Then he heard a hammering, and saw below men employed driving the pegs into the sockets in the rock, and fastening the wedges that held them firm. No sooner was the full connection made than up the stair ran men and even women, and boys who had scrambled out of bed, and these stood in a line against the rock up the lengthy ladder-stair gazing at the suspended man. Then also from above the draw-bridge was lowered, and the men-at-arms who had been in the castle ran out of the gate and ran down the stair to have a better sight thence of the swinging, helpless man than they could from the battlements. A terrible spectacle it was that they witnessed--such a one as could not be looked on by Christian people unmoved save in such an evil age as that, when men were rendered ferocious as wild Indians and callous to the sufferings of their brethren; a spectacle such as could not be looked on without pity save in such a place as that where all had suffered in some degree from the exactions or the barbarities of this wretched man. The flames danced and curled as if they also frolicked at the sight of the agony of the man who had so often fed them with hard-won harvests of the peasantry, and the humble goods of the cottager too worthless to be carried away. In the glare of the leaping bonfire Le Gros Guillem was distinctly visible, looking like a monstrous yellow spider at the end of his line. He thrust out now one long leg, then another, next he extended his lengthy arms each armed with lean and bony fingers. He endeavoured to scramble into a standing position upon his bar, but failed--one side would descend before the other, and he nearly fell in attempting this impossible feat. He gripped the rope with hands and knees and endeavoured to swarm up it, but the cable was rendered slippery by its passage over a roller in the window. Rage was in his heart, rage at being there a sight to men, women, and children, without power of spreading destruction about him before he died. Then he swung himself laterally, hoping to be able to reach a projection of rock whence possibly he might creep up or down, or even laterally from jutting point to point, holding by his fingers till he attained the stair. As he came swinging like a pendulum he was carried close to the stairway, and those upon it held their breath and drew back against the rock, thinking he would make a leap in attempt to light on the steps. Were he to do this, then to arrest himself from falling backwards, with his long fingers he would inevitably clutch at them, and so precipitate them along with himself below. Those persons standing on that portion of the steps within range sidled upwards or else downwards, to be out of the risk of such a danger. They could see in the upward flash of the firelight the sparkle in his great eyes as he glared at the steps, calculating his distance, making resolve to leap, and his heart failing him or his judgment assuring him that to do so were certainly fatal.