THE HANGMAN'S LETrfER TO THE QUEENN; IN REPLY TO THE " GROANS OF THE GALLOWS," VINDICATING HIS LIFE, CHARACTER AND PROFESSION: WITH HIS PROPOSED NEW MACHINE, TO BE SUBSTITUTED FOR THE GALLOWS; CALLED

CALCRAPT'S MAIDEN', COMBINING THE EFFECTU.A.L EXECUTION OF CRIMINALS, WITH A SURE PREVENTIVE OF ANOTHER BOUSFIELD TRACEDY. Including a. History of all the Different Modes of Hanging and Bcheading from the Earliest to the Present Times. ENTERED AT STATIONEl{S' HALL. ONE PENNY

THE HANGMAN'S LETTER

TO THE QUEEN.

"\Vhen the first edition of the "Groans of the Gallows" was published in 1846, since issued with additional information, Mr. Calcraft, our indefatigable public servant (so we were informed by a close friend of his), thought he would send a memorial to the Queen, in reply to many of the observations contained therein. The late disgusting "Bousfield Tragedy'' having proved beyond doubt the truth of the revelations long before given in that work, of the agonised feelings he has endured in the performance of his horrible office, and in addition to the demoralization attending the exhibition of the gallows, that it is in its old age, as decrepit in the art of neatly strangling as the aged nervous hangman himself, we thought that now was the most propitious time for the lowest " officer of state" to make known to the highest his thoughts on the result of his twenty-seven years experience of public neck- stretching for terror and example sake, to men and women, and babes of both sexes. Especially when so serious a climax as shoot- ing him on the platform of the gibbet was threatened that he was compelled to run away, we did more than hope, wc felt positive Calcraft would discharge himself, demand a pension, and show good practical reasons why the gallows and its hideous parapher- nalia, and even black Newgate itself should give way to the ad- vanced civilization of the age. This course, we have heard, he was inclined to at first, but old habits were hard to shake off, therefore his motto for a little longer must be- " He that hangs and runs away, Lives to hang another day." f Besides, his half-formed resolution to drop the " DROP," and retire upon his dingy laurels, to moralize in obscurity upon the many arduous struggles he has been engaged in, and to let his country, from the Queen downwards, know the e:r:act number C!f murders his performance on the national platform has prevented, was totally reversed by the interview with closed doors which he had afterwards with the pure-minded and enlightened directors of " N u;wa ATE F Arn;" who doubtless thought that the old Hang· 4 man's tottering nerves could be propped up by the strength of a young Assistant for a little while, until he had served sufficient ap · prenticeship at the stretching business ; and thus prevent the failure of the museum they so delight in, and the necessity of the sheriffs soiling their hands with the dirty work of their deputy. To a brother snob Calcraft expressed a strong wish to memo- ralise the Queen against the " Groans of the Gallows,'' but he was sorry that he could not write well enough, or else, as there arc " sermons" even in '' stones," a Hangman could probably preach an eloquent sermon to a queen. To forego such an important and instructive intention, involving may be in the unseen future the safety of England's state- " Big with the fate of a Victoria and her throne,"- We thought it our duty to here proffer our services as amanuensis, and communicate what we think are, or ought to be, the thoughts of an executioner of more than a hundred persons, himself now tottering to the grave. This will be doing great honour to our hanging friend, and gnitc accordir:tg to precedent, for that there were literary execu- tioners we shall show, by quoting in the course of these pRges, the letter written by his brother executioner of France. But we do not wish to adopt the conclusions of our allies when they found the same difficulties in hanging as Calcraft did in the case of Bousfielcl, by substituting the guillotine ; rather we would set them the example of a system of punishment more befitting the Christianity and enlightenment of our country,-first, making a bonfire of the gallows and mingling its ashes with the ruins of N ewgate ; and, then in a better classified gaol adapted for instruc- tion, employment and punishment, confining for life (doomed to unrecompensed labour) every one who takes the life of a fellow creature. In 1792, the gallows being found to inflict prolonged torture, by the common mode of hanging, Duport, the Minister of Justice, writes the following letter respecting the substitution of some mode of beheading:- 3rd j}Jarch, 1792. "It appears from the communications made to me by the executioners themselves, that, without some precautions of t!ie nature of those wliich attracted for a moment the attention of tf

