looking man, with light hair and
eyebrows,--the latter by no means jutting out or like a crag,--and
with none of those marks which our fancy had pre-bestowed upon him.

I find I am getting unawares too serious; the best way on such
occasions is to leave off, which I shall do by generally recommending
to all prosecuting advertisers not to confound crimes with ugliness;
or rather, to distinguish between that physiognomical deformity,
which I am willing to grant always accompanies crime, and mere
_physical ugliness_,--which signifies nothing, is the opponent of
nothing, and may exist in a good or bad person indifferently.

CRITO.

ON THE INCONVENIENCES RESULTING FROM
BEING HANGED.

* * * * *

TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR."

Sir,--I am one of those unhappy persons whose misfortunes, it seems,
do not entitle them to the benefit of pure pity. All that is bestowed
upon me of that kindest alleviator of human miseries comes dashed
with a double portion of contempt. My griefs have nothing in them
that is felt as sacred by the bystanders. Yet is my affliction, in
truth, of the deepest grain--the heaviest task that was ever given to
mortal patience to sustain. Time, that wears out all other sorrows,
can never modify or soften mine. Here they must continue to gnaw as
long at that fatal mark----

Why was I ever born? Why was innocence in my person suffered to be
branded with a stain which was appointed only for the blackest guilt?
What had I done, or my parents, that a disgrace of mine should
involve a whole posterity in infamy? I am almost tempted to believe,
that, in some preexistent state, crimes to which this sublunary life
of mine hath been as much a stranger as the babe that is newly born
into it, have drawn down upon me this vengeance, so disproportionate
to my actions on this globe.

My brain sickens, and my bosom labors to be delivered of the weight
that presses upon it, yet my conscious pen shrinks from the avowal.
But out it must----

O, Mr. Reflector! guess at the wretch's misery who now writes this to
you, when, with tears and burning blushes, he is obliged to confess
that he has been--HANGED----

Methinks I hear an involuntary exclamation burst from you, as your
imagination presents to you fearful images of your correspondent
unknown--_hanged!_

Fear not, Mr. Editor. No disembodied spirit has the honor of
addressing you. I am flesh and blood, an unfortunate system