ly prostrated, as
to be hardly conscious of the circumstances around him. This was clearly
obvious when the verdict of "guilty" was uttered in the dead silence
which prevailed through the court. No sooner were the words pronounced
than he looked about him wildly, and exclaimed--

"What's that? what's that? Oh, God--; sweet Jasus! sweet Jasus!"

His lips then moved for a little, and he was observed to mark his breast
prvately with the sign of the cross; but in such a manner as to prove
that the act was dictated by the unsettled incoherency of terror, and
not by the promptings of piety or religion.

The judge now put on the black cap, and! was about to pronounce the
fatal sentence, when the prisoner shrieked out, "Oh, my Lord--my Lord,
spare me! Oh, spare me, for I'm not fit to die. I daren't meet God!"

"Alas!" exclaimed the judge, "unhappy man, it is too often true, that
those who are least prepared to meet their Almighty Judge, are also the
least reckless in the perpetration of those crimes which are certain,
ere long, to hurry them into His presence. You find now, that whether as
regards this life or the next, he who observes the laws of his religion
and his country, is the only man who can be considered, in the true
sense of the word, his own friend; and there is this advantage in his
conduct, that, whilst he is the best friend to himself, it necessarily
follows that he must be a benefactor in the same degree to society at
large. To such a man the laws are a security, and not, as in your case,
and in that of those who resemble you, a punishment. It is the wicked
only who hate the laws, because they are conscious of having provoked
their justice. In asking me to spare your life, you are aware that you
ask me for that which I cannot grant. There is nothing at all in your
case to entitle you to mercy; and if, by the life you have led, you feel
that you are unfit to die, it is clear upon your own principles, and by
the use you have made of life, that you are unfit to live."

He then proceeded to exhort him, in the usual terms, to sue for
reconciliation with an offended God, through the merits and sufferings
of Christ. After which he sentenced him to be executed on the fifth day
from the close of the assizes. On hearing the last words of the judge,
he clutched the dock at which he stood with a convulsive effort; his
hands and arms, however, became the next moment relaxed, and he sank
down in a state of helpless insens