“An’ d’ ye really think noo, atween you an’ me,” said the advocate, in his most insinuating Scotch manner, “that there’s onything ava intill the cratur’?”
“I wadna lippen him wi’ a bull-stirk,” was the instant and brilliant rejoinder; and Jeffrey admitted that Cockburn had fairly extracted the essence of the evidence.
Cockburn, who entered the faculty in the year 1800, was in his day the most eloquent and persuasive orator at the Scottish Bar. With his impressive oratory, writes one, his expressive face and fine eye, his mellow voice, and his pure and homely Scottish dialect, he was almost irresistible with a jury, or in the General Assembly of the Church, where he was often engaged as counsel. On the trial of the infamous Burke and his wife, in 1829, for numerous murders of unfortunate creatures whom they had lured into their den and murdered, and whose bodies they sold to the Edinburgh doctors for dissection purposes, he acted as counsel for the woman. The trial lasted till five in the morning of the second day, and after sixteen or seventeen hours’ previous exertion, he addressed the jury, in one of the most impassioned, and powerful speeches he ever delivered. He spoke for an hour, and literally held the jury and the audience spell-bound. His chief aim was to break down the evidence of Hare, and his wife, who were socii criminis, and had been admitted by the Crown as approvers. While the miserable woman was giving her evidence, she had a child in her arms, who continued to scream almost incessantly. After drawing, in scathing and terrible words, a picture of her and Hare’s atrocities, whom he represented as the real criminals, he ascribed the screaming of the child to terror, “as if it had felt the fingers of the murderous hag clutching its little innocent throat.” His peroration, delivered with a glistening eye, in tones of the utmost solemnity and pathos, put it to the jury that there was no real evidence except that of the approvers, and that if they found the accused guilty upon such evidence as that of the two Hares, “these [pointing with a tremulous hand to the accused] will be murdered, and these [pointing to the jury] will be perjured.” Horrified as all in Court had been at the fearful atrocities disclosed on the trial, there was, when he sat down, a universal hum of sympathy from the large audience. His speech saved the woman’s life; for, while the jury found the man guilty, their verdict in the case of the woman was “not proven.”
For racy wit and humour Cockburn was equally distinguished as he was for eloquence. On one occasion he was engaged in a case in which some miscreant had ill-used and maimed a farmer’s cattle by cutting off their tails. At the conclusion of a consultation, at which the farmer was present, some conversation took place as to the disposal of the animals. Turning to him, Cockburn said the cattle might now be sold, but that he must be content to sell them wholesale, because he could not retail them. On another occasion he was counsel for a man accused of a capital crime, for which, if found guilty, the punishment was death. The evidence was quite conclusive as to the man’s guilt. When the jury had retired to consider their verdict, his client roundly taxed him with not having done him justice in the defence. He bore the fellow’s insolence for some time, but at last he gave him the pithy reply—“Keep your mind easy, my worthy friend, you’ll get perfect justice about this time six weeks”—six weeks being then the period allowed to elapse between a sentence of death and its execution.
That recalls a story told by Dr. Rogers concerning Sir John Hay, Bart., at one time Sheriff-Substitute of Stirlingshire, and one of the most facetious members of his order. Sir John had a habit, even when sitting on the bench, of crooning, or whistling, in an undertone, one or other of the Scottish airs. A youthful panel was in his court, found guilty of an act of larceny, for which in those days a sentence of banishment might be pronounced. After awarding him a sentence of imprisonment for a period, Sir John added, “and take care you don’t come here again, my man, or——,” and he closed the interview by humming the tune “Ower the Water to Charlie,” affording a gentle hint, which was no doubt well enough understood.
The Judges and Counsel engaged in our Scottish Law Courts, it has been seen, have been a peculiarly witty and entertaining set, and the same may be said of some of the witnesses who have passed through their fingers. The following examination, which took place in a question tried in 1817, in the Jury Court, between the Trustees on the Kinghorn Passage and the town of Kirkcaldy, affords a striking illustration of the cannieness of one.
The witness was called on the part of the trustees, and apparently full of their interest. The counsel having heard that the man had got the present of a coat from the clerk to the trustees before coming to attend the trial, thought proper to interrogate him on that point; as, by proving this, it would have the effect of completely setting aside his testimony. The examination was as follows:—
“Pray, where did you get that coat?”
The witness (looking obliquely down on the sleeve of his coat, and from thence to the counsel), with a mixture of effrontery and confusion, exclaimed—