He did not wear his scarlet¹ coat,

                 For blood and wine are red,

               And blood and wine were on his hands

                 When they found him with the dead,

               The poor dead woman whom he loved,

                 And murdered in her bed.

 

               He walked amongst the Trial Men

                 In a suit of shabby grey;

               A cricket cap was on his head,

                 And his step seemed light and gay;

               But I never saw a man who looked

                 So wistfully at the day.

 

               I never saw a man who looked

                 With such a wistful eye

               Upon that little tent of blue

                 Which prisoners call the sky,

               And at every drifting cloud that went

                 With sails of silver by.

 

               I walked, with other souls in pain,

                 Within another ring,

               And was wondering if the man had done

                 A great or little thing,

               When a voice behind me whispered low,

                 "That fellow's got to swing."

 

               Dear Christ! the very prison walls

                 Suddenly seemed to reel,

               And the sky above my head became

                 Like a casque of

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