aracter is lost, it is true. When the wicked turneth
from the wickedness that they have committed, they shall save their soul
alive.

"Let us imagine for a moment that we see the souls standing before the
awful tribunal, and we hear its dreadful sentence, depart ye cursed into
everlasting fire. Imagine you hear the awful lamentations of a soul in
hell. It would be enough to melt your heart, if it was as hard as
adamant. You would fall upon your knees and plead for God's mercy, as a
famished person would for food, or as a dying criminal would for a
pardon. We soon, very soon, must go the way whence we shall ne'er
return. Our names will be struck off the records of the living, and
enrolled in the vast catalogues of the dead. But may it ne'er be
numbered with the damned.--I hope it will please God to set you at your
liberty, and that you may see the sins and follies of your life past. I
shall now close my letter with a few words which I hope you will receive
as from a dying man; and I hope that every important truth of this
letter may sink deep in your heart, and be a lesson to you through life.

"Rising griefs distress my soul,
And tears on tears successive roll--
For many an evil voice is near,
To chide my woes and mock my fear--
And silent memory weeps alone,
O'er hours of peace and gladness known.

"I still remain your sincere friend, CHARLES GIBBS."

In another letter which the wretched Gibbs wrote after his condemnation
to one who had been his early friend, he writes as follows:--"Alas! it
is now, and not until now, that I have become sensible of my wicked
life, from my childhood, and the enormity of the crime, for which I must
shortly suffer an ignominious death!--I would to God that I never had
been born, or that I had died in my infancy!--the hour of reflection has
indeed come, but come too late to prevent justice from cutting me
off--my mind recoils with horror at the thoughts of the unnatural deeds
of which I have been guilty!--my repose rather prevents than affords me
relief, as my mind, while I slumber, is constantly disturbed by
frightful dreams of my approaching awful dissolution!"

On Friday, April twenty-second, Gibbs and Wansley paid the penalty of
their crimes. Both prisoners arrived at the gallows about twelve
o'clock, accompanied by the marshal, his aids, and some twenty or thirty
United States' marines. Two clergymen attended them to the fatal spot,
where everything being in readines