During the whole course of the terrible scene which was now at
its height, one man in the jail suffered a degree of fear and mental torment
which had no parallel in the endurance, even of those who lay under sentence of
death.
When the rioters first assembled before the building, the murderer was roused
from sleep--if such slumbers as his may have that blessed name--by the roar of
voices, and the struggling of a great crowd. He started up as these sounds met
his ear, and, sitting on his bedstead, listened.
After a short interval of silence the noise burst out again. Still listening
attentively, he made out, in course of time, that the jail was besieged by a
furious multitude. His guilty conscience instantly arrayed these men against
himself, and brought the fear upon him that he would be singled out, and torn to
pieces.
Once impressed with the terror of this conceit, everything tended to confirm
and strengthen it. His double crime, the circumstances under which it had been
committed, the length of time that had elapsed, and its discovery in spite of
all, made him, as it were, the visible object of the Almighty's wrath. In all
the crime and vice and moral gloom of the great pest-house of the capital, he
stood alone, marked and singled out by his great guilt, a Lucifer among the
devils. The other prisoners were a host, hiding and sheltering each other--a
crowd like that without the walls. He was one man against the whole united
concourse; a single, solitary, lonely man, from whom the very captives in the
jail fell off and shrunk appalled.
It might be that the intelligence of his capture having been bruited abroad,
they had come there purposely to drag him out and kill him in the street; or it
might be that they were the rioters, and, in pursuance of an old design, had
come to sack the prison. But in either case he had no belief or hope that they
would spare him. Every shout they raised, and every sound they made, was a blow
upon his heart. As the attack went on, he grew more wild and frantic in his
terror: tried to pull away the bars that guarded the chimney and prevented him
from climbing up: called loudly on the turnkeys to cluster round the cell and
save him from the fury of the rabble; or put him in some dungeon underground, no
matter of what depth, how dark it was, or loathsome, or beset with rats and
creeping things, so that it hid him and was hard to find.
But no one came, or answered him. Fearful, even while he cried to them, of
attracting attention, he was silent. By and bye, he saw, as he looked from his
grated window, a strange glimmering on the stone walls and pavement of the yard.
It was feeble at first, and came and went, as though some officers with torches
were passing to and fro upon the roof of the prison. Soon it reddened, and
lighted brands came whirling down, spattering the ground with fire, and burning
sullenly in corners. One rolled beneath a wooden bench, and set it in a blaze;
another caught a water-spout, and so went climbing up the wall, leaving a long
straight track of fire behind it. After a time, a slow thick shower of burning
fragments, from some upper portion of the prison which was blazing nigh, began
to fall before his door. Remembering that it opened outwards, he knew that every
spark which fell upon the heap, and in the act lost its bright life, and died an
ugly speck of dust and rubbish, helped to entomb him in a living grave. Still,
though the jail resounded with shrieks and cries for help,--though the fire
bounded up as if each separate flame had had a tiger's life, and roared as
though, in every one, there were a hungry voice--though the heat began to grow
intense, and the air suffocating, and the clamour without increased, and the
danger of his situation even from one merciless element was every moment more
extreme,--still he was afraid to raise his voice again, lest the crowd should
break in, and should, of their own ears or from the information given them by
the other prisoners, get the clue to his place of confinement. Thus fearful
alike, of those within the prison and of those without; of noise and silence;
light and darkness; of being released, and being left there to die; he was so
tortured and tormented, that nothing man has ever done to man in the horrible
caprice of power and cruelty, exceeds his self-inflicted punishment.
Now, now, the door was down. Now they came rushing through the jail, calling
to each other in the vaulted passages; clashing the iron gates dividing yard
from yard; beating at the doors of cells and wards; wrenching off bolts and
locks and bars; tearing down the door-posts to get men out; endeavouring to drag
them by main force through gaps and windows where a child could scarcely pass;
whooping and yelling without a moment's rest; and running through the heat and
flames as if they were cased in metal. By their legs, their arms, the hair upon
their heads, they dragged the prisoners out. Some threw themselves upon the
captives as they got towards the door, and tried to file away their irons; some
danced about them with a frenzied joy, and rent their clothes, and were ready,
as it seemed, to tear them limb from limb. Now a party of a dozen men came
darting through the yard into which the murderer cast fearful glances from his
darkened window; dragging a prisoner along the ground whose dress they had
nearly torn from his body in their mad eagerness to set him free, and who was
bleeding and senseless in their hands. Now a score of prisoners ran to and fro,
who had lost themselves in the intricacies of the prison, and were so bewildered
with the noise and glare that they knew not where to turn or what to do, and
still cried out for help, as loudly as before. Anon some famished wretch whose
theft had been a loaf of bread, or scrap of butcher's meat, came skulking past,
barefooted-- going slowly away because that jail, his house, was burning; not
because he had any other, or had friends to meet, or old haunts to revisit, or
any liberty to gain, but liberty to starve and die. And then a knot of
highwaymen went trooping by, conducted by the friends they had among the crowd,
who muffled their fetters as they went along, with handkerchiefs and bands of
hay, and wrapped them in coats and cloaks, and gave them drink from bottles, and
held it to their lips, because of their handcuffs which there was no time to
remove. All this, and Heaven knows how much more, was done amidst a noise, a
hurry, and distraction, like nothing that we know of, even in our dreams; which
seemed for ever on the rise, and never to decrease for the space of a single
instant.
He was still looking down from his window upon these things, when a band of
men with torches, ladders, axes, and many kinds of weapons, poured into the
yard, and hammering at his door, inquired if there were any prisoner within. He
left the window when he saw them coming, and drew back into the remotest corner
of the cell; but although he returned them no answer, they had a fancy that some
one was inside, for they presently set ladders against it, and began to tear
away the bars at the casement; not only that, indeed, but with pickaxes to hew
down the very stones in the wall.
As soon as they had made a breach at the window, large enough for the
admission of a man's head, one of them thrust in a torch and looked all round
the room. He followed this man's gaze until it rested on himself, and heard him
demand why he had not answered, but made him no reply.
In the general surprise and wonder, they were used to this; without saying
anything more, they enlarged the breach until it was large enough to admit the
body of a man, and then came dropping down upon the floor, one after another,
until the cell was full. They caught
him up among them, handed him to the window, and those who stood upon the
ladders passed him down upon the pavement of the yard. Then the rest came out,
one after another, and, bidding him fly, and lose no time, or the way would be
choked up, hurried away to rescue others.
It seemed not a minute's work from first to last. He staggered to his feet,
incredulous of what had happened, when the yard was filled again, and a crowd
rushed on, hurrying Barnaby among them. In another minute--not so much: another
minute! the same instant, with no lapse or interval between!--he and his son
were being passed from hand to hand, through the dense crowd in the street, and
were glancing backward at a burning pile which some one said was Newgate.
From the moment of their first entrance into the prison, the crowd dispersed
themselves about it, and swarmed into every chink and crevice, as if they had a
perfect acquaintance with its innermost parts, and bore in their minds an exact
plan of the whole. For this immediate knowledge of the place, they were, no
doubt, in a great degree, indebted to the hangman, who stood in the lobby,
directing some to go this way, some that, and some the other; and who materially
assisted in bringing about the wonderful rapidity with which the release of the
prisoners was effected.
But this functionary of the law reserved one important piece of intelligence,
and kept it snugly to himself. When he had issued his instructions relative to
every other part of the building, and the mob were dispersed from end to end,
and busy at their work, he took a bundle of keys from a kind of cupboard in the
wall, and going by a kind of passage near the chapel (it joined the governors
house, and was then on fire), betook himself to the condemned cells, which were
a series of small, strong, dismal rooms, opening on a low gallery, guarded, at
the end at which he entered, by a strong iron wicket, and at its opposite
extremity by two doors and a thick grate. Having double locked the wicket, and
assured himself that the other entrances were well secured, he sat down on a
bench in the gallery, and sucked the head of his stick with the utmost
complacency, tranquillity, and contentment.
It would have been strange enough, a man's enjoying himself in this quiet
manner, while the prison was burning, and such a tumult was cleaving the air,
though he had been outside the walls. But here, in the very heart of the
building, and moreover with the prayers and cries of the four men under sentence
sounding in his ears, and their hands, stretched our through the gratings in
their cell- doors, clasped in frantic entreaty before his very eyes, it was
particularly remarkable. Indeed, Mr Dennis appeared to think it an uncommon
circumstance, and to banter himself upon it; for he thrust his hat on one side
as some men do when they are in a waggish humour, sucked the head of his stick
with a higher relish, and smiled as though he would say, 'Dennis, you're a rum
dog; you're a queer fellow; you're capital company, Dennis, and quite a
character!'
He sat in this way for some minutes, while the four men in the cells, who
were certain that somebody had entered the gallery, but could not see who, gave
vent to such piteous entreaties as wretches in their miserable condition may be
supposed to have been inspired with: urging, whoever it was, to set them at
liberty, for the love of Heaven; and protesting, with great fervour, and truly
enough, perhaps, for the time, that if they escaped, they would amend their
ways, and would never, never, never again do wrong before God or man, but would
lead penitent and sober lives, and sorrowfully repent the crimes they had
committed. The terrible energy with which they spoke, would have moved any
person, no matter how good or just (if any good or just person could have
strayed into that sad place that night), to have set them at liberty: and, while
he would have left any other punishment to its free course, to have saved them
from this last dreadful and repulsive penalty; which never turned a man inclined
to evil, and has hardened thousands who were half inclined to good.
