A SEQUEL TO 'MURDER CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE FINE ARTS.' [1]

[1854.]

It is impossible to conciliate readers of so saturnine and gloomy a class,

that they cannot enter with genial sympathy into any gaiety whatever, but,

least of all, when the gaiety trespasses a little into the province of the

extravagant. In such a case, not to sympathize is not to understand; and

the playfulness, which is not relished, becomes flat and insipid, or

absolutely without meaning. Fortunately, after all such churls have

withdrawn from my audience in high displeasure, there remains a large

majority who are loud in acknowledging the amusement which they have

derived from a former paper of mine, 'On Murder considered as one of the

Fine Arts;' at the same time proving the sincerity of their praise by one

hesitating expression of censure. Repeatedly they have suggested to me,

that perhaps the extravagance, though clearly intentional, and forming one

element in the general gaiety of the conception, went too far. I am not

myself of that opinion; and I beg to remind these friendly censors, that

it is amongst the direct purposes and efforts of this _bagatelle_ to

graze the brink of horror, and of all that would in actual realization be

most repulsive. The very excess of the extravagance, in fact, by

suggesting to the reader continually the mere aeriality of the entire

speculation, furnishes the surest means of disenchanting him from the

horror which might else gather upon his feelings. Let me remind such

objectors, once for all, of Dean Swift's proposal for turning to account

the supernumerary infants of the three kingdoms, which, in those days,

both at Dublin and at London, were provided for in foundling hospitals, by

cooking and eating them. This was an extravaganza, though really bolder

and more coarsely practical than mine, which did not provoke any

reproaches even to a dignitary of the supreme Irish church; its own

monstrosity was its excuse; mere extravagance was felt to license and

accredit the little _jeu d'esprit_, precisely as the blank impossibilities

of Lilliput, of Laputa, of the Yahoos, &c., had licensed those. If,

therefore, any man thinks it worth his while to tilt against so mere a

foam-bubble of gaiety as this lecture on the aesthetics of murder, I

shelter myself for the moment under the Telamonian shield of the Dean.

But, in reality, my own little paper may plead a privileged excuse for its

extravagance, such as is altogether wanting to the Dean's. Nobody can

pretend, for a moment, on behalf of the Dean, that there is any ordinary

and natural tendency in human thoughts, which could ever turn to infants

as articles of diet; under any conceivable circumstances, this would be

felt as the most aggravated form of cannibalism--cannibalism applying

itself to the most defenceless part of the species. But, on the other

hand, the tendency to a critical or aesthetic valuation of fires and

murders is universal. If you are summoned to the spectacle of a great

fire, undoubtedly the first impulse is--to assist in putting it out. But

that field of exertion is very limited, and is soon filled by regular

professional people, trained and equipped for the service. In the case of

a fire which is operating upon _private_ property, pity for a neighbor's

calamity checks us at first in treating the affair as a scenic spectacle.

But perhaps the fire may be confined to public buildings. And in any case,

after we have paid our tribute of regret to the affair, considered as a

calamity, inevitably, and without restraint, we go on to consider it as a

stage spectacle. Exclamations of--How grand! How magnificent! arise in a

sort of rapture from the crowd. For instance, when Drury Lane was burned

down in the first decennium of this century, the falling in of the roof

was signalized by a mimic suicide of the protecting Apollo that surmounted

and crested the centre of this roof. The god was stationary with his lyre,

and seemed looking down upon the fiery ruins that were so rapidly

approaching him. Suddenly the supporting timbers below him gave way; a

convulsive heave of the billowing flames seemed for a moment to raise the

statue; and then, as if on some impulse of despair, the presiding deity

appeared not to fall, but to throw himself into the fiery deluge, for he

went down head foremost; and in all respects, the descent had the air of a

voluntary act. What followed? From every one of the bridges over the

river, and from other open areas which commanded the spectacle, there

arose a sustained uproar of admiration and sympathy. Some few years before

this event, a prodigious fire occurred at Liverpool; the _Goree_, a vast

pile of warehouses close to one of the docks, was burned to the ground.

The huge edifice, eight or nine stories high, and laden with most

combustible goods, many thousand bales of cotton, wheat and oats in

thousands of quarters, tar, turpentine, rum, gunpowder, &c., continued

through many hours of darkness to feed this tremendous fire. To

aggravate the calamity, it blew a regular gale of wind; luckily for the

shipping, it blew inland, that is, to the east; and all the way down to

Warrington, eighteen miles distant to the eastward, the whole air was

illuminated by flakes of cotton, often saturated with rum, and by what

seemed absolute worlds of blazing sparks, that lighted up all the upper

chambers of the air. All the cattle lying abroad in the fields through a

breadth of eighteen miles, were thrown into terror and agitation. Men, of

course, read in this hurrying overhead of scintillating and blazing

vortices, the annunciation of some gigantic calamity going on in

Liverpool; and the lamentation on that account was universal. But that

mood of public sympathy did not at all interfere to suppress or even to

check the momentary bursts of rapturous admiration, as this arrowy sleet

of many-colored fire rode on the wings of hurricane, alternately through

open depths of air, or through dark clouds overhead.

Precisely the same treatment is applied to murders. After the first

tribute of sorrow to those who have perished, but, at all events, after

the personal interests have been tranquillized by time, inevitably the

scenical features (what aesthetically may be called the comparative

_advantages_) of the several murders are reviewed and valued. One

murder is compared with another; and the circumstances of superiority, as,

for example, in the incidence and effects of surprise, of mystery, &c.,

are collated and appraised. I, therefore, for _my_ extravagance, claim an

inevitable and perpetual ground in the spontaneous tendencies of the human

mind when left to itself. But no one will pretend that any corresponding

plea can be advanced on behalf of Swift.

In this important distinction between myself and the Dean, lies one reason

which prompted the present writing. A second purpose of this paper is, to

make the reader acquainted circumstantially with three memorable cases of

murder, which long ago the voice of amateurs has crowned with laurel, but

especially with the two earliest of the three, viz., the immortal

Williams' murders of 1812. The act and the actor are each separately in

the highest degree interesting; and, as forty-two years have elapsed since

1812, it cannot be supposed that either is known circumstantially to the

men of the current generation.

Never, throughout the annals of universal Christendom, has there indeed

been any act of one solitary insulated individual, armed with power so

appalling over the hearts of men, as that exterminating murder, by which,

during the winter of 1812, John Williams in one hour, smote two houses

with emptiness, exterminated all but two entire households, and asserted

his own supremacy above all the children of Cain. It would be absolutely

impossible adequately to describe the frenzy of feelings which, throughout

the next fortnight, mastered the popular heart; the mere delirium of

indignant horror in some, the mere delirium of panic in others. For twelve

succeeding days, under some groundless notion that the unknown murderer

had quitted London, the panic which had convulsed the mighty metropolis

diffused itself all over the island. I was myself at that time nearly

three hundred miles from London; but there, and everywhere, the panic was

indescribable. One lady, my next neighbor, whom personally I knew, living

at the moment, during the absence of her husband, with a few servants in a

very solitary house, never rested until she had placed eighteen doors (so

she told me, and, indeed, satisfied me by ocular proof), each secured by

ponderous bolts, and bars, and chains, between her own bedroom and any

intruder of human build. To reach her, even in her drawing-room, was like

going, as a flag of truce, into a beleaguered fortress; at every sixth

step one was stopped by a sort of portcullis. The panic was not confined

to the rich; women in the humblest ranks more than once died upon the

spot, from the shock attending some suspicious attempts at intrusion upon

the part of vagrants, meditating probably nothing worse than a robbery,

but whom the poor women, misled by the London newspapers, had fancied to

be the dreadful London murderer. Meantime, this solitary artist, that

rested in the centre of London, self-supported by his own conscious

grandeur, as a domestic Attila, or 'scourge of God;' this man, that walked

in darkness, and relied upon murder (as afterwards transpired) for bread,

for clothes, for promotion in life, was silently preparing an effectual

answer to the public journals; and on the twelfth day after his inaugural

murder, he advertised his presence in London, and published to all men the

absurdity of ascribing to _him_ any ruralizing propensities, by striking a

second blow, and accomplishing a second family extermination. Somewhat

lightened was the _provincial_ panic by this proof that the murderer had

not condescended to sneak into the country, or to abandon for a moment,

under any motive of caution or fear, the great metropolitan _castra

stativa_ of gigantic crime, seated for ever on the Thames. In fact, the

great artist disdained a provincial reputation; and he must have felt, as

a case of ludicrous disproportion, the contrast between a country town or

village, on the one hand, and, on the other, a work more lasting than

brass--a [Greek: _chtaema es aei_]--a murder such in quality as any murder

that _he_ would condescend to own for a work turned out from his own

_studio_.

Coleridge, whom I saw some months after these terrific murders, told me,

that, for _his_ part, though at the time resident in London, he had

not shared in the prevailing panic; _him_ they effected only as a

philosopher, and threw him into a profound reverie upon the tremendous

power which is laid open in a moment to any man who can reconcile himself

to the abjuration of all conscientious restraints, if, at the same time,

thoroughly without fear. Not sharing in the public panic, however,

Coleridge did not consider that panic at all unreasonable; for, as he said

most truly in that vast metropolis there are many thousands of households,

composed exclusively of women and children; many other thousands there are

who necessarily confide their safety, in the long evenings, to the

discretion of a young servant girl; and if she suffers herself to be

beguiled by the pretence of a message from her mother, sister, or

sweetheart, into opening the door, there, in one second of time, goes to

wreck the security of the house. However, at that time, and for many

months afterwards, the practice of steadily putting the chain upon the

door before it was opened prevailed generally, and for a long time served

as a record of that deep impression left upon London by Mr. Williams.

Southey, I may add, entered deeply into the public feeling on this

occasion, and said to me, within a week or two of the first murder, that

it was a private event of that order which rose to the dignity of a

national event. [2] But now, having prepared the reader to appreciate on

its true scale this dreadful tissue of murder (which as a record belonging

to an era that is now left forty-two years behind us, not one person in

four of this generation can be expected to know correctly), let me pass to

the circumstantial details of the affair.

Yet, first of all, one word as to the local scene of the murders.

Ratcliffe Highway is a public thoroughfare in a most chaotic quarter of

eastern or nautical London; and at this time (viz., in 1812), when no

adequate police existed except the _detective_ police of Bow Street,

admirable for its own peculiar purposes, but utterly incommensurate to the

general service of the capital, it was a most dangerous quarter. Every

third man at the least might be set down as a foreigner. Lascars, Chinese,

Moors, Negroes, were met at every step. And apart from the manifold

ruffianism, shrouded impenetrably under the mixed hats and turbans of men

whose past was untraceable to any European eye, it is well known that the

navy (especially, in time of war, the commercial navy) of Christendom is

the sure receptacle of all the murderers and ruffians whose crimes have

given them a motive for withdrawing themselves for a season from the

public eye. It is true, that few of this class are qualified to act as

'able' seamen: but at all times, and especially during war, only a small

proportion (or _nucleus_) of each ship's company consists of such men: the

large majority being mere untutored landsmen. John Williams, however, who

had been occasionally rated as a seaman on board of various Indiamen, &c.,

was probably a very accomplished seaman. Pretty generally, in fact, he was

a ready and adroit man, fertile in resources under all sudden

difficulties, and most flexibly adapting himself to all varieties of

social life. Williams was a man of middle stature (five feet seven and

a-half, to five feet eight inches high), slenderly built, rather thin, but

wiry, tolerably muscular, and clear of all superfluous flesh. A lady, who

saw him under examination (I think at the Thames Police Office), assured

me that his hair was of the most extraordinary and vivid color, viz.,

bright yellow, something between an orange and lemon color. Williams had

been in India; chiefly in Bengal and Madras: but he had also been upon the

Indus. Now, it is notorious that, in the Punjaub, horses of a high caste

are often painted--crimson, blue, green, purple; and it struck me that

Williams might, for some casual purpose of disguise, have taken a hint

from this practice of Scinde and Lahore, so that the color might not have

been natural. In other respects, his appearance was natural enough; and,

judging by a plaster cast of him, which I purchased in London, I should

say mean, as regarded his facial structure. One fact, however, was

striking, and fell in with the impression of his natural tiger character,

that his face wore at all times a bloodless ghastly pallor. 'You might

imagine,' said my informant, 'that in his veins circulated not red life-

blood, such as could kindle into the blush of shame, of wrath, of pity--

but a green sap that welled from no human heart.' His eyes seemed frozen

and glazed, as if their light were all converged upon some victim lurking

in the far background. So far his appearance might have repelled; but, on

the other hand, the concurrent testimony of many witnesses, and also the

silent testimony of facts, showed that the oiliness and snaky insinuation

of his demeanor counteracted the repulsiveness of his ghastly face, and

amongst inexperienced young women won for him a very favorable reception.

