of Lords had unanimously found him guilty, he would not interfere. Last week my lord keeper very good naturedly got out of a gouty bed to present another: the King would not hear him. "Sir," said the keeper, "I don't come to petition for mercy or respite; but that the four thousand pounds which Lord Ferrers has in India bonds, may be permitted to go according to his disposition of it to his mistress, children, and the family of the murdered man." "With all my heart," said the King, "I have no objection; but I will have no message carried to him from me." However, this grace was notified to him and gave him great satisfaction; but unfortunately it now appears to be law, that it is forfeited to the sheriff of the county where the fact was committed; though when my Lord Hardwicke was told that he had disposed of it, he said, to be sure he may before conviction.

Dr. Pearce, Bishop of Rochester,1 offered his service to him he thanked the Bishop, but said, as his own brother was a clergyman, he chose to have him. Yet he had another relation who has been much more busy about his repentance. I don't know whether you have ever heard that one of the singular characters here is a Countess of Huntingdon, aunt of Lord Ferrers. She is the Saint Theresa of the Methodists. Judge how violent bigotry must be in such mad blood! The Earl, by no means disposed to be a convert, let her visit him, and often sent for her, as it was more company; but he grew sick of her, and complained that she was enough to provoke anybody. She made her suffragan, Whitfield, pray for and preach about him, and that impertinent fellow told his enthusiasts in his sermon, that my Lord's heart was stone. The earl wanted much to see his mistress: my Lord Cornwallis, as

1 Zachariah Pearce, translated from the see of Bangor in 1756. He was an excellent man, and later in life, in the year 1768, finding himself growing infirm, he presented to the world the rare instance of disinterestedness, of wishing to resign all his pieces of preferment. These consisted of the deanery of Westminster and bishoprick of Rochester. The deanery he gave up, but was not allowed to do so by the bishoprick, which was said, as a peerage, to be inalienable.-D.

2 Lady Selina Shirley, daughter of an Earl of Ferrers. (Selina Shirley, second daughter and coheiress of Washington Earl Ferrers, and widow of Theophilus Hastings, ninth Earl of Huntingdon. She was the peculiar patroness of enthusiasts of all sorts in religion.-D.)

VOL. IV.

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simple an old woman as my Lady Huntingdon herself, consulted her whether he should permit it. "Oh! by no means;

it would be letting him die in adultery!" In one thing she was more sensible. He resolved not to take leave of his children, four girls, but on the scaffold, and then to read to them a paper he had drawn up, very bitter on the family of Meredith, and on the House of Lords for the first transaction. This my Lady Huntingdon persuaded him to drop, and he took leave of his children the day before. He wrote two letters in the preceding week to Lord Cornwallis on some of these requests: they were cool and rational, and concluded with desiring him not to mind the absurd requests of his (Lord Ferrers's) family in his behalf. On the last morning he dressed himself in his wedding clothes, and said, he thought this, at least, as good an occasion of putting them on as that for which they were first made. He wore them to Tyburn. This marked the strong impression on his mind. His mother wrote to his wife in a weak angry style, telling her to intercede for him as her duty, and to swear to his madness. But this was not so easy: in all her cause before the Lords, she had persisted that he was not mad.

Sir William Meredith, and even Lady Huntingdon had prophesied that his courage would fail him at last, and had so much foundation, that it is certain Lord Ferrers had often been beat:- but the Methodists were to get no honour by him. His courage rose where it was most likely to fail, - an unlucky circumstance to prophets, especially when they have had the prudence to have all kind of probability on their side. Even an awful procession of above two hours, with that mixture of pageantry, shame, and ignominy, nay, and of delay, could not dismount his resolution. He set out from the Tower at nine, amidst crowds, thousands. First went a string of constables; then one of the sheriffs, in his chariot and six, the horses dressed with ribbons; next Lord Ferrers, in his own landau and six, his coachman crying all the way; guards at each side; the other sheriff's chariot followed empty, with a mourning coach-and-six, a hearse, and the Horse Guards. Observe, that the empty chariot was that of the other sheriff,

