appeared; almost suffocated with smoke, and scorched by the blazing rafters which fell from the burning roof, they at last made a desperate attempt to break a passage through the great portal.

Arnuf was at their head, and sunk to abjectness by his despair, in a voice which terror rendered piercing, he called aloud for mercy.