In particular, one gentle-mannered girl, whom Williams had undoubtedly

designed to murder, gave in evidence--that once, when sitting alone with

her, he had said, 'Now, Miss R., supposing that I should appear about

midnight at your bedside, armed with a carving knife, what would you say?'

To which the confiding girl had, replied, 'Oh, Mr. Williams, if it was

anybody else, I should be frightened. But, as soon as I heard _your_

voice, I should be tranquil.' Poor girl! had this outline sketch of Mr.

Williams been filled in and realized, she would have seen something in the

corpse-like face, and heard something in the sinister voice, that would

have unsettled her tranquillity for ever. But nothing short of such

dreadful experiences could avail to unmask Mr. John Williams.

Into this perilous region it was that, on a Saturday night in December,

Mr. Williams, whom we suppose to have long since made his _coup d'essai_,

forced his way through the crowded streets, bound on business. To say, was

to do. And this night he had said to himself secretly, that he would

execute a design which he had already sketched, and which, when finished,

was destined on the following day to strike consternation into 'all that

mighty heart' of London, from centre to circumference. It was afterwards

remembered that he had quitted his lodgings on this dark errand about

eleven o'clock P. M.; not that he meant to begin so soon: but he needed to

reconnoitre. He carried his tools closely buttoned up under his loose

roomy coat. It was in harmony with the general subtlety of his character,

and his polished hatred of brutality, that by universal agreement his

manners were distinguished for exquisite suavity: the tiger's heart was

masked by the most insinuating and snaky refinement. All his acquaintances

afterwards described his dissimulation as so ready and so perfect, that

if, in making his way through the streets, always so crowded on a Saturday

night in neighborhoods so poor, he had accidentally jostled any person, he

would (as they were all satisfied) have stopped to offer the most

gentlemanly apologies: with his devilish heart brooding over the most

hellish of purposes, he would yet have paused to express a benign hope

that the huge mallet, buttoned up under his elegant surtout, with a view

to the little business that awaited him about ninety minutes further on,

had not inflicted any pain on the stranger with whom he had come into

collision. Titian, I believe, but certainly Rubens, and perhaps Vandyke,

made it a rule never to practise his art but in full dress--point ruffles,

bag wig, and diamond-hilted sword; and Mr. Williams, there is reason to

believe, when he went out for a grand compound massacre (in another sense,

one might have applied to it the Oxford phrase of _going out as Grand

Compounder_), always assumed black silk stockings and pumps; nor would he

on any account have degraded his position as an artist by wearing a

morning gown. In his second great performance, it was particularly noticed

and recorded by the one sole trembling man, who under killing agonies of

fear was compelled (as the reader will find) from a secret stand to become

the solitary spectator of his atrocities, that Mr. Williams wore a long

blue frock, of the very finest cloth, and richly lined with silk. Amongst

the anecdotes which circulated about him, it was also said at the time,

that Mr. Williams employed the first of dentists, and also the first of

chiropodists. On no account would he patronize any second-rate skill. And

beyond a doubt, in that perilous little branch of business which was

practised by himself, he might be regarded as the most aristocratic and

fastidious of artists.

But who meantime was the victim, to whose abode he was hurrying? For

surely he never could be so indiscreet as to be sailing about on a roving

cruise in search of some chance person to murder? Oh, no: he had suited

himself with a victim some time before, viz., an old and very intimate

friend. For he seems to have laid it down as a maxim--that the best person

to murder was a friend; and, in default of a friend, which is an article

one cannot always command, an acquaintance: because, in either case, on

first approaching his subject, suspicion would be disarmed: whereas a

stranger might take alarm, and find in the very countenance of his

murderer elect a warning summons to place himself on guard. However, in

the present ease, his destined victim was supposed to unite both

characters: originally he had been a friend; but subsequently, on good

cause arising, he had become an enemy. Or more probably, as others said,

the feelings had long since languished which gave life to either relation

of friendship or of enmity. Marr was the name of that unhappy man, who

(whether in the character of friend or enemy) had been selected for the

subject of this present Saturday night's performance. And the story

current at that time about the connection between Williams and Marr,

having (whether true or not true) never been contradicted upon authority,

was, that they sailed in the same Indiaman to Calcutta; that they had

quarrelled when at sea; but another version of the story said--no: they

had quarrelled after returning from sea; and the subject of their quarrel

was Mrs. Marr, a very pretty young woman, for whose favor they had been

rival candidates, and at one time with most bitter enmity towards each

other. Some circumstances give a color of probability to this story.

Otherwise it has sometimes happened, on occasion of a murder not

sufficiently accounted for, that, from pure goodness of heart intolerant

of a mere sordid motive for a striking murder, some person has forged, and

the public has accredited, a story representing the murderer as having

moved under some loftier excitement: and in this case the public, too much

shocked at the idea of Williams having on the single motive of gain

consummated so complex a tragedy, welcomed the tale which represented him

as governed by deadly malice, growing out of the more impassioned and

noble rivalry for the favor of a woman. The case remains in some degree

doubtful; but, certainly, the probability is, that Mrs. Marr had been the

true cause, the _causa teterrima_, of the feud between the men. Meantime,

the minutes are numbered, the sands of the hour-glass are running out,

that measure the duration of this feud upon earth. This night it shall

cease. To-morrow is the day which in England they call Sunday, which in

Scotland they call by the Judaic name of 'Sabbath.' To both nations, under

different names, the day has the same functions; to both it is a day of

rest. For thee also, Marr, it shall be a day of rest; so is it written;

thou, too, young Marr, shalt find rest--thou, and thy household, and the

stranger that is within thy gates. But that rest must be in the world

which lies beyond the grave. On this side the grave ye have all slept your

final sleep.

The night was one of exceeding darkness; and in this humble quarter of

London, whatever the night happened to be, light or dark, quiet or stormy,

all shops were kept open on Saturday nights until twelve o'clock, at the

least, and many for half an hour longer. There was no rigorous and

pedantic Jewish superstition about the exact limits of Sunday. At the very

worst, the Sunday stretched over from one o'clock, A. M. of one day, up to

eight o'clock A. M. of the next, making a clear circuit of thirty-one

hours. This, surely, was long enough. Marr, on this particular Saturday

night, would be content if it were even shorter, provided it would come

more quickly, for he has been toiling through sixteen hours behind his

counter. Marr's position in life was this: he kept a little hosier's shop,

and had invested in his stock and the fittings of his shop about 180

pounds. Like all men engaged in trade, he suffered some anxieties. He was

a new beginner; but, already, bad debts had alarmed him; and bills were

coming to maturity that were not likely to be met by commensurate sales.

Yet, constitutionally, he was a sanguine hoper. At this time he was a

stout, fresh-colored young man of twenty-seven; in some slight degree

uneasy from his commercial prospects, but still cheerful, and

anticipating--(how vainly!)--that for this night, and the next night, at

least, he will rest his wearied head and his cares upon the faithful bosom

of his sweet lovely young wife. The household of Marr, consisting of five

persons, is as follows: First, there is himself, who, if he should happen

to be ruined, in a limited commercial sense, has energy enough to jump up

again, like a pyramid of fire, and soar high above ruin many times

repeated. Yes, poor Marr, so it might be, if thou wert left to thy native

energies unmolested; but even now there stands on the other side of the

street one born of hell, who puts his peremptory negative on all these

flattering prospects. Second in the list of his household, stands his

pretty and amiable wife, who is happy after the fashion of youthful wives,

for she is only twenty-two, and anxious (if at all) only on account of her

darling infant. For, thirdly, there is in a cradle, not quite nine feet

below the street, viz., in a warm, cosy kitchen, and rocked at intervals

by the young mother, a baby eight months old. Nineteen months have Marr

and herself been married; and this is their first-born child. Grieve not

for this child, that it must keep the deep rest of Sunday in some other

world; for wherefore should an orphan, steeped to the lips in poverty,

when once bereaved of father and mother, linger upon an alien and

murderous earth? Fourthly, there is a stoutish boy, an apprentice, say

thirteen years old; a Devonshire boy, with handsome features, such as most

Devonshire youths have; [3] satisfied with his place; not overworked;

treated kindly, and aware that he was treated kindly, by his master and

mistress. Fifthly, and lastly, bringing up the rear of this quiet

household, is a servant girl, a grown-up young woman; and she, being

particularly kind-hearted, occupied (as often happens in families of

humble pretensions as to rank) a sort of sisterly place in her relation to

her mistress. A great democratic change is at this very time (1854), and

has been for twenty years, passing over British society. Multitudes of

persons are becoming ashamed of saying, 'my master,' or 'my mistress:' the

term now in the slow process of superseding it is, 'my employer.' Now, in

the United States, such an expression of democratic hauteur, though

disagreeable as a needless proclamation of independence which nobody is

disputing, leaves, however, no lasting bad effect. For the domestic

'helps' are pretty generally in a state of transition so sure and so rapid

to the headship of domestic establishments belonging to themselves, that

in effect they are but ignoring, for the present moment, a relation which

would at any rate dissolve itself in a year or two. But in England, where

no such resources exist of everlasting surplus lands, the tendency of the

change is painful. It carries with it a sullen and a coarse expression of

immunity from a yoke which was in any case a light one, and often a benign

one. In some other place I will illustrate my meaning. Here, apparently,

in Mrs. Marr's service, the principle concerned illustrated itself

practically. Mary, the female servant, felt a sincere and unaffected

respect for a mistress whom she saw so steadily occupied with her domestic

duties, and who, though so young, and invested with some slight authority,

never exerted it capriciously, or even showed it at all conspiciously.

According to the testimony of all the neighbors, she treated her mistress

with a shade of unobtrusive respect on the one hand, and yet was eager to

relieve her, whenever that was possible, from the weight of her maternal

duties, with the cheerful voluntary service of a sister.

To this young woman it was, that, suddenly, within three or four minutes

of midnight, Marr called aloud from the head of the stairs--directing her

to go out and purchase some oysters for the family supper. Upon what

slender accidents hang oftentimes solemn lifelong results! Marr occupied

in the concerns of his shop, Mrs. Marr occupied with some little ailment

and restlessness of her baby, had both forgotten the affair of supper; the

time was now narrowing every moment, as regarded any variety of choice;

and oysters were perhaps ordered as the likeliest article to be had at

all, after twelve o'clock should have struck. And yet, upon this trivial

circumstance depended Mary's life. Had she been sent abroad for supper at

the ordinary time of ten or eleven o'clock, it is almost certain that she,

the solitary member of the household who escaped from the exterminating

tragedy, would _not_ have escaped; too surely she would have shared

the general fate. It had now become necessary to be quick. Hastily,

therefore, receiving money from Marr with a basket in her hand, but

unbonneted, Mary tripped out of the shop. It became afterwards, on

recollection, a heart-chilling remembrance to herself--that, precisely as

she emerged from the shop-door, she noticed, on the opposite side of the

street, by the light of the lamps, a man's figure; stationary at the

instant, but in the next instant slowly moving. This was Williams; as a

little incident, either just before or just after (at present it is

impossible to say which), sufficiently proved. Now, when one considers the

inevitable hurry and trepidation of Mary under the circumstances stated,

time barely sufficing for any chance of executing her errand, it becomes

evident that she must have connected some deep feeling of mysterious

uneasiness with the movements of this unknown man; else, assuredly, she

would not have found her attention disposable for such a case. Thus far,

she herself threw some little light upon what it might be that, semi-

consciously, was then passing through her mind; she said, that,

notwithstanding the darkness, which would not permit her to trace the

man's features, or to ascertain the exact direction of his eyes, it yet

struck her, that from his carriage when in motion, and from the apparent

inclination of his person, he must be looking at No. 29.

