farmers and their wives, with itinerant venders of every saleable and
unsaleable article from far and near.

I was in the upper schoolroom with another boy, and, looking out of
the window, had an opportunity of watching all that took place for a
considerable space. There was a good deal of merriment to divert our
attention, for there were clowns and merry-andrews passing along the
highroad, with singlestick players, Punch and Judy shows, and other
public amusers. Every one knows that the smallest event in the country
will cause a good deal of excitement, even if it be so small an
occurrence as a runaway horse.

There was, however, no runaway horse to-day; but suddenly a great
silence came over the people, and a sullen gloom that made a great
despondency in my mind without my knowing why. Public solemnity
affects even the youngest of us. At all events, it affected me.

Presently--and deeply is the event impressed on my mind after seventy
years of a busy life, full of almost every conceivable event--I saw,
emerging from a bystreet that led from Bedford Jail, and coming along
through the square and near the window where I was standing, a common
farm cart, drawn by a horse which was led by a labouring man. As I was
above the crowd on the first floor I could see there was a layer of
straw in the cart at the bottom, and above it, tumbled into a rough
heap, as though carelessly thrown in, a quantity of the same; and I
could see also from all the surrounding circumstances, especially the
pallid faces of the crowd, that there was something sad about it all.
The horse moved slowly along, at almost a snail's pace, while behind
walked a poor, sad couple with their heads bowed down, and each with
a hand on the tail-board of the cart. They were evidently overwhelmed