When Ralph, accompanied by Sim, arrived at Carlisle and surrendered
himself to the high sheriff, Wilfrey Lawson, he was at once taken
before the magistrates, and, after a brief examination, was ordered to
wait his trial at the forthcoming assizes. He was then committed to
the common gaol, which stood in the ruins of the old convent of Black
Friars. The cell he occupied was shared by two other prisoners--a man
and a woman. It was a room of small dimensions, down a small flight of
steps from the courtyard, noisome to the only two senses to which it
appealed--gloomy and cold. It was entered from a passage in an outer
cell, and the doors to both were narrow, without so much as the
ventilation of an eye-hole, strongly bound with iron, and double
locked. The floor was the bare earth, and there was no furniture
except such as the prisoners themselves provided. A little window near
to the ceiling admitted all the light and air and discharged all the
foul vapor that found entrance and egress.
The prisoners boarded themselves.
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