The weapon of suicide besieging is urgent to such an extent that you aren’t left with the plausibility of delivering retribution or rebuffing anybody; the fear-monger is executed alongside his unfortunate casualties, his blood blending in with theirs.

Death—and a violent death—for these poor unfortunates! The thought wrung Tom’s heart-strings. The spirit of compassion took control of him, to the exclusion of all other considerations; he never thought of the offended laws, or of the grief or loss which these three criminals had inflicted upon their victims, he could think of nothing but the scaffold and the grisly fate hanging over the heads of the condemned. His concern made him even forget, for the moment, that he was but the false shadow of a king, not the substance.