information at first hand, the discussion went on every day and all
day long. Ashley himself was keenly excited. He had quite broken
away from a number of his old friends who supported the Assembly in
its blind obstinacy. Nobody could sit by unmoved whilst Charles and
Humphrey Angell told their tale of horror and woe; and, moreover,
both Julian Dautray and Fritz Neville had much to tell of the
aggressive policy of France, and of her resolute determination to
stifle and strangle the growing colonies of England, by giving them
no room to expand, whilst she herself claimed boundless untrodden
regions which she could never hope to populate or hold.

Fresh excitements came daily to the city. Early one morning, as the
tardy daylight broke, a rumble of wheels in the street below told
of the arrival of travellers. The wheels stopped before Ashley's
door, and he hastily finished his toilet and went down.

In a few moments all the house was in a stir and commotion. A
terrible whisper was running from mouth to mouth. That cart
standing grimly silent in the street below carried, it was said, a
terrible load. Beneath its heavy cover lay the bodies of about
twenty victims of Indian ferocity; and the guardians of the load
were stern-faced men, bearing recent scars upon their own persons,
who ate and drank in stony silence, and only waited till the
Assembly had met before completing their grim mission.

The thing had got wind in the town by now, and the square space was
thronged. The members of the Assembly looked a little uneasy as
they passed through the crowd, but not a sound was made till all
had gathered in the upper room.