A corpse missing. The trial. The verdict. The effect of it. A fearful night scene at Nabbfield.

IN order that the charge brought against Doctor Rowel, of having been guilty of the murder of Lawyer Skinwell, might if possible be clearly substantiated, Mr. Lupton had not omitted any means at all likely to conduce towards that end; not the least important of which was the disinterment of the deceased's coffin from its grave, in the churchyard of Bramleigh, where it had been laid. This curious operation was undertaken with as much quietness as such an unusual piece of business can reasonably be supposed to have been performed; and a careful examination would, doubtless, have taken place in the porch of the church, had it not been soon discovered, to everybody's amazement, on opening the grave, that somebody had been there before, and the corpse was gone. This fact was no sooner ascertained than speculations innumerable, and of every variety, started into existence with the suddenness of a batch of summer flies; and strange stories were published, which had never so much as been dreamed of before, by the very parties who now gave instant birth to them, of dim lights having been seen, or supposed to have been seen, in the churchyard after dark; of something like the sound of a spade having been once heard there in the dead of night,—though, when heard, or what favoured mortal had heard it, could not precisely be made out:—as well as of suspicious looking strangers having, at one time, been observed staring over the yard wall, as though marking in the mind's eye some spot which was destined to become the scene of future dark and mysterious operations.

All these things however ended, as such things usually do, exactly where they began. The vulgar, that is, nine hundred and ninety-nine at least, out of every thousand, swallowed them with “intense interest;” while the place itself, in which Mr. Skinwell's remains had once been deposited, and from which they had also been thus unaccountably abstracted, became as a standing wonder throughout the parish, and was daily visited and marvelled at by bewildered and curious bipeds of both sexes. Certain parties who had had the misfortune to fall under Mr. Skinwell's hands during his lifetime, went so far as to insinuate that a lawyer's corpse was a very tempting bit to the old gentleman himself, and a likely thing—nothing more so—to have been carried off by him; but this insinuation was commonly thought at once so palpably libellous, that though many heard, few took the trouble to repeat it. Hence, like many other productions of a different description, but presumed by their authors to be equally able, it died a natural death very shortly after it was born. The mystery, however, attending this circumstance was certainly never positively cleared up; although on the examination of Doctor Rowel's establishment at Nabbfield, some time afterwards, a rather curious circumstance occurred, which gave strong ground for suspicion, that as that gentleman had been considerably cut up by the lawyer when alive, he had seized his opportunity to return the compliment, and cut him up, in another fashion, after his departure. But this incident will better appear in another place.

Every other description of evidence which Mr. Lupton could possibly procure was obtained and arranged for the Doctor's anticipated trial; although the failure of that which might have been added by the abovenamed investigation, could it have taken place, was regretted by all parties desirous of bringing the supposed culprit to justice, as unfortunate in the extreme.

While the Doctor soliloquized in a cell of the castle at York, whither he had been removed between the time of which we are now speaking and that at which we last parted with him, information was conveyed to him by his brother, of the rescue of James Woodruff, by Colin and his party, and the subsequent event of old Jerry Clink's death. His brother-in-law being thus free, Doctor Rowel gave up everything as lost; and during some time after the receipt of the news, he remained sunk in a state of hopelessness and stupor as deserved as it was deplorable. Regarding himself as now abandoned altogether by that fortune which during so many years had permitted his infamous practices and designs, he so far lost all spirit as to sink into one of the most abject creatures that ever breathed the breath of life. Painfully fearful of the end which seemed to be awaiting him, his sole anxiety was to contrive means for averting the threatened fate, and of prolonging that life which few, save himself, valued at more than a rope's end. Under these circumstances, and dreading the course which Mr. Woodruff himself might see fitting to adopt, the doctor caused a formal communication to be made to that injured individual, through the agency of Mr. Lupton, in which he bound himself not only to restore the estate of Charnwood, which had been so long withheld from him, but also to make every restitution in his power to grant, for the injuries he had sustained; injuries indeed for which in reality no compensation could atone, but which he yet trusted might possibly be regarded with some feeling of forgiveness and mercy, when his awful situation in other respects came to be considered.

