It was not till the dawn had broken that the Countess of Buchan had sunk into a deep though troubled slumber, for it was not till then the confused sounds of the workmen employed in erecting the scaffold had ceased.

She knew not for whom it was upraised, what noble friend and gallant patriot would there be sacrificed.

She would not, could not believe it was for Nigel; for when his name arose in her thoughts, it was shudderingly repelled, and with him came the thought of her child--where, oh, where was she ?--what would be her fate?
The tolling of the bell awoke her from the brief trance of utter unconsciousness into which, from exhaustion, she had fallen.

She glanced once beneath her.

The crowds, the executioner at his post, the guard already round the scaffold, too truly told the hour was at hand, and though her heart turned sick with apprehension, and she felt as if to know the worst were preferable to the hour of suspense, she could not look again, and she would have sought the inner chamber, and endeavor to close both ears and eyes to all that was passing without, when the Earl of Berwick suddenly entered, and harshly commanded her to stir not from the cage.
"It is your sovereign's will, madam, that you witness the fate of the traitor so daring in your cause," he said, as with a stern grasp he forced her to the grating and retained his hold upon her arm; "that you may behold in his deserved fate the type of that which will at length befall the yet blacker traitor of his name.