"Go down, go down," said the judge, angrily, and down he went.
"Gentlemen of the jury," said his lordship, "this case will require very little of your attention—the only evidence against the prisoner at the bar which goes to fasten the crime upon him, is that which has been offered by the last witness, who evidently is ignorant of the nature and obligation of an oath. With respect to the pig's toes which the prisoner stands charged with stealing——"
"A peg-top, my lord!" said Flappertrap, standing up, turning round, and speaking over the bench into the judge's ears.
"Peg-top," said his lordship—"oh—ah—I see—very bad pen—it looks in my notes like pig's toes. Well—peg-top—of the peg-top which it is alleged he took from the prosecutor, there has not been one syllable mentioned by the prosecutor himself; nor do I see that the charge of taking the bacon is by any means proved. There is no point for me to direct your attention to, and you will say whether the prisoner at the bar is guilty or not; and a very trumpery case it is altogether, that I must admit."
His lordship ceased, and the jury again laid their heads together; again the foreman gave the little "hem" of conscious readiness for decision; again did the clerk of the arraigns ask the important question, "How say ye, gentlemen, is the prisoner at the bar guilty or not guilty?" "Guilty," said the foreman to the clerk of the arraigns; and "I told you so," said the sheriff to me.
The next case was a short one. The prisoner a woman, the evidence clear and straightforward; but no great interest was excited, because it was known that the case, for the trial of which in point of fact the learned judge had, for particular reasons, given his attendance, and which accounted for his lordship's presence at the close of the session, was very speedily to come on. This extraordinary combination of circumstances afforded me the most favourable opportunity of seeing all the sights of this half awful, half amusing scene, even to the discharge of the grand jury, who had been specially kept together for the purpose of finding or ignoring the bill preferred against the eminent culprit, who was evidently the great attraction of the day—having found which, they had but three more to decide upon.
It was in the middle of the defence of the female prisoner, now "coram nobis," and just as she was making a beautiful but useless appeal to the "gentlemen of the jury," that a bustle in the court announced some coming event.
"I am," said the weeping prisoner, "an orphan—I lost my mother while I was yet a child—my father married again, and I was driven from what had been before a happy home—I have only to pray——"
Bang went a door—the scuffle of feet were heard—down went some benches—"Make way—make way!" cried some of the officers. "Stand back, sir, stand back—the gentlemen of the grand jury are coming into court." To what the moaning prisoner at the bar might have limited her supplications, I never had an opportunity of ascertaining, for the noise I have mentioned was succeeded by the appearance of eighteen or nineteen men, dressed up in something like the shabbiest dominoes I had seen at Lady Wolverhampton's masquerade, trimmed with very dirty fur—the leader, or foreman, carrying in his hand three bits of parchment. As these gentlemen advanced to a space reserved for them in the centre of the court, the judge kept exchanging bows with them until they had all reached their destination—the foreman then delivered to the clerk of arraigns the three bits of parchment, who, putting his glasses on his nose, read—James Hickson, larceny—not found.—John Hogg, felony—true bill.—Mary Ann Hodges, felony—not found. The clerk then informed his lordship, partly by words, and partly by signs, the result of the deliberations of the grand jury, and the fact that there were no more bills to set before them. Having thus far proceeded, that officer inquired if the gentlemen of the grand jury had any presentment to make; whereupon the foreman, one of the largest and dirtiest-looking persons imaginable, but whose countenance was indicative of love of power and command, and who appeared, at the moment he prepared himself to unburthen his great soul of a grievance, to feel as if the whole world were a football, made for him to play with,—
"My lord," said he, drawing himself up into an attitude, "I am sure I need not, at this time of day, enter into any discussion with your lordship on the vast importance of the rights and privileges of Englishmen—of the original establishment of the trial by jury in this country. It would be worse than idle to occupy your valuable time and that of this court, by dilating upon the merits of our constitution—the chiefest of which has, I may say—been always—and I will say—wisely, considerately, and prudently held to be that peculiar mode of administering justice between man and man. But, my lord, if in civil cases the deliberation and decision of a jury are considered adequate safeguards to the rights and property of the people, the law, still more careful of their lives and liberties, has interposed in criminal cases another and a higher tribunal, in the nature of a grand jury." [Hereabouts the judge, having bowed his head graciously, omitted to raise it again, having dropped into a sound slumber.]