proposition was finally made through them by the instructions of the
officers, that, as the brothers knew their guilt was fully established,
it would have a tendency to mitigate their sentence, if they would
expose the head man, by whose knavery many extensive property-holders
were threatened with total bankruptcy. This was the precise position at
which the secret band of brothers had been aiming. The next step was to
secure, if possible, the younger brother as "state's evidence" against
the appointed victim of Cleaveland notoriety, whom, for the sake of
convenience, I will designate by his name, Taylor.

He was a man of extraordinary abilities and gentlemanly deportment. He
and the two brothers were mutual acquaintances. They had been
accomplices, no doubt, in many a deed of darkness. But as "the devil
should have his due," I am bound to exculpate him from any participation
in the alleged crime. That he was innocent in this affair I have the
fullest evidence. I was solicited by the pettifogger, (I will not say
lawyer,) for the brothers, to take a bribe for perjury, and swear poor
Taylor guilty of giving me five hundred dollars of counterfeit money,
which money he would place in my hands. Of this fellow, I will speak in
another chapter. The younger brother was now to declare himself and
brother as having been seduced by Taylor. It was to be done without the
apparent knowledge of the elder brother, whom we will hereafter call
Colonel Brown. It was to be communicated to one of the officers, with a
solicitation to keep it a secret from the colonel. He also had an
appointed part to play. The character he was to sustain in this drama of
well-concocted treachery, I will next present.