The little incident which I have alluded to as confirming Mary's belief

was, that, at some period not very far from midnight, the watchman had

specially noticed this stranger; he had observed him continually peeping

into the window of Marr's shop; and had thought this act, connected with

the man's appearance, so suspicious, that he stepped into Marr's shop, and

communicated what he had seen. This fact he afterwards stated before the

magistrates; and he added, that subsequently, viz., a few minutes after

twelve (eight or ten minutes, probably, after the departure of Mary), he

(the watchman), when re-entering upon his ordinary half-hourly beat, was

requested by Marr to assist him in closing the shutters. Here they had a

final communication with each other; and the watchman mentioned to Marr

that the mysterious stranger had now apparently taken himself off; for

that he had not been visible since the first communication made to Marr by

the watchman. There is little doubt that Williams had observed the

watchman's visit to Marr, and had thus had his attention seasonably drawn

to the indiscretion of his own demeanor; so that the warning, given

unavailingly to Marr, had been turned to account by Williams. There can be

still less doubt, that the bloodhound had commenced his work within one

minute of the watchman's assisting Marr to put up his shutters. And on the

following consideration:--that which prevented Williams from commencing

even earlier, was the exposure of the shop's whole interior to the gaze of

street passengers. It was indispensable that the shutters should be

accurately closed before Williams could safely get to work. But, as soon

as ever this preliminary precaution had been completed, once having

secured that concealment from the public eye it then became of still

greater importance not to lose a moment by delay, than previously it had

been not to hazard any thing by precipitance. For all depended upon going

in before Marr should have locked the door. On any other mode of effecting

an entrance (as, for instance, by waiting for the return of Mary, and

making his entrance simultaneously with her), it will be seen that

Williams must have forfeited that particular advantage which mute facts,

when read into their true construction, will soon show the reader that he

must have employed. Williams waited, of necessity, for the sound of the

watchman's retreating steps; waited, perhaps, for thirty seconds; but when

that danger was past, the next danger was, lest Marr should lock the door;

one turn of the key, and the murderer would have been locked out. In,

therefore, he bolted, and by a dexterous movement of his left hand, no

doubt, turned the key, without letting Marr perceive this fatal stratagem.

It is really wonderful and most interesting to pursue the successive steps

of this monster, and to notice the absolute certainty with which the

silent hieroglyphics of the case betray to us the whole process and

movements of the bloody drama, not less surely and fully than if we had

been ourselves hidden in Marr's shop, or had looked down from the heavens

of mercy upon this hell-kite, that knew not what mercy meant. That he had

concealed from Marr his trick, secret and rapid, upon the lock, is

evident; because else, Marr would instantly have taken the alarm,

especially after what the watchman had communicated. But it will soon be

seen that Marr had _not_ been alarmed. In reality, towards the full

success of Williams, it was important, in the last degree, to intercept

and forestall any yell or shout of agony from Marr. Such an outcry, and in

a situation so slenderly fenced off from the street, viz., by walls the

very thinnest, makes itself heard outside pretty nearly as well as if it

were uttered in the street. Such an outcry it was indispensable to stifle.

It _was_ stifled; and the reader will soon understand _how_. Meantime, at

this point, let us leave the murderer alone with his victims. For fifty

minutes let him work his pleasure. The front-door, as we know, is now

fastened against all help. Help there is none. Let us, therefore, in

vision, attach ourselves to Mary; and, when all is over, let us come

back with _her_, again raise the curtain, and read the dreadful

record of all that has passed in her absence.

The poor girl, uneasy in her mind to an extent that she could but half

understand, roamed up and down in search of an oyster shop; and finding

none that was still open, within any circuit that her ordinary experience

had made her acquainted with, she fancied it best to try the chances of

some remoter district. Lights she saw gleaming or twinkling at a distance,

that still tempted her onwards; and thus, amongst unknown streets poorly

lighted, [4] and on a night of peculiar darkness, and in a region of

London where ferocious tumults were continually turning her out of what

seemed to be the direct course, naturally she got bewildered. The purpose

with which she started, had by this time become hopeless. Nothing remained

for her now but to retrace her steps. But this was difficult; for she was

afraid to ask directions from chance passengers, whose appearance the

darkness prevented her from reconnoitring. At length by his lantern she

recognized a watchman; through him she was guided into the right road; and

in ten minutes more, she found herself back at the door of No. 29, in

Ratcliffe Highway. But by this time she felt satisfied that she must have

been absent for fifty or sixty minutes; indeed, she had heard, at a

distance, the cry of _past one o'clock_, which, commencing a few seconds

after one, lasted intermittingly for ten or thirteen minutes.

In the tumult of agonizing thoughts that very soon surprised her,

naturally it became hard for her to recall distinctly the whole succession

of doubts, and jealousies, and shadowy misgivings that soon opened upon

her. But, so far as could be collected, she had not in the first moment of

reaching home noticed anything decisively alarming. In very many cities

bells are the main instruments for communicating between the street and

the interior of houses: but in London knockers prevail. At Marr's there

was both a knocker and a bell. Mary rang, and at the same time very gently

knocked. She had no fear of disturbing her master or mistress; _them_

she made sure of finding still up. Her anxiety was for the baby, who being

disturbed, might again rob her mistress of a night's rest. And she well

knew that, with three people all anxiously awaiting her return, and by

this time, perhaps, seriously uneasy at her delay, the least audible

whisper from herself would in a moment bring one of them to the door. Yet

how is this? To her astonishment, but with the astonishment came creeping

over her an icy horror, no stir nor murmur was heard ascending from the

kitchen. At this moment came back upon her, with shuddering anguish, the

indistinct image of the stranger in the loose dark coat, whom she had seen

stealing along under the shadowy lamp-light, and too certainly watching

her master's motions: keenly she now reproached herself that, under

whatever stress of hurry, she had not acquainted Mr. Marr with the

suspicious appearances. Poor girl! she did not then know that, if this

communication could have availed to put Marr upon his guard, it had

reached him from another quarter; so that her own omission, which had in

reality arisen under her hurry to execute her master's commission, could

not be charged with any bad consequences. But all such reflections this

way or that were swallowed up at this point in over-mastering panic. That

her double summons _could_ have been unnoticed--this solitary fact in

one moment made a revelation of horror. One person might have fallen

asleep, but two--but three--_that_ was a mere impossibility. And even

supposing all three together with the baby locked in sleep, still how

unaccountable was this utter--utter silence! Most naturally at this moment

something like hysterical horror overshadowed the poor girl, and now at

last she rang the bell with the violence that belongs to sickening terror.

This done, she paused: self-command enough she still retained, though fast

and fast it was slipping away from her, to bethink herself--that, if any

overwhelming accident _had_ compelled both Marr and his apprentice-boy to

leave the house in order to summon surgical aid from opposite quarters--a

thing barely supposable--still, even in that case Mrs. Marr and her infant

would be left; and some murmuring reply, under any extremity, would be

elicited from the poor mother. To pause, therefore, to impose stern

silence upon herself, so as to leave room for the possible answer to this

final appeal, became a duty of spasmodic effort. Listen, therefore, poor

trembling heart; listen, and for twenty seconds be still as death. Still

as death she was: and during that dreadful stillness, when she hushed her

breath that she might listen, occurred an incident of killing fear, that

to her dying day would never cease to renew its echoes in her ear. She,

Mary, the poor trembling girl, checking and overruling herself by a final

effort, that she might leave full opening for her dear young mistress's

answer to her own last frantic appeal, heard at last and most distinctly a

sound within the house. Yes, now beyond a doubt there is coming an answer

to her summons. What was it? On the stairs, not the stairs that led

downwards to the kitchen, but the stairs that led upwards to the single

story of bed-chambers above, was heard a creaking sound. Next was heard

most distinctly a footfall: one, two, three, four, five stairs were slowly

and distinctly descended. Then the dreadful footsteps were heard advancing

along the little narrow passage to the door. The steps--oh heavens!

_whose_ steps?--have paused at the door. The very breathing can be heard

of that dreadful being, who has silenced all breathing except his own in

the house. There is but a door between him and Mary. What is he doing on

the other side of the door? A cautious step, a stealthy step it was that

came down the stairs, then paced along the little narrow passage--narrow

as a coffin--till at last the step pauses at the door. How hard the fellow

breathes! He, the solitary murderer, is on one side the door; Mary is on

the other side. Now, suppose that he should suddenly open the door, and

that incautiously in the dark Mary should rush in, and find herself in the

arms of the murderer. Thus far the case is a possible one--that to a

certainty, had this little trick been tried immediately upon Mary's

return, it would have succeeded; had the door been opened suddenly upon

her first tingle-tingle, headlong she would have tumbled in, and perished.

But now Mary is upon her guard. The unknown murderer and she have both

their lips upon the door, listening, breathing hard; but luckily they are

on different sides of the door; and upon the least indication of unlocking

or unlatching, she would have recoiled into the asylum of general

darkness.

What was the murderer's meaning in coming along the passage to the front

door? The meaning was this: separately, as an individual, Mary was worth

nothing at all to him. But, considered as a member of a household, she had

this value, viz., that she, if caught and murdered, perfected and rounded

the desolation of the house. The case being reported, as reported it would

be all over Christendom, led the imagination captive. The whole covey of

victims was thus netted; the household ruin was thus full and orbicular;

and in that proportion the tendency of men and women, flutter as they

might, would be helplessly and hopelessly to sink into the all-conquering

hands of the mighty murderer. He had but to say--my testimonials are dated

from No. 29 Ratcliffe Highway, and the poor vanquished imagination sank

powerless before the fascinating rattlesnake eye of the murderer. There is

not a doubt that the motive of the murderer for standing on the inner side

of Marr's front-door, whilst Mary stood on the outside, was--a hope that,

if he quietly opened the door, whisperingly counterfeiting Marr's voice,

and saying, What made you stay so long? possibly she might have been

inveigled. He was wrong; the time was past for that; Mary was now

maniacally awake; she began now to ring the bell and to ply the knocker

with unintermitting violence. And the natural consequence was, that the

next door neighbor, who had recently gone to bed and instantly fallen

asleep, was roused; and by the incessant violence of the ringing and the

knocking, which now obeyed a delirious and uncontrollable impulse in Mary,

he became sensible that some very dreadful event must be at the root of so

clamorous an uproar. To rise, to throw up the sash, to demand angrily the

cause of this unseasonable tumult, was the work of a moment. The poor girl

remained sufficiently mistress of herself rapidly to explain the

circumstance of her own absence for an hour; her belief that Mr. and Mrs.

Marr's family had all been murdered in the interval; and that at this very

moment the murderer was in the house.

The person to whom she addressed this statement was a pawnbroker; and a

thoroughly brave man he must have been; for it was a perilous undertaking,

merely as a trial of physical strength, singly to face a mysterious

assassin, who had apparently signalized his prowess by a triumph so

comprehensive. But, again, for the imagination it required an effort of

self-conquest to rush headlong into the presence of one invested with a

cloud of mystery, whose nation, age, motives, were all alike unknown.

Rarely on any field of battle has a soldier been called upon to face so

complex a danger. For if the entire family of his neighbor Marr had been

exterminated, were this indeed true, such a scale of bloodshed would seem

to argue that there must have been two persons as the perpetrators; or if

one singly had accomplished such a ruin, in that case how colossal must

have been his audacity! probably, also, his skill and animal power!

Moreover, the unknown enemy (whether single or double) would, doubtless,

be elaborately armed. Yet, under all these disadvantages, did this

fearless man rush at once to the field of butchery in his neighbor's

house. Waiting only to draw on his trousers, and to arm himself with the

kitchen poker, he went down into his own little back-yard. On this mode of

approach, he would have a chance of intercepting the murderer; whereas

from the front there would be no such chance; and there would also be

considerable delay in the process of breaking open the door. A brick wall,

nine or ten feet high, divided his own back premises from those of Marr.