"I must ·solicit from the National Assembly an immediate de- cision ; for a case at the moment presses for execution, which, however, is suspended by the humanity of the judges and the fright Cl' effi·oi] of the executioner." The representations of the Departement is to the same effect, and, making no allusion whatever to mechanism, implies that death was to be by the sword;- 3rd March, 1792. "The executioner represents to us that he cannot fulfill the in- tentions of the law, which is, that the criminal shall suffer nothing · beyond the simple privation of life. The executioner fears that from the want of experience he may make decollation a frightful torture, ana we entertain the same apprehensions." These letters, we see, refer to the opinion of the Executioner himself; and as that opinion has been preserved, our readers will not, we think, be sorry to see, as a literary curiosity, an essay by such a hand on such a subject. " Memorandum of Observations on the Execution of Criminals by Beheading; with the nature of the various objections which it presents, and to which it is really liable- " That is to say:- " In order that the execution may be performed according to the law (simple privation of life) it is necessary that, even with- out any obstacle on the part of the criminal, the executioner should be very expert, and the criminal very firm, without which one could never get through an execution by the sword without the certainty of dangerous accidents." " After one execution, the sword will no longer be in a condi- tion to perform another : being liable to get notched, it is abso- lutely necessary, if there are many persons to execute at the same time, that it should be ground and sharpened anew. It would be necessary then to have a sufficient number of swords all ready. That would lead to great and almost insurmountable difficulties." "It is also to be remarked that swords have been very often broken in executions of this kind." The executioner of Paris possesses only two, which were given him by the Ci-devant Parliament of Paris. They cost six hundred livres (£24) a piece. "It is to be considered that, when there shall be several crimi- nals to execute at the same time, the terror that such an execution presents by the immensity of blood which it produces, and which is scattered all about, will carry fright and weakness into the most intrepid hearts of those whose turn is to come. Such weakness would present an invincible obstacle to th@ execution. The patient 6

being no longer able to support himself, the execution, if persisted in, will become a struggle and a massacre. Even in executions of another class-HANGING--which do not need anything like the precision that this kind requires. We have seen criminals grow sick at the sight of the execution of their companions, at least they are liable to that weakness ; all that is against beheading with the sword. In fact, who could bear the sight of so bloody an ex- ecution without feeling and showing some such weakness? In the other kind of execution it is easy to conceal those weak- nesses from the public, because, in order to complete the opera- tion, there is no necessity that the patient should continue firm and without fear ; but in this, if the criminal falters, the execu- ion must fail also. How can the executioner have the necessary power over a man who will not, or cannot keep himself in a cor.venieut posture? It seems, however, that the National Assembly only devised this species of execution (beheading by the sword) for the purpose of preventing the length to which executions in the old way (by hanging) were protracted. " It is in furtherance of their humane views that I have the honour of giving this forewarning of the many accidents that these executions may produce, if attempted by the sword. " It is therefore indispensable that, in order to fulfill the humane intentions of the National Assembly, some means should '.:le found to avoid delays and assure certainty, by fixing the patient so that the success of the operation shall not be doubtful. "By this, the intention of the legislature will be fulfilled, and the executioner himslf protected from any accidental effervescence of the public. CHARLES HENRY SANSON." We think our readers will be surprised at the good sense and decency of M. Sanson's observations on a very delicate subject, and they will have noticed the gentle hint that he gives that the National Assembly had legislated on a matter they did not under- stand, and passed a law that would have defeated its own object : qut what is most strange is, that here is-not only no mention of the machine (wrongly ascribed to Dr. Guillotine as the inventor, because he recommeuded it) which had made so much noise three year5 before ; but-decisive evidence that it was understood by the executioner himself, as it at first sight :oeems to have been by everybody else, that the law contemplated execution by the sword. We have here seen how the past and present experience of ex- ecutioners accords : " The exece.tioner, terrified himself, exposed 7 to the fury of the people.'' The B ,usfield tragedy then is not new ; it has occurred often, and may occur again if the punish- ment of death is tolerated. We have before battled with the sys- tem on moral and religious grounds. Our object in the present work is to take the liberty, (an Englishman's cherished privilege) on humane grounds for the Hangman's sake, and on state grounds or the Sovereign's sake, to write in the name of one to the otluir

THE HA~CIYlf\N'S LETTEll TO THE QUEEN.

GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN, The importance of the question on which I address you, needs no waste of ink to attempt an apology. It is your pride and boast to be the Ruler of one of the most powerful and enlightened nations, and I wish I could add also, one of the most moral. But as an Englishman, and a subject of your Majesty, I regret that I cannot conscientiously call my country truly moral, when after the nun1berless pn.wfs of the demoralization of the gib- bet, robbing, gambling, cursing, swearing, obscenity, and fighting at the foot of the platform within sight of strangled corpses dangling from the beam as a terror to evil doers; and in all th& places of public entertainment around the same crimes, intermixer with drunkenness and beastiality, licensed too, and therefor< bringing to your Majesty's revenue a portion of the proceeo..;, while murders and assassinations, which the gallows was instituted to prevent, are on the increase, yet it is still permitted by your Majesty's authorities. All the arguments on these grounds have been before exhausted, but there are three others not hitherto popularly touched upon, and which perhaps your Maje8ty may not have considered. Firstly : Your public servant the hangman, like your Majesty, possesses human feelings and sympathies, if cast in a rougher mould, fashioned by difference of station and education; and though compelled by the force of cruel circum- stances to follow my calling so long, that I have grown grey in this branch of your Majesty's service, I have manifested as finely struag nerves as the most sensitive lady of your Majesty's court. The sensitiveness of my nature produced the catastrophe at Wil· liam Bousfield's execution. Your Majesty's ministers and Parlia- ment echoed the cries of the people and the public press, and did me the honour of debating on my mishap, produced by age, long service, and the awakening of that disgust I felt at my office for many years past, but was afraid to avow lest I should be dis- charged and be without bread for mv wif~ and family; but they 8

were only echoes (that are often he:l.rd on other questions of re form) to die away as hollow as the hearts from whence they issued. I attended before the gaol committee, but I found no hope there ; I did not think at fhst that the awful scene on the last occasion would have led them to advocate the suppression of the gallows, and my retirement on a pension sufficient to pro- tect!rny defenceless position, (not being able to get employment like other men, on account of the office I have performed), and to < enable me just to live in some silent abode, forgotten. Alas, no ! r}, I must still follow my horri~ calling of :'killing to live !" I then convict your system of continued torture to my feelings, and a great injustice to my person. The criminals I execute endure the pang of one sudden death, all is then painless and for- ~otten. I endure the more excruciating pangs of a living death, .1hat is to say, I live to myself in full consciousness of my degra- dation; but I am as one dead to all my fellow men, cut off for ever from their society. I convict your criminal law also of encouraging " malice afore thought," on the part of other men against me, the very motive that leads to murder, and which I am employed to avenge. In the public house, when seeking amusement, I am sworn at ·and brutally threatened; the privacy of my home is sometimes inva- ded by suspicious-looking persons, seeming on some mischief bent; and on your Majesty's highway, protected as it is by police, I cannot by day or night walk safely, without the friends ·and acqaintances of criminals who have died by my hands seeking ':to cross my path and treacherously way-lay me. . Secondly :-A more serious and solemn objection I have to make against the countinance of my office is, that your Majesty's •own sex are often assassinated after having been made assassins by the operation of your criminal and poor laws, and the neglect •of society to adopt a preventive of the crime of child murder. In support of my assertions, the following forcible atticle from the Daily Telegraph of April the 19th, 1856, I commend to your Majesty's attention:- "The great increase of crime throughout England within the last !few months is something fearfnl to contemplate. Since October or .November last, hardly a day has passed without the public journals .having to record one or more foul acts of murder. It would almost 'seem as if the spirit of evil had for a time taken possession of the lancl, ·ancl was for some unknown cause allowed to lead fat.. more than the ·ordinary number of men to perdition by means of their own evil pns- 'sions. In London alone since the 1st of January, a period of less than .our montlts, three men and two women have been convicted by 9

