xecuted man, upon whom I could try
my skill.

"I broached the subject to him, and found him not averse. He said, that
if I would come forward and claim, as next of kin and allow the body to
be removed to his house, the body of the criminal who was to be executed
the first time, from that period, that he could give me a hint that I
should have no real next of kin opponents, he would throw every facility
in my way.

"This was just what I wanted; and, I believe, I waited with impatience
for some poor wretch to be hurried to his last account by the hands of
my friend, the public executioner.

"At length a circumstance occurred which favoured my designs most
effectually,--A man was apprehended for a highway robbery of a most
aggravated character. He was tried, and the evidence against him was so
conclusive, that the defence which was attempted by his counsel, became
a mere matter of form.

"He was convicted, and sentenced. The judge told him not to flatter
himself with the least notion that mercy would be extended to him. The
crime of which he had been found guilty was on the increase it was
highly necessary to make some great public example, to show evil doers
that they could not, with impunity, thus trample upon the liberty of the
subject, and had suddenly, just as it were, in the very nick of time,
committed the very crime, attended with all the aggravated circumstances
which made it easy and desirable to hang him out of hand.

"He heard his sentence, they tell me unmoved. I did not see him, but he
was represented to me as a man of a strong, and well-knit frame, with
rather a strange, but what some would have considered a handsome
expression of countenance, inasmuch as that there was an expression of
much haughty resolution depicted on it.

"I flew to my friend the executioner.

"'Can you,' I said, 'get me that man's body, who is to be hanged for the
highway robbery, on Monday?'

"'Yes,' he said; 'I see nothing to prevent it. Not one soul has offered
to claim even common companionship with him,--far less kindred. I think
if you put in your claim as a cousin, who will bear the expense of his
decent burial, you will have every chance of getting possession of the
body.'

"I did not hesitate, but, on the morning before the execution, I called
upon one of the sheriffs.

"I told him that the condemned man, I regretted to say, was related to
me; but as I knew nothing could be done to save him on the trial, I had
ab