--Preparations--The Scales of Justice.
At last the trial came on, and Sir Robert Whitecraft, the great champion
of Protestantism--a creed which he did not believe--was conducted into
the court-house and placed in the dock. He was dressed in his best
apparel, in order to distinguish himself from common culprits, and to
give this poor external evidence of his rank, with a hope that it might
tell, to a certain extent at least, upon the feeling of the jury. When
placed in the dock, a general buzz and bustle agitated the whole
court His friends became alert, and whispered to each other with much
earnestness, and a vast number of them bowed to him, and shook hands
with him, and advised him to be cool, and keep up his spirits. His
appearance, however, was any thing but firm; his face was deadly pale,
his eyes dull and cowardly, his knees trembled so much that he was
obliged to support himself on the front of the dock.
At length the trial commenced, and the case having been opened by a
young lawyer, a tall, intellectual-looking man, about the middle age,
of pale but handsome features, and an eye of singular penetration and
brilliancy, rose; and after pulling up his gown at the shoulders,
and otherwise adjusting it, proceeded to lay a statement of this
extraordinary case before the jury.
He dwelt upon “the pain which he felt in contemplating a gentleman of
rank and vast wealth occupying the degraded position of a felon, but
not, he was sorry to say, of a common felon. The circumstances, my lord,
and gentlemen of the jury, which have brought the prisoner before you
this day, involve a long catalogue of crimes that as far transcend, in
the hideousness of their guilt, the offences of a common felon as his
rank and position in life do that of the humblest villain who ever stood
before a court of justice.
“The position, gentlemen, of this country has for a long series of years
been peculiar, anomalous, and unhappy. Divided as it is, and has been,
by the bitter conflict between two opposing creeds and parties, it is
not to be wondered at that it should be a melancholy scene of misery,
destitution, famine, and crime; and, unhappily, it presents to us the
frightful aspect of all these. The nature, however, of the conflicts
between those creeds and parties, inasmuch as it bears upon the case of
the prisoner, gentlemen, who now stands for trial and a verdict at your
hands, is such as forces me, on that account, to dwell briefly upon it.
In doing so, I will have much, for the sake of our common humanity, to
regret and to deplore. It is a fundamental principle, gentlemen, in our
great and glorious Constitution, that the paramount end and object of
our laws is to protect the person, the liberty, and the property of
the subject. But there is something, gentlemen, still dearer to us than
either liberty, person, or property; something which claims a protection
from those laws that stamps them with a nobler and a loftier character,
when it is afforded, and weaves them into the hearts and feelings of
men of all creeds, when this divine mission of the law is fulfilled. I
allude, gentlemen, to the inalienable right of every man to worship God
freely, and according to his own conscience--without restraint--without
terror--without oppression, and, gentlemen of the jury, without
persecution. A man, or a whole people, worship God, we will assume,
sincerely, according to their notions of what is right, and, I say,
gentlemen, that the individual who persecutes that man, or those people,
for piously worshipping their Creator, commits blasphemy against the
Almighty--and stains, as it were, the mercy-seat with blood.
“Gentlemen of the jury, let me ask you what has been the state and
condition of this unhappy and distracted country? I have mentioned two
opposing creeds, and consequently two opposing parties, and I have also
mentioned persecution; but let me also ask you again on which side has
the persecution existed? Look at your Roman Catholic fellow-subjects,
and ask yourselves to what terrible outburst of political and religious
vengeance have they not been subjected? But it is said they are not
faithful and loyal subjects, and that they detest the laws. Well, let
us consider this--let us take a cursory view of all that the spirit and
operation of the laws have left them to be thankful for--have brought
to bear upon them for the purpose, we must suppose, of securing their
attachment and their loyalty. Let us, gentlemen, calmly and solemnly,
and in a Christian temper, take a brief glance at the adventures which
the free and glorious spirit of the British Constitution has held out
to them, in order to secure their allegiance. In the first place, their
nobles and their gentry have been deprived of their property, and the
right of tenure has been denied even to the people. Ah, my lord, and
gentlemen of the jury, what ungrateful and disloyal miscreant could
avoid loving a Constitution, and hugging to his grateful heart laws
which showered down such blessings upon him, and upon all those who
belong to a creed so favored? But it would seem to have been felt that
these laws had still a stronger claim upon their affections. They would
protect their religion as they did their property; and in order
to attach them still more strongly, they shut up their places of
worship--they proscribed and banished and hung their clergy--they hung
or shot the unfortunate people who tied to worship God in the desert--in
mountain fastnesses and in caves, and threw their dead bodies to find
a tomb in the entrails of the birds of the air, or the dogs which even
persecution had made mad with hunger. But again--for this pleasing
panorama is not yet closed, the happy Catholics, who must have danced
with delight, under the privileges of such a Constitution, were deprived
of the right to occupy and possess all civil offices--their enterprise
was crushed--their industry made subservient to the rapacity of their
enemies, and not to their own prosperity. But this is far from being
all. The sources of knowledge--of knowledge which only can enlighten
and civilize the mind, prevent crime, and promote the progress of human
society--these sources of knowledge, I say, were sealed against
them; they were consequently left to ignorance, and its inseparable
associate--vice. All those noble principles which result from education,
and which lead youth into those moral footsteps in which they should
tread, were made criminal in the Catholic to pursue, and impossible to
attain; and having thus been reduced by ignorance to the perpetration of
those crimes which it uniformly produces--the people were punished for
that which oppressive laws had generated, and the ignorance which was
forced upon them was turned into a penalty and a persecution. They
were first made ignorant by one Act of Parliament, and then punished by
another for those crimes which ignorance produces.
