A loud cry near the spot he had left arose on his ears without
suspending his flight. The hound had stopped at the place where the
Pedlar's wounds bled so profusely, and deeming the chase now over, it
lay down there, and could not be induced to proceed; in vain the men
beat it with frantic violence, and tried again to put the hound on the
scent,--the sight of blood had satisfied the animal that its work was
done, and with dogged resolution it resisted every inducement to pursue
the same scent a second time. The pedlar boy in the meantime paused not
in his flight till morning dawned--and still as he fled, the noise of
steps seemed to pursue him, and the cry of his assassins still sounded
in the distance. Ten miles off he reached a village, and spread instant
alarm throughout the neighbourhood--the inhabitants were aroused with
one accord into a tumult of indignation--several of them had lost sons,
brothers, or friends on the heath, and all united in proceeding
instantly to seize the old woman and her sons, who were nearly torn to
pieces by their violence. Three gibbets were immediately raised on the
moor, and the wretched culprits confessed before their execution to the
destruction of nearly fifty victims in the Murder Hole which they
pointed out, and near which they suffered the penalty of their crimes.
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