“And now,” he added in conclusion, “being freed from the trammels of my oath of office, which have lately become so painful to me, I feel myself again one of the people, and stand ready to cooperate with them in any measure required by the public welfare.” A very faint and scattering shout of applause, in two or three places, mingled with hisses and murmurs in others, was the only response with which this address was received. But even with this equivocal testimony of public feeling towards him, this despicable functionary felt gratified. “I _am safe_,” said he to himself, with a long-drawn breath, as he descended the steps, to watch an opportunity to mingle with the party with whom he was now especially anxious to be seen, and to whom he was ready to say, in the words of the satirist,-- “I'm all submission, what you'd have me, make me; The only question is, sirs, will you take me?” At this moment a sash was thrown up, and the prisoner, Herriot, appeared at a window of the court-room above. “I have been brought up here this morning,” he said, shaking back his gray locks, and raising his stern, solemn voice to a pitch clearly audible to all in the grounds below--“I have been brought here from my dungeon to answer to the charge of a foul crime; and both my accusers and triers, fleeing even before any one appeared to pursue, have left their places, having neither tried nor condemned me. But scorning to follow their example, I now appear, to submit myself for a verdict, to the rightful source of all power--the people.” “Neither will we condemn thee,” cried Knowlton, pursuing the scriptural thought of the other; “if thy accusers and judges have left thee uncondemned, thou shalt not be condemned by us; at least not by me, who have long had my opinions of the character of this prosecution.” “As also have I,” responded Captain Wright. “I know something of the witnesses, on whom, it is said, they depended to convict father Herriot; and I would not hang a dog on their testimony. I move, therefore, that we here pronounce a verdict of acquittal. Who says, ay?” “Ay!” promptly responded a dozen voices; and “Ay!” the next instant rose in one loud, unanimous shout from the whole multitude. “A thousand thanks to you, my friends, for your generous confidence in my innocence,” returned the old man with emotion; “and, thank God, your confidence is not misplaced. I was formerly guilty of much, which has cost me many bitter tears of repentance; but there is no blood on _my_ hands, and I will now return to my hermit hut, from which they dragged me, there to pray for the success of the good cause in which you are engaged, leaving to you what lesson shall be taught those Hamans who have filled these dungeons with the dying and wounded, now demanding your care.”