Cornish Characters and Strange Events

by S. Baring-Gould

"I suppose you have been sent for?" was the curt reply. Mountford said, No—he was there on his way home from the playhouse.

"You know all about the lady, I imagine," said Lord Mohun.

Mountford not understanding the drift of his words said, "I hope that my wife has given you no offence."

"You mistake me," said Lord Mohun; "it is Mrs. Bracegirdle that I mean."

"Mrs. Bracegirdle is no concern of mine," replied Mountford; "but I hope your lordship does not countenance any ill action of Mr. Hill."

The conversation was interrupted by the impatient captain, who suddenly started forward, and exclaiming, "This is no longer the time for such discourses!" struck Mountford with his left hand, and immediately ran him through the body. The wounded man did not fall to the ground at once; he had still, for a moment, sufficient strength left to draw his sword, though not to use it, when, exhausted by the effort, he sank upon the ground.

A cry of murder arose, Hill fled, and the watch came up now from the tavern where they had been questioning the drawer and imbibing. Mountford was carried to his own lodgings, where he died, about one o'clock in the afternoon of the same day, for it was some time after midnight when the affair took place.

"The grand jury of Middlesex," says Macaulay, "consisting of gentlemen of note, found a bill of murder against Hill and Mohun. Hill escaped. Mohun was taken. His mother threw herself at King William's feet, but in vain. 'It was a cruel act,' said the King. 'I shall leave it to the law.'

"The trial came on in the Court of the Lord High Steward, and, as Parliament happened to be sitting, the culprit had the advantage of being judged by the whole body of the peerage. There was then no lawyer in the Upper House. It therefore became necessary, for the first time since Buckhurst had pronounced sentence on Essex and Southampton, that a peer who had never made jurisprudence his special study should preside over that grave tribunal. Caermarthen, who, as Lord President, took precedence of all the nobility, was appointed Lord High Steward. A full report of the proceedings has come down to us. No person, who carefully examines that report, and attends to the opinion unanimously given by the judges in answer to a question which Nottingham drew up, and in which the facts brought out by the evidence are stated with perfect fairness, can doubt that the crime of murder was fully brought home to the prisoner. Such was the opinion of the King, who was present during the trial; and such was the almost unanimous opinion of the public. Had the issue been tried by Holt and twelve plain men at the Old Bailey, there can be no doubt that a verdict of Guilty would have been returned. The Peers, however, by sixty-nine votes to fourteen, acquitted their accused brother. One great nobleman was so brutal and stupid as to say, 'After all, the fellow was but a player; and players are rogues.' All the newspapers, all the coffee-house orators complained that the blood of the poor was shed with impunity by the great. Wits remarked that the only fair thing about the trial was the show of ladies in the galleries. Letters and journals are still extant in which men of all shades of opinion, Whigs, Tories, Non-jurors, condemn the partiality of the tribunal."

On the one hand, the words of the dying man exculpated Mohun from any share in the actual murder; on the other hand, it is clear from the uncontradicted testimony of more than one witness, that he was fully cognizant of Hill's intentions, and that he did not hesitate to encourage him by his presence through the whole affair. According to the Attorney-General, his first question, when he surrendered himself, was, "Has Mr. Hill escaped?" and, upon being answered in the affirmative, he exclaimed, "I am glad of it! I should not care if I were hanged for him," his only regret being that Hill had escaped with very little money about him. He confessed, moreover, to the watch, that he had changed coats with his friend; the object, of course, was to throw out the pursuers as much as possible by this slight disguise.