Joseph Wilmot, or, The Memoirs of a Man-Servant — page 132: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

society ought to keep in mind the necessity of re- i i ee + eS Soa eee ae JOSEPH WILMOT; OR, THR MEMOIRS OF A MAN-SERVANT. 119 a a the morning fixed for the dreadful ceremony, a In the very centre of the square stood a high plat- vast crowd was assembled in the great square; form, against which a flight of steps was erected ; and the numbers of congregated spectators flooded and on this platform there were four chairs. While likewise all the diverging streets up to the very |I was looking from the window a few minutes remotest point whence a view of the scaffold could | after having placed myself there, I perceived a be obtained. All the windows and balconies of | sensation amongst the crowd at a point where the the dwellings which commanded the same pro-| nearest street joined the square; and then my spect, were thronged with beholders, male and | ears caught the sounds of a low solemn chaunt, female: but I must candidly confess that there | commingled with the rumbling of wheels and the were none of those disgraceful scenes of drunken- | heavy tramp of horses proceeding at a walking ness, quarrelling, and practical joking which, | pace. The other spectators in that room uttered according to the newspapers, invariably characterize | ejaculations from which I by this time knew suffi- the ceremony of public executions in my own/| cient of Italian to comprehend that the fatal pro- native country. The assembled multitude was the | cession was advancing. most orderly and the best-behaved I had ever seen: | In a few minutes it entered upon the great it appeared as if the gathered populace felt all the | square,—two lines of troops which convoyed it, force of the moral example thus presented to their | making the people fall back on either side, so that view. But I would not have it from this observa- | its progress might not be impeded. It soon came tion inferred that I am an advocate for death | within the scope of my view; and now I beheld punishments :— quite the reverse. It is mysolemn | Marco Uberti, Philippo, and the two other bandit- belief that man impiously usurps the authority of | prisoners seated in a large rumbling cart with two the Almighty when he assumes a control over the | high wheels, and in which they were jolted over life of a fellow-creature. Society has no doubt a| the stones, though the pair of horses which drew right to protect itself against evil-doers and those | the vehicle were proceeding at a very slow pace. who would disturb its equilibrium or outrage its | The four prisoners were heavily ironed; and they laws: but its means of repression as well as of | were attended by as many priests, whose lugu- punishment should not extend beyond incarcerat- | briously solemn chaunt it was that had met my ing the offender in heinous cases for the rest of | ears. For a few minutes the vebicle was so near his life, and thus depriving him of the power of | the front of the coffee-house, that I had no diffi- offending again. I believe also that no degree of | culty in distinguishing the countenances of the punishment on the one hand for extreme crime, | prisoners. That of Marco Uberti wore the same should exceed the power of man on the other hand | air of gloomy ferocious sullenness which had in- to recompense the highest degree of virtue. From | vested it when the Count of Livorno and myself this premise I infer that as society cannot extend | brought him as a captive into Florence: but ever the life of any individual as a reward for the good | and anon his eyes glared savagely around upon the he may do, neither ought society to abridge the | multitude, and then settled for a moment with life of an individual as a chastisement for the evil | mocking scorn upon his own attendant priest ere that he may perform. Besides, although indi- | they relapsed again into moody listlessness. It was viduals may be vindictive, yet society asa whole | different with Philippo: he was greatly altered, cannot possibly be imbued with a spirit of ven- | and appeared terrified as well as profoundly de- geance: it does not punish, therefore, to avenge | jected. The other two brigands seemed to study itself—but to protect itself for the future ; and | as much as possible the air of their chief; and as this punishment should have a twofold object:— | they had faithfully obeyed him in life, so now first, to prevent the offender from repeating his| they seemed determined to imitate him at the offence—and secondly, by the force of example, to | point of death. deter others from outraging its laws. Incarcera-| The equipage passed slowly through the crowd tion for life would answer both these ends much | towards the platform in the centre of the square, better than capital punishment. And then, too, |—the priests continuing their solemn chaunt— though every now and then one of them in his forming the offender, and enabling him by peni-/ turn bent down to whisper a few words, no doubt tence to win heaven’s pardon for that soul which | of earnest exhortation, to the bandit unto whom he he has to be saved. If society slay the offender at | specially ministered in his ghostly capacity: and I a blow, both these objects are lost; and society | must not forget to mention that throughout the has no right to destroy an individual mortally | scene a respectful silence, religious and awe-felt, upon earth and eternally in the other world. prevailed on the part of the multitude. There The reader will pardon this digression, inas- | were no yells nor execrations—no insulting words much as I feel strongly upon the subject which has | thrown at’ the captives—no looks of gloating betrayed me into it,—and likewise because I do triumph bent upon them: it appeared as if the not think that I can be taxed with a very frequent | ‘populace thought they were sufficiently punished digression in the course of my autobiography. I by the decrees of doom which the law had pro- will now pursue the thread of mymarrative. The “nounced against them. great square and the diverging streets were, as I| The platform in the centre of the square was have already stated, thronged with an orderly and | | reached; and there the heavy cart kalted,—the well-conducted multitude. I managed to work | soldiers forming a circle about the fatal spot. The my way to the front of one of the ranges of build- | four captives were conducted up to the platform ings overlooking the square; and there, for some | by the police-agents who specially had them in small fee, 1 obtained admission into an upper-room | custody, and who had hitherto walked by the side of a coffee-house. From the window there I hada/| of the vehicle. The doomed wretches were com- full view of the entire scene: and what a sea of pelled to seat themselves in the chairs which stood human heads it was that stretched out before me! | upon the platform, and which, as I subsequently EORNIC OOO S (C@) An) >