Over this he vaulted; and at the moment when he was recalling himself to

the necessity of going back for a candle, he suddenly perceived a feeble

ray of light already glimmering on some part of Marr's premises. Marr's

back-door stood wide open. Probably the murderer had passed through it one

half minute before. Rapidly the brave man passed onwards to the shop, and

there beheld the carnage of the night stretched out on the floor, and the

narrow premises so floated with gore, that it was hardly possible to

escape the pollution of blood in picking out a path to the front-door. In

the lock of the door still remained the key which had given to the unknown

murderer so fatal an advantage over his victims. By this time, the heart-

shaking news involved in the outcries of Mary (to whom it occurred that by

possibility some one out of so many victims might still be within the

reach of medical aid, but that all would depend upon speed) had availed,

even at that late hour, to gather a small mob about the house. The

pawnbroker threw open the door. One or two watchmen headed the crowd; but

the soul-harrowing spectacle checked them, and impressed sudden silence

upon their voices, previously so loud. The tragic drama read aloud its own

history, and the succession of its several steps--few and summary. The

murderer was as yet altogether unknown; not even suspected. But there were

reasons for thinking that he must have been a person familiarly known to

Marr. He had entered the shop by opening the door after it had been closed

by Marr. But it was justly argued--that, after the caution conveyed to

Marr by the watchman, the appearance of any stranger in the shop at that

hour, and in so dangerous a neighborhood, and entering by so irregular and

suspicious a course, (_i.e._, walking in after the door had been closed,

and after the closing of the shutters had cut off all open communication

with the street), would naturally have roused Marr to an attitude of

vigilance and self-defence. Any indication, therefore, that Marr had _not_

been so roused, would argue to a certainty that _something_ had occurred

to neutralize this alarm, and fatally to disarm the prudent jealousies of

Marr. But this 'something' could only have lain in one simple fact, viz.,

that the person of the murderer was familiarly known to Marr as that of an

ordinary and unsuspected acquaintance. This being presupposed as the key

to all the rest, the whole course and evolution of the subsequent drama

becomes clear as daylight. The murderer, it is evident, had opened gently,

and again closed behind him with equal gentleness, the street-door. He had

then advanced to the little counter, all the while exchanging the ordinary

salutation of an old acquaintance with the unsuspecting Marr. Having

reached the counter, he would then ask Marr for a pair of unbleached

cotton socks. In a shop so small as Marr's, there could be no great

latitude of choice for disposing of the different commodities. The

arrangement of these had no doubt become familiar to the murderer; and he

had already ascertained that, in order to reach down the particular parcel

wanted at present, Marr would find it requisite to face round to the rear,

and, at the same moment, to raise his eyes and his hands to a level

eighteen inches above his own head. This movement placed him in the most

disadvantageous possible position with regard to the murderer, who now, at

the instant when Marr's hands and eyes were embarrassed, and the back of

his head fully exposed, suddenly from below his large surtout, had unslung

a heavy ship-carpenter's mallet, and, with one solitary blow, had so

thoroughly stunned his victim, as to leave him incapable of resistance.

The whole position of Marr told its own tale. He had collapsed naturally

behind the counter, with his hands so occupied as to confirm the whole

outline of the affair as I have here suggested it. Probable enough it is

that the very first blow, the first indication of treachery that reached

Marr, would also be the last blow as regarded the abolition of

consciousness. The murderer's plan and _rationale_ of murder started

systematically from this infliction of apoplexy, or at least of a stunning

sufficient to insure a long loss of consciousness. This opening step

placed the murderer at his ease. But still, as returning sense might

constantly have led to the fullest exposures, it was his settled practice,

by way of consummation, to cut the throat. To one invariable type all the

murders on this occasion conformed: the skull was first shattered; this

step secured the murderer from instant retaliation; and then, by way of

locking up all into eternal silence, uniformly the throat was cut. The

rest of the circumstances, as self-revealed, were these. The fall of Marr

might, probably enough, cause a dull, confused sound of a scuffle, and the

more so, as it could not now be confounded with any street uproar--the

shop-door being shut. It is more probable, however, that the signal for

the alarm passing down to the kitchen, would arise when the murderer

proceeded to cut Marr's throat. The very confined situation behind the

counter would render it impossible, under the critical hurry of the case,

to expose the throat broadly; the horrid scene would proceed by partial

and interrupted cuts; deep groans would arise; and then would come the

rush up-stairs. Against this, as the only dangerous stage in the

transaction, the murderer would have specially prepared. Mrs. Marr and the

apprentice-boy, both young and active, would make, of course, for the

street door; had Mary been at home, and three persons at once had combined

to distract the purposes of the murderer, it is barely possible that one

of them would have succeeded in reaching the street. But the dreadful

swing of the heavy mallet intercepted both the boy and his mistress before

they could reach the door. Each of them lay stretched out on the centre of

the shop floor; and the very moment that this disabling was accomplished,

the accursed hound was down upon their throats with his razor. The fact

is, that, in the mere blindness of pity for poor Marr, on hearing his

groans, Mrs. Marr had lost sight of her obvious policy; she and the boy

ought to have made for the back door; the alarm would thus have been given

in the open air; which, of itself, was a great point; and several means of

distracting the murderer's attention offered upon that course, which the

extreme limitation of the shop denied to them upon the other.

Vain would be all attempts to convey the horror which thrilled the

gathering spectators of this piteous tragedy. It was known to the crowd

that one person had, by some accident, escaped the general massacre: but

she was now speechless, and probably delirious; so that, in compassion for

her pitiable situation, one female neighbor had carried her away, and put

her to bed. Hence it had happened, for a longer space of time than could

else have been possible, that no person present was sufficiently

acquainted with the Marrs to be aware of the little infant; for the bold

pawnbroker had gone off to make a communication to the coroner; and

another neighbor to lodge some evidence which he thought urgent at a

neighboring police-office. Suddenly some person appeared amongst the crowd

who was aware that the murdered parents had a young infant; this would be

found either below-stairs, or in one of the bedrooms above. Immediately a

stream of people poured down into the kitchen, where at once they saw the

cradle--but with the bedclothes in a state of indescribable confusion. On

disentangling these, pools of blood became visible; and the next ominous

sign was, that the hood of the cradle had been smashed to pieces. It

became evident that the wretch had found himself doubly embarrassed--

first, by the arched hood at the head of the cradle, which, accordingly,

he had beat into a ruin with his mallet, and secondly, by the gathering of

the blankets and pillows about the baby's head. The free play of his blows

had thus been baffled. And he had therefore finished the scene by applying

his razor to the throat of the little innocent; after which, with no

apparent purpose, as though he had become confused by the spectacle of his

own atrocities, he had busied himself in piling the clothes elaborately

over the child's corpse. This incident undeniably gave the character of a

vindictive proceeding to the whole affair, and so far confirmed the

current rumor that the quarrel between Williams and Marr had originated in

rivalship. One writer, indeed, alleged that the murderer might have found

it necessary for his own safety to extinguish the crying of the child; but

it was justly replied, that a child only eight months old could not have

cried under any sense of the tragedy proceeding, but simply in its

ordinary way for the absence of its mother; and such a cry, even if

audible at all out of the house, must have been precisely what the

neighbors were hearing constantly, so that it could have drawn no special

attention, nor suggested any reasonable alarm to the murderer. No one

incident, indeed, throughout the whole tissue of atrocities, so much

envenomed the popular fury against the unknown ruffian, as this useless

butchery of the infant.

Naturally, on the Sunday morning that dawned four or five hours later, the

case was too full of horror not to diffuse itself in all directions; but I

have no reason to think that it crept into any one of the numerous Sunday

papers. In the regular course, any ordinary occurrence, not occurring, or

not transpiring until fifteen minutes after 1 A. M. on a Sunday morning,

would first reach the public ear through the Monday editions of the Sunday

papers, and the regular morning papers of the Monday. But, if such were

the course pursued on this occasion, never can there have been a more

signal oversight. For it is certain, that to have met the public demand

for details on the Sunday, which might so easily have been done by

cancelling a couple of dull columns, and substituting a circumstantial

narrative, for which the pawnbroker and the watchman could have furnished

the materials, would have made a small fortune. By proper handbills

dispersed through all quarters of the infinite metropolis, two hundred and

fifty thousand extra copies might have been sold; that is, by any journal

that should have collected _exclusive_ materials, meeting the public

excitement, everywhere stirred to the centre by flying rumors, and

everywhere burning for ampler information. On the Sunday se'ennight

(Sunday the _octave_ from the event), took place the funeral of the

Marrs; in the first coffin was placed Marr; in the second Mrs. Marr, and

the baby in her arms; in the third the apprentice boy. They were buried

side by side; and thirty thousand laboring people followed the funeral

procession, with horror and grief written in their countenances.

As yet no whisper was astir that indicated, even conjecturally, the

hideous author of these ruins--this patron of grave-diggers. Had as much

been known on this Sunday of the funeral concerning that person as became

known universally six days later, the people would have gone right from

the churchyard to the murderer's lodgings, and (brooking no delay) would

have torn him limb from limb. As yet, however, in mere default of any

object on whom reasonable suspicion could settle, the public wrath was

compelled to suspend itself. Else, far indeed from showing any tendency to

subside, the public emotion strengthened every day conspicuously, as the

reverberation of the shock began to travel back from the provinces to the

capital. On every great road in the kingdom, continual arrests were made

of vagrants and 'trampers,' who could give no satisfactory account of

themselves, or whose appearance in any respect answered to the imperfect

description of Williams furnished by the watchman.

With this mighty tide of pity and indignation pointing backwards to the

dreadful past, there mingled also in the thoughts of reflecting persons an

under-current of fearful expectation for the immediate future. 'The

earthquake,' to quote a fragment from a striking passage in Wordsworth--

'The earthquake is not satisfied at once.'

All perils, specially malignant, are recurrent. A murderer, who is such by

passion and by a wolfish craving for bloodshed as a mode of unnatural

luxury, cannot relapse into _inertia_. Such a man, even more than the

Alpine chamois hunter, comes to crave the dangers and the hairbreadth

escapes of his trade, as a condiment for seasoning the insipid monotonies

of daily life. But, apart from the hellish instincts that might too surely

be relied on for renewed atrocities, it was clear that the murderer of the

Marrs, wheresoever lurking, must be a needy man; and a needy man of that

class least likely to seek or to find resources in honorable modes of

industry; for which, equally by haughty disgust and by disuse of the

appropriate habits, men of violence are specially disqualified. Were it,

therefore, merely for a livelihood, the murderer whom all hearts were

yearning to decipher, might be expected to make his resurrection on some

stage of horror, after a reasonable interval. Even in the Marr murder,

granting that it had been governed chiefly by cruel and vindictive

impulses, it was still clear that the desire of booty had co-operated with

such feelings. Equally clear it was that this desire must have been

disappointed: excepting the trivial sum reserved by Marr for the week's

expenditure, the murderer found, doubtless, little or nothing that he

could turn to account. Two guineas, perhaps, would be the outside of what

he had obtained in the way of booty. A week or so would see the end of

that. The conviction, therefore, of all people was, that in a month or

two, when the fever of excitement might a little have cooled down, or have

been superseded by other topics of fresher interest, so that the newborn

vigilance of household life would have had time to relax, some new murder,

equally appalling, might be counted upon.

Such was the public expectation. Let the reader then figure to himself the

pure frenzy of horror when in this hush of expectation, looking, indeed,

and waiting for the unknown arm to strike once more, but not believing

that any audacity could be equal to such an attempt as yet, whilst all

eyes were watching, suddenly, on the twelfth night from the Marr murder, a

second case of the same mysterious nature, a murder on the same

exterminating plan was perpetrated in the very same neighborhood. It was

on the Thursday next but one succeeding to the Marr murder that this

second atrocity took place; and many people thought at the time, that in

its dramatic features of thrilling interest, this second case even went

beyond the first. The family which suffered in this instance was that of a

Mr. Williamson; and the house was situated, if not absolutely _in_

Ratcliffe Highway, at any rate immediately round the corner of some

secondary street, running at right angles to this public thoroughfare, Mr.

Williamson was a well-known and respectable man, long settled in that

district; he was supposed to be rich; and more with a view to the

employment furnished by such a calling, than with much anxiety for further

accumulations, he kept a sort of tavern; which, in this respect, might be

considered on an old patriarchal footing--that, although people of

considerable property resorted to the house in the evenings, no kind of

anxious separation was maintained between them and the other visitors from

the class of artisans or common laborers. Anybody who conducted himself

with propriety was free to take a seat, and call for any liquor that he

might prefer. And thus the society was pretty miscellaneous; in part

stationary, but in some proportion fluctuating. The household consisted of

the following five persons:--1. Mr. Williamson, its head, who was an old

man above seventy, and was well fitted for his situation, being civil, and

not at all morose, but, at the same time, firm in maintaining order; 2.

Mrs. Williamson, his wife, about ten years younger than himself; 3. a

little grand-daughter, about nine years old; 4. a housemaid, who was

nearly forty years old; 5. a young journeyman, aged about twenty-six,

belonging to some manufacturing establishment (of what class I have

forgotten); neither do I remember of what nation he was. It was the

established rule at Mr. Williamson's, that, exactly as the clock struck

eleven, all the company, without favor or exception, moved off. That was

one of the customs by which, in so stormy a district, Mr. Williamson had

found it possible to keep his house free from brawls. On the present

Thursday night everything had gone on as usual, except for one slight

shadow of suspicion, which had caught the attention of more persons than

one. Perhaps at a less agitating time it would hardly have been noticed;

but now, when the first question and the last in all social meetings

turned upon the Marrs, and their unknown murderer, it was a circumstance

naturally fitted to cause some uneasiness, that a stranger, of sinister

appearance, in a wide surtout, had flitted in and out of the room at

intervals during the evening; had sometimes retired from the light into

obscure corners; and, by more than one person, had been observed stealing

into the private passages of the house. It was presumed in general, that

the man must be known to Williamson. And in some slight degree, as an

occasional customer of the house, it is not impossible that he _was_.

But afterwards, this repulsive stranger, with his cadaverous ghastliness,

extraordinary hair, and glazed eyes, showing himself intermittingly

through the hours from 8 to 11 P.M., revolved upon the memory of all who

had steadily observed him with something of the same freezing effect as

belongs to the two assassins in 'Macbeth,' who present themselves reeking

from the murder of Banquo, and gleaming dimly, with dreadful faces, from

the misty background, athwart the pomps of the regal banquet.

Meantime the clock struck eleven; the company broke up; the door of

entrance was nearly closed; and at this moment of general dispersion the

situation of the five inmates left upon the premises was precisely this:

the three elders, viz., Williamson, his wife, and his female servant, were

all occupied on the ground floor--Williamson himself was drawing ale,

porter, &c., for those neighbors, in whose favor the house-door had been

left ajar, until the hour of twelve should strike; Mrs. Williamson and her

servant were moving to and fro between the back-kitchen and a little

parlor; the little grand-daughter, whose sleeping-room was on the

_first_ floor (which term in London means always the floor raised by

one flight of stairs above the level of the street), had been fast asleep

since nine o'clock; lastly, the journeyman artisan had retired to rest for

some time. He was a regular lodger in the house; and his bedroom was on

the second floor. For some time he had been undressed, and had lain down

in bed. Being, as a working man, bound to habits of early rising, he was

naturally anxious to fall asleep as soon as possible. But, on this

particular night, his uneasiness, arising from the recent murders at No.

29, rose to a paroxysm of nervous excitement which kept him awake. It is

possible, that from somebody he had heard of the suspicious-looking

stranger, or might even personally observed him slinking about. But, were

it otherwise, he was aware of several circumstances dangerously affecting

this house; for instance, the ruffianism of this whole neighborhood, and

the disagreeable fact that the Marrs had lived within a few doors of this

very house, which again argued that the murderer also lived at no great

distance. These were matters of _general_ alarm. But there were others

peculiar to this house; in particular, the notoriety of Williamson's

opulence; the belief, whether well or ill founded, that he accumulated, in

desks and drawers, the money continually flowing into his hands; and

lastly, the danger so ostentatiously courted by that habit of leaving the

house-door ajar through one entire hour--and that hour loaded with extra

danger, by the well-advertised assurance that no collision need be feared

with chance convivial visiters, since all such people were banished at

eleven. A regulation, which had hitherto operated beneficially for the

character and comfort of the house, now, on the contrary, under altered

circumstances, became a positive proclamation of exposure and

defencelessness, through one entire period of an hour. Williamson himself,

it was said generally, being a large unwieldy man, past seventy, and

signally inactive, ought, in prudence, to make the locking of his door

coincident with the dismissal of his evening party.

Upon these and other grounds of alarm (particularly this, that Mrs.

Williamson was reported to possess a considerable quantity of plate), the

journeyman was musing painfully, and the time might be within twenty-eight

or twenty-five minutes of twelve, when all at once, with a crash,

proclaiming some hand of hideous violence, the house-door was suddenly

shut and locked. Here, then, beyond all doubt, was the diabolic man,

clothed in mystery, from No. 29 Ratcliffe Highway. Yes, that dreadful

being, who for twelve days had employed all thoughts and all tongues, was

now, too certainly, in this defenceless house, and would, in a few

minutes, be face to face with every one of its inmates. A question still

lingered in the public mind--whether at Marr's there might not have been

_two_ men at work. If so, there would be two at present; and one of

the two would be immediately disposable for the up-stairs work; since no

danger could obviously be more immediately fatal to such an attack than

any alarm given from an upper window to the passengers in the street.

Through one half-minute the poor panic-stricken man sat up motionless in

bed. But then he rose, his first movement being towards the door of his

room. Not for any purpose of securing it against intrusion--too well he

knew that there was no fastening of any sort--neither lock, nor bolt; nor

was there any such moveable furniture in the room as might have availed to

barricade the door, even if time could be counted on for such an attempt.

It was no effect of prudence, merely the fascination of killing fear it

was, that drove him to open the door. One step brought him to the head of

the stairs: he lowered his head over the balustrade in order to listen;

and at that moment ascended, from the little parlor, this agonizing cry

from the woman-servant, 'Lord Jesus Christ! we shall all be murdered!'

What a Medusa's head must have lurked in those dreadful bloodless

features, and those glazed rigid eyes, that seemed rightfully belonging to

a corpse, when one glance at them sufficed to proclaim a death-warrant.

Three separate death-struggles were by this time over; and the poor

petrified journeyman, quite unconscious of what he was doing, in blind,

passive, self-surrender to panic, absolutely descended both flights of

stairs. Infinite terror inspired him with the same impulse as might have

been inspired by headlong courage. In his shirt, and upon old decaying

stairs, that at times creaked under his feet, he continued to descend,

until he had reached the lowest step but four. The situation was

tremendous beyond any that is on record. A sneeze, a cough, almost a

breathing, and the young man would be a corpse, without a chance or a

struggle for his life. The murderer was at that time in the little parlor

--the door of which parlor faced you in descending the stairs; and this

door stood ajar; indeed, much more considerably open than what is

understood by the term 'ajar.' Of that quadrant, or 90 degrees, which the

door would describe in swinging so far open as to stand at right angles to

the lobby, or to itself, in a closed position, 55 degrees at the least

were exposed. Consequently, two out of three corpses were exposed to the

young man's gaze. Where was the third? And the murderer--where was he? As

to the murderer, he was walking rapidly backwards and forwards in the

parlor, audible but not visible at first, being engaged with something or

other in that part of the room which the door still concealed. What the

something might be, the sound soon explained; he was applying keys

tentatively to a cupboard, a closet, and a scrutoire, in the hidden part

of the room. Very soon, however, he came into view; but, fortunately for

the young man, at this critical moment, the murderer's purpose too

entirely absorbed him to allow of his throwing a glance to the staircase,

on which else the white figure of the journeyman, standing in motionless

horror, would have been detected in one instant, and seasoned for the

grave in the second. As to the third corpse, the missing corpse, viz., Mr.

Williamson's, _that_ is in the cellar; and how its local position can

be accounted for, remains a separate question much discussed at the time,

but never satisfactorily cleared up. Meantime, that Williamson was dead,

became evident to the young man; since else he would have been heard

stirring or groaning. Three friends, therefore, out of four, whom the

young man had parted with forty minutes ago, were now extinguished;

remained, therefore, 40 per cent. (a large per centage for Williams to

leave); remained, in fact, himself and his pretty young friend, the little

grand-daughter, whose childish innocence was still slumbering without fear

for herself, or grief for her aged grand-parents. If _they_ are gone

for ever, happily one friend (for such he will prove himself, indeed, if

from such a danger he can save this child) is pretty near to her. But

alas! he is still nearer to a murderer. At this moment he is unnerved for

any exertion whatever; he has changed into a pillar of ice; for the

objects before him, separated by just thirteen feet, are these:--The

housemaid had been caught by the murderer on her knees; she was kneeling

before the fire-grate, which she had been polishing with black lead. That

part of her task was finished; and she had passed on to another task,

viz., the filling of the grate with wood and coals, not for kindling at

this moment, but so as to have it ready for kindling on the next day. The

appearances all showed that she must have been engaged in this labor at

the very moment when the murderer entered; and perhaps the succession of

the incidents arranged itself as follows:--From the awful ejaculation and

loud outcry to Christ, as overheard by the journeyman, it was clear that

then first she had been alarmed; yet this was at least one and a-half or

even two minutes after the door-slamming. Consequently the alarm which had

so fearfully and seasonably alarmed the young man, must, in some

unaccountable way, have been misinterpreted by the two women. It was said,

at the time, that Mrs. Williamson labored under some dulness of hearing;

and it was conjectured that the servant, having her ears filled with the

noise of her own scrubbing, and her head half under the grate, might have

confounded it with the street noises, or else might have imputed this

violent closure to some mischievous boys. But, howsoever explained, the

fact was evident, that, until the words of appeal to Christ, the servant

had noticed nothing suspicious, nothing which interrupted her labors. If

so, it followed that neither had Mrs. Williamson noticed anything; for, in

that case, she would have communicated her own alarm to the servant, since

both were in the same small room. Apparently the course of things after

the murderer had entered the room was this:--Mrs. Williamson had probably

not seen him, from the accident of standing with her back to the door.

Her, therefore, before he was himself observed at all, he had stunned and

prostrated by a shattering blow on the back of her head; this blow,

inflicted by a crow-bar, had smashed in the hinder part of the skull. She

fell; and by the noise of her fall (for all was the work of a moment) had

first roused the attention of the servant; who then uttered the cry which

had reached the young man; but before she could repeat it, the murderer

had descended with his uplifted instrument upon _her_ head, crushing

the skull inwards upon the brain. Both the women were irrecoverably

destroyed, so that further outrages were needless; and, moreover, the

murderer was conscious of the imminent danger from delay; and yet, in

spite of his hurry, so fully did he appreciate the fatal consequences to

himself, if any of his victims should so far revive into consciousness as

to make circumstantial depositions, that, by way of making this

impossible, he had proceeded instantly to cut the throats of each. All

this tallied with the appearances as now presenting themselves. Mrs.

Williamson had fallen backwards with her head to the door; the servant,

from her kneeling posture, had been incapable of rising, and had presented

her head passively to blows; after which, the miscreant had but to bend

her head backwards so as to expose her throat, and the murder was

finished.

It is remarkable that the young artisan, paralyzed as he had been by fear,

and evidently fascinated for a time so as to walk right towards the lion's

mouth, yet found himself able to notice everything important. The reader

must suppose him at this point watching the murderer whilst hanging over

the body of Mrs. Williamson, and whilst renewing his search for certain

important keys. Doubtless it was an anxious situation for the murderer;

for, unless he speedily found the keys wanted, all this hideous tragedy

would end in nothing but a prodigious increase of the public horror, in

tenfold precautions therefore, and redoubled obstacles interposed between

himself and his future game. Nay, there was even a nearer interest at

stake; his own immediate safety might, by a probable accident, be

compromised. Most of those who came to the house for liquor were giddy

girls or children, who, on finding this house closed, would go off

carelessly to some other; but, let any thoughtful woman or man come to the

door now, a full quarter of an hour before the established time of

closing, in that case suspicion would arise too powerful to be checked.