Mr Dennis, who had been bred and nurtured in the good old school, and had
administered the good old laws on the good old plan, always once and sometimes
twice every six weeks, for a long time, bore these appeals with a deal of
philosophy. Being at last, however, rather disturbed in his pleasant reflection
by their repetition, he rapped at one of the doors with his stick, and cried:
'Hold your noise there, will you?'
At this they all cried together that they were to be hanged on the next day
but one; and again implored his aid.
'Aid! For what!' said Mr Dennis, playfully rapping the knuckles of the hand
nearest him.
'To save us!' they cried.
'Oh, certainly,' said Mr Dennis, winking at the wall in the absence of any
friend with whom he could humour the joke. 'And so you're to be worked off, are
you, brothers?'
'Unless we are released to-night,' one of them cried, 'we are dead men!'
'I tell you what it is,' said the hangman, gravely; 'I'm afraid, my friend,
that you're not in that 'ere state of mind that's suitable to your condition,
then; you're not a-going to be released: don't think it--Will you leave off that
'ere indecent row? I wonder you an't ashamed of yourselves, I do.'
He followed up this reproof by rapping every set of knuckles one after the
other, and having done so, resumed his seat again with a cheerful countenance.
'You've had law,' he said, crossing his legs and elevating his eyebrows:
'laws have been made a' purpose for you; a wery handsome prison's been made a'
purpose for you; a parson's kept a purpose for you; a constitootional officer's
appointed a' purpose for you; carts is maintained a' purpose for you--and yet
you're not contented!--WILL you hold that noise, you sir in the furthest?'
A groan was the only answer.
'So well as I can make out,' said Mr Dennis, in a tone of mingled badinage
and remonstrance, 'there's not a man among you. I begin to think I'm on the
opposite side, and among the ladies; though for the matter of that, I've seen a
many ladies face it out, in a manner that did honour to the sex.--You in number
two, don't grind them teeth of yours. Worse manners,' said the hangman, rapping
at the door with his stick, 'I never see in this place afore. I'm ashamed of
you. You're a disgrace to the Bailey.'
After pausing for a moment to hear if anything could be pleaded in
justification, Mr Dennis resumed in a sort of coaxing tone:
'Now look'ee here, you four. I'm come here to take care of you, and see that
you an't burnt, instead of the other thing. It's no use your making any noise,
for you won't be found out by them as has broken in, and you'll only be hoarse
when you come to the speeches,--which is a pity. What I say in respect to the
speeches always is, "Give it mouth." That's my maxim. Give it mouth. I've
heerd,' said the hangman, pulling off his hat to take his handkerchief from the
crown and wipe his face, and then putting it on again a little more on one side
than before, 'I've heerd a eloquence on them boards--you know what boards I
mean--and have heerd a degree of mouth given to them speeches, that they was as
clear as a bell, and as good as a play. There's a pattern! And always, when a
thing of this natur's to come off, what I stand up for, is, a proper frame of
mind. Let's have a proper frame of mind, and we can go through with it,
creditable--pleasant-- sociable. Whatever you do (and I address myself in
particular, to you in the furthest), never snivel. I'd sooner by half, though I
lose by it, see a man tear his clothes a' purpose to spile 'em before they come
to me, than find him snivelling. It's ten to one a better frame of mind, every
way!'
While the hangman addressed them to this effect, in the tone and with the air
of a pastor in familiar conversation with his flock, the noise had been in some
degree subdued; for the rioters were busy in conveying the prisoners to the
Sessions House, which was beyond the main walls of the prison, though connected
with it, and the crowd were busy too, in passing them from thence along the
street. But when he had got thus far in his discourse, the sound of voices in
the yard showed plainly that the mob had returned and were coming that way; and
directly afterwards a violent crashing at the grate below, gave note of their
attack upon the cells (as they were called) at last.
It was in vain the hangman ran from door to door, and covered the grates, one
after another, with his hat, in futile efforts to stifle the cries of the four
men within; it was in vain he dogged their outstretched hands, and beat them
with his stick, or menaced them with new and lingering pains in the execution of
his office; the place resounded with their cries. These, together with the
feeling that they were now the last men in the jail, so worked upon and
stimulated the besiegers, that in an incredibly short space of time they forced
the strong grate down below, which was formed of iron rods two inches square,
drove in the two other doors, as if they had been but deal partitions, and stood
at the end of the gallery with only a bar or two between them and the cells.
