I was sworn to as being one of the men that fired on the police. I didn’t hear a great deal of it, but livened up when the judge put on his black cap and made a speech, not a very long one, telling about the way the law was set at naught by men who had dared to infest the highways of the land and rob peaceful citizens with arms and violence. In the pursuit of gain by such atrocious means, blood had been shed, and murder, wilful murder, had been committed. He would not further allude to the deeds of blood with which the prisoner at the bar stood charged. The only redeeming feature in his career had been brought out by the evidence tendered in his favour by the learned counsel who defended him. He had fought fairly when opposed by the police force, and he had on more than one occasion acted in concert with the robber known as Starlight, and the brother James Marston, both of whom had fallen in a recent encounter, to protect from violence women who were helpless and in the power of his evil companions. Then the judge pronounced the sentence that I, Richard Marston, was to be taken from the place whence I came, and there hanged by the neck until I was dead. “And might God have mercy upon my soull”

My lawyer had beforehand argued that although I had been seen in the company of persons who had doubtless compassed the unlawfully slaying of the Queen’s lieges and peace officers, yet no proof had been brought before the court that day that I had wilfully killed any one. “He was not aware,” would his Honour remark, “that any one had, seen me fire at any man, whether since dead or alive. He would freely admit that I had been seen in bad company, but that fact would not suffice to hang a man under British rule. It was therefore incumbent on the jury to bring in a verdict for his client of ‘not guilty.’ ”

But the cock wouldn’t fight. I was found guilty by the jury and sentenced to death by the judge. I expect I was taken back without seeing or hearing to the gaol, and I found myself alone in the condemned cell, with heavy leg-irons—worn for the first time in my life. The rough and tumble of a bush-ranger’s life was over at last, and this was the finish up.

For the first week or two I didn’t feel anything particular. I was hardly awake. Sometimes I thought I must be dreaming—that this man, sitting in a cell, quiet and dull-looking, with heavy irons on his limbs, could never be Dick Marston, the shearer, the stock-rider, the gold-miner, the bush-ranger.