SENTENCE ON THE MURDERER 161 



proved that the leader of the party had a stick, and gave the 

 word to fire. He was the man that ran away from the black- 

 smith's shop when he saw me. Coles had what was called a 

 helper, or night -watcher, out with him, who ran away the 

 moment it was found that poachers were in the wood, and Coles 

 advanced on the poachers, who came out of the copsewood and 

 collected in the ride, alone. They threatened to shoot him if 

 he continued to advance or follow them, and the murderer twice 

 raised his gun, but Coles on his death-bed said that each time, 

 by the light of the moon, he could see, or at least he thought he 

 saw, the man did not intend to fire. The third time Coles felt so 

 convinced that he would fire, that he had time to guard his heart 

 with his arm, and in his arm he received the whole charge, or he 

 would have been shot dead. Now in this there seemed a providen- 

 tial interference, that the man should be preserved sufficiently to 

 make a deposition and to afford a clue to the murderer ; and the 

 result proved that Coles' inexplicable belief was right, " that the 

 gang consisted of Carleton men," and not of the long-suspected 

 labourers from Bozeat. Though transportation seems a slight 

 punishment in the eyes of men, when life has been illegally taken, 

 probably death would have been preferred by the miserable 

 culprit ; he ought, however, to have been left for execution, if 

 not because he shot that man, still by way of precaution to others, 

 for the prevention of crime is the true object of all criminal 

 legislation. That he was grievously punished in prison, and 

 that he was a melancholy and severe lesson to all other culprits, 

 there can be no doubt, for, before his illness, he used to alarm 

 the gaol at night with his cries of terror. When approached by 

 the aroused gaolers they found him pale as a ghost, his hair 

 on end, and staring wildly round him ; and, in reply to the 

 question of " What ailed him ? " he asserted that the murdered 

 gamekeeper appeared to him, and, coming close to his ear, cried 

 murder in it, and, sleeping or waking in the dark, he was thus 

 for ever visited. 



After I had preserved game for some time at Harrold, the 

 " exclusive right " to all sport being rented by me, two of the 



