BEing brought upon Suspicion of this great Robbery and Murder, before the Justice, and being charged with the Fact, utterly denyed it. The question being asked where he had bestowed his time since he left his Masters Service, to which he replied that he had been in Holland, and that he came last from Dover, and arrived here on Munday last, and had taken a Lodging in White-cross-Street. But b ing further urged con­cerning the matter of Fact, still denied it: whereupon a Per­son there present that lived near to the House of his Master, (Esquire Bluck) which was the instrumental person of his be­ing apprehended testified that he brought two or three Razors to his Shop to be Ground: and seeing this Mrs. Burt n desired her being an old acquaintance to drink with him, which she did, and after some time departed: and on Wednesday towards the Evening he came again to this Razor-grinders Shop, and this Mrs. Burton sitting at her Masters Dore, he asked her to drink a pot of Ale, which she accepted of, desiring him to come in and sit down in the Passage: which was between the Parlour and the Kitchen, after they had done he said he was in great hast to be gon: but the poor woman (not imagining he had such Cruelty lodged within his Brest) desired him to stay longer, for it was time enough to go home, whereupon some words did arise between them as he said, and desiring him to go into the Kitchen, going along he strook her a blow on the head with which she fell down.

Then he seeing the Body strugling on the ground, he took a Green Carpet that lay on the Table, and threw over her, and so left her, and went and broke open all the Trucks and Boxes-in the House, out of which he took the Plate, being Tankards, Cups, Plates, Fruit Dishes, and other Plate, to the Value of between two and three hundred pounds; a Silver, Hilted Sword, and a Camlit Cloak, out of which he carried away nineteen Spoons and Forks, a Fruit-dish; a Tankard, the Cloak and the Sword, and left the remaining part in one of the Chimnies, and so he Departed; all which he denied before that Sir William Turner sent to search his Lodging, where they found the Trunck, and when that was brought into his sight, he declared all the foregoing Story, and seemed to be very much troubled and very Penitent, and said, he would have brought the Plate again but was afraid of being Apprehended, on Thursday he said he was walking in the Fields, and on Fri­day night came again to the Razor Grinders Shop who having [Page]heard of this Bloody Murther, and knowing of no other per­son to have been there but only him, sent immediately for the Constable and brought him before Sir William Turner, and there making this his Confession was committed to Newgate, where we leave him to the Mercy of God and the Judicious Court of Justice to answer for this his Bloody Crime,

HE that hereafter shall undertake truly to blazon forth this bruitish Age to the eyes of Poste­rity, can express it no way better than by froathy streams of scarlet gore, thwarting a field of black, of deeper die (if it may be) than the long Egyp­tian night. Melpomene must give place, and as too much agast at the more than tragical events of our times, remit her trembling Poets to the Infernal furies, whose flaming whips would be the best pens to describe such Stygian exploits, which now the hardned Sun like ordinary things beholds, whereas far less crimes have formerly made him veil his more bashful face. If the World may rightly be said to have run through four Ages, which according, their several tempers are di­stinguished by the significant epithets of Gold, Silver, Brass, and Iron; when we see then the wickedness of ours so monstrously transcend that of the former, what can we collect from thence, but that we are entred into a fefth, yielding so prodigious an increase of vices, that it deserves not as other, to be denominated by any mine­ral in that first ventricle of the Earth, where Pluto hides his precious dirt, but rather from its most infernal Re­gion, and that very dismal Center where Grim Pluto's horrid Chair is set; from whence, as if some of that Tyrant's more officious Pioneers had lately wrought through an open passage, legions of evils assail us, and [Page 2]those Owl-vices which before revered, now trusting in their numbers, out-dare the light. For certainly, if it goes on with so numerous a superfaetation of Monsters as it has begun, there will not only want room in our An­nals to place them, but there will want Writers too to insert them; no humane creature, but such Devils as act them, being able to express the hellish actions now per­petrated on the stage of the World. You Galiants may now save your mony, and you Players turn Spectators; you need not now, Gentlemen Poets, wrack your brains to invent new, or revive old Tragedies, since now ones are so rife; you need not amuse your selves with pain­ted or imaginary cruelties, when Hell having as it seems removed purposely into our upper Regions to divert you, daily presents you real ones; and still further to humour the lunacy of your fancies, every moment al­ters its scenes, dresses, and subjects. So many strange Robberies, unheard-of Curelties, savage Murders, and Bloudy Exploits continually alarming our senses, that our eyes are scarcely well fitted with amazement at one strange event, but they are recalled the more prodigious horror of a new accident, from whose multiplying num­bers we may well conclude, that now, if ever, the great Deceiver is let loose, with all his praestigious devices, to make us the sad actors of our own ruine. For the earth has hardly covered the last blood with which, in this kind, you heard its unnatural children besmeared her face; the ink is hardly dry that moistned its dole­ful narrative: when behold, new villanies of no less scarlet hue display themselves, which, though I can ne­ver express with all the horrid circumstances attending [Page 3]it are best known to the hellish actors, and their subtil Cur, from whose cabal they had their peculiar instru­ctions, yet I shall give such a delineation as a trembling hand is able in such a paroxism of astonishment as the tragicalness of so doleful a subject must needs cause.

