How Lawrence came to make such a drawing, and what induced so refined and dignified a person to interest himself in a subject so repulsive, it is difficult to understand. Although Lawrence had not then been elected to the presidency of the Royal Academy, he held a high position in society as the first portrait painter of his day. We give an illustration of the sketch in question which is quite authentic. [Illustration: JOHN WILLIAMS From a drawing made after he had committed suicide in prison by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A.] Until 1823 it was directed that the body of a suicide should be buried in a cross-road and have a stake driven through it, and there can be little doubt that that of Williams was thus treated. It was not, indeed, until 1882 that an Act was passed putting an end to this barbarous custom. This circumstance readily calls to mind Tom Hood’s description of the fate that befell Ben Battle, the victim of Faithless Nelly Gray: A dozen men sat on his corpse, To find out why he died-- And they buried Ben in four cross-roads, With a _stake_ in his inside! Of the characters that became, in course of time, suitable objects for the “Dead Room” we have neither the space nor the inclination to dwell upon, but a passing reference to two or three that helped to give the place its present distinctiveness may prove interesting. The hideous crimes perpetrated by Burke and Hare, to which slight reference has already been made, took place about the year 1828, and the memory of those crimes was still fresh in the mind of the public when we opened in Baker Street; indeed, a matter of six years could not suffice for its obliteration. The appalling revelation that it was not only possible, but easy, for one’s neighbour to be decoyed away, put to death, and his body sold, without question, for a sum varying from £8 to £14, aroused a feeling of consternation throughout the country of a very real and lasting character. The high prices paid for bodies required for dissection had begotten this terrible traffic. At least sixteen murders had been traced to these miscreants, but the evidence at the trial failed to answer the question “How many more?” Burke was executed in January, 1829, on the strength of Hare’s evidence, so that for nearly a century have the portrait-models of these two notorious criminals stood facing each other. There are to this day many visitors who, on catching sight of their forbidding features, seem to recognise them, and make ready comment, without the aid of a Catalogue, on the leading circumstances associated with their nefarious careers. [Illustration: BURKE AND HARE Both notorious criminals who perpetrated a series of gruesome murders in Scotland before 1828. These models from life by Madame Tussaud were among the first of contemporary criminals made by her for the famous “Chamber of Horrors,” then called the “Dead Room” or the “Black Room.”]