+-------------------------------------------------+ |Transcriber’s note: | | | |Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | | | +-------------------------------------------------+ [Illustration: ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD] AN AUTHENTIC HISTORY OF THE CATO-STREET CONSPIRACY; WITH THE TRIALS AT LARGE _OF THE CONSPIRATORS_, FOR High Treason and Murder; A DESCRIPTION OF THEIR WEAPONS AND COMBUSTIBLE MACHINES, AND EVERY PARTICULAR CONNECTED WITH THE RISE, PROGRESS, DISCOVERY, AND TERMINATION OF THE HORRID PLOT. _With Portraits of all the Conspirators, taken during their Trials, by Permission, and other Engravings._ [Illustration] BY GEORGE THEODORE WILKINSON, ESQ. EDITOR OF THE NEW NEWGATE CALENDAR IMPROVED. LONDON: PRINTED FOR THOMAS KELLY, 17, PATERNOSTER-ROW, _And sold by all Booksellers in the United Kingdom_. PREFACE. To those, who are accustomed to look with an observant eye upon the causes which lead to the fall and destruction of nations, the present epoch offers materials for their most weighty consideration. They have seen their country involved in one of the most destructive and arduous contests ever recorded in its annals; they have seen the combined force of the civilized world directed against its very existence; they have witnessed its unexampled and glorious struggle; the loyalty and patriotism of the people, and finally they have beheld it, rising at the close of the contest, not subdued nor conquered, but towering with renovated fame and lustre, and scattering to their loathsome dens the dark demons of anarchy and ruin; they beheld the industrious artisan returning to the shuttle--the laborious peasant to the plough--the war-worn soldier was seated at his native hearth telling the story of his battles, and the weather-beaten sailor, in the fulness of his pride, was glorying in the wounds obtained in the defence of his country. Peace gave to the nation its blessings, and round the consecrated altars of our fathers knelt the children of this favoured land in grateful prayer to that God, who had gone forth with them in the day of battle; and who, in the wreck of surrounding kingdoms, had vouchsafed to spread over this his protecting hand. But, in the midst of these cheering prospects, the pestilential air of Atheism and Infidelity was raging abroad like the blasting heat of the Simoon in the desert, and throwing its sickening hue over the beautiful forms of Religion and Virtue. Men, if such an exalted name can be given them, who have openly thrown off all submission--all reverence--all duty and love to their God; who, in the most blasphemous manner, had reviled and denied their divine Redeemer, considered themselves enfranchised from every moral and religious duty, from allegiance to their earthly Sovereign and obedience to the laws of the country. In