me
of which we write, namely, the recording of the sentence of death against
Wilson and his associates.

John Porteous, one of the captains of the Edinburgh City Guard, was son of
Stephen Porteous, a tailor in Canongate. The father held a fair character,
and was esteemed a good honest man in the whole conduct of his life, his
greatest misfortune was his having such a son as John.

The father early discovered in his son a perverseness of nature, and a
proneness to commit mischievous and more than childish tricks. The mother,
out of a blind affection for her child, took them all for growing proofs of
spirit and manliness, and as marks of an extraordinary and sprightly
genius.

Thus the family were divided upon the education of the son, and from being
often thwarted in his measures about him, the father lost his authority,
and for the peace of his family winked at the faults which the good man saw
it his duty to correct. The loss of parental authority begot want of filial
regard, so that the boy, shooting up with these vicious habits and
disregard of the father, advanced from reproaches and curses to blows,
whenever the unfortunate old man ventured to remonstrate against the folly
and madness of his son's conduct.

The mother saw, when it was too late, what her misguided affection had
produced, and how to her fond love in childhood the man made the base
return of threatening language and the utmost disregard; for he proved too
hard for both father and mother at last.

The father having a good business, wanted John to learn his trade of a
tailor, both because it was easiest and cheapest for the old man, and a
sure source of good living for the son, whether he began business for
himself or waited to succeed the father after his death; but as he grew up
his evil habits increased, and at last when checked by his father in his
mad career, he almost put the good old man to death by maltreatment.

At last, provoked beyond all endurance, the father resolved to rid himself
of him by sending him out of the country, and managed to get him engaged to
serve in the army under the command of Brigadier Newton.

While in Flanders, he saw, in passing along with one of his brother
soldiers, a hen at a little distance covering her chickens under her wings,
and out of pure wanton and malicious mischief he fired his musket and shot
the hen. The poor woman to whom it belonged, startled by the shot, went out
and saw her hen dead; and follo