quested to know why the Lord Mayor had not been brought forward as a witness? This "flagrant civil war" took place in the City, and consequently under the jurisdiction of his Lordship. Why was he not called as a witness? Was the Attorney General afraid to call him? ["No, no," from the Attorney General.] Then he ought to have been a witness, considering the very active hand he had in the suppression of this war. All the Rebel army in the City had been quelled, and this individual was its last remnant; yet this was seriously described as a "flagrant civil war." It was impossible, morally impossible, to hear such a description of this miserable proceeding, and be grave. If war existed, where was it levied? Was it in Spa-fields? If the Jury credited the account of Mr. Dowling, the short-hand writer, there was a war of words, but nothing else. But it was rather unfortunate for Mr. Dowling that he had not been confirmed by a single witness; and he (Mr. Wetherell) denied utterly that such things had been said as were alleged. He would venture to assert, and stake his legal reputation upon the assertion, that mere force as force, mere tumult as tumult, unless specifically applied, did not amount to an offence which came within the Statute of Treasons. The Attorney General, because he could not prove the weaker case, was determined to prove the stronger. He had no evidence to shew that the arms demanded by the rioters were to be directed against the Crown, in order to do some particular thing: he could not prove that any particular Magistrate or Privy Counsellor, or measure, was to be attacked; and not being able to do so, he was resolved to prove every thing. To argue in such a manner, however, was totally to forget the definition of levying war. There was no difficulty in saying to what class of offences the crime of the prisoners belonged; nor was it difficult to point out how it might be punished. A riot might have some un defined objects in view; but treason must have specific objects. He could adduce a number of authorities in support of that argument. In the reign of Edward VI. (Statute 3 and 4) it was made high treason for any twelve persons to meet for the purpose of obtaining any alteration of the laws, &c. by force, if they did not disperse within an hour after proclamation was made. That Statute was the precise origin of the Riot Act passed in the reign of George I. by which the same description of offence was made liable to the same degree of punishment. Upon the death of Edward, that Statute was repealed by the 1st of Mary, ch. 1. among the other Treasons that had been created since the 25th Edward III.;

or more

He

but the prohibition was in substance reenacted (1st Mary, 2, c. 12), though with an inferior degree of punishment, making the offence only single felony. Upon the death of Mary it fell to the ground, but was revived by Elizabeth; and the preamble set forth, "That an Act passed in the last reign, for the preventing and punishing unlawful and rebellious assemblies, should be revived," &c. The use of the word "rebellious," pretty strongly indicated that there might be a degree of popular violence and tumult, of such a description as to deserve even the name of rebellion, without, however, constituting the crime of high treason. That Statute, also, upon the death of Elizabeth, fell to the ground; and, from that time till the reign of George I. there was no Law of this country applicable to such offences. In that reign the Riot Act was introduced; and he begged to call the attention of the Jury to the preamble of that Act. He would stake his credit as a Lawyer, that his view of the proceedings of the 2d December was the same as the Law had always taken of similar proceedings; namely, that, being merely an undefined tumult, they came within the meaning of the Riot Act, and not the Statute of Treasons. maintained, therefore, without fear of contradiction, that vague tumults, like those now charged against the prisoner, never were, by any Attorney General in this country, raised up to the magnitude of Treason. He asserted that; and he defied the Attorney General or the Solicitor General to disprove him by any prece dents in the history of our Laws. If, therefore, the Jury valued consistencyif they would save their country from the reproach of punishing one class of men as rioters, and another class of the same description as traitors-if they would not batter down and annihilate the forces that had been reared by the wisdom of their ancestors- their verdict must be an acquittal of the prisoner. If once they gave to any government, however wise, and temperate, and virtuous, it might be (all which qualities he sincerely believed the present one to possess), such a power; what would become of their liberties, when it was abused by a Government of a different description? He should now advert to another feature in the present case. The Jury probably were not aware that the transactions of the 2d of December were once characterised by the Attorney General himself as a misdemeanour merely. They did not know, perhaps, that the name of the prisoner then under trial was actually to be found in an indictment as a conspirator for producing a riot. And he would ask, therefore, how it was that that which was considered only a misdeameanour at Hicks's Hall, should be transformed

