IF THERE WERE NEED Time wore on in the ancient capital of England.

The tramp of troops echoed in the streets, and the fleets of Britain made ready to carry her sons over seas for wars and for adventures.

The intrigues of party against party, of church against church, of Parliament against king; the loves, the hates, the ambitions, the desires of all the city's hurrying thousands went on as ever.

Who, then, should remember a single prisoner, waiting within the walls of England's jail?
The hours wore on slowly enough for that prisoner.

He had faced a jury of his peers and was condemned to face the gallows.