"'He's a game un,' I heard many a man say, and our fellows who had such hard work watching the Fenians by night and by day, had no hard feelings agin the brave fellow then. The women around the scaffold waved their handkerchiefs to him, you see, Sir, the women, bless them, are always up to such blessed games, and there was some man in the crowd when the rope was put around his neck, who wore a fur coat, and seemed like an American, who cried out as loud as he could-- "Good heart--Michael Barrett--this day. All is not lost while one drop of Irish blood remains." [Sidenote: THE PESTIFEROUS PRISON.] "I saw the man, and I made a jump for him with two of my pals, but the crowd opened and let him pass through,--it seemed a purpose like, and just then I heard a roar and a great convulsive sob, and the crowd pushed this way and crushed that way, almost smothering me, and I nearly fainted from the awful squeezing I got, and I picked up a little girl from atween my feet, and when I looked up Barrett's body was a swinging to and fro from a rope, and all was over, and believe me, Sir, I was glad of it when it was over." [Illustration: THE LAST EXECUTION AT NEWGATE.] It was high noon when I arrived at Newgate, and my visit was paid chiefly to that part of the prison devoted to the subsistence of the prisoners. I passed through the corridors and passages, and door after door, and hinge after hinge grated as I advanced with a companion. All around the prison are the high walls of the neighboring buildings, and attached to them are precipitous sheds with spikes to prevent the escape of prisoners who may succeed in getting as far as the yard. On top of the prison is a huge circular fan which revolves and gives ventilation to the interior of the jail. This improvement was the result of the labors of the great philanthropist John Howard. In the old days Newgate was a hell upon earth. During the Eighteenth century prisoners endured the tortures of the damned here. Jail birds were shackled to the floor to prevent their escape, and mouldy bread and stinking water was given them to drink until their stomachs loathed the appearance of food. Their beds were of stinking straw, the rain from the heavens dripped through the roof upon them, the frost and cold eat into their bones; they festered in dirt, disease, and destitution, till their limbs broke out in horrible blains, and ulcers and all kinds of agues and dysenteries swept down upon them. Then in this terrible state, after rotting for months awaiting a trial, they came into the dock at the Old Bailey with the jail fevers upon them to slay with the pestiferous miasma which exhaled from their bodies, judge, jury, and pettifogging attorneys.