2

He cer

formed into treason in the King's Bench? Where were they, if such shiftings and changings were to be tolerated? tainly could not give a date for every portion of information which the Government received; but within a fortnight of the transaction all the particulars concerning it were communicated to the Treasury. But, Gentlemen of the Jury, will you suffer an Attorney General of England to found a prosecution for Treason? Will you suffer the honour, the liberty, and the life, of a British subject, to depend upon the evidence of that indescribable villain, Mr. Castle? Will you add to the blood-money he has already earned? Will you increase the trade and merchandize of a wretch who lives only on blood? Will you, the guardians of the lives and liberties of your fellow-subjects, betray them, because that creature has been sworn before you? Will you suffer him to immolate fresh victims? Let me add, if you do, will the British publick endure it?-Mr. W. contended, then, that every thing except what Castle knew or invented was known to Government-before. He should like to know, therefore, how a case, which was considered as a Misdemeanour only before Castle was brought to light, became a Treason when he was brought to light? Every thing must stand or fall upon the testimony of Castle: and he should not consider whether that testimony was supported in this or that particular, but look at his broad and wholesale credibility. He should be told, no doubt, that Castle was to be believed in those things which were confirmed by other witnesses, but not in such as were unconfirmed. He would apply that doctrine, therefore, of confirmation and non-confirmation, to the testimony of that man. Might he not, too, for his own sinister purposes, have prevailed upon young Watson, who was only 20 years of age, while the bawdyhouse bully was 40, to engage in schemes that were intended only as the instruments of his destruction? But the man was so utterly infamous, that he deserved not the slightest credit. He regularly lied all over the town; wherever he went, lies travelled with him as his inseparable companions. He was a convicted liar in that very Court. In his evidence he said there were thirty men who were addressed by Thistlewood on the Tower walls. The men themselves, the very men who were harangued, said there were but two: that was one sample of a lie. Again, he said there were two persons who addressed the soldiers; it was proved there was only one, He contended, indeed, that the evidence of Castle remained unconfirmed in every point of importance. The more closely he, canvassed all that had been GENT. MAG. Suppl. LXXXVII, PART I.

H

given in evidence, the more strictly he compared the various points of testimony, he, as he advanced, felt increase his inability to understand any thing assuming the character and complexion of a settled plan of insurrection. He could, indeed, see turbulent assemblages of the people, in the hour of great distress, discussing the nature of their grievances he could distinguish mischievous mobs, in the delirium of their phrenzy, plundering the shops of their fellow-citizens; but he could not find that which was essentially necessary to support the indictment against the prisoners, and without which there could exist no Treason; namely, a deliberate plan to overturn the State. If there did exist such a settled plan and system, in what part of the proceedings can you trace its developement? Was it in Spafields? Was it in Skinner-street? Was it in the Minories? In all these places nothing like plan was intelligible; and if not clearly and unequivocally intelligible, then the transaction reduces itself into that undigested state of things, known under the designation of a Riot. In almost every character of the alphabet you can trace to him a double alliteration of crime. He stands before you the confessed bully of a bawdy-house, and acknowledged by himself to be guilty of bigamy. Will you, Gentlemen, believe him? Can you credit this forger and felon, who, at the moment that he stood before you, had confessed himself to have worked out his own safety-to have owed his very existence to the sacrifice he made of a confederate in a capital crime? In your presence he was forced, by examination, to confess himself guilty of larceny, even on one of the unhappy prisoners at the bar. Therefore, following him from his early life, where he lived in one of those haunts of moral depravity, in a capacity at which even the very dissolute, with one spark of manly feeling left, would revolttracing him from the bawdy-house, in which he was the abandoned bully, through the ascending progress of his turpitudeafter having sacrificed to the earnings of his blood-money one miserable man, and committed every description of guilt, he now presents himself in a cause of High Treason as the witness of the Crown; pardon me, not the witness of the Crown in its ordinary acceptation, but the fed, clothed witness of the Crown; wearing on his body the apparel which Mr. Staf ford, of Bow-street, had provided for him. Yes, Gentlemen, the very clothes on his back are the incipient wages of that bloodmoney of that remuneration which, as a price, he has set on the lives of the unfortunate prisoners at the bar, and which he did not deny that on their sacrifice be 2 did

did expect to receive. Let him be wrong in the legal view; still the fact was, that up to a given time, Misdemeanour, not Treason, was the character given to the offence. He had stated the opinions of almost every Writer-of every Judge upon the subject of Treason, and he called upon the Solicitor General to add to the catalogue, or to disprove the conclusion, that an undefined Riot, though accompanied with outrage, was not Treason. He would not take the Law from the Attorney General; neither would he allow the inference, that, if the prisoners at the bar could not explain the whole of these proceedings, Treason was to be presumed. If that were the principle, all those restrictions which the wisdom of the Law had placed upon prosecutions for High Treason were of no avail. The learned gentleman having adverted to the evidence of Castle, as to meeting Mr. Hunt in Cheapside, said, he would call that Gentleman, who was subpoenaed by the Crown, and who ought to have been examined, to confirm, not indeed the veracity, but the falsehood, of that miscreant. Whatever might be the warmth and indiscretion of Mr. Hunt's politics, no man had attempted to cast an imputation on his moral character, or his claims to veracity; and from his lips the Jury should hear, that though Castle said (feeling fully the tendency of the question) that he only told Mr. Hunt the

Meeting in Spa-fields was over, yet that Gentleman would tell them that Castle told him the Tower was in their pos session an hour before. Had not Providence, or Mr. Hunt's own circumspection, protected him from such an attempthad he but turned his curricle- could this detested reptile have mixed him unconsciously for a single moment in the mob-instead of being here attending as a witness, he would most certainly have stood at the bar, to multiply the victims of that indescribable villain. Then would this C. P. S. become a confirmatory evievidence against him, or against any of those persons whose names were inserted in that paper. Can any man have a doubt but that paper was drawn out for that villainous and diabolical purpose? and what a warning does it hold out to gentlemen of high honour and distinguished integrity, whom the warmth of their politics might lead to associate themselves at public meetings with miscreants of that description! Had Sir Francis Burdett (he mentioned the name with respect), for instance, not prudently abstained from accepting the invitation of attending the Spa-fields Meeting, was it not possible that he might be mixed in this conspiracy by the oath of such a criminal, to be confirmed by this paper of C. P. S.?

The Verdict of the Jury-Not Guilty → has been already noticed, p. 560.

SUMMER

CIRCUITS,

1817.

Mond.Ju.14 Tuesday 15

Wednesd.16

Friday 18

HOME.

Saturday 19

Monday 21

Buckinghm.

Wednesd.23

Dorchester

GAZETTE PROMOTION.

CIVIL PROMOTIONS.

Mr. Hawes, Master of the young Gentlemen at his Majesty's Chapel Royal, vice Smith, resigned.

Patrick Copland, Professor of Natural Philosophy in Marischal College, Aberdeen. Dr. Robert Hamilton, Professor of Mathematics, vice Copland. - Mr. John Cruickshank, assistant and successor to Dr. Hamilton.-Rev. Daniel Dewar, LL.D. Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University and King's College of Aberdeen.

ECCLESIASTICAL PREFERMENTS.

Rev. S. Goddard, Archdeacon of Lincoln. Rev. William Kendall, Framborough Perpetual Curacy, co. York, vice Heblethwayte, deceased.

Rev. Charles Nourse Wodehouse, M.A. a Prebendal Stall in Norwich Cathedral, vice Dr. Pretyman, deceased.

Rev, W. F. Protheroe, Stoke Talmage R. co. Oxford.

Rev, Henry Small, Rector of the Abbey Church, St. Alban's.

Rev. Richard Pretyman, Precentor of Lincoln Cathedral.

