[43] Spencer Cowper (1669-1727) was the younger brother of Earl Cowper,
who was the first Lord Chancellor of Great Britain. He was educated at
Westminster, and made Controller of the Bridge House Estates in 1690. At
the time of this trial his brother was the member for Hertford. In 1705
and 1708 he represented Beeralston in Parliament; he was one of the
managers in Sacheverell's trial, and lost his seat in consequence, but
was afterwards elected for Truro in 1711. In 1714 he became
Attorney-General to the Prince of Wales, and in 1717 Chief-Justice of
Chester. On the accession of George the Second he was made
Attorney-General of the Duchy of Chester, and a Judge of the Common
Pleas in 1727. He died the same year. He was the grandfather of William
Cowper the poet.
[44] Sir Henry Hatsell (1641-1714) was the son of an active Roundhead
who sat in the House of Commons during the Commonwealth. He was educated
at Exeter College, was called to the Bar in 1667, and became a Baron of
the Exchequer in 1697. The present trial was the most conspicuous with
which he was connected, from which fact it may be supposed that he never
enjoyed a very high reputation. He was removed from the Bench soon after
Queen Anne's accession.
[45] This John Dimsdale was apparently the father of the first Baron
Dimsdale, who inoculated Catharine of Russia and the Grand Duke Paul,
her son, for smallpox in 1728. John's father was William, who
accompanied William Penn to America in 1684; so that it is not clear who
the Mr. Dimsdale, senior, and Dr. Robert Dimsdale of this trial were.
The family is, however, one which has long been settled in
Hertfordshire.
[46] _Vulgar Errors_, Book IV., ch. vi., 'Of Swimming and Floating.'
[47] The Lord of the Manor might have a right to the forfeited goods of
a felon.
[48] Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753) was born in Co. Down. He studied
medicine abroad, and was elected a member of the Royal Society in 1685.
In 1687 he went to the West Indies as secretary to the Duke of
Albemarle, and made valuable scientific collections. He was elected
secretary of the Royal Society in 1693, and succeeded Sir Isaac Newton
as president of the same body in 1727. He was physician to Queen Anne
and George the Second, and founded the botanical garden at Chelsea for
the Society of Apothecaries. He left his collections to the nation, and
they formed part of the original nucleus of the British Museum. Sloane
Street and Hans Square derive their names from him.
[49] The lay reader must observe that Sloane is talking of the 'civil
law.'
[50] William Cowper (1666-1709) was a leading surgeon at the time of
this trial, having been elected a member of the Royal Society in 1696,
and in 1698 having published a treatise on anatomy, which led to a
vigorous controversy between him and a Dutch doctor of the name Bidloo,
whose anatomical plates he seems to have adopted for his own work. He
subsequently published a variety of papers on surgery, and was the
discoverer of Cowper's glands.