steps of villainy, beginning, in his boyish years, as a pickpocket; bat he confined himself to none, appear iug in the streets, in houses, and on the highway, as booty presented. His enormities were the subject of public conversation, and the dread of the traveller. He was a native of London, and was sent to school by his parents for the space of six years; but he made little progress in learning, having a very early propensity to acts of dishonesty. While at school he made an acquaintance with William Blewit (who afterwards entered into Jonathan Wild's gang), became one of the most notorious villains of the age, and then he acquired the nickname of Blueskin, from his dark countenance. No sooner had Blake left school than he commenced pick pocket, and had been in all the prisons for felons before he was fifteen years of age. From this practice he turned street-robber, and joined with Oaky, Levee, and many other villains, who acted under the directions of Jonathan Wild. For some of the robberies they committed they were taken into custody, and Blake was admitted an evidence against his companions, who were convicted. In consequence of these convictions Blake claimed his liberty, and part of the reward allowed by government; but he was informed by the Court that he had no right to either, because he was not a voluntary evidence; since, so far from having surrendered, he made an obstinate resistance, and was much wounded before he was taken; and, therefore, he must find security for his good behaviour, or be transported. Not being able to give the requisite security, he was lodged in Wood Street Compter, where he remained a considerable time, during which period Jonathan Wild allowed him three shillings and sixpence a week. At length he prevailed on two gardeners to be his bail; but the Court at the Old Bailey hesitating to take their security, they went before Sir John Fryer, who took their recognisance for Blake's good behaviour for seven years. A gentleman, who happened to be present at Sir John's, asked how long it might be before Blake would appear again at the Old Bailey: to which another gentleman answered, Three sessions ;' and ho happened to be perfectly right in his conjecture. Blake had no sooner obtained his liberty than he was concerned in several robberies with Jack Sheppard, and particularly that for which the two brothers, Brightwell, were tried. The footpad robberies and burglaries they committed were very numerous; but the fact for which Blake suffered was the robbery of Mr. Kneebone, as will appear by the following ac count: At the Old Bailey sessions, in October, 1724, Joseph Blake, otherwise Blueskin, was indicted for breaking and entering the dwelling-house of William Kneebone, and stealing 108 yards of woollen cloth, value 367. and other goods. The prosecutor having sworn that the bars of his cellar-window were cut, and that the cellar-door, which had been bolted and padlocked, was broke open, he acquainted Jonathan Wild with what had happened, who went to Blake's lodgings, with two other persons; but Blake refusing to open the door, it was broke open by Quilt Arnold, one of Wild's men. On this Blake drew a penknife, and swore he would kill the first 6 man that entered; in answer to which Arnold said, Then I am the first man, and Mr. Wild is not far behind; and, if you don't deliver your penknife immediately, I will chop your arm off.' Hereupon the prisoner dropped the knife; and, Wild entering, he was taken into custody. As the parties were conveying Blake to Newgate, they came by the house of the prosecutor; on which Wild said to the prisoner, 'There's the ken;' and the latter replied,Say no more of that, Mr. Wild, for I know I am a dead man; but, what I fear is, that I shall afterwards be carried to Surgeons' Hall, and anatomized:' to which Wild replied, No, I'll take care to prevent that, for I'll give you a coffin.' William Field, who was evidence on the trial, swore that the robbery was committed by Blake, Sheppard, and himself; and the jury brought in a verdict of guilty. As soon as the verdict was given, Blake addressed the Court in the following terms:-On Wednesday morning last, Jonathan Wild said to Simon Jacobs,* "I believe you will not bring 40%. this time: I wish Joe (meaning me) was in your case; but I'll do my endeavour to bring you off as a single felon." And then, turning to me, he said, "I be lieve you must die-I'll send you a good book or two, and provide you a coffin, and you shall not be anatomized."' Wild was to have been an evidence against this malefactor; but, going to visit him in the bail dock, previous to his trial, Blake suddenly drew a clasped penknife, with which he cut Jonathan's throat, which prevented his giving evidence; but as the