More formal confessions, both of Bishop and Williams, than those

which

appeared on Saturday, were published by authority in Tuesday's Times. These confessions, which were made partly on Friday night and partly on Saturday, were duly reported to Barons Vaughan and the other

Judges presiding at the Old Bailey, on Saturday, and subsequently to Chief Justice Tindal. Their contents were afterwards laid before Lord Melbourne and the consequence was a respite during his Majesty's plea- sure for day. The case against this man, as it went to the Jury, was altogether a feeble one on which to found a verdict of guilty as principal ; and though we describe the respite as a consequence of the confessions, we would rather attribute it to the nature of the evidence on which the Jury decided, it appears to us more zealously than wisely. It is really too much to call on us to believe that such men as Bishop and Williams would scruple at any falsification either to palliate their own conduct or to excuse that of their companion. They confess, it will be seen, to three murders only ; but it is hardly credible that they should have per- petrated no more, with the facilities which they possessed, and the cool- ness with which they evidently went about their horrible attempts. It is far more likely that they encountered death with a lie on their lips, than that truth was honoured in their exit.

The preparations for the execution commenced on Saturday night, when barriers were begun to be erected at intervals throughout the whole length of the Old Ba;ley, from Ludgate Hill to Newgate. Scat- tered groups of persons were assembled in the street near the prison during the greater part of Sunday. At a very early hour on Monday, those who were anxious to witness the execution began to press round the Debtor's-door; and by half-past six o'clock, when the City Police, who were to guard the scaffold, arrived, the street was so filled, that they found it impossible to make their way along it, and were compelled to be marched through the interior of the prison. The prisoners were brought into the press-room about half-past seven o'clock, for the pur- pose of being pinioned. Nothing of particular moment is reported re- specting their conduct on the occasion. The reporters, indeed, speak of great changes of appearance, and how one of the criminals was much cast down, and the other very sullen ; but these remarks we have seen repeated, we rather think, on every occasion of an execution where there were two sufferers. There is another fact related common to all the cases we have perused ; we allude to the pertinacious inquisition of the attending clergyman. It was not enough that this man must pester his compelled listeners with questions respecting the accuracy and complete- ness of their confession on Saturday and Sunday ; be must repeat these questions in the press-room, on the way to the scaffold, on the scaffold itself, after the very rope was grasping the neck of the wretch whom he was tormenting with his mistimed curiosity; When Bishop appeared on the scaffold, the assembled multitude raised one universal shout of triumph ; and the same cry of savage satisfac- tion welcomed Williams. The .ast ceremonial was rapidly hurried over ; and in five minutes, the objects of not unjustifiable execration ceased to live.

It is to be regretted, that in consequence of a rush among the mob at the moment of Bishop's appearance on the scaffold, one of the prin- cipal barriers gave way, and a number of persons were thrown down and severely injured. Seventeen persons were conveyed to St. Bartho- lomew's Hospital ; but in one case only were any bones broken ; and thirteen of the parties were able to quit the Hospital in the course of the afternoon. These precautions against accident never fail, through the bungling of those who are entrusted with their erection to produce the very catastrophe that they are intended to ward off. Unless barriers are so numerous as actually to pen the mob like the cattle of which on such occasions they are very apt representatives, barriers are worse than use- less. A barrier which is powerful enough to stand the pressure of a column of a couple of hundred of human beings, will, by its resistance, squeeze to death the unhappy row that is next to it, much more effec- tually than if it gave way. In fact, it is the breaking of the barrier that saves, not that sacrifices, the lives of the people in all such cases.

