3 mitted the murder: in confequence of which his house was searched the next day, and the cloaths he wore at the time of perpetrating the horrid fact being found, it appeared that endeavours had been ufed to wash out the blood, the stains of which were ftill clearly difcernible. He was taken into cuftody on fufpicion of the murder, and committed to gaol in preparation for his trial at the ensuing aflizes at Wells. Tucker fuborned witneffes to appear in his behalf, and two of them were guilty of perjury on his trial; and he had recourfe to other ftratagems, with a view of avoiding the punishment that was due to his enormous crime; but the evidence against him, though of a circumftantial nature, was fo ftrong that the jury were fully convinced of his guilt, and he was therefore fentenced to fuffer death. Tucker heard his fentence pronounced with great compofure; and being conveyed back to prifon, through the intereft of his friends, he was frequently vifited by two clergymen, and he prepared for the dreadful fate that awaited him in a manner that seemed to prove him perfectly refigned and penitent. Reginald Tucker was executed at Wells in Somersetshire, on the 25th of Auguft, 1775. The cafe of this unhappy man affords a ftriking inftance of the dangerous effects of indulging violent paffions. The difagreement preceding the murder arose from a circumftance of a very trifling nature. Whether the meat was really bad, or whether he only imagined it to be so, is of little confequence; in either cafe there was no cause for Tucker's difpleasure against his wife. When we fuffer our paffions to gain the afcendency over rea fon,, |