And he was in uniform,
though, as a measure of precaution, and not to make himself too
conspicuous, he wore his tunic turned inside out--a disguise that one
would pronounce to be something of the simplest.
There was, of course, no possible defence--indeed, he owned up, and at
the next assizes was condemned to death. And here the link with the fate
of Wallace and Hislop came in. As he lay awaiting execution, Hall
confessed that it was he, that February night in 1785, who had stunned
and robbed Captain Craes. He had seen the old sailor making his not very
steady way homewards, and had followed him, and at the loneliest part of
the street, where no house showed a light, he came up behind and tripped
him; and as the captain essayed to get again on his feet, Hall had
struck him a violent blow on the head with a cudgel, stunning him. The
man told, too, how a little later he had gone into a public-house to get
a drink, and that there he found some men playing at cards; he had
joined them, and had lost money, and one of the men (Hislop, as he
afterwards understood) had changed for him a guinea which he had a
little time before taken from the pocket of the man he had stunned.
Thus were Wallace and Hislop added to the long list of the victims of
circumstantial evidence.
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