Rev. J. Aspland, M. A. Earl's Stonham R. Suffolk.

Rev. S. Forster, D. D. Shotley R. Suffolk. Rev. Thomas Hart, M. A. Ringwood V. co. Southampton.

Rev. John Henry Renouard, M.A. Orwell R. co. Cambridge.

Rev. G. A. Browne, M.A. Chesterton V. co. Cambridge.

Rev. John Cook, B.D. Ockley R. Surrey. Rev. Charles James Blomfield, M. A. Great and Little Chesterford united Rectory, Essex.

Rev. W. S Bradley, Barton St. David's V. with Chard V. Somerset.

Rev. W. B. Williams, M. A. Boyle's Lecturer.

BIRTHS.

14.

June 1. At Park House, Scotland, the wife of Lieut.-col. Gordon, a son.-6. At the Chateau of Bethusy, Switzerland, the wife of George Lowther, esq. a dau.-13. In Piccadilly, the wife of Capt. Paxton, 3d guards, a son.- At Deal, the wife of Capt. Smith, H. M.S. Alert, a son. — At Chichester, the wife of Capt. Schomberg, R. N. a son.-16. In South Audleystreet, the wife of Dr. Badham, a son.20. At Paris, the wife of Lieut. - col. Wylly, A. A. G. a son.-21. At Naish house, the wife of Philip John Miles, esq. a son.-23. In Highbury Place, the wife of Joseph Huddart, esq. a dau.-24. At Cheltenham, the wife of Capt. Hancock, C. B. R.N. a son.-25. At Rotterdam, the

Major Fane, M.P. a son.

Lately. At Southampton, the lady of Sir William Walter Yeo, bart. a son.

MARRIAGES.

March... At the Cape of Good Hope, Joseph Luson, esq. Agent to the East India Company, to Catherine Maria, dau. of Peter Laurence Cloete, esq. of Cape Town.

May 1. At Gibraltar, Robert Henry Birch, esq. Major in the Royal Artillery, to Georgiana, second dau. of George Skyring, esq. Major in the same corps.

3. At Halifax, Nova Scotia, C. Martyr, esq. Agent for the Royal Naval Hospital there, to Miss M'Lean, daughter of the late Major M'Lean.

29. Capt. J. B. Gardiner, 50th regt. to Anna Maria, only dau. of the late Rev. Isaac Gosset, D.D. of Newman-street,

June 3. Capt. Wilson, R.N. son of the late Judge Wilson, of How, near Kendal, to Dorothy, dau. of Charles Gibson, esq. of Quermore Park, co. Lancaster.

5. Lieut. Thiballier, 35th regt. son of the late Col. Thiballier, to the only daughter of Denis, esq. of Waterford, and niece of Sir Philip Musgrave, bart.

John Beverley Robinson, esq. Solicitorgeneral of Upper Canada, to Emma, only dau. of Charles Walker, esq. and niece to the Deputy-Secretary at War.

W. Mills, esq. eldest son of T. Mills, esq. of Great Saxham Hall, Suffolk, to Clara Jane, second dau. of Rev. Richard Huntley, Rector of that parish.

James Crichton, esq. Commander of the Lord Lyndoch, to Catherine, youngest dau. of the late A. Small, D.D. Minister of Kilconquhar, co. Fife.

6. Henry Powys, esq. eldest son of

Powys, esq. of Hardwicke, co. Oxford, to Julia, third dau, of Fitzwilliam Bar. rington, esq. of Calbourne, Isle of Wight, and niece of Sir John Barrington, bart.

7. William Sanders Paterson, esq. of Durnsford Lodge, Surrey, to Louisa, dau. of the late John Bridge, esq. of Winford Eagle, co. Dorset.

Capt. William Henderson, R. N. to Margaretta, second daughter of John Henderson, esq.

9. Brigade-major Rice Jones, Royal Engineers, to Jane, dau. of Richard Jones, esq. of Aldgate.

11. Thomas Fairfax Best, esq. eldest son of George Best, esq. of Chilston Park, to Margaret Anna, third dau. of George Brett, esq. of Grove house, Old Brompton.