There would be a sudden alarm given; after which, mere luck would decide

the event. For it is a remarkable fact, and one that illustrates the

singular inconsistency of this villain, who, being often so superfluously

subtle, was in other directions so reckless and improvident, that at this

very moment, standing amongst corpses that had deluged the little parlor

with blood, Williams must have been in considerable doubt whether he had

any sure means of egress. There were windows, he knew, to the back; but

upon what ground they opened, he seems to have had no certain information;

and in a neighborhood so dangerous, the windows of the lower story would

not improbably be nailed down; those in the upper might be free, but then

came the necessity of a leap too formidable. From all this, however, the

sole practical inference was to hurry forward with the trial of further

keys, and to detect the hidden treasure. This it was, this intense

absorption in one overmastering pursuit, that dulled the murderer's

perceptions as to all around him; otherwise, he must have heard the

breathing of the young man, which to himself at times became fearfully

audible. As the murderer stood once more over the body of Mrs. Williamson,

and searched her pockets more narrowly, he pulled out various clusters of

keys, one of which dropping, gave a harsh gingling sound upon the floor.

At this time it was that the secret witness, from his secret stand,

noticed the fact of Williams's surtout being lined with silk of the finest

quality. One other fact he noticed, which eventually became more

immediately important than many stronger circumstances of incrimination;

this was, that the shoes of the murderer, apparently new, and bought,

probably, with poor Marr's money, creaked as he walked, harshly and

frequently. With the new clusters of keys, the murderer walked off to the

hidden section of the parlor. And here, at last, was suggested to the

journeyman the sudden opening for an escape. Some minutes would be lost to

a certainty trying all these keys; and subsequently in searching the

drawers, supposing that the keys answered--or in violently forcing them,

supposing that they did _not_. He might thus count upon a brief interval

of leisure, whilst the rattling of the keys might obscure to the murderer

the creaking of the stairs under the re-ascending journeyman. His plan

was now formed: on regaining his bedroom, he placed the bed against

the door by way of a transient retardation to the enemy, that might give

him a short warning, and in the worst extremity, might give him a chance

for life by means of a desperate leap. This change made as quietly as

possible, he tore the sheets, pillow-cases, and blankets into broad

ribbons; and after plaiting them into ropes, spliced the different lengths

together. But at the very first he descries this ugly addition to his

labors. Where shall he look for any staple, hook, bar, or other fixture,

from which his rope, when twisted, may safely depend? Measured from the

window-_sill_--_i.e._, the lowest part of the window architrave--there

count but twenty-two or twenty-three feet to the ground. Of this length

ten or twelve feet may be looked upon as cancelled, because to that

extent he might drop without danger. So much being deducted, there would

remain, say, a dozen feet of rope to prepare. But, unhappily, there is no

stout iron fixture anywhere about his window. The nearest, indeed the sole

fixture of that sort, is not near to the window at all; it is a spike

fixed (for no reason at all that is apparent) in the bed-tester; now, the

bed being shifted, the spike is shifted; and its distance from the window,

having been always four feet, is now seven. Seven entire feet, therefore,

must be added to that which would have sufficed if measured from the

window. But courage! God, by the proverb of all nations in Christendom,

helps those that help themselves. This our young man thankfully

acknowledges; he reads already, in the very fact of any spike at all being

found where hitherto it has been useless, an earnest of providential aid.

Were it only for himself that he worked, he could not feel himself

meritoriously employed; but this is not so; in deep sincerity, he is now

agitated for the poor child, whom he knows and loves; every minute, he

feels, brings ruin nearer to _her_; and, as he passed her door, his

first thought had been to take her out of bed in his arms, and to carry

her where she might share his chances. But, on consideration, he felt that

this sudden awaking of her, and the impossibility of even whispering any

explanation, would cause her to cry audibly; and the inevitable

indiscretion of one would be fatal to the two. As the Alpine avalanches,

when suspended above the traveller's head, oftentimes (we are told) come

down through the stirring of the air by a simple whisper, precisely on

such a tenure of a whisper was now suspended the murderous malice of the

man below. No; there is but one way to save the child; towards _her_

deliverance, the first step is through his own. And he has made an

excellent beginning; for the spike, which too fearfully he had expected to

see torn away by any strain upon the half-carious wood, stands firmly when

tried against the pressure of his own weight. He has rapidly fastened on

to it three lengths of his new rope, measuring eleven feet. He plaits it

roughly; so that only three feet have been lost in the intertwisting; he

has spliced on a second length equal to the first; so that, already,

sixteen feet are ready to throw out of the window; and thus, let the worst

come to the worst, it will not be absolute ruin to swarm down the rope so

far as it will reach, and then to drop boldly. All this has been

accomplished in about six minutes; and the hot contest between above and

below is steadily but fervently proceeding. Murderer is working hard in

the parlor; journeyman is working hard in the bedroom. Miscreant is

getting on famously down-stairs; one batch of bank-notes he has already

bagged; and is hard upon the scent of a second. He has also sprung a covey

of golden coins. Sovereigns as yet were not; but guineas at this period

fetched thirty shillings a-piece; and he has worked his way into a little

quarry of these. Murderer is almost joyous; and if any creature is still

living in this house, as shrewdly he suspects, and very soon means to

know, with that creature he would be happy, before cutting the creature's

throat, to drink a glass of something. Instead of the glass, might he not

make a present to the poor creature of its throat? Oh no! impossible!

Throats are a sort of thing that he never makes presents of; business--

business must be attended to. Really the two men, considered simply as men

of business, are both meritorious. Like chorus and semi-chorus, strophe

and antistrophe, they work each against the other. Pull journeyman, pull

murderer! Pull baker, pull devil! As regards the journeyman, he is now

safe. To his sixteen feet, of which seven are neutralized by the distance

of the bed, he has at last added six feet more, which will be short of

reaching the ground by perhaps ten feet--a trifle which man or boy may

drop without injury. All is safe, therefore, for him: which is more than

one can be sure of for miscreant in the parlor. Miscreant, however, takes

it coolly enough: the reason being, that, with all his cleverness, for

once in his life miscreant has been over-reached. The reader and I know,

but miscreant does not in the least suspect, a little fact of some

importance, viz., that just now through a space of full three minutes he

has been overlooked and studied by one, who (though reading in a dreadful

book, and suffering under mortal panic) took accurate notes of so much as

his limited opportunities allowed him to see, and will assuredly report

the creaking shoes and the silk-mounted surtout in quarters where such

little facts will tell very little to his advantage. But, although it is

true that Mr. Williams, unaware of the journeyman's having 'assisted' at

the examination of Mrs. Williamson's pockets, could not connect any

anxiety with that person's subsequent proceedings', nor specially,

therefore, with his having embarked in the rope-weaving line, assuredly he

knew of reasons enough for not loitering. And yet he _did_ loiter.

Reading his acts by the light of such mute traces as he left behind him,

the police became aware that latterly he must have loitered. And the

reason which governed him is striking; because at once it records--that

murder was not pursued by him simply as a means to an end, but also as an

end for itself. Mr. Williams had now been upon the premises for perhaps

fifteen or twenty minutes; and in that space of time he had dispatched, in

a style satisfactory to himself, a considerable amount of business. He had

done, in commercial language, 'a good stroke of business.' Upon two

floors, viz., the cellar-floor and the ground-floor, he has 'accounted

for' all the population. But there remained at least two floors more; and

it now occurred to Mr. Williams that, although the landlord's somewhat

chilling manner had shut him out from any familiar knowledge of the

household arrangements, too probably on one or other of those floors there

must be some throats. As to plunder, he has already bagged the whole. And

it was next to impossible that any arrear the most trivial should still

remain for a gleaner. But the throats--the throats--there it was that

arrears and gleanings might perhaps be counted on. And thus it appeared

that, in his wolfish thirst for blood, Mr. Williams put to hazard the

whole fruits of his night's work, and his life into the bargain. At this

moment, if the murderer knew all, could he see the open window above

stairs ready for the descent of the journeyman, could he witness the life-

and-death rapidity with which that journeyman is working, could he guess

at the almighty uproar which within ninety seconds will be maddening the

population of this populous district--no picture of a maniac in flight of

panic or in pursuit of vengeance would adequately represent the agony of

haste with which he would himself be hurrying to the street-door for final

evasion. That mode of escape was still free. Even at this moment, there

yet remained time sufficient for a successful flight, and, therefore, for

the following revolution in the romance of his own abominable life. He had

in his pockets above a hundred pounds of booty; means, therefore, for a

full disguise. This very night, if he will shave off his yellow hair, and

blacken his eyebrows, buying, when morning light returns, a dark-colored

wig, and clothes such as may co-operate in personating the character of a

grave professional man, he may elude all suspicions of impertinent

policemen; may sail by any one of a hundred vessels bound for any port

along the huge line of sea-board (stretching through twenty-four hundred

miles) of the American United States; may enjoy fifty years for leisurely

repentance; and may even die in the odor of sanctity. On the other hand,

if he prefer active life, it is not impossible that, with _his_ subtlety,

hardihood, and unscrupulousness, in a land where the simple process of

naturalization converts the alien at once into a child of the family, he

might rise to the president's chair; might have a statue at his death; and

afterwards a life in three volumes quarto, with no hint glancing towards

No. 29 Ratcliffe Highway. But all depends on the next ninety seconds.

Within that time there is a sharp turn to be taken; there is a wrong turn,

and a right turn. Should his better angel guide him to the right one, all

may yet go well as regards this world's prosperity. But behold! in two

minutes from this point we shall see him take the wrong one: and then

Nemesis will be at his heels with ruin perfect and sudden.

Meantime, if the murderer allows himself to loiter, the ropemaker overhead

does _not_. Well he knows that the poor child's fate is on the edge

of a razor: for all turns upon the alarm being raised before the murderer

reaches her bedside. And at this very moment, whilst desperate agitation

is nearly paralyzing his fingers, he hears the sullen stealthy step of the

murderer creeping up through the darkness. It had been the expectation of

the journeyman (founded on the clamorous uproar with which the street-door

was slammed) that Williams, when disposable for his up-stairs work, would

come racing at a long jubilant gallop, and with a tiger roar; and perhaps,

on his natural instincts, he would have done so. But this mode of

approach, which was of dreadful effect when applied to a case of surprise,

became dangerous in the case of people who might by this time have been

placed fully upon their guard. The step which he had heard was on the

staircase--but upon which stair? He fancied upon the lowest: and in a

movement so slow and cautious, even this might make all the difference;

yet might it not have been the tenth, twelfth, or fourteenth stair? Never,

perhaps, in this world did any man feel his own responsibility so cruelly

loaded and strained, as at this moment did the poor journeyman on behalf

of the slumbering child. Lose but two seconds, through awkwardness or

through the self-counteractions of panic, and for _her_ the total

difference arose between life and death. Still there is a hope: and

nothing can so frightfully expound the hellish nature of him whose baleful

shadow, to speak astrologically, at this moment darkens the house of life,

than the simple expression of the ground on which this hope rested. The

journeyman felt sure that the murderer would not be satisfied to kill the

poor child whilst unconscious. This would be to defeat his whole purpose

in murdering her at all. To an epicure in murder such as Williams, it

would be taking away the very sting of the enjoyment, if the poor child

should be suffered to drink off the bitter cup of death without fully

apprehending the misery of the situation. But this luckily would require

time: the double confusion of mind, first, from being roused up at so

unusual an hour, and, secondly, from the horror of the occasion when

explained to her, would at first produce fainting, or some mode of

insensibility or distraction, such as must occupy a considerable time. The

logic of the case, in short, all rested upon the _ultra_ fiendishness

of Williams. Were he likely to be content with the mere fact of the

child's death, apart from the process and leisurely expansion of its

mental agony--in that case there would be no hope. But, because our

present murderer is fastidiously finical in his exactions--a sort of

martinet in the scenical grouping and draping of the circumstances in his

murders--therefore it is that hope becomes reasonable, since all such

refinements of preparation demand time. Murders of mere necessity Williams

was obliged to hurry; but, in a murder of pure voluptuousness, entirely

disinterested, where no hostile witness was to be removed, no extra booty

to be gained, and no revenge to be gratified, it is clear that to hurry

would be altogether to ruin. If this child, therefore, is to be saved, it

will be on pure aesthetical considerations. [5]