jurios of capital offences. On the plea of insanity two of the former have had their sentences commuted to imprisonment and transporta- tion for life, whilst two females are now awaiting in Newgate the punishments to which they have been condemned. The fact of two mothers being at one time under sentence of death in the same jail for the murder of their respective offspring, is, we have reason to believe, unusual in the annals of crime, either in this or any other country. Nor does the offence stop hiire. There are at this moment no less than three females awaiting ia different prisons in England their trials for infanticide. "When a mother deliberately and intentionally deprives of life her offspring, there is something so utterly abhorrent to human na- ture in the deed, that it behoves all men to inquire into wl:at c.an possibly prompt such an act. But when, as is now the case, not one but several instances of infanticide have occurred within a few weeks of each other, it is time that something should be done to ch~ck the evil. " Until lately, the English criminal law has altogether ignored the doctrine of prevention. To punish, but not to hinder, was the mis- sion of the magistrate. Thanks to the exertions of many philan- thropic persons, we have changed all this. An attempt to reform all, save murderers, is now made in every jail throughout the land; and to prevent crime is deemed as much the duty of the executive as is punishment after an offence has been committed. Why should this not be extended to the offencG of infanticide? It is a humiliating fact, that Christian and Protestant England is almost the only coun- try in Europe where mothers murder their offspring. In France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Russia, and Denmark, the crime is all but unknown. And yet great poverty amongst the lower orders exists all over the continent, as well as in the United Kingdom, and, legislate as we like, illegitimate children will never cease to be born in every part of the world. A recent French paper, remarking upon the fact of infanticide haYing lately become so common in England states, from the official criminal statistics published hy the Minister of Justice, that in France but one offence of the kind has happened in the last five years, and the unfortunate woman who committed the act was proved beyond a doubt to be insane. " Shame and poverty-these are the only reasons which can ever lead a mother to destroy her child- at leust we know of no other. And the grand social blunder we make in this country is, not providing an asylum in e¥ery large town, ·where the children of either those who haYe fallen from virtue, or who are too poor to maintain their off- spring, could be placed. In France the Government supports in all capitals of departments, and in many smaller towns, establishments of this kind, and the consequence is that when women are either ashamed of their children, or too poor to support them, they place them in safe keeping until circumstances allow them to claim them again. In England we hav<) nothing of the kind, !lnd the consequenee is that such children as might be tltken care of are murdered. ' A premium upon bastardy!' we hear some honest-minded but indignant son o 10

Albion exclaim, ' would you introduce amongst us that which ac'. L!tlly would encourage the birth of children out of ·wedlock?' To this we reply, by asking, is it better that such unfortunate children should be preserved or murdered? We may-and apparently do-prefer the latter mode of treating the complaint, but we shall most assuredly never cure it thereby. It is very certain that it is not every poor man, nor yet every woman who is a mother without being first a wife in France, who takes advantage of these foundling hospitals. The very last thing a poor woman does is to part with her children. But the difference between the results of the French and the English systems is this, that whereas by the former hundreds of children are annually preserved, by the latter ne8;rlY as many arc every year murdered. If such a state of things can exist without shame to a country that pro- fesses to be guided on all matters by the precepts of Scripture, let no one interfere to promote a change ; but, if otherwise, let some friend of the female outcasts in Eu gland fake upon himself a mission which will do moro good than half the schemes set on foot for the reforma- tion of the human race. " It is true that we have in London what is called the Foundling Hospital, originally mtendcd for the very same purpose as the insti- tutions of the same name established in France. . But, like almost every other charity in England, it is wonderfully perverted from the founder's intention. The only means of obtaining entrance for an orphan into this place, is by that degrading begging for patronage amongst the governors, which deprives the gift, even when obtained, of all tho advantages that it ought to confer. How wonderfully be- hind-hand we arc in England as to all that regards the management of public charities. Abroad, the first maxim obscn·cd in all such un- dertakings is not to lot tho loft hand know what the right hand doeth. fo this country we first collect the necessary funds in the most sounding manner., then by advertisements and subscription lists, call attention to the name of every man who, for the love of God or his fellow-creature, has parted with a five pound note; and having done this, we expend as much as possible of the charity's income upon house rent, secretary's salary, treasurer's ditto, &c., and end by trying how difficult we can make the proposed benefits of the institution to every one who really needs them. It requires as much time and patience to canvass for the admission of a:i infirm adult or an orphan child into one of our much-vaunted charitable establishments, as to secure a seat in the India House for a gentleman who aspires to the honours of the direction. In fact, to attempt the undertakino- without some funds in hand would be utter madness. Hence the re~son why almost every institution of the kind in the kingd0m has degenerated, and no longer serves the purpose for which it was originally in- tended. "For the unprotected infants of either poor or fallen women, we w~uld ask somethi:ig of a differ~nt k_ind .. If we want to prevent an evil, we must provide for that evil as it exists. To oblige women who perhaps are barely able to walk, from utter destitution and hunger, to go from housQ to house canvassing for the admission of their children • 11