'Halloa!' cried Hugh, who was the first to look into the dusky passage:
'Dennis before us! Well done, old boy. Be quick, and open here, for we shall be
suffocated in the smoke, going out.'
'Go out at once, then,' said Dennis. 'What do you want here?'
'Want!' echoed Hugh. 'The four men.'
'Four devils!' cried the hangman. 'Don't you know they're left for death on
Thursday? Don't you respect the law--the constitootion-- nothing? Let the four
men be.'
'Is this a time for joking?' cried Hugh. 'Do you hear 'em? Pull away these
bars that have got fixed between the door and the ground; and let us in.'
'Brother,' said the hangman, in a low voice, as he stooped under pretence of
doing what Hugh desired, but only looked up in his face, 'can't you leave these
here four men to me, if I've the whim! You do what you like, and have what you
like of everything for your share,--give me my share. I want these four men left
alone, I tell you!'
'Pull the bars down, or stand out of the way,' was Hugh's reply.
'You can turn the crowd if you like, you know that well enough, brother,'
said the hangman, slowly. 'What! You WILL come in, will you?'
'Yes.'
'You won't let these men alone, and leave 'em to me? You've no respect for
nothing--haven't you?' said the hangman, retreating to the door by which he had
entered, and regarding his companion with a scowl. 'You WILL come in, will you,
brother!'
'I tell you, yes. What the devil ails you? Where are you going?'
'No matter where I'm going,' rejoined the hangman, looking in again at the
iron wicket, which he had nearly shut upon himself, and held ajar. 'Remember
where you're coming. That's all!'
With that, he shook his likeness at Hugh, and giving him a grin, compared
with which his usual smile was amiable, disappeared, and shut the door.
Hugh paused no longer, but goaded alike by the cries of the convicts, and by
the impatience of the crowd, warned the man immediately behind him--the way was
only wide enough for one abreast--to stand back, and wielded a sledge-hammer
with such strength, that after a few blows the iron bent and broke, and gave
them free admittance.
It the two sons of one of these men, of whom mention has been made, were
furious in their zeal before, they had now the wrath and vigour of lions.
Calling to the man within each cell, to keep as far back as he could, lest the
axes crashing through the door should wound him, a party went to work upon each
one, to beat it in by sheer strength, and force the bolts and staples from their
hold. But although these two lads had the weakest party, and the worst armed,
and did not begin until after the others, having stopped to whisper to him
through the grate, that door was the first open, and that man was the first out.
As they dragged him into the gallery to knock off his irons, he fell down among
them, a mere heap of chains, and was carried out in that state on men's
shoulders, with no sign of life.
The release of these four wretched creatures, and conveying them, astounded
and bewildered, into the streets so full of life--a spectacle they had never
thought to see again, until they emerged from solitude and silence upon that
last journey, when the air should be heavy with the pent-up breath of thousands,
and the streets and houses should be built and roofed with human faces, not with
bricks and tiles and stones--was the crowning horror of the scene. Their pale
and haggard looks and hollow eyes; their staggering feet, and hands stretched
out as if to save themselves from falling; their wandering and uncertain air;
the way they heaved and gasped for breath, as though in water, when they were
first plunged into the crowd; all marked them for the men. No need to say 'this
one was doomed to die;' for there were the words broadly stamped and branded on
his face. The crowd fell off, as if they had been laid out for burial, and had
risen in their shrouds; and many were seen to shudder, as though they had been
actually dead men, when they chanced to touch or brush against their garments.
At the bidding of the mob, the houses were all illuminated that
night--lighted up from top to bottom as at a time of public gaiety and joy. Many
years afterwards, old people who lived in their youth near this part of the
city, remembered being in a great glare of light, within doors and without, and
as they looked, timid and frightened children, from the windows, seeing a FACE
go by. Though the whole great crowd and all its other terrors had faded from
their recollection, this one object remained; alone, distinct, and well
remembered. Even in the unpractised minds of infants, one of these doomed men
darting past, and but an instant seen, was an image of force enough to dim the
whole concourse; to find itself an all-absorbing place, and hold it ever after.
When this last task had been achieved, the shouts and cries grew fainter; the
clank of fetters, which had resounded on all sides as the prisoners escaped, was
heard no more; all the noises of the crowd subsided into a hoarse and sullen
murmur as it passed into the distance; and when the human tide had rolled away,
a melancholy heap of smoking ruins marked the spot where it had lately chafed
and roared.
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