The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1870-07-19 00:00:00

To du T-E Dust Enekiood HERO

Bleu) be T.E Man Tr mires T-Ea Stones

And curet be He ; moves my Bones."
SAakspeares gravesloft.
After some inflammatory writin in the Irish prow on
the subject of Tboinpeon's death, the " friends of the
convict" have at length gained their point, and have
carried away from Portland some particles of matter
which were formerly the body of the man who was
convicted of being accessory too murder. We should
nay that it wee • ghastly prooedere ; but r-liston
teaches us that the epirit and therefore the real self of
the man was elsewhere, so we can only rezard the
morbid intrusion upon one of Nature's moat merciful
works—the commingling again of " earth to earth" as
simply calculated to awake disgust. The bodies of the
dead, in the bid old times, have been crammed into so-
called holy place., to no poseible end but the sickening
ml poisoning of the living would, and even the set of
'gambling for the worship of Goo has been rendered
a danger on account of the mouldering relics of mor-
tality that lay beneath the floor of the church. When
wal men learn that, in potting off this mortal body,
their friends leave that which they have nothing to do
with, and which is required for the earth's crust for its
renewal as much as any other dead matter that has onoe
been in the possession of man' It is not from any
with to lower the estimation in which the dead Fenian
may be held by his friends, or to heap opprobrium on
him who has gone, that we write thus; but to protest
against the false though long-lingering lea that the
hod r • hen severed from the apirit has anything to do
with the dead man. '' Thou sowed not that body that
shal be," says the apostle alluding to resurrection and
if Thornpson's friends, Roman Catholic. Protestant, or
aught else, have fanoied they were doing good to poor
Thompson by removing to Ireland what once
belonged to him, let them remember that the
body which we hope for from the reaurrection is not
that which is eonnseted with corruption. dishonour,
' weakness, but what shall be raised in e.rruption. glory.
power. What Mr. Andrews, of Fortune's Well, so
carefully made a coffin with glass Win+, w over the face
for, was one of those things on which N tore stamps an
appearance horrible to the living, that they may not do
the very thing that Mr. Hogan (and many before him)
have done, attach • kind of weredness and value to that
which is seen when the spirit for which it was loved hail
posited away. For this it WWI that telegraphic menages
have so frequently passed between Mr. Hogan and Mr,
Aedreses, and for this the former returned to the Con-
vict prison at half-pest eleven on Thursdiy. For We
the Divernor was neenpied. even in 'pits of his absorb•
ing ewes about the bundre is of the living around hint,
and for this Captain Salter, Deputy Governor, Dr.
Rinker, medical nfficier, Mr. Hogan, and a number of
Portlanders, weembled at that lonely burial•plaoe at
Rotorua at four o'clock. The inbahitante had some im-
pression of the unfitness of the action, ter they almost
if not quite unanimously blamed the Govern, oh for
permitting what wield be nrodnetive of no pomade use, a 1.141 warn very likely to do harm, lit at tut an hove the
diggers had removed the kindly toil, and again the air
wul taintee with the body formerly Thompson's, now
hastening into noxious gas. forn.less dust, and a skeleton
which is the symbol of what many regard with affright. A prison coffi i alone preserved the recovered body
from apPeating a visible horror, and a cart was the
Owlet of state for Mr. Hogan's ,treamre, till removed
to Fortune's Well. Some sacking nerved as the seared
curtain behind which the horrible act of uncolliaing the
festering remains was ectoonsplished, and Natnre once
more protested strongly, bye dreadful smell,against the
violence done. By the aid of • quantity of brandy
those behind the sail cloths managed to resist the
stench, and Captain Salter, Dr. Maker, and Mr. Holten,
Identified the remains. The letter wan prudently
anxious that the newspapers should take no pm-Wales.

notice of what was done--perhaps the dreadful ahem
don of the face of what had otsce been his friend mutely
rebuked him, but even Hogan need not have insulted
English reporters by Sending out a policeman to We
" them reporters did not look under" the sail sloths.
Ugh! What reporkts could Mr: Hogan have known
that he could have suspected the gnglish press of Mb
an act? Surely the smell wee frightful enough without
Hogan's prohibition Without the repulsive sista
Itself, every one of any experienee knelt what wan to
be seen, hut when Hogan said they wanted to take
•w.y the body " without any "Daiso at all at
all, it was doubted whether imine of the lrbth pre.*
*wild let it rem,iii qclite no "quite," and Englidinten
have • right to their share of remark. The glees-
' windowed coffin wail then used to tea. ive the holy on
its being removed from the prison she,' ; this wee placed
in a lead .n one and that again in one of enk with •
Gross. urn, and shield on the lid. The following was
the inscription : -
"WILLIAM P. THOMPeoIf,”
"Died June 28th, 1870,
"Aged 32 years."
At the conclusion of the removal Hogan came out,
end gave an idea of what state his sem° of gruel was in,
wto:n he said the body "'namely smelt at all." Of a
piece with this was the Information that Thomp,nn
• was as good • .nan *sever lied, only he unfortunetely
got into a little trouble." Prom Hogan's letter to the
triakritax, we learn, that he conindered nommen
"Ivey. and gentle, "always good and pure"—" the
gentlest of the gentle"—' tile truest of the true." Was
this the ripix that won sent to Portland ? In the mimeo,
law, order. end truth, let us know hoc he came there?
Is it kit, or false that be was convicted for being woes.
Rely to the murder of an officer on duty? Who are the
men, who the C 111,4, who the association, of whom
Thompson was "the rntlest of tie gentle."" always
good and pure ?" For otudentat sake let us know them,
that we may beware of the rest I Surely Hogan is not
one, for be .eemed a reapectable oisn I Let us hope that
these are flowers of rhrtor c, of which Hogan will be
ashamed. But we issue to the clove of this charnel-
house etory, as far as Punkin' is concerned The coffins
were pieced in a strong deal case and sent by the last
train from Portland to Weymonth, thence by G.W.R.
to Preston' at an expense of 13 guinea., cos route to
Belfast, and we shall soon bear of the observanc• of the
promise to Government that there should be no demon.
stration over the remains. Perhaps an exhibition of
the face, through the glees window, would not be amiss,
for it would tea, h all who viewed it, to reb•t the body
one, formed in the image of GOD, will be brought by
Fenianiaiii and all other sin—a sickening thing, to he
viewed with deepest grief, and hurried from the sight.