This long Vacation having rendred many employs here in Town at present useless, and to most such a re­laxation of the business and care that the other seasons of the year keep in ure both their minds and bodies; and the pleasantness now of the Country inviting them be­sides for variety as well as refreshments sake, to lay by their City recreations for rural divertisements, where Flora and Ceres seem both to contend, one with her cu­riously embroidered flowery plains, and enamelled hil­locks; and the other with her richer, because ponderous and truly golden tresses of barbed Corn, who should most best caress, and most magnificently entertain the Citizen guest; I say whilst this pleasant season in its usual return had amongst others invited the wealthy In­habitants of this unhappy house, the fatal scene of our present Tragedy, whilst they pleased themselvs in seeing the joyful Husband-men shaving the rich looks of their mother earth; the Devil and his Factors was it seems (as he usually is) as busy here to make his Harvest in the Sun-shine of their security, and to despoil them of that wealth which no question were the fruits of many years industry. So treacherous and unsure are all earthly pleasures and enjoyments, that when we think our selves mos [...] secure, then the greatest calamities, like surprizing Hur [...]icanes, fall on us, and in a moment scatter to no­thing our supposed Paradise. For so it was, that these [Page 4]people going for some time into the Country, and lea­ving for the Guard of their too well lined Mansion, only one Gentle woman, whose carefulness and fidelity they considered more intertively than her weakness, they by this means gave a notable opportunity to the Harpies of the Town to seize their wealth: for those whose minds hanker after Golden Apples, are rather invited than ter­rified, when such feeble Dragons are set to keep them. And certainly, if occasion ever made a thief, 'twas here; for those perhaps which dared not to design such an at­tempt when the house was full, knew full well to time an opportunity when given them, which it seems they did to an hair: for whilst there remained two men in the house with the said Gentlewoman, this hell-hatcht plot durst not peep, but no sooner (upon what occasion I know not) were they departed, and forbore to lie in the house, but the very next night, when this poor inno­cent Gentlewoman having discharged her duty with that care which became her trust, and being gone to bed, there to such reflections as usually quiet consciences af­ter honest, labours bless the souls of their owner withal, she was miserably surprized by some as yet unknown persons, whose names as yet remain unmasked in the darkness of ignorance, as their faces were then in the obscurity of the night, who barbarously seizing on her, whose life was the only obstacle between them and the inticing pelf they so hellishly coveted, did butcher-like slash her under the ear, and left her a liveless example of their execrable curelty. And leaving her weltring in her own gore, they proceeded to break open all the Chests, Trunks, and Boxes they could find, taking of [Page 5]their bowels, a spoil, whose value though yet unknown, cannot but be supposed very considerable, but not con­siderable enough for those appetites, who after having gorged themselves with bloud, could not easily be sa­tisfied with Gold or Silver, for not content with that, they in a most lamentable and unheard of manner ran­sacked and rifled the whole house, and taking what-ever they could possibly carry away, disordered the rest, eve­ry where making either a Vacuum or a Chaos, that by the remaining works of their sancys it was too sadly visible what ravenous vermine had been there.

In a word, after they had rather wearied and over­loaded their bodies with spoil and pelf, than sated their unsatiable avarice or glutted their savage appetites with cruelty, exactly like Owls, Birds of Darkness as they were, apprehending the rising of that bright Morning Tapor, and fearing discovery, they took their flight from this miserable house, and retired into some place where as yet the deluding Impostor their Master, has secured them and their booty from discovery, although endea­vours with utmost industry are used to trace them. God give to their pursuers Eagles eyes to descry, and Vul­tures claws to lay hold on these notorious Malefactors, that so the terror of all such Heaven affronting Varlets, who contemning all Laws Divine and Humane, will, if let alone, destroy all our rights, and by invading their neighbours peculiars, bring all Societies, and the whole World to its first Chaos and confusion, they may be ren­dred to Justice, and be brought to condign punish­ment.

In the mean while, those who shall chance to read or [Page 6]hear of this strange and doleful accident, may make this use of it: Let them consider how happy the owners of this house and goods some few days ago thought themselves; how secure they thought themselves pos­sessed of their wealth, whereas now a great loss has suddenly like a Thunder-clap discharged it self, and un­expectedly shaken their happiness, whilst they securely, and it may be innocently followed their pleasures in the Country, that little dreamt what a storm threatned them from the City: you see then the frailty and un­certainty of worldly things, what a sudden change pro­vidence can make. Let him that stands then, never think himself so sure, but let him have a care of a fall: never let us pride our selves so much in any thing here, or think our selves so well fortified, but let our thoughts reach further, let us in prudence take all care to secure our blessings, but when all is done, let us be prepared for a loss, which none of us but may, after all care and wis­dom imaginable, expect, as long as we live in a fleeting World, which is such a floating Sea of troubles, that amidst such waves no sure footing can be fixed.