Gentlemen, it is upon these grounds, therefore, I submit to you, these three defendants are not guilty of the offence charged upon this record. I shall trouble you with no witnesses;—there is nothing for me to repel. If I am right in my notion of the law;—if I am right in the persuasion that you can see nothing in the evidence connecting the two plots together;—and if my opinion of the law is sanctioned by my Lord, when he shall address himself to you, there is nothing I have to answer for. It is out of my power to prove, by any evidence, that these three persons were not connected with any of the other defendants upon the record; such a negative as that I can never establish, and therefore I can have no proofs.
Gentlemen, such is the situation in which the three gentlemen for whom I appear stand. I have expressed my sentiments upon the subject as shortly as I could. It is undoubtedly a great misfortune to my learned friends, as well as myself, that we should have been called upon to make our defences, when both you and we are so much exhausted.
There is but one other circumstance for me to mention, it is but a slight one;—the person who came up from Dover appears to have paid all his post-chaise drivers in foreign coin; there is no pretence for saying that any thing was paid by my clients but in Bank of England notes; there is nothing in that respect, therefore, connecting these two parties together; and if they are not connected together, I trust you will find Mr. Holloway, Mr. Sandom, and Mr. Lyte, not guilty of this charge.
Lord Ellenborough. Gentlemen of the Jury; It appears to me this would be the most convenient time for dividing the cause, as the evidence will occupy considerable time, probably. I cannot expect your attendance before ten o'clock.
It being now three o'clock on Thursday morning, the Court adjourned to ten o'clock.
Court of King's Bench, Guildhall.
Thursday, 9 June 1814.