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234 One red gleam of a winter sunset broke the heavy vapours that had collected on the air—a single bright spot, but rapidly disappearing, for the thick atmosphere rolled like the turbid waves of some dark sea. That crimson light passed through the murky gratings of a high and narrow window in the Tower, and, falling direct on the hearth, almost extinguished the decaying brands, whose fire was lost in the white and smouldering ashes. There was something peculiarly dreary in the aspect of the room; the lofty walls and ceiling were discoloured with smoke and time, and the smooth wainscot had no other ornament than initial letters and names, rudely carved by some unpractised hands: each was a record of the weary hour and of the hope deferred—the languid task set by imprisonment to itself, glad to waste the time which has no employment save melancholy thought, and finding even in this trivial labour a resource.

Two chairs, a deal table, and a worn footstool, were the sole furniture of the comfortless chamber; and yet there were indulgences which told that the prisoners had command of that universal talisman, gold. Glasses, whose slender stems seemed endangered by the touch, and carved with the delicate tracery of Venice—flowers just breathed