is conduct.

EXECUTION OF ADMIRAL BYNG.

The unfortunate admiral being thus abandoned to the stroke of justice,
prepared himself for death with resignation and tranquillity. He
maintained a surprising cheerfulness to the last; nor did he, from his
condemnation to his execution, exhibit the least sign of impatience
or apprehension. During that interval he had remained on board of
the Monarque, a third-rate ship of war, anchored in the harbour of
Portsmouth, under a strong guard, in custody of the marshal of the
admiralty. On the fourteenth of March, the day fixed for his execution,
the boats belonging to the squadron at Spithead being manned and armed,
containing their captains and officers, with a detachment of marines,
attended this solemnity in the harbour, which was also crowded with an
infinite number of other boats and vessels filled with spectators. About
noon, the admiral having taken leave of a clergyman, and two friends
who accompanied him, walked out of the great cabin to the quarter-deck,
where two files of marines were ready to execute the sentence.
He advanced with a firm deliberate step, a composed and resolute
countenance, and resolved to suffer with his face uncovered, until
his friends, representing that his looks would possibly intimidate the
soldiers, and prevent their taking aim properly, he submitted to their
request, threw his hat on the deck, kneeled on a cushion, tied one white
handkerchief over his eyes, and dropped the other as a signal for his
executioners, who fired a volley so decisive, that five balls passed
through his body, and he dropped down dead in an instant. The time in
which this tragedy was acted, from his walking out of the cabin to his
being deposited in the coffin, did not exceed three minutes.

Thus fell, to the astonishment of all Europe, admiral John Byng; who,
whatever his errors and indiscretions might have been, seems to have
been rashly condemned, meanly given up, and cruelly sacrificed to vile
considerations. The sentiments of his own fate he avowed on the verge
of eternity, when there was no longer any cause of dissimulation, in the
following declaration, which, immediately before his death, he delivered
to the marshal of the admiralty: "A few moments will now deliver me
from the virulent persecution, and frustrate the further malice of
my enemies: nor need I envy them a life subject to the sensations my
injuries, and the injustice done me, must create. Persuade