“Unworthy,” remarked Mr. Woodruff, when this statement was made to him,—“undeserving and unworthy as that man is, whom I cannot ever again name as a relation, or scarcely consider even in the common light of an ordinary human being,—and hideous even to remember as are the tortures of mind and body I have undergone through conduct on his part which might well be considered as little less than infernal,—yet I do not feel disposed to gratify any feeling of revenge, by demanding the infliction of that extreme punishment which doubtless the laws would allow. I have suffered, but those sufferings are past; they cannot be alleviated in the least by the sufferings of another. If he even died upon a scaffold, what consolation would that bring to me? To know that he pined in prison as I have done, and wore away interminable days, nights, and years, in exquisite pain,—would not give me any satisfaction. I know too well what that sorrow is, ever to wish it endured by even the most worthless and criminal wretch alive. No; all I wish that man to do is, to be left to the reflection that all his stratagems have, at length, failed; that the evil labours of so many years have produced him only a harvest of wretchedness. I would leave his own past actions to be the rack on which—if he have any spark of humanity left within him—his spirit must eventually be broken. For the rest,—the great and fearful trial of the future,—that lies between Heaven and him;—and a frightful contemplation it must prove!”

Although every person who heard these sentiments from Mr. Woodruff's mouth, could not but feel deeply the charity and worthiness of that good and injured man, yet the general sentiment appeared to be that in leaning towards the guilty Doctor, and overlooking the irreparable injuries he had himself sustained, he forgot justice in his anxiety for mercy, and allowed that degree of criminality to escape to which the common opinion of mankind at large would apportion punishment of considerable severity.

Nevertheless, Mr. Woodruff remained uninfluenced by those and many similar remarks; and notwithstanding even the persuasions and advice of Mr. Lupton himself, persisted in his determination to abide by the opinions he had already expressed, and leave his cruel brother-in-law without other punishment than that which might possibly be awarded to him on his forthcoming trial; or such as his own conscience, and now everlastingly blighted prospects, would in all probability render inevitable.

Nor, in pursuing this charitable and moderate line of conduct was Mr. Woodruff, as the event proved, at all mistaken; since a calamity more fearful in its nature than any infliction of the criminal laws could possibly have been—more terrible to contemplate than even an ignominious death itself, subsequently befel the Doctor, and rendered him to the last hour of his life an object at once of pity, detestation, and fear. It seemed, indeed, that in this terrible visitation, Providence had specially intended to exhibit such an instance of that retributive justice which crime, though it escape the laws of man, not unfrequently entails upon itself from the violated laws of nature, as should not only punish the guilty individual himself, but stand as a solemn and striking warning to all who might become acquainted with his story, that though sin and evil may seem to bask securely in the sunshine for awhile, their time of darkness and pain must come, as surely as midnight followeth the noon.

While the period fixed for his trial was drawing on, the constabulary of the district made themselves uncommonly active in ferreting out every scrap of evidence, as well as much that amounted to no evidence at all, in the hope of fixing the guilt beyond all doubt upon the shoulders of a man to whom everybody secretly believed it to belong, although many expressed their fears that the fact could never be sufficiently established to warrant a jury in pronouncing the doctor's doom.

The whole circumstances preceding and attendant on the case were of such an unusual nature, and had now become in their leading particulars so well known, that when the day of trial at length actually arrived, the most extraordinary interest was evinced by the public to get admitted into the court, or obtain even the most passing glimpse of the prisoner. Many persons came from distant parts of the country in order to be present during this extraordinary investigation; and the yards and precincts of the castle were crowded during the whole time it lasted by a multitude of anxious and patient people, whose curiosity kept them in an inexhaustible state of discussional fermentation from daylight till many hours after dark on each day of the trial. At the same time the village of Bramleigh exhibited such a scene of bustle and stir as had no parallel “within the memory,” as the newspapers stated, “of the oldest inhabitant of the place.” The village pot-house was literally besieged; the price of ale was temporarily raised, or, what amounts to exactly the same thing, the quality of it was materially lowered, while it was sold for the same money; almost every flitch of bacon in the parish seemed placed in imminent jeopardy of being sacrificed; the butcher declared he never did so much business in his life before; and happy were all those fortunate cottagers whose hens behaved handsome enough to lay an egg every day, without missing Sundays.

All this hubbub and tumult arose in consequence of the great influx of visitors to inspect, as far as the walls would allow them, the Doctor's establishment at Nabbfield; to see the house where Mr. Skinwell had died, and the churchyard wherein his remains had been deposited. Nor did it in any material degree become lessened for several weeks after.