The respite which had been obtained for May, was communicated in a manner that mer:ts the strongest reprobation. We give the account of it from the Globe. "Shortly after the arrival of the respite at Newgate, Dr. Cotton and Mr. Wontner went to the room in which the three pri- soners were confined together for the day. The reverend gentleman opened the paper and began to read it aloud. The most anxious atten- tion was paid to its contents by all the prisoners ; but the interest ma- nifested by May, who must have known that the fate of his miserable companions was sealed, hut had felt that there was still hope for him, was quite painful to witness—his agitation was dreadful ; but no sooner had Dr. Cotton repeated the words that the execution of the sentence upon John May shall be respited during his Majesty's most gracious plea- sure,' than the poor wretch fell to the earth as if struck by lightning His arms worked with the most-frightful contortions; and.fonr.of the officers of the prison could with difficulty hold-him • his countenance as- sumed a livid paleness—the blood forsook his lips—his eye appeared set, and pulsation at the heart could not be distinguished. All persons pre- sent thought that he could not possibly survive—it was believed, indeed, that the warrant of mercy had proved his death-blow." The poor wretch, when he recovered his senses, stated, that from the manner in which the announcement was made by the clergyman, he thought that the death- warrant was intended for him as well as his two companions' and that when the contrary burst upon him so unexpectedly, he was wholly inca- pable of withstanding the terrible revulsion of feeling it produced. Now, why was such a scena got up at all ? If the Reverend Dr. Cotton must be the chosen instrument on such an occasion, why did he not break the intelligence by degrees both to the condemned and the par- doned; and if the communication Was a mere formality, why was it not gone through in a mere formal way ? Why the.melodrame of bringing the prisoners together, the introduction of auditors, the mystification of looks and tones ? For no purpose, we honestly believe, whatever cloak of sentiment it may be wrapped up in, but to afford to low, busy, gossip- ing curiosity, a sight and an anecdote the more. .

There are, of course, many anecdotes in the pages of our contempo- raries respecting both those that have been executed and those that have been spared ; and but for the opening of Parliament, which has turned the public feeling into another channel, we doubt not we should have had as many ten times told. For our own part, we do not think we should do well to devote any greater space to such details of atrocity than the above brief narrative and the subjoined confessions occupy. In fact, unless in the aggravated and peculiar nature of their crimes, the two wretched sufferers of Monday differed in no respect from the general character of London ruffians. Idle, drunken, sensual, they possessed, in their dis- like of regulated industry, and in their thirst for physical enjoyments, no other than the ordinary materials out of which the circumstances of a great metropolis, abounding in temptation are in the every-day habit of fabricating candidates, as the Judge and may be inclined, for New Holland or the gallows.

The following are the Confessions.

" Netvgate, Dec. 4.

