coolly placed his head against the door of the hut, and said,
"fire!" and was shot dead.

Permission being given for prisoners to unite with the bushrangers, to
betray them, men in irons left the town secretly, joined the gang, and
gave intelligence to the police. This manoeuvre was soon worn out. A
prisoner, who escaped from gaol, desired to join them in good faith; but
believing him a decoy, the gang adjudged him to suffer death. He was
compelled to drink a quantity of laudanum: they then left him; but his
stomach rejected the drug, and after a sound sleep he recovered. He
again met Brady and his gang: two pistols were discharged at him: he
fell, and was left for dead; but the wound was not mortal, and reviving
he determined to deliver himself up. He was, however, again unfortunate:
he met Brady and his companions once more, who again fired; but the
bullet, instead of entering the skull, glanced round it. He fell
senseless to the ground, and was thrown into a dry creek; he, however,
recovered, and long survived these adventures.[171] The high authority
on which this anecdote rests, is quite necessary to suppress the
question of its truth.

During two years ending with 1826, one hundred and three persons
suffered death, being 3 8-15ths in proportion to one thousand of the
population: more than in Great Britain. He who looks at these statistics
alone, will conclude not only that the people were wicked, but that the
government was cruel. At one sitting of the court thirty-seven persons
were sentenced to death; and of these, twenty-three were executed in the
course of a fortnight: nine suffering together, and fourteen others on
two days closely following. A sacrifice of life so unusual, could only
be justified by the peculiar circumstances of the colony, and the
character of the criminals; and the notions which then prevailed
respecting the punishment of death.

We are forcibly reminded of a passage in Lord Coke:--"If a man could see
all the _Christians_, that in one year come to that untimely and
ignominious death--if there were any spark or grain of charity in him,
it would make his heart bleed!" The extreme pains taken to reconcile the
unfortunate beings to their lot; the assiduity of the clergy to make up,
by the assurance of divine mercy, the inexorable fate which awaited
them; proved that these awful slaughters were onerous to the colonial
conscience, and vindicable only as the last resort of the last
necessity.