IT is autumn: we stand on the fortress wall, and look out over the sea; we look at the numerous ships, and at the Swedish coast on the other side of the Sound, which rises high in the evening glow; behind us the rampart goes steeply down; mighty trees surround us, the yellow leaves flutter down from the branches. Down there where the sentinel goes, stand gloomy houses fenced in with palisades; inside these it is very narrow and dismal, but still more dismal is it behind the grated loopholes in the wall, for there sit the prisoners, the worst criminals.

A ray of the sinking sun shoots into the bare cell of one of the captives. The sun shines upon the good and the evil. The dark stubborn criminal throws an impatient look at the cold ray. A little bird flies towards the grating. The bird twitters to the wicked as to the just. He only uttershis short “tweet! tweet!”............