“On the 20th of February last, Richard Parsons, and three more men met at a private house at Chalford, in order to play at cards, about six o’clock in the evening. They played at loo till about eleven or twelve that night, when they changed their game to whist: after a few deals, a dispute arose about the state of the game. Parsons affirmed, with oaths, that they were six, which the others denied, upon which he wished ‘that he might never enter the kingdom of heaven, that his flesh might rot upon his bones, if they were not six in the game.’ These wishes were several times repeated, both then and afterwards. Upon this, the candle was put out by one James Young, a stander by, who says he was shocked with the oaths and expressions he heard; and that he put out the candle with a design to put an end to the game. “Presently, upon this, they adjourned to another house, and there began a fresh game, when Parsons and his partner had great success. Then they played at loo again till four in the morning. During this second playing, Parson complained to one Rolles, his partner, of a bad pain in his leg, which, from that time, increased. There was an appearance of a swelling, and, afterwards, the colour changing to that of a mortified state. On the following Sunday, he rode to Minchin Hampton, to get the advice of Mr Pegler, the surgeon in that town, who attended him from the Thursday after February 27. Notwithstanding all the applications that were made, the mortification increased, and showed itself in different parts of the body. On Monday, March 3, at the request of some of his female relations, the clergyman of Bisley attended him, and administered the sacrament, without any knowledge of what had happened before, and which he continued a stranger to, till he saw the account in the _Gloucester Journal_. Parsons appeared to be extremely ignorant of religion, having been accustomed to swear, to drink (though he was not in liquor when he uttered the above execrable wish), to game, and to profane the Sabbath, though he was only in his nineteenth year. After he had received the Sacrament, he appeared to have some sense of the ordinance; for he said, ‘Now I must never sin again; he hoped God would forgive him, having been wicked not above six years, and that, whatsoever should happen, he would not play at cards again.’