PERHAPS IT WAS the fact that he was already dead that enabled Walter Raleigh to face his execution with such equanimity. On October 19th 1618 he was led from the Tower of London; along the way he smiled and joked. Seeing a bald man in the assembled crowd, he offered him his hat ("Thou hast more need of it now than I"). Then he laid his head upon the block. Legally speaking, Raleigh had already been "dead" for 15 years, after being found guilty of plotting against James I and deprived of his rights. Now, an axe added sharpened steel to sharp legal practice.
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