6` I, John Bishop. do hereby declare and confess that the boy supposed to be the Italian boy was a Lincolnshire boy. I and Williams took him to my house about half-past ten o'clock on the Thursday night, the 3d of November, from the Bell. in Smithfield. He walked home with us. Williams promised to give him some work- Williams went with him from the Bell to the Old Bailey watering-house, whilst I went to the Fortune of War. Williams came from the Old Bailey watering-house to the Fortune of War for me, leaving the boy standing at the corner of the court by the watering-house in the Old Bailey. I went directly with Williams to the boy, and we walked then all three to Nova Scotia Gardens, taking a pint of stout at a public-house near Holywell Lane, Shoreditch, on our way, of which we gave the boy a part ; we only stayed just to drink it, and walked on to my house, where we arrived at about eleven o'clock. My wife and children and Mrs. Williams were not gone to bed, so we put him In the privy, and told him to wait there for us. Williams wen,t in and told them to go to bed, and I stayed in the garden. Williams came out directly, and we both walked out of the garden a little way to give time for the family getting to bed ; we returned In about ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, and listened outside at the window to ascertain whether the family were gone to bed. All was quiet, and we then went to the boy in the privy, and took him into the house ; we lighted a candle, and gave the boy sorne,bread and cheese, and after he had eaten, we gave him a cup full of rum, with about half a small phial of laudanum In it. (I had bought the rum the same evening at the Three Tons, in Smithfield, and the laudanum also in small quantities at different shops.) There was no water or other liquid put in the cup with the rum and laudanum. The boy drank the con- tents of the cup directly in two draughts, and afterwards a little beer. In about ten minutes he fell asleep on the chair on which he sat, and I removed him from the chair to the floor, and laid him on his side. We then went out and left him there. We had a quartern of gin and a pint of beer at the Feathers, near Shore- ditch church, and then went home again, having been away from the boy about twenty minutes. We found him asleep as we had left him. We took him directly, asleep and insensible, into the garden, and tied a cord to his feet to enable us to pull him up by, and I then took him in my arms, and let him slide from them headlong into the well in the garden, whilst Williams held the cord to prevent the body going altogether too low in the well. He was nearly wholly in the water of the well—his feet just above the surface. Williams fastened the other end of the cord round the paling, to prevent the body getting beyond our reach. The boy struggled a little with his arms and legs in the water, and the water bubbled for a minute. We waited till these symptoms were past, and then went in doors, and afterwards I think we went out, and walked down Shoreditch to occupy the time, and in about three-quarters of an hour we returned and took him out of the well, by pulling him by the cord attached to his feet : we undressed him in the paved yard, rolled his clothes up, and buried them where they were found by the witness who produced them. We carried the boy into the washhouse, laid hint on the floor, and covered him over with a bag. We left him there, and went and had some coffee in Old Street Road, and then (a little before two in the morning of Friday) went back to my house. We immediately doubled the body up, and put it into a box, which we corded, so that nobody might open it to see what was in it, and then went again, and had some more coffee at the same place in Old Street Road, where we stayed a little while, and then went home to bed—both in the same house, and to our own beds, as usual. We slept till about ten o'clock on Friday morning, when we got up, took breakfast together with the family, and then went both of us to !Smithfield to the Fortune of War. We had something to eat and drink there, and after we had been there about half an hour May came in. I knew May, but had not seen him for about a fortnight before. He had some rum with me at the bar. Williams remain- ing In the tap-room. May and I went to the door ; I had a smockfrock on, and May asked me where I had bought it ; I told him 'in Field Lane ;' he said he wanted to buy one, and asked me to go with hint ; I went with him to Field Lane, where he bought a frock at the corner shop; we then went into a clothes-shop in West Street to buy a pair of breeches, but May could not agree about the price ; May was rather In liquor, and sent out for some rum, which we and the woman in the shop drank together ; May said he would treat her because he had given her a good deal of trouble for nothing. We then returned to the Fortune of War, and joined V. ii- llama, and had something more to drink ; we waited there a short time, and then Williams and I went to the West End of the town, leaving May at the Fortune of War. Williams and I went to Ur. Tuson's, in Windmill Street, where I saw Mr. Tuson, and offered to sell him a subject, meaning the boy we had left at home. He said he had waited sb long for a subject which I had before undertaken to procure, that he had been obliged to buy one the day before. We went from there to Mr. Carpue's, in Dean Street. and offered it to him in the Lecture-room with other gen- tlemen: they asked me if it was fresh ; I told them yes ; they told me to wait. I asked them ten guineas ; and, after waiting a little, a gentleman there said they would give eight guineas, which I agreed to take, and engaged to carry it there the next morning at ten o'clock. I and Williams then returned to the Fortune of V. we found May in the tap-room: this was about a quarter before fonr o'clock in the afternoon ; we had something to drink again, and I called May out to the outside of the house, and asked what was the best price given for things'— he said he had sold two the day before for ten guineas each, I think. I told him I'had a subject ; he asked what sort of one ; I said, a boy about fourteen years old, and that I had been offered eight guineas for it ; he sald if It was his, he would not take it ; he could sell it where he sold his for more. I told him that all he could get above nine guineas he might have for himself; we agreed to go pre- sently and get a coach. I and May then went to