But all considerations whatever are at this moment suddenly cut short. A

second step is heard on the stairs, but still stealthy and cautious; a

third--and then the child's doom seems fixed. But just at that. moment all

is ready. The window is wide open; the rope is swinging free; the

journeyman has launched himself; and already he is in the first stage of

his descent. Simply by the weight of his person he descended, and by the

resistance of his hands he retarded the descent. The danger was, that the

rope should run too smoothly through his hands, and that by too rapid an

acceleration of pace he should come violently to the ground. Happily he

was able to resist the descending impetus: the knots of the splicings

furnished a succession of retardations. But the rope proved shorter by

four or five feet than he had calculated: ten or eleven feet from the

ground he hung suspended in the air; speechless for the present, through

long-continued agitation; and not daring to drop boldly on the rough

carriage pavement, lest he should fracture his legs. But the night was not

dark, as it had been on occasion of the Marr murders. And yet, for

purposes of criminal police, it was by accident worse than the darkest

night that ever hid a murder or baffled a pursuit. London, from east to

west, was covered with a deep pall (rising from the river) of universal

fog. Hence it happened, that for twenty or thirty seconds the young man

hanging in the air was not observed. His white shirt at length attracted

notice. Three or four people ran up, and received him in their arms, all

anticipating some dreadful annunciation. To what house did he belong? Even

_that_ was not instantly apparent; but he pointed with his finger to

Williamson's door, and said in a half-choking whisper--'_Marr's murderer,

now at work!_'

All explained itself in a moment: the silent language of the fact made its

own eloquent revelation. The mysterious exterminator of No. 29 Ratcliffe

Highway had visited another house; and, behold! one man only had escaped

through the air, and in his night-dress, to tell the tale.

Superstitiously, there was something to check the pursuit of this

unintelligible criminal. Morally, and in the interests of vindictive

justice, there was everything to rouse, quicken, and sustain it.

Yes, Marr's murderer--the man of mystery--was again at work; at this

moment perhaps extinguishing some lamp of life, and not at any remote

place, but here--in the very house which the listeners to this dreadful

announcement were actually touching. The chaos and blind uproar of the

scene which followed, measured by the crowded reports in the journals of

many subsequent days, and in one feature of that case, has never to my

knowledge had its parallel; or, if a parallel, only in one case--what

followed, I mean, on the acquittal of the seven bishops at Westminster in

1688. At present there was more than passionate enthusiasm. The frenzied

movement of mixed horror and exultation--the ululation of vengeance which

ascended instantaneously from the individual street, and then by a sublime

sort of magnetic contagion from all the adjacent streets, can be

adequately expressed only by a rapturous passage in Shelley:--

'The transport of a fierce and monstrous gladness

Spread through the multitudinous streets, fast flying

Upon the wings of fear:--From his dull madness

The starveling waked, and died in joy: the dying,

Among the corpses in stark agony lying,

Just heard the happy tidings, and in hope

Closed their faint eyes: from house to house replying

With loud acclaim the living shook heaven's cope,

And fill'd the startled earth with echoes.' [6]

There was something, indeed, half inexplicable in the instantaneous

interpretation of the gathering shout according to its true meaning. In

fact, the deadly roar of vengeance, and its sublime unity, _could_

point in this district only to the one demon whose idea had brooded and

tyrannized, for twelve days, over the general heart: every door, every

window in the neighborhood, flew open as if at a word of command;

multitudes, without waiting for the regular means of egress, leaped down

at once from the windows on the lower story; sick men rose from their

beds; in one instance, as if expressly to verify the image of Shelley (in

v. 4, 5, 6, 7), a man whose death had been looked for through some days,

and who actually _did_ die on the following day, rose, armed himself

with a sword, and descended in his shirt into the street. The chance was a

good one, and the mob were made aware of it, for catching the wolfish dog

in the high noon and carnival of his bloody revels--in the very centre of

his own shambles. For a moment the mob was self-baffled by its own numbers

and its own fury. But even that fury felt the call for self-control. It

was evident that the massy street-door must be driven in, since there was

no longer any living person to co-operate with their efforts from within,

excepting only a female child. Crowbars dexterously applied in one minute

threw the door out of hangings, and the people entered like a torrent. It

may be guessed with what fret and irritation to their consuming fury, a

signal of pause and absolute silence was made by a person of local

importance. In the hope of receiving some useful communication, the mob

became silent. 'Now listen,' said the man of authority, 'and we shall

learn whether he is above-stairs or below.' Immediately a noise was heard

as if of some one forcing windows, and clearly the sound came from a

bedroom above. Yes, the fact was apparent that the murderer was even yet

in the house: he had been caught in a trap. Not having made himself

familiar with the details of Williamson's house, to all appearance he had

suddenly become a prisoner in one of the upper rooms. Towards this the

crowd now rushed impetuously. The door, however, was found to be slightly

fastened; and, at the moment when this was forced, a loud crash of the

window, both glass and frame, announced that the wretch had made his

escape. He had leaped down; and several persons in the crowd, who burned

with the general fury, leaped after him. These persons had not troubled

themselves about the nature of the ground; but now, on making an

examination of it with torches, they reported it to be an inclined plane,

or embankment of clay, very wet and adhesive. The prints of the man's

footsteps were deeply impressed upon the clay, and therefore easily traced

up to the summit of the embankment; but it was perceived at once that

pursuit would be useless, from the density of the mist. Two feet ahead of

you, a man was entirely withdrawn from your power of identification; and,

on overtaking him, you could not venture to challenge him as the same whom

you had lost sight of. Never, through the course of a whole century, could

there be a night expected more propitious to an escaping criminal: means

of disguise Williams now had in excess; and the dens were innumerable in

the neighborhood of the river that could have sheltered him for years from

troublesome inquiries. But favors are thrown away upon the reckless and

the thankless. That night, when the turning-point offered itself for his

whole future career, Williams took the wrong turn; for, out of mere

indolence, he took the turn to his old lodgings--that place which, in all

England, he had just now the most reason to shun.

Meantime the crowd had thoroughly searched the premises of Williamson. The

first inquiry was for the young grand-daughter. Williams, it was evident,

had gone into her room: but in this room apparently it was that the sudden

uproar in the streets had surprised him; after which his undivided

attention had been directed to the windows, since through these only any

retreat had been left open to him. Even this retreat he owed only to the

fog and to the hurry of the moment, and to the difficulty of approaching

the premises by the rear. The little girl was naturally agitated by the

influx of strangers at that hour; but otherwise, through the humane

precautions of the neighbors, she was preserved from all knowledge of the

dreadful events that had occurred whilst she herself was sleeping. Her

poor old grandfather was still missing, until the crowd descended into the

cellar; he was then found lying prostrate on the cellar floor: apparently

he had been thrown down from the top of the cellar stairs, and with so

much violence, that one leg was broken. After he had been thus disabled,

Williams had gone down to him, and cut his throat. There was much

discussion at the time, in some of the public journals, upon the

possibility of reconciling these incidents with other circumstantialities

of the case, supposing that only one man had been concerned in the affair.

That there _was_ only one man concerned, seems to be certain. One

only was seen or heard at Marr's: one only, and beyond all doubt the same

man, was seen by the young journeyman in Mrs. Williamson's parlor; and one

only was traced by his footmarks on the clay embankment. Apparently the

course which he had pursued was this: he had introduced himself to

Williamson by ordering some beer. This order would oblige the old man to

go down into the cellar; Williams would wait until he had reached it, and

would then 'slam' and lock the street-door in the violent way described.

Williamson would come up in agitation upon hearing this violence. The

murderer, aware that he would do so, met him, no doubt, at the head of the

cellar stairs, and threw him down; after which he would go down to

consummate the murder in his ordinary way. All this would occupy a minute,

or a minute and a half; and in that way the interval would be accounted

for that elapsed between the alarming sound of the street-door as heard by

the journeyman, and the lamentable outcry of the female servant. It is

evident also, that the reason why no cry whatsoever had been heard from

the lips of Mrs. Williamson, is due to the positions of the parties as I

have sketched them. Coming behind Mrs. Williamson, unseen therefore, and

from her deafness unheard, the murderer would inflict entire abolition of

consciousness while she was yet unaware of his presence. But with the

servant, who had unavoidably witnessed the attack upon her mistress, the

murderer could not obtain the same fulness of advantage; and _she_

therefore had time for making an agonizing ejaculation.

It has been mentioned, that the murderer of the Marrs was not for nearly a

fortnight so much as suspected; meaning that, previously to the Williamson

murder, no vestige of any ground for suspicion in any direction whatever

had occurred either to the general public or to the police. But there were

two very limited exceptions to this state of absolute ignorance. Some of

the magistrates had in their possession something which, when closely

examined, offered a very probable means for tracing the criminal. But as

yet they had _not_ traced him. Until the Friday morning next after

the destruction of the Williamsons, they had not published the important

fact, that upon the ship-carpenter's mallet (with which, as regarded the

stunning or disabling process, the murders had been achieved) were

inscribed the letters 'J. P.' This mallet had, by a strange oversight on

the part of the murderer, been left behind in Marr's shop; and it is an

interesting fact, therefore, that, had the villain been intercepted by the

brave pawnbroker, he would have been met virtually disarmed. This public

notification was made officially on the Friday, viz., on the thirteenth

day after the first murder. And it was instantly followed (as will be

seen) by a most important result. Meantime, within the secrecy of one

single bedroom in all London, it is a fact that Williams had been

whisperingly the object of very deep suspicion from the very first--that

is, within that same hour which witnessed the Marr tragedy. And singular

it is, that the suspicion was due entirely to his own folly. Williams

lodged, in company with other men of various nations, at a public-house.

In a large dormitory there were arranged five or six beds; these were

occupied by artisans, generally of respectable character. One or two

Englishmen there were, one or two Scotchmen, three or four Germans, and

Williams, whose birth-place was not certainly known. On the fatal Saturday

night, about half-past one o'clock, when Williams returned from his

dreadful labors, he found the English and Scotch party asleep, but the

Germans awake: one of them was sitting up with a lighted candle in his

hands, and reading aloud to the other two. Upon this, Williams said, in an

angry and very peremptory tone, 'Oh, put that candle out; put it out

directly; we shall all be burned in our beds.' Had the British party in

the room been awake, Mr. Williams would have roused a mutinous protest

against this arrogant mandate. But Germans are generally mild and facile

in their tempers; so the light was complaisantly extinguished. Yet, as

there were no curtains, it struck the Germans that the danger was really

none at all; for bed-clothes, massed upon each other, will no more burn

than the leaves of a closed book. Privately, therefore, the Germans drew

an inference, that Mr. Williams must have had some urgent motive for

withdrawing his own person and dress from observation. What this motive

might be, the next day's news diffused all over London, and of course at

this house, not two furlongs from Marr's shop, made awfully evident; and,

as may well be supposed, the suspicion was communicated to the other

members of the dormitory. All of them, however, were aware of the legal

danger attaching, under English law, to insinuations against a man, even

if true, which might not admit of proof. In reality, had Williams used the

most obvious precautions, had he simply walked down to the Thames (not a

stone's-throw distant), and flung two of his implements into the river, no

conclusive proof could have been adduced against him. And he might have

realized the scheme of Courvoisier (the murderer of Lord William Russell)

--viz., have sought each separate month's support in a separate well-

concerted murder. The party in the dormitory, meantime, were satisfied

themselves, but waited for evidences that might satisfy others. No sooner,

therefore, had the official notice been published as to the initials J. P.

