At any rate, as is not the case with shooting, it is easy to know when the victim is really dead.
For seconds that seemed minutes--for minutes that seemed hours the poor wretch spun, his elbows out, his knees up, his tongue out, his face wrinkled into tortured shapes, and his toes pointed upward so sharply that they almost touched his shins.

Then suddenly the toes turned downward and the knees relapsed.

The corpse hung limp, and the crowd sighed miserably, to the last man, woman and child, turning its back on what to them must have symbolized German rule.
They left the corpse hanging there.

It was to be there until evening, some one said, for an example to frequenters of the market-place.

The crowd trailed away, none glancing back.