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was hopeless; the streets were thick streams of humanity. Any vehicles that had been in the road had been firmly stopped and were now being used as perches from which the curious could see over the heads of others. Relentlessly the two men were pushed and shoved nearer to the river and the prison. Hawkers, seemingly impervious to the moving human mass, darted in and out shouting, "Penny sheet! John Robinson! Boldest rake of London! Read his life story! Penny sheet!"
    James shoved one persistent urchin who had grabbed his coat sleeve.
    "Buy a sheet, sir? Got his confession ... in his own words!" the urchin whined. "Penny, sir, penny sheet."
    From somewhere behind them a shrill, excited voice screamed, "It's 'is cart! 'E's comin'. The cart's comin'!"
    Men held children high on their shoulders, admonishing them to look carefully at the prisoner in the cart. "He came to no good. Look at the dirty animal, and remember what you see, boy."
    Women shouted at the highwayman bound and

    fighting to keep his balance in the slow, unevenly moving cart. Others threw flowers and themselves at the cart, begging the condemned man's favors before he died. Bottles passed from hand to hand and were emptied and smashed in the cobbled streets. The streets smelled of gin and rum and sweat and urine. People heated and steaming in the cold air pressed tightly against one another and tried to get a clear view of John Robinson. Some shouted their hatred, others their admiration. A chant went up to the right of James and Peter. "Johnny, Johnny, JohnnyI"
    With another mighty surge forward the crowd came in view of Newgate. James looked up at the solid gray stone walls of the enormous prison. In front of the wall was a scaffold. The cart bearing John Robinson on his last trip through London stopped in front of the wooden structure. The prisoner looked up at the hangman and began his ascent to the platform.
    James shuddered and clasped Peters arm without thinking. "I don't care to watch this," he said weakly. He began pushing the wall of people behind him.
    Fascinated and horrified, Peter stared at the man on the platform for several more seconds. The noose was placed around John Robinson's neck. With a disdainful, arrogant smile the man nodded to the crowd. His mouth puckered as he blew kisses to a group of yelling women at the foot of the scaffolding. Flowers were thrown to him. They made wilting little spots of color on the fresh wood of the platform.
    "Peter!" James said loudly. "Please. I can't watch this."
    Peter bowed his head. "No, neither can I." Leading the way, he forced a path for them through the crowd. The hawkers still hopped in and out among the people shouting the glories of their sheet and selling their wares.

    Peter and James were still close enough to hear the snap of the platform's trap door as the crowd was momentarily silenced. Then a great roar of human awe and perverted animal pleasure rose and gained deafening proportions. Unable to resist, Peter looked back. John Robinsons body wrenched and twisted grossly. The quartering of the man had begun. Again the crowd hushed with the first rush of blood, then rose to even greater frenzy.
    Peter felt the horror of fascination. James was nauseated. He wanted his son away from this place. Today the mere thought of such a death was more terrifying than James could bear. He couldn't stand to see or even think of the bits of hangman's rope being sold for souvenirs, or of the women who would battle and bargain for the dead man's clothing, later to be sold piece by piece and hung as gruesome reminders in someone's home.
    Finally they broke free of the crowd and emerged on a side street nearly empty of life, for it seemed that all of London was packed into that small network of streets near the river to watch a man die.
    They walked until James found a cab, then went to an inn. The George made James feel somewhat better. It had open galleries that led to the chambers, and gave James a feeling of