nto a foundling hospital, would be worse than mockery. Speedy, mmediate relief, without submitting the applicant to previous inqui- sitorial questioning, is what we require, if the crime of child-murder is to be put a stop to. We would do well to take a leaf trom the book of our French neighbours in this respect. In that country the asylums for deserted children are not only universal, but even the face of the pers0n who deposits the infant is not seen. The latter is placed at the gate, a bell rung, and at every hour of the day or night a person is in waiting to receive it. A ticket, with some distinctive mark, number, or name, is nearly always attached to the dress, and serves as a means of claiming the child afterwards. That all who thus abandon their offspring to the care of this institution are not radically criminal, may be adduced from the established fact that upwards of sixty per cent. of these foundlings are claimed in after years-some sooner, some later-by their parents or friends. Those not claimed arc brought up to various trades, and started in life at the expense of the State. "We want something of this kind fearfully in England. Last Monday the two women, Somner and Harris, were to be hung for the murder of their children. The latter convict has still an infant at the breast, which she is nursing in the condemned cell of Newgate. Surely such horrible cases will not be without some effect on the charitable ladies of England? It needs but another Miss Nightingale to rescue such unfortunates from the crime of murder for the future, and to wipe off its national .disgrace of haviug no place of refuge for the most helpless of our race. It is impossible that the appeal will long re- main unanswered. A fortnight hence the religious " May meetings" at Exeter Hall will commence. One-teuth of the money subscribed every year in that building· to effect utter impossibilities, would cer- tainly establish a model foundling hospital in London. Let those who have the means and opportunities try and carry into practice what we have feebly endeavoured to advocate." These reasons sum up all that I would say upon this branch of my subject, compared to which the representations I have urged fur my personal safety weigh but as a feather in the balance of importance. Thirdly, and lastly :-The continuance of the system of capi- fal punishments, especially as exhibited to an ignorant brutal populace on the platform of the gallows, tends in the course of time to its becoming a fixed national habit ; and in times of political agitation and commotion, to the mob demanding the gratifica- tion of executing persons of rank and station. Sound state policy, and the wish to preserve your Majest's dynasty from a repetition of the catastrophe that befel the Stuart line of your Majesty's illustrious ancestors, should dictate the earliest possible ernsure from the statute book of oi'r criminal law of revenge : a law of :revenge it only_is, for, as a moral ex- ample, or as a corrective punishment, the increase of murder de- monstrates its entire failure. 12

That enlightened and powerful nation lately allied to us, affords us in her history some warning lessons, which it would profit your Majesty to study, in the light in which I wish it to be viewed. ·with this object I quote the following extracts from. the Right Honourable John Wilson C.:roker's " History of the Guillotine:" "The revoluntionary horrors which France is so anxious to forget, it the more behoves us and the rest ef Europe to remember and meditate. Such massacres will probably never be repeated, they will no doubt, stand unparalleled in the future, as they do in the former anmtls of the world, but they should never be forgotten as an example of the incalculable excesses of the popular insanity." "The whole French Revolution, from the taking of the Bas tile to the overthrow of the Empire, was in fact one long Reign of Terror. The summary vengeance of the lanterne in the earlier years-the systematised murders of the guillotine under the CONVENTION ; the arbitrary exile to pestilential climates under the Directory, and the tortures of the dungeon mid the rniZ.itary executions imder BuoNAPAinE, ail tended, in their way and for their time, to the creation and maintenance of that grand i::npos- ture, of which, although the events and their consequences were but too real, all the motives and pretences were the falsest and most delusive that ever audacity forged, credulity ·believed, or cowardice obeyed. Nor have the effects of this protracted system of terror yet passed away; it poisoned in its passage the very sources of history, and has left posterity, in many respects, under the same delusions that it imposed on its contemporaries. "The subserviency of the press to the dominant tyranny of the day waR so general and so complete as to be now nearly incredi- ble; those who look to the files of newspapers for information will find nothing but what, under the overwhelming terror of the mo- ment, the ruling faction might choose to dictate to the trembling journalists. "At a debate in the National Assembly on the 9th October, 1789, on the propositions of Dr. Guillotine for substituting decapitation for hanging, the Abbe Maury, with prophetic sagacity, objected to the adoption of decapitation as a general punishment, " be- cause it might tend to deprave the people by famili"ar:izing tlumi with the sight of blood;" but Maury's objection seems to have made no great impression at a time when no one, not even the sagacious and eloquent Abbe himself, could have foreseen such a prodigality of legal murders, such a deluge of blood as afterwards afforded so practical and so frightful a corroboration of his theo- retical suggestion. " 13

"Two Years of bloody anarchy had, we-presume, a little sobered all minds capable of sobriety, but the Duke de Liancourt a dis- tinguished professor of philanthropy, employed the recent nrnr- d_e:s a la lanterne as an argument in favour of the new propo- sition·- "There was one consideration, " he said, " which ough': to in- cline the Assembly to adopt the proposal for beheaclin,r/ ; the ~ccessity of effacing from the social system all traces of a pun- ishment [hanging] which has lately been so irregitlarly applied, and which has, during the course of the Revolution, so unfor- tunately lent itself to populm· ven,r;eance." " There were three brothers of a respectaMe family in Paris of the name of Agasse, the two eldest of whom, printers and pro- prietors of the Moniteur, were convicted for forgery of bank-notes and sentenced to be banged. This condemnation excited, from the youth and antecedent respectability of the parties, great public interest. It might be naturally exprcted that this sympathy would have exerted itself in trying to procure a pardon, or at least some commutation of punishment, for these young men, whose crime was really nothing compared with those of which Paris was the daily and hourly scene; but no! There seems, on the contrary, to h'lve been a pretty general desire that they should suffer the full s0ntence of the law, in order that the National Assembly and the ,qoorl people of Paris might h~.ve a practical opportunity of carry- ing out the new principle that " tlie crime does not disgrnce tlie family." In the evening sitting of the 21st January (a date soon to become still more remarkable in the history of the Guillotine) an Abbe Pepin mounted hastiiy the tribune of the National Assembly, recalled to its attention Guillotine's propositions, which had been, he said, too long neglected, and stated that a case had now occurred which required the instant passing of the three articles which related to the abolition of public hanging and of confiscation of property, and to the restoring the bodv to the family. That most foolish of the National Assemblies loved to act by impulses. and the three articles were enthusiastically passed for the m-owcd purpose of being applied to the individual case, as they, in fact, were in the following extraordinary man- ner : ' Three clays after the passing of the decree the battalion of National Guard of the district of St. Honore, where the Agas- ses resided, assembled in grand parade; they voted an address to M. Agasse, the uncle of the criminals, first, to condole with his affliction, and secondly, to announce their adoption of the I whole surviving family as friends and brothers! and, as a first I step, they elected the young brother and younger cousin of the 14 culprits to be lieutenants of the. Grenadier company of the bat~ talion, and then the' battalion being drawn up in front of the Louvre, these young men were marched forth, and complimented on their new rank by M. de Lafayette, the commander-in-chief, accompanied by a numerous staff. Nor was this all; a deputa- tion of the battalion were formally introduced into the National Assembly, and were harangued and complimented by the Presi- dent on this touching occasion. They were after1Vard entertained at a banquet, at which Lafayette (then in more than royal power and glory, placed them at his side, and " frequently embraced them." They were also led in procession to St. Eustache and and other churches, and paraded, with every kind of ostentation to the public gaze. A public dinner of six hundred National Guards was got up in their honour ; numerous patriotic and phil- anthropic toasts were drank, and then, in an "ivresse," not alto- gether of wine, the newspapers say, but of: patriotism and Joy, the two youths were marched back through Paris, preceded by a band of music, to the house of the uncle, where the rest of the Agasse family, old and young, male and female, came forth into the street to receive the congratulations of the tipsy crowd. Can we imagine any greater cruelty than the making a show of the grief of those unhappy people, and thus forcing them to celebrate as it were, in the incongruous novelties of gold lace and military promotion, and public exhibitions, the violent death of their nearest and dearest relations ? 'Vhile these tragical farces where playing, the poor culprits, who did not at all partake of the kind of enthusiasm their case excited, were endeavouring to escape from the painful honour of having this great moral experiment made in their persons; but in vain; their appeals were rejected, and at length they were, on the 8th of February led forth to execution in a kind of triumph, of which it was remarked that they felt nothing but the aggavation of their own personal misery, and were beheaded with as much tenderness as old Izaak 'Valton hooked hii worm; and that pre- liminary process being over, the bodies were delivered with I!- vast parade of reverence and decency to the family." So thirsty for blood had the populace become by familiarity with public executions, that the guillotine was erected in perma- nence, and thousands were executed to satisfy political and party malice, being brought out in batches of forty and fifty of a morn- ing ; while women sat in chairs and carriages at the foot of the scaffold r.nd chatted and worked as if at home at some familv en- tertainment. The sight of the guillotine became the " delight of the Parisian mob, and was absolutely canonised in the philosophi·· •

