The trial was very short and very clear. Such things as could be said
for him were said,--how he had taken to industrious habits, and had
thriven lawfully and reputably. But nothing could unsay the fact that
he had returned, and was there in presence of the Judge and Jury. It was
impossible to try him for that, and do otherwise than find him guilty.
At that time, it was the custom (as I learnt from my terrible experience
of that Sessions) to devote a concluding day to the passing of
Sentences, and to make a finishing effect with the Sentence of Death.
But for the indelible picture that my remembrance now holds before me,
I could scarcely believe, even as I write these words, that I saw
two-and-thirty men and women put before the Judge to receive that
sentence together. Foremost among the two-and-thirty was he; seated,
that he might get breath enough to keep life in him.
The whole scene starts out again in the vivid colors of the moment, down
to the drops of April rain on the windows of the court, glittering in
the rays of April sun. Penned in the dock, as I again stood outside it
at the corner with his hand in mine, were the two-and-thirty men
and women; some defiant, some stricken with terror, some sobbing and
weeping, some covering their faces, some staring gloomily about. There
had been shrieks from among the women convicts; but they had been
stilled, and a hush had succeeded. The sheriffs with their great chains
and nosegays, other civic gewgaws and monsters, criers, ushers, a great
gallery full of people,--a large theatrical audience,--looked on, as the
two-and-thirty and the Judge were solemnly confronted. Then the Judge
addressed them. Among the wretched creatures before him whom he must
single out for special address was one who almost from his infancy had
been an offender against the laws; who, after repeated imprisonments and
punishments, had been at length sentenced to exile for a term of years;
and who, under circumstances of great violence and daring, had made his
escape and been re-sentenced to exile for life. That miserable man would
seem for a time to have become convinced of his errors, when far removed
from the scenes of his old offences, and to have lived a peaceable and
honest life. But in a fatal moment, yielding to those propensities and
passions, the indulgence of which had so long rendered him a scourge to
society, he had quitted his haven of rest and repentance, and had
come back to the country where he was proscribed. Being here presently
denounced, he had for a time succeeded in evading the officers of
Justice, but being at length seized while in the act of flight, he had
resisted them, and had--he best knew whether by express design, or in
the blindness of his hardihood--caused the death of his denouncer, to
whom his whole career was known. The appointed punishment for his return
to the land that had cast him out, being Death, and his case being this
aggravated case, he must prepare himself to Die.