The suspense which they endured during this time was probably something more terribly painful than one can imagine, and the uncertainty of their coming doom made it all the more dreadful in anticipation. This state of things lasted for some little while, and a stillness, solemn {213}and awful in its intensity, reigned around. The wind fell again, and the sound of thunder ceased; only the old river went rolling on in its calm, ceaseless stream, the soothing ripple of which smote upon the ear of the unhappy witches as the solemn tones of a judge must fall upon the guilty criminal before him. Each moment seemed an hour to the terror-stricken old hags, and I imagine that no child who has waited in a dentist’s room until that popular operator was ready for him has ever endured half the agony of expectation which was experienced at this time by the three witches. At last the silence was broken, and that in a manner which it would have been impossible for them to have anticipated. The low roll of a drum was heard in the wood, which sound swelled gradually upon the ear, and was then mingled with other martial music, evidently betokening the approach of an army. In a few moments more there issued from the direction of the owl’s castle a strange and unwonted procession. First of all came a splendid array of cock pheasants, gay with their bright and gaudy colours, and carrying their well-known banner of dark blue, in the centre of which is depicted a magnificent bird of their species looking round with a defiant air, whilst underneath him is inscribed the celebrated motto of his race--“Game to the last.” The pheasants were followed by a strong detachment of partridges, each with his brown horseshoe strongly developed upon his breast, whilst a golden wheat-sheaf upon a banner of russet brown, and the motto, “Hurrah for the harvest-fields!” showed the character of the regiment. They were followed by a body of woodcocks and snipes, marching {214}in alternate ranks, and displaying their respective banners, being a bird of each race worked in blue upon a white ground, and represented as tossing his long beak high in the air and saying, in the inscription below, “Settle my bill if you can!” To these succeeded a gallant regiment of bantams, whose arrogant motto, “Cock of the walk,” was displayed upon their crimson flags; whilst the “Come back! come back!” of the Guinea-fowl was seen upon the banners of the next comers. Other bands of birds followed, each with its own peculiar standard and device, and all marched in slow and solemn order from the wood to the music already mentioned, which was played by an invisible band within the leafy shade of the same.