the bar, had something more to drink ; and then, leaving Williams at the Fortune of War, we went and tried to hire a cab in the Old Bailey ; the cab-man was at tea at the watering-house, and we went in and spoke to him about a fare, and had also tea there ourselves. Whilst we were at tea, the cab-driver went away, and we found him gone from the stand when we came out; we then went to Bridge Street, Blackfriars, and asked a coachman if he would take such a fare as we wanted ; he refused, and We then 'went to Farling- don Street, where we engaged a yellow chariot. I and May got in, drove to the Fortune of War, and (Williams joining us by the George, in the Old Bailey, on our way) at the Fortune of War we drank something again, and then (about six o'clock) we all three went in the chariot to Nova Scotia Gardens; we went into the wash- house, where I uncorded the trunk, and showed May the body. He asked How are the teeth 19 I said I had not looked at them. Williams went and fetched a brad-awl from the house, and May took it and forced the teeth out it is the constant practice to take the teeth out first, because, if the body be lost, the teeth are saved. After the teeth were taken out, we put the body in a bag and took it to the chariot; May and I carried the body, and Williams got first into the coach, and then assisted in pulling the body in : we all then drove off to Guy's Hospital, where we saw Mr. Davis, and offered to sell the body to him ; he refused, saying that he had bought two the day before of May. I asked him to let us leave It there till the next morning ; he consented, and we pat it in a little room, the door or which Mr. Davis locked. 'Williams was, during this, left with the chariot ; I told Mr. Davis not to let the sub- ject go to any body unless I was there, for itbelonged to me, and May also told him not to let it go unless he was present, or else he should be money out of pocket; I understood this to mean the money paid by May for our teas at the Old Bailey (about four shillings) and the coach fare, which we had agreed with the coachman should be ten shillings. May had no other interest or right to the money to be ob- tained for the body, except for such payment, and for what he could get above nine guineas, as I had promised him. May paid the coachman ten shillings on our leav- ing the hospital; but before we discharged the coach, May and I ran to Mr. Appleton, at Mr. Grainger's school, leaving Williams with the coach. We offered the subject to Mr. Appleton, but he declined to buy it ; and May and I then joined Williams, discharged the coach, and went to a public-house close by, and had something to drink ' After this, we got into a coach in the Borough, and drove again to the Fortune of War, ,;here we hail somethingmore to drink ; this wasubout eight o'clock in the evening. We all three stayed there about one hour, and then went out, got a coach in Smithfield, and went towards Old Street Road, stopped in Golden Lane with the coach, and drank something, and then on to Oid Street. At the corner of Old Street (the Star corner) May got out of the coach and said he was going home, and I and Williams drove to the corner of Union Street, Kingsland Road, where we got out and paid the coach-fare out of money lent us by May (he having advanced to each of us three shillings). We then walked home, and went to bed that night as nasal. We had agreed with May on his leaving us to meet him at Guy's Huspital at nine o'clock the nett morning (Saturday). I and Williams n-ent at &gilt o'clock on Saturday morning to the Fortune of War, where we met Shields, the porter, and engaged him to go with us over the water to carry a subject. I asked him to go to St. Bartholomew's Hospital for a hamper which I had seen there ; he refused, and I fetched it myself. We had a pint of beer there ; and I, and Wil- liams, and Shields, went to Guy's Hospital, Shields carrying the hamper. We met May there ; Williams and Shields went to a public-house, whilst I and May went to Mr. Appleton, and offered him the subject again. He again refused to buy it, stating that he did not want it. May and I then joined Shields and Williams, and had some drink, and then left them again, crossed the water in a boat to the King's College, whereave inquired of Mr. Hill, the porter, if he wanted a subject ; he said he was not particularly in want, but would speak to Mr.Partridge, the demonstrator. Mr. Partridge came, and asked what the subject was. May said, 'a male subject.' Mr. Partridge asked the price. May said, Twelve guineas.' Mr. Partridge said he could not give so much, and went away. Mr. Hill asked us to stay a few minutes whilst he went after Mr. Partridge, to speak to him again. Hill returned, and said Mr. Partridge would give nine guineas. May said, 'lie would be d—d if it should go under ten guineas.' He was in liquor, and on his moving a little way off, I took the opportunity of saying to Hill that he should come in at nine guineas. I told May, directly after, that I had sold it for nine guineas, and that I would out of it pay him what I hail of him, and give him something besides. We then got into a cabriolet, and went back to Williams and Shields, at the public-house, where all four had some beefsteaks and beer ; and afterwards went to Guy's Hospital, packed the body in the hamper, and put it on to Shields's head, telling him to take it to the King's Col- leee, where he went, Williams and Shields walking, and I and May riding part of the way in a cab. On reaching the King's College we carried the body into the theatre, and then into a little room, where we took the body out. Mr. Hill looked at it, and asked what it died of. May answered that he did not know, and it did concern him. Mr. Hill asked how a cut, which was on the forehead, came. I told hint that it was done by May throwing it out of the sack on the stones ; which was thedruth. Hill told us to remain in the other room, and he would bring in the money. We went into the other room and waited for sometime, when Mr. Partridge came to us, and showed me a 50I. note, and said he must go and get it changed, for he had not sufficient money without ; and he pulled out his purse, and counted three or four sovereigns. I said he might let us have that, and he could give us the re- mailider on Monday. He said no, he would rather pay it altogether, and went away. We waited some time, when the police-officers came, and took us into custody. "Witness, Robert Ellis." "JOHN BISUOP."

"I declare that this statement is all true, and contains all the facts as far as I can recollect. May knew nothing of the murder, and I do not believe he suspected that I had got the body except in the usual way, and after the death of it. I always told him that I got it from the ground, and he never knew to the contrary until I confessed to Mr. Williams since the trial. I have known May as a body-snatcher four.or five years, bat I do not believe be ever obtained a body except in the com- mon course of men in that calling, by stealing from the graves. I also confess that I and Williams were concerned in the murder of a female whom I believe to have been since discovered to be Fanny Pigburn, on or about the 9th of October last. I and Williams saw her sitting, about eleven or twelve o'clock at night, on the step of a door in Shoreditch, near the church. She bad a child four or five years old with her, on her lap. I asked why she was sitting there. She said she had no home to go to, for her landlord had turned her out into the street. I told her that she might go home with us, and sit by the fire all night; she said she would go with us, and she walked with us to my house, in Nova Scotia Gardens, tarrying her child with her. When we got there, we found the family abed, and we took the woman in and lighted a fire, by which we all sat down to- gether. I went nut for beer, and we all partook of beer and rum (I had brought the runt from Smithfield in my pocket): the woman and her child lay down on some dirty linen on the floor, and I and Williams went to bed : about six o'clock next morning I and Williams told her to go away, and to meet us at the London Appren- tice, in Old Street Road, at one o'clock ; this was before our families were up : she met us ;wain at one o'clock at the London Apprentice, without her child; we gave her some halfpence and beer, and desired her to meet us again at ten o'clock at night at the same place; after this we bought rum and laudanum at different places, and at ten o'clock we met the woman again at the London Apprentice ; she had no child with lier ; we drank three pints of beer between us there, and stayed there about an hour. We should have stayed there longer, but an old man came in, whom the woman said she knew, and she said she did not like him to see her there with any body ; we therefore all went out; it rained hard, and we took shelter under a door- way in the Hackney Road for about half an hour. We then walked to Nova Scotia Gardens ; and Williams and I led her into No. 2, an empty house, adjoining my house. We had no light. Williams stepped out into the garden with the rum and laudanum, which I had handed to him ; he there mixed them together in a half- pint bottle, and came into the house to me and the woman, and gave her the bottle to drink ; she drank the whole at two or three draughts; there was a quartern of rum, and about half a phial of laudanum ; she sat down on the step between two rooms in the house, and went off to sleep in about ten minutes. She was falling hack; I caught her to save her fall, and she lay back on the floor. Then Williams and I 'went to a public-house, got something to drink, and in about half an hour came back to the woman; we took her cloak off, tied a cord to her feet, carried her to the well in the garden, and thrust her into it headlong; she struggled very little after- wards, and the water bubbled a little at the top ; we fastened the cord to the palings to prevent her going down beyond our reach, and left her and took a walk to Shoreditch and back in about half an hour ; we left the woman in the well for this length of time that the rum and laudanum might run out of the body at the mouth; on our return we took her out of the well, cut her Clothes off, put them down the privy of the empty house, carried the body into the wash-house of my own house, where we doubled it up and put it into a hair-box, which we corded, and left it there. We did not go to bed, hut went to Shields's house in Eagle Street, Red Lion Square, and called him up ; this was between four and five o'clock in the morning ; we then went with Shields to a public.house near the Sessions House, Clerkenwell, and bad sonic gin, and from thence to my house, where we went in and stayed a little while to wait the change of the police. I told Shields he was to carry that trunk to St. Thomas's Hospital. He asked if there was a woman in the house who could walk alongside of him, so that people might not take any notice. Williams called his Wife up, and asked her to walk with Shields, and to Carry the hat-box which he gave her to carry. There was nothing in it, but it was ilea up as if there were. We then put the box with the body on Shields's head, and went tothe Hospital, Shields and Mrs. Williams walking on one side the street, and I and Williams on the other. At St. Thomas's Hospital I saw Mr. South's footman, and sent him up stairs to Mr. South to ask if he wanted a subject. The footman brought me Word that his master wanted one, but could not give an answer till the next day, as he had not time to look at it. During this interview, Shields, Williams, and his wife were waiting at a public-house. I then went alone to Mr. Appleton, at Mr. Grainger's, and agreed to sell it to him for eight guineas, and afterwards I fetched it from St. Thomas's Hos- pital and took it to Mr. Appleton, who paid me 5/. then, and the rest on the fol- lowing Monday. After receiving the 5/. I went to Shields and Williams and his wife at the public-house, where I paid Shields 10s. for his trouble, and we then all went to the Flower Pot, in Bishopsgate, where we had something to drink, and then went home. I never saw the woman's child after the first time before-mentioned. She said she had left the child with the person she had taken some of her things to, before her landlord took her goods. The woman murdered did not tell us her name ; she said her age was thirty-tive, I think, and that her husband, before he died, was a cabinet-maker. She was thin, rather tall, and very mach marked with the small-pox. I also confess the murder of a boy who told us his name was Cun- ningham. It was a fortnight after the murder of the woman. I and Williams found him sleeping about eleven or twelve o'clock at night, on Friday the 21st of Octo- ber, as I think, under the pig-boards in the pig-market at Smithfield. Williarriff woke him. and asked him to conic along with him (Williams). and the boy walked with Williams and me to my house in Nova Scotia Gardens. We took him into my house, and gave him some warm beer, sweetened with sugar, with rum and laudanum in it. He drank two or three cups full, and then fell asleep in a little chair belonging to one of my children. We laid him on the floor, and went out for a lone while and got something to drink, and then returned, carried the boy to the well, and threw him into it, in the same way as we had served the other boy and the woman. He died instantly in the well, and we left hint there a little while, to give time for the mixtures we had give him to run out of the body. We then took the body from the well, took off the clothes in the garden, and buried them there. The body' we carried into the washhouse, and put it into the same box, and left it there till the next evening, when we got a porter to carry it with us to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where I sold it to Mr. Smith for eight guineas. This boy was about ten or eleven years old, said his mother lived in Kent Street, and that he had not been home for a twelve- month and better. I solemnly declare that these are all the murders in which I have been concerned, or that I know any thing of; that I and Williams were alone concerned in these, and that no other person whatever knew any thing about either of them ; and that I do not know whether there are others who practise the same mode of obtaining bodies for sale. I know nothing of any Italian boy, and was never concerned in, or knew of, the murder of such a boy. There have beea no white mice about my house for the last six months. My son, about eight months ago, bought two mice, and I made him a cage for them. It was flat, with wires at the top. They lived about two months, and were killed, I think, by a cat in the garden, where they got out of the cage. They were frequently seen running in the garden, and used to hide in a hole under the privy. I and my wife and chil- dren saw one of them killed by a cat in the garden whilst we were at tea. Until the transactions before set forth, I never was concerned in obtaining a subject by destruction of the living. I have followed the course of obtaining a livelihood as a body-snatcher for twelveyears, and have obtained and sold, I think. from 500 to 1,000 bodies ; but I declare. before God, that they were all obtained after death, and that, with the above exceptions, I am ignorant of any murder for that or any other purpose. JOUN Brsaur." "Witness, ROBERT Echis, Under-Sheriff."

"I, Thomas Head, alias Williams. now under sentence of death in Newgate, do solemnly confess and declare the foregoing statement and confession of John Bishop, which has been made in my presence, and since read over to me distinctly, is altogether true, so far as the same relates to me. I declare that I was never con- cerned in or privy to any other transaction of the like nature—that I never knew any thing of the murder of any other person whatever—that I was never a body- snatcher or concerned in the sale of any other body than the three murdered by Bi- shop and myself—that Slay was a stranger to me, and I had never seen him inure than once or twice before Friday, the 4th of November last—and that May was wholly innocent and ignorant of any of those murders in which I was concerned, and for one of which I am about to suffer death.

"Witness, R. ELLIS. "THOMAS READ." " Newgate, Dec. 4, 1831."

" The above coufessions taken literally, from the prisoners, in our presence, "T. Wo on, R. Emas, Under-Sheriffs."' The Jury, it must be observed, by their general verdict of guilty, brought the case of the criminals under either or both counts of the in- dictment. Had they found on the first only, which charged them with the murder of the Italian boy, the Home Secretary would have been placed in a strait. If he believe the criminals, he could not help ac- knowledging that they were about to suffer for a crime of which theyhad not been convicted ; if he did not believe them, then the participation of May in their crimes remained as doubtful as ever it was, and the confessions made out no case for the further consideration of his sentence. We have already stated, that we do not believe the confessions to be either true or complete. The fact of an Italian boy being seen by four distinct witnesses close to Bishop's house on the day of the murder—the identity of the n-earing apparel, proved by as many more—to say no- thing of the white mice, the evidence as to the identity of the body, and the medical opinions as to the cause of death—are only met in the con- fessions by a direct contradiction ; and there can be small doubt, in such a conflict of evidence, to which side we must perforce lean. Nor should the evident desire of the prisoners to exculpate the females be forgotten. Yet, if they had admitted the body to be that of the Italian (allured as be must have been to the hovel, in all probability, by two o'clock in the day), there could have been little moral doubt as to their knowledge of the deed. Nothing but the reappearance of the boy Ferrari will con- vince the public that he has not fallen a victim to the gang as well as the rest.

From a note addressed to the Times yesterday by Sir John Sewell, it would appear that Bishop made a second confession on Sunday, of not less than sixty murders ; and that he was going on with his declaration to the Rev. Mr. Williams, when it was interrupted by the entrance of the superlatively curious Dr. Cotton. The criminal immediately stopped in his narrative, nor could any inducement prevail on him to resume it ; so that both Dr. Cotton and the public remain equally in the dark as to what he might have further disclosed but for the intrusion of the former. Is there no Nen-gate by-law, under which, in cases where any thing of importance is going forward, the Reverend Doctor could be confined— not to a cell, of course but to a chamber ? We never read of any transac- tion within the gaol that we do not find him in the way. Mr. Corder, attended by Peragalli and Colla, two Italian witnesses examined at the trial of the murderers appeared at Bow Street on Thursday, for the purpose of reiterating their statement respecting the identity of the body found, with the missing Italian boy, notwithstand- ing the denial contained in the confession. Both the witnesses ex pressed themselves fully satisfied of the correctness of the evidence they had given.

SUPPOSED CASE OF BERKING.—On Saturday last, the body of a little girl, aged six years, was found in an outhouse in C,owheel Court, .Bar-

him, under circumstances whiclt led to the conclusion that she had been murdered with a view to make a subject of the body. The body was-discovered by another little girl belonging to the same court, who accidentally trod on it. An inquest was hell on the body on Tuesday; when a boy named Newton, whom the screams of the child who trod

on the body had attracted, was examined. He swore to two persons, a

man and a woman, having hoist from the place where the body lay, and having pushed against him and put out a light he held in his hand. A woman named Calkin whose account of herself has been contradicted in several particulars, and in whose company the child was last seen, is in custody ; but the boy could not state whether she was the person who rushed out upon him or not.

CHARGE OF BURKING.—A painter and glazier, named Thomas Loyd, who was accused of having made away with Isis wife, was reexamined at

Hatton Garden on Tuesday. A witness, who knew the woman, came

forward and swore that he saw and conversed with her only five days before and subsequent to Loyd's being apprehended. The mother of the woman insisted, notwithstanding, that her daughter had been Burked by her husband; but the Magistrates were, luckily for him, not so hard of belief. He was discharged. MAGISTERIAL DISCRETION.—William Burns, said to be a grandson of the celebrated poet, was charged before Mr. Dyer of the Marlborough

Street office, on Tuesday, with putting a pitch plaster on a little boy's mouth, and thereby alarming the little boy. The offence was committed in Walker's Court, Berwick Street. Burns said he was tarring sacks for his master all day, and was teased and interrupted by the boys who came round him; he stuck the bit of tarred canvas on the boy's face, merely to get rid of him and his companions. Mr. Dyer fined him five shillings ; observing, that" he was disposed to believe the defendant had no seriously bad motive ; but, even admitting that he merely intended to play off a joke, such practical jokes, at a time like the present, were calculated to produce the most serious alarm."

SUEJEC Ts.—A body, which had been sent to St. Bartholomew's Hos- pital, was submitted on Thursday tO a coroner's inquest, in consequence of its exhibiting a longitudinal cut from the neck to near the knee, and from the demonstrator hesitating, in the present excited state of public feeling, to expose a body in such a state on his dissecting:table. The most satisfactory evidence was given that the cut in question had been made after death,—the witnesses supposed, by the resurrectionist's hook, by which the body was pulled out of the coffin. It was more likely to be effected by an accidental nail in the lid of the coffin. The Jury found a verdict of natural.death ; and the coroner, Mr. William Payne, after declaring "that be would admit of no dictation contrary to what he considered his duty to do in in the case," issued his warrant to the churchwardens of the parish to bury the body It is quite evi- dent that Barking must go on, for any thing less than the Barking of some score of them will never beat reason into the heads of those from whom the public ought to receive instruction and example. MRS. WALSH.—Cooke and his partner were re-examined on Thursday. Several witnesses gave evidence which went to charge Ross, the female, with selling a shawl, a bonnet, and some stay-laces and other small arti- cles, in which the missing person is known to have dealt. Ross repeated her assertion, that money had been given to her son, for the purpose of inducing him to swear as he did ; and that he had sent part of it to her in prison. She expressed great indignation against the witnesses, parti- cularly Button, the granddaughter of Mrs. Walsh. The prisoners are to be again examined on the 22nd. ANOTHER MISSING FEMALE.—A decent and respectable female, named s Sarah Barton, left her friends in Lower Clapham Street, St. George's in the last, on the 23rd November last, in order to pay a visit to an aunt at Bayswater ; and from that day no tidings have been heard of her. She. had been witness in a case in which a man named Bryant was ac- cused of stealing thirty sovereigns from a Captain Tomlinson; and Bryant, it is alleged, had been afterwards heard to say he would murder hen for the evidence she had given. Bryant was examined before Mr. Broderip, at the Thames Police-office, on Thursday ; but nothing was elicited. He was remanded. 7 FITS AND BURKING.—A young woman was seized with a most terrific fit near Cornhill, on Tuesday; and as it appeared to a constable to be somewhat uncommon, he took her to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where two: young surgeons soon discovered the fit was feigned. They imme- diately desired all persons, in a solemn voice, to quit the room. On this taking place, one said to the other, "Jack, she can't recover : this is just the sort of subject we want : let's put her into the surgery and Burke her." The sick female immediately became convalescent, and jumped from the bed on which she was lying, and said with an oath, "You thieves, I thought what you were going to do to me all the time ; but I'm blessed if you shall have my body—Murder, murder !" SINOULA R TREASURE TROVE.—Yesterday afternoon, some bricklayers at work on the roof of a house in Burton Crescent, found a human hand. It was brown, dried, and shrivelled, and had the appearance of having been cut off by the wrist. The inspector of police produced it at Hatton Garden Police-office, and was directed by the .31agistrate to take care of it until some further examination was made. The people of the house were not a little alarmed and amazed by the discovery ; they are stated to be perfectly respectable.