“Silence!” roared Robinson, “I am the judge, and it is for me to pronounce the verdict.”

“Silence! hear Judge Lynch!” Silence was not obtained for five minutes, during which the court was like a forest of wild beasts howling.

“I condemn him to be exposed all day, with his dust tied round his neck, and then drummed out of the camp.”

This verdict was received first with a yell of derisive laughter, then with a roar of rage.

“Down with the judge!”

“We are the judges!”

“To the rock with him!”

“Ay, to the rock with him.”

With this, an all-overpowering rush was made, and Walker was carried off up the rock in the middle of five hundred infuriated men.

The poor wretch cried, “Mercy! mercy!”

“Justice! dog,” was the roar in reply.  The raging crowd went bellowing up the rock like a wave, and gained a natural platform forty feet above the great deep pool that lay dark and calm below.  At the sight of it, the poor wretch screamed to wake the dead, but the roars and yells of vengeance drowned his voice.

“Put his dust in his pocket,” cried one, crueler than the rest.

Their thirst of vengeance was too hot to wait for this diabolical proposal; in a moment four of them had him by the shoulders and heels; another moment and the man was flung from the rock, uttering a terrible death-cry in the very air; then down his body fell like lead, and struck with a tremendous plunge the deep water that splashed up a moment, then closed and bubbled over it.

From that moment the crowd roared no longer, but buzzed and murmured, and looked down upon their work half stupidly.

“Hush!”

“What is that?”

“It is his head!”

“He is up again!”

“Can he swim?”

“Fling stones on him.”

“No!  Let him alone, or we’ll fling you atop of him.”

“He is up, but he can’t swim.  He is only struggling! he is down again!”

He was down, but only for a moment; then he appeared again choking and gurgling.

“Mercy! mercy!”

“Justice, thieving dog!” was the appalling answer.

“Save me! save me!  Oh, save me! save me!”

“Save yourself! if you are worth it!” was the savage reply.

The drowning, despairing man’s head was sinking again, his strength exhausted by his idle struggles, when suddenly on his left hand he saw a round piece of rock scarce a yard from him.  He made a desperate effort and got his hand on it.  Alas! it was so slimy he could not hold by it; he fell off it into the water; he struggled up again, tried to dig his feet into the rock, but, after a convulsive fling of a few seconds, fell back—­the slimy rock mocked his grasp.  He came up again and clung, and cried piteously for help and mercy.  There was none!—­but a grim silence and looks of horrible curiosity at his idle struggles.