Page:Adventures of the extravagant wit, or, The English swindler.pdf/12

 comrades of life; the third rogue ran away Being in a labyrinth of perplexity. I thought is the beſt way to fell my life at as dear a rate as I could (knowing very well, that if I was taken I ſhould be hanged.) I fought with my ſword as long as could ſtand upon my legs, wounding both them and their horſes; but at laſt one of them unhappily ran me through the ſword hand, and thereupon I was diſormed I was carried by them before the next Juſtice of Peace, and by him was committed could not now expect any thing but death; but the next news I heard was, that I muſt be removed to Newgate, there being other things to be alledged to my charge I was therefore mounted in order to my removal, but very badly mounted, being bound thereunto, and pinioned. As ſoon as the keeper ſaw me, leaping for joy, O ſir, are you come again? we will take care of you now; and ſo without mere ado, he confined me cloſe prifoner to a dungeon.

Appearing at the next Seſſions, and ſeeing ſo many of my adverſaries ready to give in their evidence againſt me, I concluded myſelf a loſt man; my very countenance betrayed both my thoughts of guilt and deſpair. In ſhort; I received ſentence of death to be hanged at Tyburn by the neck till I was dead: I thought theſe ſad tidings would preſently have deprived me of life, and to have ſaved the hangman the labour. All the way I went back to Newgate, I fancied nothing but gibbets ſtood in my way; and I ſaw no other trades but cord-winders. Being entered the priſon, I was forthwith put into a dungeon, and laden with ſhackles. I had not been many hours there, before a charitable phyſician of the ſoul, I mean a miniſter, care to viſit me; who adviſed me to repent, ſince it was high time; and endeavouring to diſburthen my conſcience, by extracting from me a general ingenious confeſſion of what crimes I had committed: