calling me as he used by the name of Bell, told me he should die, and bid me shift for myself. He died on Saturday following, and I presently hastened to a port, almost a day's journey distant, when I addressed myself to two men, who came out of a ship belonging to Hamburgh, which, as they said, was bound for Portugal within two or three days.

I inquired of them for an English ship; they answered there was none. I intreated them to take me into their ship; but they durst not for fear of being discovered by the searchers, which might occasion the forfeiture, not only of their goods, but also of their lives. At length they took me on board, and placed me below in the vessel, and hid me with boards and other things, so that I lay undiscovered, notwithstanding the strict search that was made in the vessel. On arriving at Lisbon, in Portugal, as soon as the master had left the ship, and was gone into the city, they set me on shore moneyless, to shift for myself. I now met four gentlemen discoursing together; after a while, one of them came to me, and spoke to me in a foreign language. I told him I was an Englishman. He then spoke to me in English, and told me that he was an Englishman himself, and born near Wisbeach, in Lincolnshire. I then related to him how I had been carried away, and my present condition; upon which he took me along with him, and by his interest with the master of a ship bound for England, procured my passage, and commended me to the master of the ship, who landed me safe at Dover, from whence I proceeded to London, where, being furnished with necessaries, I came into the country.. Having arrived at Crowland, I was told of the unhappy fate of my servant Perry, and his mother and brother; what caused John so falsely to accuse them and himself I know not. He has not only brought his blood upon his

own head, but that also of his innocent mother and brother. For I never saw either of them that evening, nor do I know who they were that carried me away after that rude and barbarous manner.

Thus, honored Sir, I have given you a true account of my great sufferings and happy deliverance.

Your Worship's, in all dutiful respects,

WILLIAM HARRISON.

In account of this affair of the Perry's, published by one Rowland Reynolds, a bookseller in the Strand, in 1676, occur the following observations :

'Many question the truth of this account Mr. Harrison gives of himself and his transportation, believing he was never out of England. But there is no question of Perry's telling a formal false story to hang himself, his mother, and his brother; and since this, of which we are assured, is no less incredible than that of which we doubt, it may induce us to suspend hard thoughts of Mr. Harrison, till time, the great discoverer of truth, shall bring to light this dark and mysterious business. That Mr. Harrison was absent from his habitation, employment, and relations, near two years, is certain, and if not carried away (as he affirms) no probable reason can be given for his absence; he living plentifully and happily in the service of that honorable family, to which he had been then related above fifty years, with the reputation of a just and faithful servant; and having all his days been a man of sober life and conversation, cannot now reasonably be thought in his old age, so far to have misbehaved himself, as in such a manner voluntarily to have forsaken his wife, his children, and his stewardship, and to leave behind him (as he

then did) a considerable sum of his lady's money in his house. We cannot, therefore, in reason or charity, but believe that Mr. Harrison was forcibly carried away; but by whom, or by whose procurement, is the question. Those whom he affirms did it, he withal affirms never before to have seen; and that he saw not his servant Perry, nor his mother, nor his brother, the evening he was carried away; that he was spirited (as some are said to have been) is no ways probable, in respect he was an old and infirm man, and taken from the most inland part of the nation; and if sold, as himself apprehends he was, for £7, it would not recompense the trouble and charge of his conveyance to the sea-side. Some, therefore, have had hard thoughts of his eldest son, not knowing whom else to suspect, and believe the hope of the stewardship, which he afterwards (by the Lord Campden's favor) enjoyed, might induce him to contrive his father's removal, and this they are the more confirmed in, from his misbehavior in it. But, on the other side, it is hard to think the son should be knowing of his father's transportation, and, consequently, of these unhappy persons' innocency as to the murder of him, and yet prosecute them to the death, as he did, and when condemned, should be the occasion of their being conveyed above twenty miles, to suffer near Campden, and to procure John Perry, to be there hanged in chains, where he might daily see him, and himself to stand at the foot of the ladder, when they were all executed, as likewise he did.

"These considerations, as they make it improbable the son should be privy to his father's transportation, so they render the whole matter the more dark and mysterious, which we must therefore leave unto Him who alone knoweth all things, in his due time to reveal and bring to light."

More than one hundred and seventy years have passed since the above remarks were written, yet no further revelation has cleared up this mysterious tale. The very story itself would, most probably, have, by this, set in oblivion, but that it stands, in our criminal annals, a landmark, to show how courts and ministers of justice, however abie, may now and then pe most fatally deceived and misled.

A MURDER IN THE TIME OF THE CRUSADES.

THERE is, perhaps, no country or climate more beautiful than England, as seen in one of its rural landscapes, when the sun has just risen upon a cloudless summer's dawn. The very feeling that the delightful freshness of the moment will not be entirely destroyed during the whole day, renders the prospect more agreeable than the anticipated fiery advance of the sun in southern or tropical lands. Exhilaration and gladness are the marked characteristics of an English summer morning. So it ever is, and so it was hundreds of years ago, when occurred the events we are about to narrate. How lovely then, on such a morning as we allude to, looked that rich vale in the centre of Gloucestershire, through which the lordly Severn flows! The singing of the birds, the reflective splendor of the silvery waters, the glittering of the dew as it dazzled and disappeared-all combined to charm sound, sight, and sense, and to produce a strong feeling of joy. But the horseman, who was passing through this graceful scene, scarcely needed the aid of any external object to enhance the pleasurable sensation that already filled his breast. The stately horse on which he sat, seemed, by its light steps, and by ever and anon proudly prancing, to share in the animation. of its rider. So, the noble stag-hound that followed, and continually looked up contentedly at its master, appeared, likewise, a participator in the general content. The stranger