on the mallet, than every man in the house recognized at once the well-

known initials of an honest Norwegian ship-carpenter, John Petersen, who

had worked in the English dockyards until the present year; but, having

occasion to revisit his native land, had left his box of tools in the

garrets of this inn. These garrets were now searched. Petersen's tool-

chest was found, but wanting the mallet; and, on further examination,

another overwhelming discovery was made. The surgeon, who examined the

corpses at Williamson's, had given it as his opinion that the throats were

not cut by means of a razor, but of some implement differently shaped. It

was now remembered that Williams had recently borrowed a large French

knife of peculiar construction; and accordingly, from a heap of old lumber

and rags, there was soon extricated a waistcoat, which the whole house

could swear to as recently worn by Williams. In this waistcoat, and glued

by gore to the lining of its pockets, was found the French knife. Next, it

was matter of notoriety to everybody in the inn, that Williams ordinarily

wore at present a pair of creaking shoes, and a brown surtout lined with

silk. Many other presumptions seemed scarcely called for. Williams was

immediately apprehended, and briefly examined. This was on the Friday. On

the Saturday morning (viz., fourteen days from the Marr murders) he was

again brought up. The circumstantial evidence was overwhelming; Williams

watched its course, but said very little. At the close, he was fully

committed for trial at the next sessions; and it is needless to say, that,

on his road to prison, he was pursued by mobs so fierce, that, under

ordinary circumstances, there would have been small hope of escaping

summary vengeance. But upon this occasion a powerful escort had been

provided; so that he was safely lodged in jail. In this particular jail at

this time, the regulation was, that at five o'clock, P. M. all the

prisoners on the criminal side should be finally locked up for the night,

and without candles. For fourteen hours (that is, until seven o'clock on

the next morning) they were left unvisited, and in total darkness. Time,

therefore, Williams had for committing suicide. The means in other

respects were small. One iron bar there was, meant (if I remember) for the

suspension of a lamp; upon this he had hanged himself by his braces. At

what hour was uncertain: some people fancied at midnight. And in that

case, precisely at the hour when, fourteen days before, he had been

spreading horror and desolation through the quiet family of poor Marr, now

was he forced into drinking of the same cup, presented to his lips by the

same accursed hands.

* * * * *

The case of the M'Keans, which has been specially alluded to, merits also

a slight rehearsal for the dreadful picturesqueness of some two or three

amongst its circumstances. The scene of this murder was at a rustic inn,

some few miles (I think) from Manchester; and the advantageous situation

of this inn it was, out of which arose the two fold temptations of the

case. Generally speaking, an inn argues, of course, a close cincture of

neighbors--as the original motive for opening such an establishment. But,

in this case, the house individually was solitary, so that no interruption

was to be looked for from any persons living within reach of screams; and

yet, on the other hand, the circumjacent vicinity was eminently populous;

as one consequence of which, a benefit club had established its weekly

rendezvous in this inn, and left the peculiar accumulations in their club-

room, under the custody of the landlord. This fund arose often to a

considerable amount, fifty or seventy pounds, before it was transferred to

the hands of a banker. Here, therefore, was a treasure worth some little

risk, and a situation that promised next to none. These attractive

circumstances had, by accident, become accurately known to one or both of

the two M'Keans; and, unfortunately, at a moment of overwhelming

misfortune to themselves. They were hawkers; and, until lately, had borne

most respectable characters: but some mercantile crash had overtaken them

with utter ruin, in which their joint capital had been swallowed up to the

last shilling. This sudden prostration had made them desperate: their own

little property had been swallowed up in a large _social_ catastrophe, and

society at large they looked upon as accountable to them for a robbery. In

preying, therefore, upon society, they considered themselves as pursuing a

wild natural justice of retaliation. The money aimed at did certainly

assume the character of public money, being the product of many separate

subscriptions. They forgot, however, that in the murderous acts, which too

certainly they meditated as preliminaries to the robbery, they could plead

no such imaginary social precedent. In dealing with a family that seemed

almost helpless, if all went smoothly, they relied entirely upon their own

bodily strength. They were stout young men, twenty-eight to thirty-two

years old; somewhat undersized as to height; but squarely built, deep-

chested, broad-shouldered, and so beautifully formed, as regarded the

symmetry of their limbs and their articulations, that, after their

execution, the bodies were privately exhibited by the surgeons of the

Manchester Infirmary, as objects of statuesque interest. On the other

hand, the household which they proposed to attack consisted of the

following four persons:--1. the landlord, a stoutish farmer--but _him_ they

intended to disable by a trick then newly introduced amongst robbers, and

termed _hocussing_, _i.e._, clandestinely drugging the liquor of the

victim with laudanum; 2. the landlord's wife; 3. a young servant woman; 4.

a boy, twelve or fourteen years old. The danger was, that out of four

persons, scattered by possibility over a house which had two separate

exits, one at least might escape, and by better acquaintance with the

adjacent paths, might succeed in giving an alarm to some of the houses a

furlong distant. Their final resolution was, to be guided by circumstances

as to the mode of conducting the affair; and yet, as it seemed essential

to success that they should assume the air of strangers to each other, it

was necessary that they should preconcert some general outline of their

plan; since it would on this scheme be impossible, without awaking violent

suspicions, to make any communications under the eyes of the family. This

outline included, at the least, one murder: so much was settled; but,

otherwise, their subsequent proceedings make it evident that they wished

to have as little bloodshed as was consistent with their final object. On

the appointed day, they presented themselves separately at the rustic inn,

and at different hours. One came as early as four o'clock in the

afternoon; the other not until half-past seven. They saluted each other

distantly and shyly; and, though occasionally exchanging a few words in

the character of strangers, did not seem disposed to any familiar

intercourse. With the landlord, however, on his return about eight o'clock

from Manchester, one of the brothers entered into a lively conversation;

invited him to take a tumbler of punch; and, at a moment when the

landlord's absence from the room allowed it, poured into the punch a

spoonful of laudanum. Some time after this, the clock struck ten; upon

which the elder M'Kean, professing to be weary, asked to be shown up to

his bedroom: for each brother, immediately on arriving, had engaged a bed.

On this, the poor servant girl had presented herself with a bed-candle to

light him upstairs. At this critical moment the family were distributed

thus:--the landlord, stupefied with the horrid narcotic which he had

drunk, had retired to a private room adjoining the public room, for the

purpose of reclining upon a sofa: and he, luckily for his own safety, was

looked upon as entirely incapacitated for action. The landlady was

occupied with her husband. And thus the younger M'Kean was left alone in

the public room. He rose, therefore, softly, and placed himself at the

foot of the stairs which his brother had just ascended, so as to be sure

of intercepting any fugitive from the bedroom above. Into that room the

elder M'Kean was ushered by the servant, who pointed to two beds--one of

which was already half occupied by the boy, and the other empty: in these,

she intimated that the two strangers must dispose of themselves for the

night, according to any arrangement that they might agree upon. Saying

this, she presented him with the candle, which he in a moment placed upon

the table; and, intercepting her retreat from the room threw his arm round

her neck with a gesture as though he meant to kiss her. This was evidently

what she herself anticipated, and endeavored to prevent. Her horror may be

imagined, when she felt the perfidious hand that clasped her neck armed

with a razor, and violently cutting her throat. She was hardly able to

utter one scream, before she sank powerless upon the floor. This dreadful

spectacle was witnessed by the boy, who was not asleep, but had presence

of mind enough instantly to close his eyes. The murderer advanced hastily

to the bed, and anxiously examined the expression of the boy's features:

satisfied he was not, and he then placed his hand upon the boy's heart, in

order to judge by its beatings whether he were agitated or not. This was a

dreadful trial: and no doubt the counterfeit sleep would immediately have

been detected, when suddenly a dreadful spectacle drew off the attention

of the murderer. Solemnly, and in ghostly silence, uprose in her dying

delirium the murdered girl; she stood upright, she walked steadily for a

moment or two, she bent her steps towards the door. The murderer turned

away to pursue her; and at that moment the boy, feeling that his one

solitary chance was to fly while this scene was in progress, bounded out

of bed. On the landing at the head of the stairs was one murderer, at the

foot of the stairs was the other: who could believe that the boy had the

shadow of a chance for escaping? And yet, in the most natural way, he

surmounted all hindrances. In the boy's horror, he laid his left hand on

the balustrade, and took a flying leap over it, which landed him at the

bottom of the stairs, without having touched a single stair. He had thus

effectually passed one of the murderers: the other, it is true, was still

to be passed; and this would have been impossible but for a sudden

accident. The landlady had been alarmed by the faint scream of the young

woman; had hurried from her private room to the girl's assistance; but at

the foot of the stairs had been intercepted by the younger brother, and

was at this moment struggling with _him_. The confusion of this life-and-

death conflict had allowed the boy to whirl past them. Luckily he took a

turn into a kitchen, out of which was a back-door, fastened by a single

bolt, that ran freely at a touch; and through this door he rushed into the

open fields. But at this moment the elder brother was set free for pursuit

by the death of the poor girl. There is no doubt, that in her delirium the

image moving through her thoughts was that of the club, which met once a-

week. She fancied it no doubt sitting; and to this room, for help and for

safety she staggered along; she entered it, and within the doorway once

more she dropped down, and instantly expired. Her murderer, who had

followed her closely, now saw himself set at liberty for the pursuit of

the boy. At this critical moment, all was at stake; unless the boy were

caught, the enterprise was ruined. He passed his brother, therefore, and

the landlady without pausing, and rushed through the open door into the

fields. By a single second, perhaps, he was too late. The boy was keenly

aware, that if he continued in sight, he would have no chance of escaping

from a powerful young man. He made, therefore, at once for a ditch, into

which he tumbled headlong. Had the murderer ventured to make a leisurely

examination of the nearest ditch, he would easily have found the boy--made

so conspicuous by his white shirt. But he lost all heart, upon failing at

once to arrest the boy's flight. And every succeeding second made his

despair the greater. If the boy had really effected his escape to the

neighboring farm-house, a party of men might be gathered within five

minutes; and already it might have become difficult for himself and his

brother, unacquainted with the field paths, to evade being intercepted.

Nothing remained, therefore, but to summon his brother away. Thus it

happened that the landlady, though mangled, escaped with life, and

eventually recovered. The landlord owed his safety to the stupefying

potion. And the baffled murderers had the misery of knowing that their

dreadful crime had been altogether profitless. The road, indeed, was now

open to the club-room; and, probably, forty seconds would have sufficed to

carry off the box of treasure, which afterwards might have been burst open

and pillaged at leisure. But the fear of intercepting enemies was too

strongly upon them; and they fled rapidly by a road which carried them

actually within six feet of the lurking boy. That night they passed

through Manchester. When daylight returned, they slept in a thicket twenty

miles distant from the scene of their guilty attempt. On the second and

third nights, they pursued their march on foot, resting again during the

day. About sunrise on the fourth morning, they were entering some village

near Kirby Lonsdale, in Westmoreland. They must have designedly quitted

the direct line of route; for their object was Ayrshire, of which county

they were natives; and the regular road would have led them through Shap,

Penrith, Carlisle. Probably they were seeking to elude the persecution of

the stage-coaches, which, for the last thirty hours, had been scattering

at all the inns and road-side _cabarets_ hand-bills describing their

persons and dress. It happened (perhaps through design) that on this

fourth morning they had separated, so as to enter the village ten minutes

apart from each other. They were exhausted and footsore. In this condition

it was easy to stop them. A blacksmith had silently reconnoitred them, and

compared their appearance with the description of the hand-bills. They

were then easily overtaken, and separately arrested. Their trial and

condemnation speedily followed at Lancaster; and in those days it

followed, of course, that they were executed. Otherwise their case fell so

far within the sheltering limits of what would _now_ be regarded as

extenuating circumstances--that, whilst a murder more or less was not to

repel them from their object, very evidently they were anxious to

economize the bloodshed as much as possible. Immeasurable, therefore, was

the interval which divided them from the monster Williams. They perished

on the scaffold: Williams, as I have said, by his own hand; and, in

obedience to the law as it then stood, he was buried in the centre of a

_quadrivium_, or conflux of four roads (in this case four streets),

with a stake driven through his heart. And over him drives for ever the

uproar of unresting London!