About three weeks after this they were passing down Drury Lane, and observing a gentleman going with one of the fine ladies of the Hundreds into a tavern thereabouts, one of the gang who knew him, and that he had married a lady with a great fortune to whom his father was guardian, and that they lived altogether in a great house near Lincoln's Inn Fields, immediately thought on a project. They slipped into an alehouse, where he wrote an epistle to the old gentleman, informing him that they had a warrant to apprehend a lewd woman who was with child by his son, but that she had made her escape, and was now actually with him at a certain tavern in Drury Lane, wherefore being apprehensive of disturbance, and being unwilling to disgrace his family, rather than take rougher methods, they had informed him, in order that by his interposition the affair might be made up. As soon as they had written this letter, they dispatched one of their number to carry it and deliver it, as if by mistake, to the young gentleman's wife. This had the desired effect, for in less than half an hour came the father, the wife, and another of her trustees, who happened to be paying a visit there when the letter came. They no sooner entered the tavern but hearing the voice of the gentleman they asked for, without ceremony they opened the door, and finding a woman there, all was believed, and there followed a mighty uproar. Two of the rogues who were best dressed, had slipped into the next room and called for half a pint. As if by accident they came out at the noise, and under pretence of enquiring the occasion, took the opportunity of picking the gentleman's pockets of twenty-five guineas, one gold watch, and two silver snuff-boxes, which it is to be presumed were never missed until the hurry of the affair was over. The last robbery Sperry committed was upon one Thomas Golding, not far from Bromley, who not having any money about him, Sperry endeavoured to make it up by taking all his clothes. Being apprehended for this, at the next sessions at the Old Bailey he was convicted for this offence, and having no friends, could not entertain the least hopes of pardon. From the time that he was convicted, and, indeed, from that of his commitment, he behaved like a person on the brink of another world, ingenuously confessing all his guilt, and acknowledging readily the justice of that sentence by which he was doomed to death. His behaviour was perfectly uniform, and as he never put on an air of contempt towards death, so, at its nearest approach he did not seem exceedingly terrified therewith, but with great calmness of mind prepared for his dissolution. On the day of his execution his countenance seemed rather more cheerful than ordinarily, and he left this world with all exterior signs of true penitence and contrition, on Monday, the 24th of May, 1725, at Tyburn, being then about twenty-three years of age. FOOTNOTES: