William Hepworth Dixon, White Conquest: Volume 1

“ [107] baffled. The State whose laws you set at defiance, whose citizens you had ruthlessly murdered, aroused herself for retributive justice. The Commonwealth, with all her resources of men and treasure, was upon your track with tireless purpose and exhaustless means. She followed you in all your wanderings, and made of your vicious associates her most efficient instruments. In every camp that gave you shelter, her officers bartered for your surrender. In the confederates you trusted, she found the man ready to betray you. From such a pursuit there could be no escape, and you are here — here with the record of your lawless life well nigh ended, without one act of generosity or deed of even courage to relieve its utter depravity. The appeals you have made to your countrymen for aid in your present distress have met a response becoming them and befitting you. Shocked at your atrocities, they have neither aided you to escape the punishment merited nor pretended the sympathy you have sought to invoke. They have left you to answer alone at the bar of justice. With the memory of your many victims before you, and the dark shadow of an approaching gloom about you, indulge no ”