Watch all and pray, the hour is drawing near
That you before the Almighty must appear:
Examine well yourselves, in time repent,
That you may not t' eternal flames be sent.
And when St. Sepulchre's bell to-morrow tolls,
The Lord above have mercy on your souls!
Past twelve o'clock!"


In the case of Stephen Gardener, who was executed at Tyburn, in 1724,
the bellman chanted the above verses. This man, with another, being
brought to St. Sepulchre's watch-house, on suspicion of felony, which,
however, was not validated, they were dismissed. "But," said the
constable to Gardener, "beware how you come here again, or this bellman
will certainly say his verses over you;" for the dreaded bellman
happened to be then in the watch-house.--Such proved to be the case,
for the same man suffered the penalty of the law, for housebreaking,
"the day and year first above mentioned."

W.H.H.

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The Contemporary Traveller.

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