to make
some atonement for his crimes--he might save an innocent man from an
ignominious death. No sooner had that thought suggested itself to his
mind, than he acted upon it, for he knew that his moments were few;
already he felt the cold hand of death upon him. He took a piece of
chalk from his pocket, and with a feeble hand traced the following words
upon the iron door of the safe:--

'My last hour is come, and I call on God, in whose awful presence I am
shortly to appear, to witness the truth of this dying declaration. I do
confess myself to be the murderer of Maria Archer. The young man Sydney
is innocent of that crime. God have mercy--'

He could write no more; his brain grew dizzy and his senses fled. It
seemed as if his iron coffin was red-hot, and he writhed in all the
agony of a death by fire. Terrible shapes crowded around him, and the
spirit of his murdered wife beckoned him to follow her to perdition. A
mighty and crushing weight oppressed him; blood gushed from the pores of
his skin; his eyes almost leaped from their sockets, and his brain
seemed swimming in molten lead. At length Death came, and snapped
asunder the chord of his existence; the soul of the murderer was in the
presence of its Maker.

* * * * *

Morning dawned upon the doomed Sydney, in his prison cell; the glad
sunbeams penetrated into that gloomy apartment, shedding a glow of ruddy
light upon the white walls. That day at the hour of noon, he was to be
led forth to die--he, the noble, generous Sydney, whose heart teemed
with the most admirable qualities, and who would not wantonly have
injured the lowest creature that crawls upon the Creator's footstool--he
to die the death of a malefactor, upon the scaffold!

The day wore heavily on; Frank, composed and resigned, was ready to meet
his fate like a man. He had heard the deep voice of the Sheriff, in the
hall of the prison, commanding his subordinates to put up the scaffold;
he had heard them removing that cumbrous engine of death from an
unoccupied cell, and his ear had caught the sound of its being erected
in the prison yard. Then he knelt down and prayed.

His hour had come. They came and removed his irons; they clothed him in
the fearful livery of the grave. His step was firm and his eye undaunted
as he passed into the prison yard, and stood beneath the black and
frowning gallows.

The last prayer was said; the last farewell spoken; and many a
hard-hearted