in a napkin, and, after staying about a quarter of
an hour chatting, went away.

Poor Mary, no longer honest, no longer
pure, no longer happy, had deceived Hannah.
She had not slept at her grandfather's; she
had been about the whole night, rambling
here and there with Thornton. John
Humpidge, a labourer of Whitton, leaving a friend's
house at Penn's Mills about a quarter before
three, saw Thornton and a girl at the "ford-rift,"
at a stile leading into Bell-lane. Humpidge
wished Thornton good morning, but the girl
held her head determinately down, and the
bonnet hid her face. This girl was Mary
Ashford; of that, there can be no doubt. It is beyond
dispute. Thomas Aspre, a man of Erdington, on
his way to Birmingham that morning, crossed
Bell-lane, leaving it on his right, and Erdington
on his left. It was about half-past three; he then
saw Mary alone, walking very fast past a horse-
pond in the lane, in the direction of Mrs.
Butler's, at whose house she called to change
her dress. At about four the lost girl was seen
by another Erdington labourer, named Dawson,
coming from Erdington. John Kesterton, a
farmer's man at Erdington, who had got up
soon after two to "fettle" his horses, put
them to the waggon at four, and watered them
at the pond in Bell-lane. At a quarter-past four
Kesterton turned the horses round, and made
straight for Birmingham, through Erdington.
Turning to look back a little past Mrs. Butler's
by some chance impulse—for the road was
quiet and lonely enough at that hour—he saw
Mary Ashford, whom he knew well, coming out
of the entry to widow Butler's cottage. He
smacked his whip to make her turn, and
she turned and looked at him. No one was
with her. She turned up Bell-lane, and seemed
to be in a great hurry. She had on a straw
bonnet and a scarlet spencer, and carried a
bundle in her left hand. The road she took led
both to her grandfather's, where she ought to
have slept, and her uncle's, to whom she was
servant.

At five o'clock, George Jackson, a Birmingham
gun-borer, who had left Moor-street,
Birmingham, on his way beyond Penn's Mills to
seek work, came past the workhouse at
Erdington. He turned out of Bell-lane about
half-past six into the ford-rift leading to Penn's
Mills, going along the foot-road till he came
to a pit close by the footpath. As he came
near it he observed, to his extreme horror,
in the pure morning sunlight, a bonnet, a pair
of shoes, and a bundle, close by the slope, that
overhung the pit; one shoe was all over blood.
The pit was in a grass-field separated from
the carriage-road only by a hedge, and near a
stile. The things were about a foot below
the top of the slope, and about four yards below
spread the dark water of the pit-mouth. There
had evidently been a murder, and the body
must lie weltering in that pool. Kesterton,
frightened, instantly ran to Penn's Mills,
half a mile off, for assistance; but at the nearest
house, finding a man named Lawell coming out,
he told him to stop and guard the things while
he ran to the mills. Some labourers came from
the mills and passed an eel-rake through the
water. Yes, there it was—a woman's body,
duckweed and leaves and mud on the pale
cold face. It was poor Mary Ashford, recognised
in a moment by her scarlet spencer and
pink gown; murdered beyond a doubt; her
clothes were steeped in blood. She had been
abused, then murdered. That was the universal
belief.

One of the workmen at Penn's Mills instantly
went along the harrowed field beyond the pit to
see if he could trace the footsteps of the poor
girl and her murderer. Going to the pit from
Erdington there were footprints of a woman
and a man; they were close together, and
appeared like the footprints of persons running,
both by the stride and the depth of the impressions.
Near the pit, the footprints doubled
backwards and forwards, as if one person had
chased the other. The footsteps were trackable
on the grass, but not on it, and were visible on
the harrowed ground. The prints were traceable
on the grass by a dry pit, then towards
a water-pit in the harrowed field. The woman's
steps were nearest the pit. The footprints of a
man were also visible the contrary way, as if
running back on the harrowed ground to the
gate at the far corner across the footpath, which
led across a clover-field towards Pipe Hall, and
by a short cut to Castle Bromwich. There was
a man's footprint near the edge of the declivity;
there was blood about forty yards off the pit,
and some as near as fourteen yards; there was
also a track of blood lying thick upon the clover
in the direction of the pit. The footpath was
about one hundred and forty yards from the
dry pit on one side, and the wet pit on the
other.

Thornton was instantly arrested, and
examined at Tyburn, the scene of that unhappy
revel. He owned to guilty association with the
girl, and at once made the following statement:

He said he was "a bricklayer; that he came
to the Three Tuns at Tyburn about six o'clock
the night before, where there was a dance; that
he danced a dance or two with the landlord's
daughter, but whether he danced with Mary
Ashford or not he could not recollect. Examinant
stayed till about twelve o'clock; he then went
with Mary Ashford, Benjamin Carter, and a
young woman, whom he understood to be Mr.
Machin's housekeeper, of Erdington; that they
walked together as far as Mr. Potter's; Carter
and the housekeeper went on towards Erdington,
examinant and Mary Ashford went on as far as
Mr. Freeman's; they then turned to the right,
and went along a lane till they came to a gate
and stile on the right-hand side of the road;
they then went over the stile, and into the next
piece, along the foot-road; they continued along
the foot-road four or five fields, but cannot
exactly tell how many. Examinant and Mary
Ashfonl then returned the same road; when
they came to the gate and stile, they first got
over; they stood there ten minutes or a quarter