Buckingham was staying at a Portsmouth inn--the "Spotted Dog," in High Street--long since demolished. Access to him was easy, among the number who waited upon his favours, and so Felton experienced no difficulty in approaching within easy striking distance. The Duke had left his dressing-room to proceed to his carriage on a visit to the King at Porchester, when, in the hall of the inn, Colonel Friar, one of his intimates, whispered a word in his ear. He turned to listen, and was instantly stabbed by Felton, receiving a deep wound in the left breast; the knife sticking in his heart. Exclaiming "Villain!" he plucked it out, staggered backwards, and falling against a table, was caught in the arms of his attendants, dying almost immediately. No one saw the blow struck, and the cry was raised that it was the work of a Frenchman; but Felton, who had coolly walked from the room, returned, and with equal composure declared himself to be the man. Thus died the gay and profligate Buckingham, in the thirty-seventh year of his age. Surrounded by his friends, his Duchess in an upper room, he was struck down as surely as though his assailant had met him solitary and alone. Within the space of a few minutes from his falling dead and the removal of his body into an adjoining room, the place was deserted. The very horror of the sudden deed left no room for curiosity. The house, awhile before filled with servants and sycophants, was left in silence. Many were found to admire and extol Felton and his deed. "God bless thee, little David," said the country folk, crowding to shake his hand as he was conveyed back to London for his trial. "Excellent Felton!" said many decent people in London; and tried to prevent the only possible ending to his career. That end came at Tyburn, where, we are told, "he testified much repentance, and so took his death very stoutly and patiently. He was very long a-dying. His body is gone to Portsmouth, there to be hanged in chains." VI [Sidenote: _JOHN WESLEY_] Among the memorable passengers along the Portsmouth Road in other days who have left any record of their journeys is "that strenuous and painful preacher," the Rev. John Wesley, D.D. On the fifth day of October, 1753, he left the "humane, loving people" of Cowes, "and crossed over to Portsmouth." Here he "found another kind of people" from the complaisant inhabitants of the Isle of Wight. They had, unlike the Cowes people, none of the milk of human kindness in their breasts, or if they possessed any, it had all curdled, for they had "disputed themselves out of the power, and well-nigh the form of religion," as Wesley remarks in his "Journals." So, after the third day among these backsliders and curdled Christians, he shook the dust of Portsmouth (if there was any to shake in October) off his shoes, and departed, riding on horseback to "Godalmin."