Thus saying he dismounted from his horse, and eight of his comrades followed his example. The well-trained beasts were then ranged in a line, and a single rope run through the bridles seemed all that was necessary to keep them together till their riders' return. One end of the rope was tied to a tree, the other to the last horse's bit; and after gazing for one moment more at the light in the window of the tower, across which a dark figure was seen to pass twice, the leader gave a signal with his hand. The whole party then began silently to descend the hill, with the exception of the two who had been appointed to remain with the horses and the unhappy groom, whose terror had now grown to such a pitch, that, had it not been for the lashings with which he was attached to his horse, he could not have sat the animal, although it remained as quiet and passive as if it had never known any other stable than that of a farmer's mule. With eager eyes and a beating heart the man marked the party descend the hill, emerge from the shadow of the trees, cross the dewy grass, which glistened like frost-work in the full beams of the moon, ascend the opposite rise, and then take their way amongst the trees behind, towards the back of the building where they proposed to effect their entrance. It was certain that the property of his lordly master was at stake at that moment, and perhaps also the lives of several of his comrades; but yet the worthy domestic felt little or no agitation upon that score. All that affected him, all he thought of, as would too naturally be the case with most of the human worms which crawl about in this state of being, was his own situation, his own danger. He knew, he felt, that any misunderstanding of the directions he had given, or that anything going wrong in the arrangements of those who had compelled him to afford them intelligence, might be attributed to intentional falsehood or mis-statement on his part, and that a life which he valued just in proportion to its worthlessness, its inactivity, and its want of fine perceptions, might be taken from him on the slightest notice. He regarded the party of nine, then, as they descended the hill, with feelings most strangely mingled and apparently contradictory; there was a hope for their success, which he trusted would free him from the painful situation in which they had placed him; there were sensations of dislike and enmity towards those who had stopped and made him a prisoner; there were feelings of anger in regard to the degradation of the Earl of Danemore, who had so long ruled paramount throughout the country round; and there was that longing desire which brutes as well as man feel, to witness everything of importance that is passing around them, especially when they are prevented by any cause from so doing.