Now this man has been made a good deal the subject of comment; for it appears that he had gone down to Dover, and was, in some respect, waiting for news; there was a kind of reluctance in him to acknowledge that, in respect of which there need not have been any, for there is nothing whatever objectionable in his sending up paragraphs for the Traveller newspaper. I believe the publishers of these papers mostly have some persons stationed at the out-ports, to obtain intelligence of important events, and particularly so critical and anxious a moment as that was they would naturally have such persons at the port of Dover; there was nothing he should not avow; and if it was with the view to purchase in the funds, in consequence of the intelligence he should receive; if a man purchases funds upon public intelligence fairly and honestly come by, when every body has an equal opportunity of acquiring it and the intelligence is genuine, it is like buying any other article in the market, upon fair knowledge of the circumstances connected with its value; it is as allowable to deal in that article as in any other, upon equal terms; but the objection here is to a dealing which resembles the playing with loaded dice; if one plays with secret means of advantage over another, it is not fair-playing—it is a cheat: I own I have been much shocked with this sort of fraudulent practice, called three times over, in the letter of Cochrane Johnstone, a hoax; I cannot apply a term which imports a joke to that, which if the Defendants are guilty of, is a gross fraud upon public and private property; and unless every species of depredation and robbery is to be regarded as a species of pleasantry, I think the name of hoax, which has been given to it, is very ill applied to a transaction of so dishonest and base a description.
Then Mr. St. John says, "I went to Dover, by desire of a friend of mine; his name is Farrell; he is a merchant in the city, and is a proprietor of the Traveller." Then being asked, where that gentleman lived, he says, "In Austin Friars: I was to communicate to Mr. Farrell or to Mr. Quin." Then he says, "certainly the arrival of news at such a time would have an effect upon the funds."
Then William Ions, the express-boy, being shewn to the last witness, St. John, he says, "this is the boy whom I saw sent with one of the two expresses that was sent that night; this lad went with the express to the Port-admiral at Deal, I believe; it was the express that Mr. Wright gave him from the gentleman who was there; from that gentleman."
William Ions says, "In February last I was in the service of Mr. Wright, of Dover; I was called up when the officer arrived there, and was sent with an express to Admiral Foley; I took the letter I received to Admiral Foley; Mr. Wright gave me the letter whilst I was upon my pony; he came out to the door with it; and that letter which I received, I delivered to the Admiral's servant at Deal. She took it up stairs to the Admiral, and I saw the Admiral before I left Deal, after the letter was delivered to the servant, who took it up stairs." Therefore, whatever he received at Dover he delivered to the Admiral, and what the Admiral received we have here; there is an interruption in the proof certainly, in consequence of Wright, of Dover, not being well enough to be here as a witness; and therefore it did not appear by his testimony, that that which he, Wright, had received, Wright had delivered to his express-boy, to go over to Deal with; but that is supplied by the circumstance of De Berenger, if he was the person, telling Shilling, the Dartford driver, that he had sent off such an express; therefore it must be presumed that he had sent that letter which contained an express to the Admiral; and that which the Admiral received he shews you.
To supply that defect in the evidence, Mr. Lavie was called to say, that he believed it to be De Berenger's hand-writing; and though this does not appear to be the ordinary undisguised hand of this Defendant, yet after Lord Yarmouth, who had given his evidence that he did not consider it his hand-writing, referred to the letter R, the initial letter of Random de Berenger's christian name, he considered that as resembling his hand-writing, and you would observe, whether there was not such a resemblance as Lord Yarmouth mentions, if it were at all material; but it ceases entirely to be material, when he tells Shilling, as he does, that he had actually sent such a letter to the Admiral.
Admiral Foley is next called; he says, "The letter was brought to me, that that boy brought to the house; I was a-bed; I read the letter in bed; I did not mark it; I enclosed it in a letter to Mr. Croker, the Secretary to the Admiralty; that is the letter; I sent it enclosed in this letter to Mr. Croker; I arose immediately, and sent for the boy into my dressing-room; I questioned the boy a good deal; I did not telegraph the Admiralty, because the weather was too thick; when I sent for the boy up, I had the letter in my hand; it was then three o'clock, and dark; the telegraph would not work; I had a candle, of course; I am not certain I should have telegraphed the Admiralty," and if he had seen reason to doubt, he would have acted very properly in abstaining from so doing; he could not communicate all that would excite the doubts he might himself entertain; he could only send a few words, indicating the most important particulars of the story which the letter contained, and therefore he might very properly hesitate about communicating any part, if he thought the whole contained doubtful, still more if untrue intelligence.
The evidence of Mr. Lavie is only that he believed this to be De Berenger's hand-writing; that he had seen him several times in the custody of the messenger in the month of April, and in the course of those interviews, he saw him write a considerable deal; he saw a whole letter which he handed across to him when he had written it, and it was given back and copied again, and for about an hour he was writing different things, and handing them backwards and forwards. He says, "I also saw his papers in his writing-desk, and I verily believe that to be his hand-writing, from what I saw him write." This is the evidence, and much less than this evidence, is what we receive every day in proof of bonds, notes, and bills of exchange; a person says, I have seen such an one write, and I belief that to be his hand-writing; and that is sufficient to launch it in evidence as primâ facie proof, leaving it to the other side to resist such proof, if they can.
Gentlemen, now we put this person in motion from Dover. Thomas Dennis is next called, who says, "I am a driver of a post-chaise in the service of Mr. Wright, at the Ship, at Dover. Early on the morning of the 21st of February, I drove the chaise from thence to Canterbury to the Fountain Inn; I drove only one person, it was a man; it was too dark to see how he was dressed; I had the leaders; he gave me and the other lad a Napoleon a-piece." He could not see the person; and there is identity only by the sort of specie in which he deals. "I sold it for a one pound note. I know the lads at Canterbury, who took him after me, Broad, and Thomas Daly; I saw Broad and Daly set off. There is nothing extraordinary in persons travelling day or night into Canterbury. I cannot say whether it might be the 20th or 22d; persons do not often give us Napoleons for driving them, I never had one given me before." No immaterial circumstance to induce a recollection of this particular traveller, nor (connected with similar evidence from other witnesses) to establish his identity.
Edward Broad, a driver of a chaise at the Fountain at Canterbury, says, "I remember the last witness coming to our house with a fare, early in the morning in February, I do not remember the day of the month, nor the day of the week; it was one gentleman came from the Ship at Dover; I drove the leaders—I drove to the Rose at Sittingbourn; the chaise went forward with four horses—he did not get out. Michael Finnis and James Wakefield drove him from thence; I did not receive any money from him, the other boy received the money, I had a Napoleon for my share." Till the day-light breaks, we have nothing to identify him in the course of his conveyance, but the Napoleons.