nge of cliffs. The whole multitude stood stock-still at
that carrion-sound. The guide said shudderingly, in a low hurried voice,
"See, see--that is her mantle"--and there indeed Margaret lay, all in a
heap, maimed, mangled, murdered, with a hundred gashes. The corpse
seemed as if it had been baked in frost, and was imbedded in coagulated
blood. Shreds and patches of her dress, torn away from her bosom,
bestrewed the bushes--for many yards round about, there had been the
trampling of feet, and a long lock of hair that had been torn from her
temples, with the dews yet unmelted on it, was lying upon a plant of
broom, a little way from the corpse. The first to lift the body from the
horrid bed was Gilbert Adamson. He had been long familiar with death in
all its ghastliness, and all had now looked to him--forgetting for the
moment that he was the father of the murderer--to perform the task from
which they recoiled in horror. Resting on one knee, he placed the corpse
on the other--and who could have believed, that even the most violent
and cruel death could have wrought such a change on a face once so
beautiful! All was distortion--and terrible it was to see the dim glazed
eyes, fixedly open, and the orbs insensible to the strong sun that smote
her face white as snow among the streaks as if left by bloody fingers!
Her throat was all discoloured--and a silk handkerchief twisted into a
cord, that had manifestly been used in the murder, was of a redder hue
than when it had veiled her breast. No one knows what horror his eyes
are able to look on, till they are tried. A circle of stupefied gazers
was drawn by a horrid fascination closer and closer round the
corpse--and women stood there holding children by the hands, and fainted
not, but observed the sight, and shuddered without shrieking, and stood
there all dumb as ghosts. But the body was now borne along by many
hands--at first none knew in what direction, till many voices muttered,
"To Moorside--to Moorside"--and in an hour it was laid on the bed in
which Margaret Burnside had so often slept with her beloved little Ann
in her bosom.

The hand of some one had thrown a cloth over the corpse. The room was
filled with people--but all their power and capacity of horror had been
exhausted--and the silence was now almost like that which attends a
natural death, when all the neighbours are assembled for the funeral.
Alice, with little Ann beside her, kneeled at the bed, nor feared to l