"Perhaps you imagine that the sentence will not be carried out. I ask you to choose between life and liberty, and an almost immediate ignominious death." "I care not for your revenge, or your mercy. Once more I say, get you gone." Then the ruffian turned round, rushed at the chained prisoner, and dealt him a terrific kick in the side, after which he spat upon his face. "She shall be mine!" he hissed, "when your corpse lies mouldering in a dishonoured traitor's grave." The young man was chained to a heavy table, but with a sudden wrench, he freed himself, raised both arms, and was about bringing down his manacled hands upon the tyrant miscreant --and that blow would have ended the rebellion at Red River,--when Luc burst into the room, seized the prisoner, and threw him. While his brute knee was on the young man's breast, and his greasy hand held the victim's throat, Riel made his escape, and turned back to his own quarters. As for poor Scott, when the tyrant, and the brutal guard had left the cell, he began to pace up and down, sorely disturbed. All along he had cherished the hope that the tyrant would be induced to commute the sentence to lengthy imprisonment. But the diabolical vengeance which he had seen in the tyrant's eye now began to undermine his hope of life. Some friends were admitted to his cell, and they informed him that they had pleaded for him, but in vain. "And do you think that he will really perpetrate this murderous deed?" he asked. "Most assuredly he will; and now nothing remains for you but to prepare to meet your doom like a true man. You are not the first who has suffered in like manner in a cause which history will ever associate with your name. The tyrant who prevails over you, will not triumph for long. Ignominious will be the atonement that he must pay. But you have to show that for the sacred cause of loyalty you know _how_ to die. You have made your peace with God, and there is nought then that you have to fear. You sorrow at going alone, leaving all the world after you, but we go hence too, in a little; and every hour the clock tells, yields a thousand souls to eternity." "Ah, my friends, this is all true, but I am young, and I had cherished one very sweet hope." "This has been the fate of tens of thousands." "I should not have shrunk from death six months ago, had he set me up as a target for his half-breed murderers. I should have uttered no word of repining, but it is different now: O God, it is very different." All hung down their heads. They were vainly trying to hide their tears.