on the other side of the parlour door; in which
posture they were found the next day at noon, at the very point of
expiring, their blood having stagnated about their necks, which put them
into the greatest danger.

But to return to Wilkinson. One night, he with his companions Lincoln
and William Lock came up with one Peter Martin, a poor pensioner of
Chelsea College, whom they stopped. Wilkinson held him down and Lincoln
knocked him down on his crying out for help; afterwards taking him up,
he would have led him along, and Wilkinson pricked him with his sword in
the shoulders and buttocks for some time, to make him advance, till
William Lock cried out to them, _How should ye expect the man to go
forward when he is dead._

For this murder and for a robbery committed by them with Carrick and
Carrol they were both capitally convicted. Wilkinson behaved himself to
the time of his execution very morosely, and when pressed, at the place
of execution, to unburden his conscience as to the crime for which he
died, he answered peremptorily that he knew nothing of the murder, nor
of Lincoln who died with him, until they were apprehended; adding, that
as to hanging in chains he did not value it, but he had no business to
tell lies, to make himself guilty of things he never did. Three days and
three nights before the time of his death, he abstained totally from
meat and drink, which rendered him so faint that he had scarce strength
enough to speak at the tree.

James Lincoln, who died with him for the aforesaid cruel murder, was a
fellow of a more docile and gentle temper than Wilkinson, owned
abundance of the offences he had been guilty of, and had designed, as he
himself owned, to have robbed the Duke of Newcastle of his gaiter
ornaments, as he returned from the instalment. Notwithstanding these
confessions, he persisted, as well as Wilkinson, in utterly denying that
he knew anything of the murder of the pensioner, and saying that he
forgave William Lock who had sworn himself and them into it. Wilkinson
was at the time of his execution about thirty-five years old, and James
Lincoln somewhat under. They died at the same time with the
afore-mentioned malefactor, Wilson, at Tyburn.

FOOTNOTES:

[20] This was near Clerkenwell Green. It was a famous Bear
Garden and the scene of various prize-fights to which public
challenges were issued. Cunningham quotes a curious one for the
year 1722:--"I, Elizabeth