“My friends,” he answered, “I feel for you—God is my judge I do!—and here, here is my witness that none hath heavier cause to feel than I have,” and as he spoke, he opened the door of an inner chamber, and showed to those worn deputies the corpse of a fair, light-haired youth, stretched on a pallet bed, emaciated beyond all conception—yea! literally wasted to the bones! “Look there!” he said, “look there! Six little days ago that famished, cold, dead carcass was the most fair, the sprightliest, the bravest, the best, the noblest boy in all wide England! You see him, as he lies there—_my_ boy, my glorious boy!—oh, God! last pledge of my lost angel, who, dying, left him to my paternal care, which here is proved forever! Gentlemen, ye are answered; when my King’s orders reach me to yield up this hold, then will I yield it up—’till then, please God, I shall maintain it; and so long as my trusty fellows have boots, and sword belts, and buff jerkins, we shall not lack a meal. So, my friends, fare ye well.” To this there was no answer; from this lay no appeal. They went away, as they had come, despairing; they betook themselves to their inhospitable homes, to their wan, starving families, and sat them down beside their fireless hearths, to pray for resignation, and for death to put an end to tortures which were fast becoming too terrible to bear. So the bright hours of daylight rolled over them unheeded, and the dark night came on—that season of repose and quiet, season of respite from all cares, relief from every wo—yet brought it no repose, no respite to the mourners of that city! The groans of manly agony, blent with the wailings of expiring infancy, and the faint sobs of women, suppressing their own agonies lest they should rend the hearts of others, went up that livelong night to Heaven; and there were humble prayers breathed out from penitent Christian bosoms; and there were wild, impatient, fierce ejaculations, which those who uttered them _called_ prayer; and there were desperate blasphemies and curses, such as fiends howl out against the throne of grace, too fearful to be written!