Indeed, the sense of having gone too far to be forgiven, held the timid
together no less than the bold. Many who would readily have pointed out
the foremost rioters and given evidence against them, felt that escape
by that means was hopeless, when their every act had been observed by
scores of people who had taken no part in the disturbances; who had
suffered in their persons, peace, or property, by the outrages of the
mob; who would be most willing witnesses; and whom the government would,
no doubt, prefer to any King's evidence that might be offered. Many of
this class had deserted their usual occupations on the Saturday morning;
some had been seen by their employers active in the tumult; others
knew they must be suspected, and that they would be discharged if they
returned; others had been desperate from the beginning, and comforted
themselves with the homely proverb, that, being hanged at all, they
might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. They all hoped and
believed, in a greater or less degree, that the government they seemed
to have paralysed, would, in its terror, come to terms with them in the
end, and suffer them to make their own conditions. The least sanguine
among them reasoned with himself that, at the worst, they were too many
to be all punished, and that he had as good a chance of escape as any
other man.
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