“There wa’n’t nothin’ more done for two or three days. I just stayed in my cell and didn’t feel much like talkin’ with anyone. Then my lawyer come over and said the motion for a new trial would be heard next day. In the mornin’ they han’cuffed me and took me back as usual. There was a lot of people in the courtroom, though not so many as before. My lawyer had a lot of books, and he talked a long while about the case, and told the judge he ought to give me a new trial on account of all the mistakes that was made before. And after he got done the judge said he’d thought of this case a great deal both by day and by night, and he’d tried to find a way not to sentence me to death, but he couldn’t do it, and the motion would be overruled. Then he said, ‘Jackson, stand up.’ Of course I got up, because he told me to. Then he looked at me awful savage and solemn and said, ‘Have you got anything to say why sentence should not be passed on you?’ and I said ‘No!’ Then he talked for a long time about how awful bad I was, and what a warnin’ I ought to be to ever’body else; and then he sentenced me to be removed to the county-jail and on Friday, the thirteenth day of this month—that’s today—to be hanged by the neck till dead, and then he said, ‘May God have mercy on your soul!’ After that he said, ‘Mr. Sheriff, remove the prisoner. Mr. Clerk, call the next case.’ And they han’-cuffed me and brought me back. “I don’t know why the judge said, ‘May God have mercy on your soul!’ I guess it was only a kind of form that they have to go through, and I don’t think he meant it, or even thought anything about it. If he had, I don’t see how he really could ask God to have mercy on me unless he could have mercy himself. The judge didn’t have to hang me unless he wanted to. “Well, the lawyer come in and told me he ought to appeal the case to the Supreme Court, but it would cost one hundred dollars for a record, and he didn’t know where to get the money. I told him I didn’t know either. Of course I hadn’t any and told him he might just as well let it go; that I didn’t s’pose it would do any good anyhow. But he said he’d see if he could find the money somehow and the next day he come in and said he was goin’ to give half out of his own pocket, and he’d seen another feller that didn’t want his name mentioned and that thought a man oughtn’t to be hung without a chance; he was goin’ to give the other half. Of course I felt better then, but still I thought there wa’n’t much chance, for ever’body was against me, but my lawyer told me there was a lot of mistakes and errors in the trial and I ought to win.