knife was blunt, the wound, though dangerous, did not prove mortal; and we shall see that Jonathan was preserved for a different fate. While under sentence of death, Blake did not show a concern proportioned to his calamitous situation. When asked if he was ad vised to commit the violence on Wild, he said, No; but that a sudden thought entered his mind; or he would have provided a knife, which would have cut off his head at once. On the nearer approach of death, he appeared still less concerned; and it was thought that his mind was chiefly bent on meditating means of escaping; but, seeing no prospect of getting away, he took to drinking, which he continued even to the day of his death; for he was observed to be intoxicated, even while he was under the gallows. He was executed at Tyburn on the 11th of November, 1723. This malefactor appears to have been a thief almost from his cradle: his habits of vice increased with his growing years, till at length he died, in a most ignominious manner, a victim to the violated laws of his country. Examples have generally more weight than precepts; from that of Blake, who became vicious at so early a period, notwithstanding the care his parents took to give him a good education, young people should learn the duty of gratitude to those parents who are kind and thoughtful enough to lay the foundation of their future happiness by proper instructions in their youth. The advantages of early piety likewise become conspicuous from the fate of those who neglect religion in the early part of life. * Jacobs was then a prisoner, but afterwards transported. Sheppard, after escaping from Newgute, persuades a Shoemaker to knock his Irons off. JOHN SHEPPARD, EXECUTED FOR HIGHWAY ROBBERY. JOHN SHEPPARD was born in Spitalfields, in the year 1702. His father, who was a carpenter, bore the character of an honest man; yet he had another son, named Thomas, who, as well as Jack, turned out a thief. The father dying while the boys were very young, they were left to the care of the mother, who placed Jack at a school in Bishopsgate Street, where he remained two years, and was then put apprentice to a carpenter. He behaved with decency in this place for about four years, when, frequenting the Black Lion alehouse, in Drury Lane, he became acquainted with some abandoned women, among whom the principal was Elizabeth Lyon, VOL. I. otherwise called Edgworth Bess, from the town of Edgworth, where she was born. While he continued to work as a carpenter, he often committed robberies in the houses where he was employed, stealing tankards, spoons, and other articles, which he carried to Edgworth Bess; but, not being suspected of having committed these robberies, he at length resolved to commence housebreaker. Exclusive of Edgworth Bess, he was acquainted with a woman named Maggot, who persuaded him to rob the house of Mr. Bains, a piece broker, in White Horse Yard; and Jack, having brought away a piece of fustian from thence, which he deposited in his trunk, went af 14 terwards at midnight, and, taking the bars out of the cellar-window, entered, and stole goods and money to the amount of 221. which he carried to Maggot. As Sheppard did not go home that night, nor the following day, his master suspected that he had made bad connexions, and, searching his trunk, found the piece of fustian that had been stolen; but Sheppard, hearing of this, broke open his master's house in the night, and carried off the fustian, lest it should be brought in evidence against him. Sheppard's master sending intelligence to Mr. Bains of what had happened, the latter looked over his goods, and, missing such a piece of fustian as had been described to him, suspected that Sheppard must have been the robber, and determined to have him taken into custody; but Jack, hearing of the affair, went to him, and threatened a prosecution for scandal, alleging that he had received the piece of fustian from his mother, who bought it for him in Spitalfields. The mother, with a view to screen her son, declared that what he had asserted was true, though she could not point out the place where she had made the purchase. Though this story was not credited, Mr. Bains did not take any farther steps in the affair. Sheppard's master seemed willing to think well of him, and he remained some time longer in the family; but, after associating himself with the worst of company, and frequently staying out the whole night, his master and he quarrelled, and the headstrong youth totally absconded in the last year of his apprenticeship, and became connected with a set of villains of Jo.. nathan Wild's gang. Jack now worked as a journeyman carpenter, with a view to the easier commission of robbery; and, being employed to assist in repairing the house of a gentleman in May Fair, he took an opportunity of carrying off a sum of money, a quantity of plate, some gold rings, and four suits of clothes. Not long after this Edgworth Bess was apprehended, and lodged in the round-house of the parish of St. Giles's, where Sheppard went to visit her, and the beadle refusing to admit him, he knocked him down, broke open the door, and carried her off in triumph; an exploit which acquired him a high degree of credit with the women of abandoned character. In the month of August, 1723, Thomas Sheppard, the brother of Jack, was indicted at the Old Bailey for two petty offences, and, being convicted, was burnt in the hand. Soon after his discharge, he prevailed on Jack to lend him forty shillings, and take him as a partner in his robberies. The first act they committed in concert was the robbing of a public house in Southwark, whence they carried off some money and wearing apparel; but Jack permitted his brother to reap the whole advantage of this booty. Not long after this, the brothers, in conjunction with Edgworth Bess, broke open the shop of Mrs. Cook, a linen-draper in Clare Market, and carried off goods to the value of 55.; and in less than a fortnight afterwards stole some articles from the house of Mr. Phillips, in Drury Lane. Tom Sheppard, going to sell some of the goods stolen at Mrs. Cook's, was apprehended, and committed to Newgate; when, in the hope of being admitted an evidence, he impeached his brother and Edgworth Bess; but they were sought for in vain. At length James Sykes, other wise called Hell and Fury, one of Sheppard's companions, meeting with him in St. Giles's, enticed him into a public house, in the hope of receiving a reward for apprehending him; and, while they were drinking, Sykes sent for a constable, who took Jack into custody, and carried him before a magistrate, who, after a short examination, sent him into St. Giles's round-house; but he broke through the roof of that place, and made his escape in the night. Within a short time after this, as Sheppard and an associate, named Benson, were crossing Leicester Fields, the latter endeavoured to pick a gentleman's pocket of his watch; but, failing in the attempt, the gentleman called out A pickpocket!' on which Sheppard was taken, and lodged in St. Ann's round-house, where he was visited by Edgworth Bess, who was detained on suspicion of being one of his accomplices. On the following day they were carried before a magistrate; and some persons appearing who charged them with felonies, they were com. mitted to the new prison; and, as they passed for husband and wife, they were permitted to lodge together in a room known by the name of Newgate ward. Sheppard being visited by several of his acquaintance, some of them furnished him with implements to make his escape; and, early in the morning, a few days after his commitment, he filed off his fetters, and, having made a hole in the wall, he took an iron bar and a wooden one out of the window; but, as the height from which he was to descend was twenty-five feet, he tied a blan ket and sheet together, and, making one of them fast to a bar in the window, Edgworth Bess first descended, and Jack followed her. Having reached the yard, they had still a wall of twenty-two feet high to scale; but, climbing up by the locks and bolts of the great gate, they got quite out of the prison, and effected a perfect escape. Sheppard's fame was greatly celebrated among the lower order of people by this exploit; and the thieves of St. Giles's courted his company. Among the rest, one Charles Grace, a cooper, begged that he would take him as an associate in his robberies, alleging, as a reason for this request, that the girl he kept was so extravagant, that he could not support her on the profits of his own thefts. Sheppard did not hesitate to make this new connexion; but, at the same time, said that he did not admit of the partnership with a view to any advantage to himself, but that Grace might reap the profits of their de predations. Sheppard and Grace making acquaintance with Anthony Lamb, an apprentice to a mathematical instrument maker, near St. Clement's Church, it was agreed to rob a gentleman who lodged with Lamb's master, and, at two o'clock in the morning, Lamb let in the other villains, who stole money and effects to a large amount. They put the door open, and Lamb went to bed, to prevent suspicion; but, notwithstanding this, his master did suspect him, and, having him taken into custody, he confessed the whole affair before a magistrate; and, being committed to Newgate, he was tried, convicted, and received sentence to be transported. On the same day Thomas Sheppard, the brother of Jack, was indicted for breaking open the dwell |