“He had joined the conspiracy for the public good. He was not the man who would have stopped. O, no; he would have gone through with it to the very bottom, or else have perished in the attempt. Their death was necessary for the public good. They might quarter his body—they might inflict on him every species of torture; but they could not shake his resolution, nor subdue his spirit. He would mount the scaffold with the same firm intrepidity he now evinced, and, if his life was called for, if his wife was to be made a widow and his child an orphan, in this mighty cause he would cheerfully sacrifice it!”
In the course of this daring address, the wretched man had worked himself up to a degree of passion bordering on rage. A feeling of horror was visible in the face of all within his hearing, whilst the unhappy man was coldly explaining and justifying his murderous purposes.
The same question was put to each of the remaining prisoners, who severally returned answers to the following effect:
Richard Tidd said, he had been convicted so late last night, that he had no time to prepare a written address, as he could have wished. He denied that the evidence against him was true, with the exception of that of the gentleman he saw on the bench (Captain Fitzclarence); and, as for shooting him, why he would as soon have thought of shooting his own father.
James Wilson declared that he had been drawn into the plot by one of the witnesses (Adams) who appeared against him.
John Harrison, on being called upon, said My Lord, they were all false witnesses.
Richard Bradburn.—The evidence of Adams was false.
John Shaw Strange.—I have only this much to say, my Lords, that the evidence of Adams and Hale was false, and that they are perjured villains.
James Gilchrist was much affected, and some time elapsed before he could speak. He said—