15

cal rubric as La Sainte Guillotine, nay, it became the model of ornamenta for women, and of toys for children. These were solq by permission of the police in the street, and the toymen furnished living sparrows to be decapitated by the instruments. Just be- fore the trial of the Queen, one of these toys was presented to her son, then a prisoner in the Temple, by the notorious Chau- mette, who, within a faw monthii, died by the object of hia pre- dilection." And now,-which it is important for your Majesty to contem- plate,-the popular frenzy for capital punishments sparing neither age, sex or rank, immolated their Sovereign, Louis XVI, his con- sort, and familv. The following hideous scene occurred, accord- ing to Prudho;nme, a trustworthy witness : "Some individuals steeped their handkerchief~ in his blood. A number of armed volunteers crowded also to dip in the blood of the despot their pikes, their bayonets, or their sabres. Several officers of the Marseillese battalion, and others, dipped the covers of letters in this impure blood, and carried them on the points of their swords at the head of their companies, exclaiming ' This is the blood of a tyrant!' One citizen got up to the guillotine it- self, and plunged his whole arm into the blood of Capet, of which a great quantity remained, he took handfuls of the clotted gore, and sprinkled it over the crowd below, each anxiou~ to receive a drop on his forehead. ' Friends,' said this citizen, in sprink- ling them, •we were threatened that the blood of Louis should be on our heads; and so you see it is ! !" Your Majesty, doubtless, is better acquainted with history than a poor illiterate hangman, therefore I will restrain my promptings t'o picture the· fate of Louis's noble-hearted, virtuous Queen and the beautiful Madame .Elizabeth. I trust that your Majesty may be convinced of the evils and dangers of our criminal system, and that your reign will be rendered more illustrious by the abolition fthe executioner's office. I have the honour to remain, Your Majesty's Faithful servant a.nrl su\iiect. THE HANG.W:AN.

"Suppose, beyond what we have already suggested, we not only abandon at last this brutal ;.md brutalizing system of strang- ng our great criminals in .the public streets, with au: kinds of horrible accompaniments in the wa'Y of obscenities and blasphe- 16 mies ; suppose we seize this favourable opportunity for doing away with the office of Jack Ketch altogether, adopting, in lieu of the black beams of the gallows, with its dangling noose, the scarlet apparatus, the inexorable blade, and the blood-stained basket of the guillotine ? Suppose ! Might not the majesty of the law be vindicated then more humanely, more terribly, and with l~ss chance of shame' to us all; our condemned criminals " Dying the death," not as hitherto by the hands .of a fellow--mortal, but by means of a grimly piece of mechanism, &c. ?" thus lately asked the Sun ; and for the hangman we reply, until the gallows is abolished, if it is only to save him from any more unnecessary per- sonal contact with the agonies of a dying creature, and the con- sequent pain to his nervous sensibilities, we submit to considera- tion an improvement of the ancient machine preserved in Edin- burgh castle, called the ":MA:IDEN," in the form of a painter's easel, a bout ten feet high, [See FrontispieceJ and which for capability of doing its business effectually, induced the Marquis of Argyle, executed in 1661, to call it the "sweete5t maiden he had ever kissed !" vVe should name it, if adopted, " Calcraft's Maiden," and for a first experience of its embracing affec- tion, we recommend the Sheriffs, or any of their advocates of capital punishment, to give it only ene trial: "I-Joni soit qui mal y pense !" By one gentle turn of the handle connected with double rope, "A long pull, a strong pull, and a pull altogether " at the neck and feet wbll effect a quiet settlement ; and

A Sheriff hanging for e.7:ample sake, '\Vould a very awful sensation make

; ,ND.

' Prjntcd and Published \Jy c. ELLIOT, Shoe Lan't;;, (•'ler;:t S~n.·et.