All the customary amusements of the people had died away.

Almost every house had a lonely and deserted look; for it was known that one or more beloved beings had gone out of it to the grave.

A dark, heartless spirit was abroad.

The whole land, in fact, mourned, and nothing on which the eye could rest, bore a green or a thriving look, or any symptom of activity, but the churchyards, and here the digging and delving were incessant--at the early twilight, during the gloomy noon, the dreary dusk, and the still more funeral looking light of the midnight taper.
The first days of the assizes were now near, and among all those who awaited them, there was none whose fate excited so profound an interest as that of old Condy Dalton.

His family had now recovered from their terrible sufferings, and were able to visit him in his prison--a privilege which was awarded to them as a mark of respect for their many virtues, and of sympathy for their extraordinary calamities and trials.
They found him resigned to his fate, but stunned with wonder at the testimony on which he was likely to be convicted.