who was in the coach with the prisoner, and who was Vaillant, the French bookseller in the Strand. How will you decypher all these strange circumstances to Florentines? A bookseller in robes and in mourning, sitting as a magistrate by the side of the Earl; and in the evening, everybody going to Vaillant's shop to hear the particulars. I wrote to him, as he serves me, for the account: but he intends to print it, and I will send it you with some other things, and the trial. Lord Ferrers at first talked on indifferent matters, and observing the prodigious confluence of people, (the blind was drawn up on his side,) he said," But they never saw a lord hanged, and perhaps will never see another." One of the dragoons was thrown by his horse's leg entangling in the hind wheel: Lord Ferrers expressed much concern, and said, "I hope there will be no death to-day but mine," and was pleased when Vaillant told him the man was not hurt. Vaillant made excuses to him on his office. "On the contrary," said the Earl, "I am much obliged to you. I feared the disagreeableness of the duty might make you depute your under-sheriff. As you are so good as to execute it yourself, I am persuaded the dreadful apparatus will be conducted with more expedition." The chaplain of the Tower, who sat backwards, then thought it his turn to speak, and began to talk on religion; but Lord Ferrers received it impatiently. However, the chaplain persevered, and said, he wished to bring his lordship to some confession or acknowledgment of contrition for a crime so repugnant to the laws of God and man, and wished him to endeavour to do whatever could be done in so short a time. The Earl replied, "He had done everything he proposed to do with regard to God and man; and as to discourses on religion, you and I, Sir," said he to the clergyman, "shall probably not agree on that subject. The passage is very short; you will not have time to convince me, nor I to refute you; it cannot be ended before we arrive." The clergyman still insisted, and urged, that, at least, the world would expect some satisfaction. Lord Ferrers replied, with some impatience, "Sir, what have I to do with the world? I am going to pay a forfeit life, which my country has thought proper to take

from me what do I care now what the world thinks of me? But, Sir, since you do desire some confession, I will confess one thing to you; I do believe there is a God. As to modes of worship, we had better not talk on them. I always thought Lord Bolingbroke in the wrong to publish his notions on religion: I will not fall into the same error." The chaplain, seeing sensibly that it was in vain to make any more attempts, contented himself with representing to him, that it would be expected from one of his calling, and that even decency required, that some prayer should be used on the scaffold, and asked his leave, at least to repeat the Lord's Prayer there. Lord Ferrers replied, "I always thought it a good prayer; you may use it if you please."

While these discourses were passing, the procession was stopped by the crowd. The Earl said he was dry, and wished for some wine and water. The Sheriff said, he was By late regulations they

sorry to be obliged to refuse him. were enjoined not to let prisoners drink from the place of imprisonment to that of execution, as great indecencies had been formerly committed by the lower species of criminals getting drunk; "And though," said he, “ "my Lord, I might think myself excusable in overlooking this order out of regard to a person of your Lordship's rank, yet there is another reason which, I am sure, will weigh with you :-your Lordship is sensible of the greatness of the crowd; we must draw up to some tavern; the confluence would be so great, that it would delay the expedition which your Lordship seems so much to desire." He replied, he was satisfied, adding," Then I must be content with this," and took some pigtail tobacco out of his pocket. As they went on, a letter was thrown into his coach; it was from his mistress, to tell him, it was impossible, from the crowd, for her to get up to the spot where he had appointed her to meet and take leave of him, but that she was in a hackney-coach of such a number. He begged Vaillant to order his officers to try to get the hackney-coach up to his. "My Lord," said Vaillant, "you have behaved so well hitherto, that I think it is pity to venture unmanning yourself." He was struck, and

As they drew nigh, he arrived; it is time to do

was satisfied without seeing her. said, "I perceive we are almost what little more I have to do;" and then taking out his watch, gave it to Vaillant, desiring him to accept it as a mark of his gratitude for his kind behaviour, adding, "It is scarce worth your acceptance; but I have nothing else; it is a stop-watch, and a pretty accurate one." He gave five guineas to the chaplain, and took out as much for the executioner. Then giving Vaillant a pocket-book, he begged him to deliver it to Mrs. Clifford his mistress, with what it contained, and with his most tender regards, saying, "The key of it is to the watch, but I am persuaded you are too much a gentleman to open it." He destined the remainder of the money in his purse to the same person, and with the same tender regards.

When they came to Tyburn, his coach was detained some minutes by the conflux of people; but as soon as the door was opened, he stepped out readily and mounted the scaffold: it was hung with black, by the undertaker, and at the expense of his family. Under the gallows was a new invented stage, to be struck from under him. He showed no kind of fear or discomposure, only just looking at the gallows with a slight motion of dissatisfaction. He said little, kneeled for a moment to the prayer, said, "Lord have mercy upon me, and forgive me my errors," and immediately mounted the upper stage. He had come pinioned with a black sash, and was unwilling to have his hands tied, or his face covered, but was persuaded to both. When the rope was put round his neck, he turned pale, but recovered his countenance instantly, and was but seven minutes from leaving the coach, to the signal given for striking the stage. As the machine was new, they were not ready at it: his toes touched it, and he suffered a little, having had time, by their bungling, to raise his cap; but the executioner pulled it down again, and they pulled his legs, so that he was soon out of pain, and quite dead in four minutes. He desired not to be stripped and exposed, and Vaillant promised him, though his clothes must be taken off, that his shirt should not. This decency ended with him: the sheriffs fell to eating and drinking on