The captain of the escort, wishing to put an end to a scene that might agitate the people, bade two soldiers take Margaret away; but she clung to her father with arms that were like bars of iron, and it was with difficulty that she could be removed.[145] She had been hardly set on the ground a few steps off, when she sprang up again, and thrusting those who had separated her from him she so loved, she broke through the crowd once more, fell upon his neck, and kissed him several times with a convulsive effort. In her, filial love had all the vehemence of passion. More, whom the sentence of death had not been able to move, lost all energy, and the tears poured down his cheeks. The crowd watched this touching scene with deep excitement, and 'they were very few in all the troop who could refrain from weeping; no, not the guards themselves.'[146] Even the soldiers wept, and refused to tear the daughter again from her father's arms. Two or three, however, of the less agitated stepped forward and carried Margaret away. The women of her household, who had accompanied her, immediately surrounded her and bore her away from a sight of such inexpressible sadness. The prisoner entered the Tower. Sir Thomas spent six more days and nights in prison. We hear certainly of his pious words, but the petty practices of an ascetic seemed to engross him too much. His macerations were increased: he walked up and down his cell, wearing only a winding-sheet as if he were already a corpse waiting to be buried.[147] He often scourged himself for a long time together, and with extraordinary violence. Yet at the same time he indulged in Christian meditations. 'I am afflicted,' he wrote to one of his friends, 'shut up in a dungeon; but God in His mercy will soon deliver me from this world of tribulation. Walls will no longer separate us, and we shall have holy conversations together, which no jailer will interrupt.'[148] On the 5th of July, desiring to bid his daughter a last farewell, More took a piece of charcoal (he had nothing else), and wrote to her: 'To-morrow is St. Thomas's day, and my saint's day; accordingly, I desire extremely that it may be the day of my departure. My child, I never loved you so dearly as when last you kissed me. I like when daughterly love has no leisure to look unto worldly courtesy.[149]... Farewell, my dearly beloved daughter; pray for me. I pray for you all, to the end that we may meet in heaven.' Thus one of the closest and holiest affections, that of a father for his daughter, and of a daughter for her father, softened the last moments of this distinguished man. Sir Thomas sent Margaret his hair-shirt and scourge, which he desired to conceal from the eyes of the indifferent. What an inheritance!