Ned Bratts

(Published in Dramatic Idyls , first series, 1879; written at Splügen.) The story is taken from The Life and Death of Mr. Badman , by John Bunyan, the author of the Pilgrim’s Progre , and published in London 1680. “At a Summer A izes holden at Hartfort, while the Judge was sitting upon the Bench, comes this old Tod into the Court, cloathed in a green suit, with a Leathern Girdle in his hand, his bosom open and all in a dung sweat, as if he had run for his Life; and being come in, he spake aloud as follows: ‘My Lord,’ said he, ‘Here is the veriest rogue that breathes upon the face of the earth. I have been a thief from a child; when I was but a little one I gave myself to rob orchards, and to do other such-like wicked things, and I have continued a thief ever since. My Lord, there has not been a robbery committed these many years, so many miles of this place, but I have either been at it, or privy to it.’ The Judge thought the fellow was mad, but after some conference with some of the Justices, they agreed to indict him; and so they did, of several felonious actions, to all which he heartily confe ed Guilty, and so was hanged with his wife at the same time.” In the poem, Ned Bratts , the scene is laid at Bedford. The a izes are held on a broiling day in June; the court-house is crammed; horse stealers, rogues, puritans and preachers are being tried and sentenced, when through the barriers there burst Publican Ned Bratts and Tabitha his wife, loudly confe ing they were the “worst couple, rogue and quean, unhanged,” and detailing the various high crimes and misdemeanours of which they had long been guilty. He tells of the laces they had bought of the Tinker in the Bedford cage, and of “His girl,—the blind young chit who hawks about his wares”; tells of the Book which the girl gave him, the Book her father wrote in prison, which told of “Christmas” [he meant “Christian”]. “Christmas was meant for me,” he says,—he must get rid of his burden and hurry from “Destruction,” which to him is Bedford town. So fearful are the converted couple that they will fall again into their old sins, and so mi Heaven’s gate, they beg the judges to “Sentence our guilty selves; so, hang us out of hand!” Ned sank upon his knees in the old court-house, while his wife Tab wheezed a hoarse “Do hang us, please!” The Lord Chief Justice wondered what judge ever had such a case before him since the world began, and having thought the matter over, said— “Hanging you both deserve, hanged both shall be this day!” And so they were.