nging
day' at the Old Bailey; on that morning a man might he certain of seeing
three or four criminals swung off before his breakfast. 'Tis a curious
study, sir, that of hanging--I have seen a great many people suffer in my
time: some go off as quiet as lambs, while others die very reluctantly. I
have remarked, sir, that 'tis very difficult to hang a Jew pedlar, or a
hackney-coachman--there's something obstinate in their nature that won't
let them die like other men. But, as I said before, the Whigs and
reformers have knocked up the hanging profession; and if it was not for
the suicides, which, I am happy to say, are as abundant as ever, I don't
know what we should do."

After my friend's indignation against the anti-hanging principles of
Reform had subsided a little, he invited me to examine his curiosities,
which he had arranged in an adjoining room.

"I have not," said he, as we were proceeding thither, "confined my
collection to objects connected with capital offenders only; it
comprehends relics of every grade of crime, from murder to petty larceny.
In that respect I am liberal, sir."

We had now reached the door of the apartment, when my conductor, seizing
my arm suddenly, pointed to the door-mat upon which I had just set my
foot, and said, "Observe that mat, sir; it is composed of oakum picked by
the fair fingers of the late Lady Barrymore, while confined in the
Penitentiary."

I cast a glance at this humble memorial of her late ladyship's industry,
and passed into the museum. In doing so, I happened to stumble over a
stable-bucket, which my friend affirmed was the one from which Thurtell
watered his horse on his way to Probert's cottage. Opening a drawer, he
produced a pair of dirty-looking slippers, the authentic property of the
celebrated Ikey Solomons; and along with them a pair of cotton hose, which
he assured me he had mangled with his own hands in Sarah Gale's mangle. In
another drawer he directed my attention to a short clay pipe, once in the
possession of Burke; and a tobacco-stopper belonging to Hare, the
notorious murderer. He had also preserved with great care Corder's
advertisement for a wife, written in his own hand, as it appeared in the
weekly papers, and a small fragment of a tile from the Red Barn, where
Maria Martin was murdered by the same Corder. He also possessed the fork
belonging to the knife with which some German, whose name I forget, cut
his wife's and children's throats; and a pewt