14. The Earl of Kintore, to Juliet, third dau. of the late Robert Renny, esq. of Borrowfield.

Capt. Beverley Robinson, Royal Artillery, to Charlotte Aubrey, eldest dau, of John Peyto Shrubb, esq. of Guildford.

ELLIS BENT, Esq. M. A. Died, lately, at his house at Sydney, Ellis Bent, esq. M. A. Judge-Advocate of the colony of New South Wales. The character of this justly-lamented magistrate, who was removed from life at the early age of 32, by a disorder occasioned, probably, by the intenseness of his application to the arduous duties of his profession, was one of no common interest; which appears to have been formed by a combination of circumstances peculiar to himself. Distinguished, during the course of the preparatory studies for his profession, by unremitted application, and the consequent attainment of literary eminence, and, at the same time, by a temper rather pensive and abstracted, he had not been called to the bar four years when he was appointed to a situation which, to such a mind as his, must have been, perhaps, the most interesting in which he could have been placed. The great principle which seems to have occupied his mind, and animated his exertions, was the contemplation of an intellectual and moral process, in which he himself was actively concerned, and in the completion of which all the best interests of the human race were involved. Mr. Judge-Advocate Bent has left behind him a widow and five young children (one of which was born since his death), his father (Robert Bent, esq.), his mother, three sisters, and his brother (Jeffery Bent, esq. who, being Judge of the Court of Equity, attended his funeral as chief mourner),to lament his loss. As in domestic and social life he discharged every relative duty with a glow of affection which necessarily kindled a return of affection, so in public life he discharged the duties of his elevated and important situation with that uprightness of principle, and with that justice, tempered with mercy, which rendered him the object of universal respect.

generally respected for his integrity and benevolence —a man, by whose death society in general has lost a link of a most valuable chain-a man, who must not pass away from life without such a tribute to his benevolent character as our Obituary can supply. To scatter a flower on the grave of departed worth, and with a tear to sprinkle it, is a sad, but not unpleasing task. To the strictest moral and religious principles, Mr. Corbet joined the best affections of the heart: warm, sincere, and steady in his friendships; the most affectionate of husbands, the kindest of fathers; an indulgent master; a generous landlord; to the needy a most liberal and constant benefactor. His manners were the most gentlemanly and unassuming; his disposition the most amiable and cheerful: affection for his family, the welfare and amusement of his friends, and benevolence to all mankind, constituted the happiness of his life. For many years previous to his death he had led a retired life; but his hospitable table was ever open to a few select friends, who esteemed him when living, and will feel his loss with peculiar regret. The poor, who frequently partook of his unostentatious bounty, will shed a tear of sympathy on his bier. The sudden rupture of a blood-vessel on the brain was the fatal cause of Mr. Corbet's death; a calamity which assailed him on the preceding day, whilst in his usual health, and surrounded by his family.

The most skilful medical assistance was instantly obtained; but human aid was fruitless, and at the end of a few short hours, society was deprived of one of its brightest ornaments. -Peace to his shade! and may "Goodness and he fill up one monument!"

To the preceding character a Correspondent enables us to add the following particulars :-The remains of the late John Corbet, esq. of Sundorne Castle, were on Monday the 26th of May removed from Muddiford, Hants, to be interred in the family vault at Battlefield, Salop. Mr. Corbet was a gentleman well known beyond the precincts of his own county, particularly in Warwickshire, where, at his sole expence, he kept a pack of foxhounds for nearly 50 years, and where, by his liberal and gentlemanly conduct, he conciliated the respect and esteem of all ranks. In his own county Mr. Corbet will not only be lamented by a numerous tenantry, to whom he was the best of landlords, but also by a large circle of friends and acquaintance, to whom his hospitable doors were ever open. To the poor he was a liberal and unceasing benefactor; and, in every sense of the word, he may truly be said to have kept up the character of the independent country gen

tleman,