pentance; one particular Part of which ought to be, acknowledging the Juſtice they had met with. They ſeem’d heedleſs for the preſent, ſome calling for Water to drink, and others applying to the Soldiers for Caps, but when this Gentleman preſs’d them for an Anſwer, they all exclaim’d againſt the Severity of the Court, and were ſo harden’d, as to curſe, and wiſh the ſame Juſtice might overtake all the Members of it, as had been dealt to them. They were poor Rogues,
they ſaid, and ſo hang’d, while others, no leſs guilty in another Way, eſcaped.
When he endeavoured to compoſe their Minds, exhorting them to dye in Charity with all the World, and would have diverted them from ſuch vain Diſcourſe, by asking them their Country, Age, and the like; ſome of them anſwered, What was that to him, they ſuffered the Law, and ſhould give no Account but to God;
walking to the Gallows without a Tear, in Token of Sorrow for their paſt Offences, or ſhewing as much Concern as a Man would expreſs at travelling a bad Road; nay, Sympſon, at ſeeing a Woman that he knew, ſaid, he had lain with that Bh three times, and now ſhe was come to ſee him hang’d.
And Hardy, when his Hands were ty’d behind him, (which happened from their not being acquainted with the Way of bringing Malefactors to Execution,) obſerved, that he had ſeen many a Man hang’d, but this Way of the Hands being ty’d behind them, he was a Stranger to, and never ſaw before in his Life.
I mention theſe two little Inſtances, to ſhew how ſtupid and thoughtleſs they were of their End, and that the ſame abandoned and reprobate Temper that had carried them thro’ their Rogueries, abided with them to the laſt.
Samuel Fletcher, another of the Pyrates ordered for Execution, but reprieved, ſeem’d to have a
