156 RECORDS OF OLD TIMES 



assizes, or general gaol delivery, two being for 

 murder, and three for horse stealing. They were 

 all hung. The two former richly deserved it ; their 

 conviction was for taking the lives of an old man and 

 his wife, who kept a turnpike gate, the house of which 

 had been broken into and the takings of the gate 

 stolen. The three horse stealers were found guilty 

 of taking a horse scarcely worth seven pounds. 

 Those poor fellows at the present day would pro- 

 bably have been punished with six or nine months' 

 imprisonment with hard labour. I have also known 

 men hung for coining and forgery. The drop, or 

 gallows, was erected on an iron gallery, about thirty 

 feet above the ground, in front of the county gaol, in 

 the open market square, where at least three or 

 four thousand people could witness the sentence 

 carried into effect ; and when any notorious criminal 

 was hung, all the windows in the square were occu- 

 pied, and a charge in many cases made for seeing 

 'the sight.' When I was a little boy, I remember 

 Baron Garrow, the judge at one assizes, condemn- 

 ing twelve men to death — two for murder, three for 

 horse stealing, those already mentioned, and seven 

 for sheep stealing. These last were reprieved, and 

 their sentences commuted to transportation for life. 

 They were sent abroad, and I don't think any of 

 them ever came back again. They were all agri- 

 cultural labourers ; and never did an assize pass 

 without the capital sentence being recorded against 

 eight or ten poor fellows for agrarian robberies and 

 other crimes. Arson was punishable with death, 



