Page:A general history of the pyrates, from their first rise and settlement in the Island of Providence, to the present time (1724).djvu/342

 quicker Sene of his Condition; for when he aw thoe he was allotted with gone to Execution, he ent a Meage by the Provot-Marhal to the Court, to be "inform’d of the Meaning of it, and humbly deir’d to know whether they deign’d him Mercy, or not? If they did, he tood infinitely oblig’d to them, and thought the whole Service of his Life an incompetent Return for o great a Favour; but that if he was to uffer, the ooner the better, he aid, that he might be out of his Pain."

There were others of thee Pyrates the revere of this, and tho’ detitute of Miniters, or fit Perons to repreent their Sins, and ait them with piritual Advice, were yet always imploying their Time to good Purpoes, and behaved with a great deal of eeming Devotion and Penitence; among thee may be reckon’d Scudamore, Williams, Philips, Stephenon, Jefferys, Lely, Harper, Armtrong, Bunce, and others.

Scudamore too lately dicerned the Folly and Wickednes of the Enterprize, that had chiefly brought him under Sentence of Death, from which, eeing there was no Hopes of ecaping, he petitioned for two or three Days Reprieve, which was granted; and for that Time apply’d himelf inceantly to Prayer, and reading the Scriptures, eem’d to have a deep Sene of his Sins, of this in particular, and deired, at the Gallows, they would have Patience with him, to ing the firt Part of the thirty firt Palm; which he did by himelf throughout.

Armtrong, having been a Deerter from his Majety’s Service, was executed on Board the Weymouth, (and the only one that was;) there was no Body to pres him to an Acknowledgement of the Crime he died for, nor of orrowing in particular for it, which would have been exemplary, and made uitable Impreions on Seamen; o that his