At these words,as Pureney would relate with a smile of recollected triumph,Matthias Brinsden screamed aloud,and a shiver ran through the idle audience which came to Newgate on a Black Sunday,as to a bullbaiting.Truly,the throng of thoughtless spectators hindered the proper solace of the Ordinary's ministrations,and many a respectable murderer complained of the intruding mob.But the Ordinary,otherwise minded,loved nothing so well as a packed house,and though he would invite the criminal to his private closet,and comfort his solitude with pious ejaculations,he would neither shield him from curiosity,nor tranquillise his path to the unquenchable fire.
Not only did he exercise in the pulpit a poignant and visible influence.He boasted the confidence of many heroes.His green old age cherished no more famous memory than the friendship of Jonathan Wild.He had known the Great Man at his zenith;he had wrestled with him in the hour of discomfiture;he had preached for his benefit that famous sermon on the text:`Hide Thy Face from my sins,and blot out all my Iniquities';he had witnessed the hero's awful progress from Newgate to Tyburn;he had seen him shiver at the nubbingcheat;he had composed for him a last dying speech,which did not shame the king of thieftakers,and whose sale brought a comfortable profit to the widow.Jonathan,on his side,had shown the Ordinary not a little condescension.It had been his whim,on the eve of his marriage,to present Mr.Pureney with a pair of white gloves,which were treasured as a priceless relic for many a year.And when he paid his last,forced visit to Newgate,he gave the Chaplain,for a pledge of his esteem,that famous silver staff,which he carried,as a badge of authority from the Government,the better to keep the people in awe,and favour the enterprises of his rogues.
Only one cloud shadowed this old and equal friendship.Jonathan had entertained the Ordinary with discourse so familiar,they had cracked so many a bottle together,that when the irrevocable sentence was passed,when he who had never shown mercy,expected none,the Great Man found the exhortations of the illiterate Chaplain insufficient for his high purpose.`As soon as I came into the condemned Hole,'thus he wrote,`I began to think of making a preparation for my soul;and the better to bring my stubborn heart to repentance,I desired the advice of a man of learning,a man of sound judgment in divinity,and therefore application being made to the Reverend Mr.Nicholson,he very Christianlike gave me his assistance.'Alas!Poor Pureney!He lacked subtlety,and he was instantly baffled,when the Great Man bade him expound the text:`Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.'The shiftiest excuse would have brought solace to a breaking heart and conviction to a casuist brain.Yet for once the Ordinary was at a loss,and Wild,finding him insufficient for his purpose,turned a deaf ear to his ministrations.Thus he was rudely awakened from the dream of many sleepless nights.His large heart almost broke at the neglect.
But if his more private counsels were scorned,he still had the joy of delivering a masterpiece from the pulpit,of using `all the means imaginable to make Wild think of another world,'and of seeing him as neatly turned off as the most exacting Ordinary could desire.And what inmate of Newgate ever forgot the afternoon of that glorious day (May the 24th,1725)?Mr.Pureney returned to his flock,fortified with punch and good tidings.He pictured the scene at Tyburn with a bibulous circumstance,which admirably became his style,rejoicing,as he has rejoiced ever since,that,though he lost a friend,the honest rogue was saved at last from the machinations of the thieftaker.
So he basked and smoked and drank his ale,retelling the ancient stories,and hiccuping forth the ancient sermons.So,in the fading twilight of life,he smiled the smile of contentment,as became one who had emptied more quarts,had delivered more harrowing discourses,and had lived familiarly with more scoundrels than any devildodger of his generation.
SHEPPARD AND CARTOUCHE
I
JACK SHEPPARD
IT was midnight when Jack Sheppard reached the leads,wearied by his magical achievement,and still fearful of discovery.The `jolly pair of handcuffs,'provided by the thoughtful Governor,lay discarded in his distant cell;the chains which a few hours since had grappled him to the floor encumbered the now useless staple.No trace of the ancient slavery disgraced him save the iron anklets which clung about his legs;though many a broken wall and shattered lock must serve for evidence of his prowess on the morrow.The StoneJug was all bechipped and shattered.
From the castle he had forced his way through a ninefoot wall into the Red Room,whose bolts,bars,and hinges he had ruined to gain the Chapel.The road thence to the roof and to freedom was hindered by three stubborn iron doors;yet naught stood in the way of Sheppard's genius,and he was sensible,at last,of the night air chill upon his cheek.