It is not my purpose to give the details of this singular trial, or to follow through all its various ramifications that mass of strong circumstantial evidence which the industry of the lower members of the executive had accumulated. This is already sufficiently made known to the reader in the scenes through which he has passed with me during the earlier portions of this history. Neither is it needful to state more on the other side, than that a most elaborate and able defence was made by an eminent counsel retained on the part of the prisoner;—a defence which in many respects had the effect of turning the heads of the jury of Yorkshiremen exactly the contrary way to that wherein they had viewed the case before.

At length his lordship summed up in an address to the sagacious body last mentioned, which occupied more than three hours in the delivery; after which the jury retired to cogitate upon the matter during a space of several hours longer. The first result of this was, its being signified to the court that they could not agree to a verdict. Farther deliberation was insisted on; and after about four hours more study and riddling of the matter, unanimity in opinion was obtained. They returned into court a few minutes before midnight, and before a breathless audience pronounced a verdict of Not Guilty. No sooner was it uttered, than the prisoner himself dropped insensible in the dock. The people in the court murmured. The words Not Guilty were instantaneously repeated on the stairs, and again outside, like magic. They ran with the rapidity of lightning down a wire, firing nearly every bosom present with indignation. The multitude almost yelled for the murderer's blood. But the verdict had gone forth, and a jury of his countrymen had pronounced him innocent. They cried for him to be brought forth and set at liberty amongst them; while some more desperately threatened to wait till he came out, to sentence him over again, and execute him on the spot. The time of night, the darkness that reigned above and around, the fearful passions of the mob now aroused in some instances almost to frenzy by communication and collision, all combined to render the scene that almost immediately ensued, one never to be forgotten by those who witnessed it.

Under all the circumstances of the case, it will not, for an instant, be supposed that Dr. Rowel was set at liberty that night. For his own sake there was but one course to pursue, and that was, to detain him within the precincts of the castle, in order to ensure his safety, and on the morrow to convey him privately away at an hour too early for the public to be made aware of his departure. Afterwards the crowd outside, evincing no disposition to disperse, was driven away by the aid of the police. Some of them, however, disappointed in this, assembled again, almost as though by common consent, at some little distance outside the walls of the city, and nigh a convent of nuns, which stands by the side of the Leeds road. The cry here soon became “For Nabbfield!” The spirit of destruction had arisen amongst them, and the fierce threat of fire had succeeded that of blood.

In the dead of night, under a black heaven that prevented almost anything being seen, a dense press of men moved rapidly but stealthily off along road, field, or farm, over river, fence, or garden, in a direction that offered the straightest line between York and Nabbfield. Scarcely a word was said, or an audible breath drawn, during this fearful march; though many were the heavy, pointed stakes drawn from the hedges in their path, many the rails and branches torn down, and converted silently into clubs, as they proceeded. The dire determination of mischief, mistaken for justice, which existed in more than a hundred breasts, seemed gathered into one fierce, dark power, hurrying headlong and irresistibly to its work of desolation, if not of death.

Their outset had not been observed from the city; and none, save, perhaps, some late and solitary farm servant, peeping fearfully from her lighted window when the dog barked, and the tramp and crash were heard as they passed below, knew of them on their road; and even then a few minutes' wonder who they were, and what they were going to do, followed perhaps by a dream of farms on fire, or poaching conflicts in the woods, was all that ensued. But nobody followed them. Like a meteor that falls unseen when the world is asleep, that little band was only known to have been by the trail of destruction, the dint in the earth it left behind it. Once only in its course was it distinctly recognised. In the very heart, as it were, of deep and peaceful sleep, the Hall of Kiddal was startled by a great and prolonged shout beneath its walls—a huzza three times repeated from above a hundred tongues, in which the names of Woodruff, Lupton, and Colin were distinctly heard; and in the next moment all was again as still as though spirits had given birth to those sounds, and then fled upon the next blast that whistled by.

In comparatively a brief time afterwards, the walls of Nabbfield were scaled; the gardens were trampled down, the trees uprooted, and the ponds in them drained dry. All this was done in silence: the place still slept in imagined security. But next came the thundering at doors, the tearing down of shutters, the smashing of glass, and, amidst all this, the shrieks and cries of the now-aroused inhabitants, though scarcely sensible from fear, astonishment, and drowsiness. The battle had begun, and the invading party had entered the premises.

