If ignorance would look upon its own degradation, let it spend a few hours in an assize court. One trial I witnessed was of two men for an offence which indeed arose out of depravity, but the depravity arose out of bad training and vicious circumstances. The oldest man, between forty and fifty, was sentenced to transportation for life to Norfolk Island, the most ferocious sentence an English judge can pronounce. When the man heard it, he bowed in genuine and awkward humbleness, and said, as he made a rustic bow to the bench, 'Thank'ee, my Lord!' Such abject humiliation of spirit I had never conceived before. Ignorance never appeared to me so frightful, so slavish, so blind, as on this occasion. Unable to distinguish a sentence passed upon him from a service done him, he had been taught to bow to his pastors and masters, and he bowed alike when cursed as when blessed. The measured contempt with which the words were spoken by the judge which blasted the man's character for ever—the scorn with which he was thrust out of the pale of society, never again to know freedom or reputation, made no impression on his dark and servile soul. That appalling weight of infamy falling on his head and on the heads of his children—for which he might justly have cursed society—only elicited from him a 'Thank'ee, my Lord!' If ignorance would see its own degradation, would feel the incalculable depth of its abjectness, let it sometimes sit for instruction in an assize court.
The preliminary proceedings at the trial I shall render as Mr. Hunt gave them, in the third person—adding what, from various causes, was omitted at the time.
On the morning of the trial the Court-house at Gloucester was very crowded. Many ladies were present from all parts of the county: the wives of clergymen, and some of the nobility, were among them, attracted by curiosity, and by the opportunity which might never occur to them again of hearing, without loss of caste, a little heresy defended in person. The audience continued undiminished till ten o'clock at night.
As the name of George Jacob Holyoake was called, he advanced and entered the dock. Mr. Ogden, the turnkey in charge of prisoners, directed him with the usual air of official impatience to take his place at the bar.
Mr. Holyoake. Do not be in a hurry. First hand me my books.
Mr. Ogden. (Looking indignantly at a large corded box lying outside the dock.) You can't have that box here. You must go to the bar and plead.
Mr. Holyoake. Nonsense. Hand me the box.
It being reluctantly handed up, Mr. Holyoake applied to the judge, Mr. Justice Erskine, for the use of a table.
Mr. Justice Erskine. There is one. (He referred to some boarding behind the bar), and there Mr. Holyoake proceeded to arrange his books and papers—although the situation was not advantageous, it being lower than the bar where the prisoners usually stand. Mr. Holyoake employed twenty minutes in this operation, and when he had done, the dock resembled, a young bookseller's stall. Mr. Holyoake then advanced to the bar and bowed to the court.
Mr. Justice Erskine (who had waited with great patience). Are you ready?