T h e place of execution was fixed on a green eminence some yards north-west of the western extremity of the present Old Gaol, about where the modern wing terminates, near B o w e n Street. Approaching the spot from Swanston Street there was a gentle acclivity, the ground was grassy, and not unlike a forest in the c o m m e n c e m e n t of partial reclamation from original savagery, studded with large trees, and presenting to the townspeople, in the inspiring freshness of the infant day, a prospect noyv looked for in vain. O n this occasion there yvas shocking mismanagement in the construction of the scaffold, which was a kind of narroyv shaky stage, consisting of two stout uprights sunk in the ground about tyvelve feet apart, and to the top of each was nailed a beam, round which the ropes yvere twisted. Beneath, at a height of half-a-dozen feet, an eighteen-inch planking of wood was extended from each upright, and in the centre, not six feet long, was the drop, i.e., a portion of plank yvorking on a hinge at one end and sustained by several bricks and a piece of quartering at the other. Around the quartering yvas looped a piece of stout cordage, the other extremity of which was (on a signal from the hangman) to be pulled by a prisoner of the Croyvn, stationed close by for the purpose. W h e n the cord yvas drawn, the quartering and bricks yvere supposed to come ayvay, the drop fall, and the hanging was done. It was a "killing" contrivance of the roughest and most inhuman kind, and in its design yvas not unlike the trapping of birds in snowy yveather in the Mother-country a century ago. This remarkable invention was reached by tyvo short ladders as unstable as itself, and when mounted barely afforded standing room for the criminals and the executioner. Nothing could well be imagined more scanty and insecure ; in fact, it yvas only a degree removed from the proverbial " bucket," the kicking of which is supposed to have constituted the original form of English hanging.
A s the procession (which could not be called a melancholy one) slowly advanced, it yvas syvelled at every few yards by groups of open-mouthed sigl.t-seers, breathless for fear they should be too late. It passed by way of Collins, William, Lonsdale, and Swanston Streets, through the noyv Hospital and Public Library grounds to the gallows hill, where there yvere over 6,000 persons congregated. Early as yvas the hour, the town had not only turned out its inhabitants en masse, but the residents for a circuit of several miles in the country poured in as if to a carnival. It yvas the Christmas holiday tide, and there was consequently a large sprinkling of gay young bucks of bushmen, yvell mounted, and got up in the fashionable style of the period, in buff breeches and top boots, or strapped trousers, and shining spurs, as excited and jovial as if mustering, in a hunting field, or on a racecourse. T h e most prominentfigurein the whole assemblage was a well-known publican n a m e d B y n g — a tall, well-developed, Yankee blackfellow, yvho was dressed in the latest style, and astride a well-appointed prancing white horse. H e was, apparently, m u c h engrossed in the various turns of the tragedy, and from the consequential manner in which he bore himself was fully conscious of, and seemingly enjoyed, the short-lived notoriety of which he yvas the object. T h e part-built walls of the gaol, and the proximate g u m trees afforded plenty of gratuitous viewing accommodation; but the 'trees were almost exclusively appropriated by a horde of Aboriginals, w h o gathered in from the neighbouring tribes, anxious to see the m o d e in which the white fellows rid themselves of obnoxious coolies. Every bough had one or more of these coloured people billetted in its foliage ; and the swarm of big, dark, curly heads popping out from a m o n g the branches, m a d e an European almost believe that the birds had been dispossessed of their patrimonial inheritances, and supplanted by a race of huge black apes. T h e black spectators, hoyvever, behaved with decorum, and so far presented an example yvhich might have been advantageously followed by the " yvhite barbarians," w h o shouted and yelled and vented their gratification in explosions of uproarious merriment, as if they yvere participating in the greatest sport. Old w o m e n and young, with children of all ages, to the babies in arms, were there. W h e n the culprits arrived the Chaplain went through a twenty-minute farce of prayer reading, undeterred by frequent interruptions and loudly-expressed hints " to cut it short." During the offering of the prayers " B o b " never ceased crying, but "Jack" remained stolid. They yvere then pinioned, and "Jack " ascended the scaffold with difficulty by reason of his fastened arms. However, after some struggling, he got on to the staging and stood under one of the ropes. T h e executioner, w h o followed, proceeded to adjust the noose round his neck, during which he never winced, but asked that the cap might not be pulled over his eyes, "as he wished to look at ' B o b '" All this time " B o b " remained shaking below and howling loudly. H e shook hands with several