Scattered up and down the house might now have been seen numbers of exasperated and desperate men, with their faces blackened, and otherwise disguised, so as to render recognition next almost to impossible. Their first object seemed to be the seizure and security of the people who had the establishment in charge and keeping; and as this task, since the imprisonment of the Doctor, had devolved almost entirely upon his own wife, the strong man Robson, with their usual assistants, and a few additional ones, the force that had thus suddenly appeared against them found little or no difficulty in effecting their object. Robson himself had started up on hearing the noise produced by the first assault, and made his way, half-dressed, into one of the lower rooms, where he soon encountered half-a-dozen of the men already described. Thinking the disturbance had arisen in consequence of some of the patients having broken from their cells, he began to call upon them, in his usual manner, to submit to their keeper, whom, he doubted not, they would instantly recognise; but he was soon convinced of his mistake when he found himself inextricably seized by many arms at once, and, at the same moment, informed, by those who held him, that if he were not quiet, both in limb and tongue, they should knock him in the head without any further ceremony. They also told him they had come to destroy for ever that execrable establishment, and to set all the people confined there free; for it seemed to be the general opinion amongst them, that in the cases of all those unfortunate persons, as well as in that of Mr. Woodruff, injustice and robbery must necessarily have been committed, and not a single lunatic was really to be found upon the premises.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Rowel, the Doctor's wife, had contrived to escape out of her room, and take refuge in a small outhouse, not far off; where, along with two of her maids, she remained shivering with cold and terror until all was over.

Many others of the assistants and dependants of the establishment having been secured, a portion of the mob proceeded to pile up the furniture, pictures, &c., in the middle of the rooms, or to carry it out upon the lawn in front of the house, and set it on fire; while others, having now armed themselves with pokers, hammers, and other more effective weapons,—flew to the various departments of the house, and, by main force, broke open the cells and let out all such of the inmates as chose to avail themselves of the privilege. Some of these escaped altogether into the woods, and during several days after rambled wildly over the surrounding country, until caught and again placed under confinement. Others were conveyed to one of the stables, and securely fastened in, under the compulsory care of Robson; while a few, it was believed, whose maladies rendered them either incapable of knowing what was going on, or made them persist in remaining in those melancholy places, which had now become all the world to them, were burnt to death in the flames, which subsequently reached from the blazing furniture to the building, and before an hour had elapsed from the commencement of this extraordinary attack, enveloped the whole in one sheet of fire.

I have before spoken of that shout of triumph which was heard at Kiddal Hall, when this party of mistaken marauders passed by. It had the effect not only of arousing Squire Lupton and all his household from sleep, but also of inducing that gentleman to arise and endeavour to discover, from his window, the men who had caused it. Nothing could be seen; but he remained a long time to watch, and at length was startled by a red light dimly appearing amongst the hills and woods in the direction of the establishment at Nabbfield. By and by, as it rose higher and higher, within the space of a very few minutes, he felt convinced that some accident or other had happened, and feared lest, possibly, if that house had taken fire, many unhappy lives would be sacrificed during the conflagration. With a degree of rapidity, then, almost inconceivable, a considerable force was mustered by him, and hurried off with an old engine, in the direction of the place in question. But so rapidly had the whole scheme been carried into execution, that, by the time of their arrival, all hope of saving any part of the building was gone, and not one single soul, of the many who had done the deed, remained to tell the tale. With an unity of purpose, and a determination to finish their object, equally as well (if well it can be called) as they had begun ft, the little army of incendiaries had departed without leaving any trace whereby their route could be pointed out and effectually discovered. Pursuers were soon afterwards despatched in all directions, by the order of Mr. Lupton, but not a single person was apprehended. And although, eventually, a reward of five hundred pounds and a free pardon to any person not actually guilty of the offence, was offered by the Government, in hopes of discovering and bringing the offenders to justice, such was the feeling of every individual concerned, however remotely, in the transaction, that no clue was ever obtained at all likely to lead to their conviction. It was also remarked, as a circumstance particularly worthy of note, that, as far as could be discovered, no attempt at robbery had been made, as the plate and other similar valuables, which the multitude had found, were thrown into the fire along with every other more combustible and less costly article.