Any one who reads it by the fireside may smile at the incongruous mixture of a sanguinary menace with bad spelling.

But deeds of blood had often followed these scrawls in Hillsborough, and Henry knew it: and, indeed, he who can not spell his own name correctly is the very man to take his neighbor's life without compunction; since mercy is a fruit of knowledge, and cruelty of ignorance.
And then there was something truly chilling in the mysterious entrance of this threat on a dagger's point into a room he had locked overnight.
It implied supernatural craft and power.

After this, where could a man be safe from these all-penetrating and remorseless agents of a secret and irresponsible tribunal.
Henry sat down awhile, and pored over the sanguinary scrawl, and glanced from it with a shudder at the glittering knife.

And, while he was in this state of temporary collapse, the works filled, the Power moved, the sonorous grindstones revolved, and every man worked at his ease, except one, the best of them all beyond comparison.
He went to his friend Bayne, and said in a broken voice, "They have put me in heart for work; given me a morning dram.

Look here." Bayne was shocked, but not surprised.