A Moorland Legend. 125 



radiance, they ran from tor to tor, and from tree to tree, 

 filling their baskets and pinafores with perfumed blossoms. 

 Their pleasure was soon turned to fright. A little boy- 

 penetrating further into the thicket than his fellows, ran out 

 into the daylight, with staring eyes and scared face. He 

 said a dead man was lying there. The terrified children 

 ran home and told their story, and in the afternoon the 

 mystery of the convict's escape was solved. Number 

 Ninety-six had secreted himself in the wood, and during 

 the great snow-storm Nature had covered him with its own 

 shroud. 



So far as could be surmised, from a careful comparison of 

 the Governor's report of the investigations made then and 

 previously, the convict, taking advantage of the outcry raised 

 by the alarm in a distant portion of the grounds, had 

 vanished in the mist, and concealed himself in a trench close 

 to the prison-grounds until the darkness of night favoured 

 his journey over the lonely two miles of moor intervening 

 between him and Druids' Wood, and the heavy snow oblite- 

 rated all traces of the flight. It was strongly suspected that 

 Hinton, the warder on duty near the convict at the time, 

 knew something of the matter, but shortly after Mr. Her- 

 bert's visit to Ringsford, that official obtained leave of 

 absence, on the plea of a sudden death of a brother, and 

 had never returned. 