“And now, my lord, and gentlemen of the jury, it remains for me to
take another view of the state and condition of this wretched country.
Perhaps there is not in the world so hideously a penal code of laws
as that which appertains to the civil and religious rights of our
unfortunate Roman Catholic countrymen. It is not that this code is
fierce, inhuman, unchristian, barbarous, and Draconic, and conceived in
a spirit of blood--because it might be all this, and yet, through the
liberality and benevolence of those into whose hands it ought to be
entrusted for administration, much of its dreadful spirit might be
mitigated. And I am bound to say that a large and important class of the
Protestant community look upon such a code nearly with as much horror
as the Catholics themselves. Unfortunately, however, in every state of
society and of law analogous to ours, a certain class of men, say rather
of monsters, is sure to spring up, as it were, from hell, their throats
still parched and heated with that insatiable thirst which the guilty
glutton felt before them, and which they now are determined to slake
with blood. For some of these men the apology of selfishness, an anxiety
to raise themselves out of the struggles of genteel poverty, and
a wolfish wish to earn the wages of oppression, might be pleaded;
although, heaven knows, it is at best but a desperate and cowardly
apology. On the other hand, there are men not merely independent, but
wealthy, who, imbued with a fierce and unreasoning bigotry, and stained
by a black and unscrupulous ambition, start up into the front ranks of
persecution, and carry fire and death and murder as they go along, and
all this for the sake of adding to their reprobate names a title--a
title earned by the shedding of innocent blood--a title earned by the
oppression and persecution of their unresisting fellow-subjects--a
title, perhaps that of baronet; if I am mistaken in this, the individual
who stands before you in that dock could, for he might, set me right.
“In fact, who are those who have lent themselves with such delight to
the execution of bad laws? of laws that, for the sake of religion and
Christianity, never ought to have been effected? Are they men of moral
and Christian lives? men whose walk has been edifying in the sight of
their fellows? are they men to whom society could look up as examples of
private virtue and the decorous influence of religion? are they men who,
on the Sabbath of God, repair with their wives and families to his holy
worship? Alas! no. These heroic persecutors, who hunt and punish a set
of disarmed men, are, in point of fact, not only a disgrace to that
religion in whose name they are persecutors, and on whose merciful
precepts they trample, but to all religion, in whatever light true
religion is contemplated. Vicious, ignorant, profligate, licentious, but
cunning, cruel, bigoted, and selfish, they make the spirit of oppressive
laws, and the miserable state of the country, the harvest of their gain.
Look more closely at the picture, gentlemen of the jury, and make, as I
am sure you will, the dismal and terrible circumstances which I will lay
before you your own. Imagine for a moment that those who are now, or at
least have been, the objects of hot and blood-scenting persecution, had,
by some political revolution, got the power of the State and of the laws
into their own hands; suppose, for it is easily supposed, that they
had stripped you of your property, deprived you of your civil rights,
disarmed you of the means of self-defence, persecuted yourselves and
proscribed your religion, or, vice versa, proscribed yourselves and
persecuted your religion, or, to come at once to the truth, proscribed
and persecuted both; suppose your churches shut up, your pious clergy
banished, and that, when on the bed of sickness or of death, some
of your family, hearing your cries for the consolations of religion,
ventured out, under the clouds of the night, pale with sorrow, and
trembling with apprehension, to steal for you, at the risk of life, that
comfort which none but a minister of God can effectually bestow upon the
parting spirit; suppose this, and suppose that your house is instantly
surrounded by some cruel but plausible Sir Robert Whitecraft, or some
drunken and ruffianly Captain Smellpriest, who, surrounded and supported
by armed miscreants, not only breaks open that house, but violates the
awful sanctify of the deathbed itself, drags out the minister of Christ
from his work of mercy, and leaves him a bloody corpse at our threshold.
I say, change places, gentlemen of the jury, and suppose in your own
imaginations that all those monstrous persecutions, all those murderous
and flagitious outrages, had been inflicted upon yourselves, with others
of an equally nefarious character; suppose all this, and you may easily
do so, for you have seen it all perpetrated in the name of God and the
law, or, to say the truth, in the hideous union of mammon and murder;
suppose all this, and you will feel what such men as he who stands
in that dock deserves from humanity and natural justice; for, alas! I
cannot say, from the laws of his country, under the protection of which,
and in the name of which, he and those who resemble him have deluged
that country with innocent blood, laid waste the cabin of the widow and
the orphan, and carried death and desolation wherever they went. But,
gentlemen, I shall stop here, as I do not wish to inflict unnecessary
pain upon you, even by this mitigated view of atrocities which have
taken place before your own eyes; yet I cannot close this portion of
my address without, referring to so large a number of our
fellow-Protestants with pride, as I am sure their Roman Catholic friends
do with gratitude. Who were those who, among the Protestant party, threw
the shield of their name and influence over their Catholic neighbors
and friends? Who, need I ask? The pious, the humane, the charitable,
the liberal, the benevolent, and the enlightened. Those were they who,
overlooking the mere theological distinctions of particular doctrines,
united in the great and universal creed of charity, held by them as a
common principle on which they might meet and understand and love each
other. And indeed, gentlemen of the jury, there cannot be a greater
proof of the oppressive spirit which animates this penal and inhuman
code than the fact that so many of those, for whose benefit it
was enacted, resisted its influence, on behalf of their Catholic
fellow-subjects, as far as they could, and left nothing undone to
support the laws of humanity against those of injustice and oppression.
When the persecuted Catholic could not invest his capital in the
purchase of property, the generous Protestant came forward, purchased
the property in his own name, became the _bona fide_ proprietor, and
then transferred its use and advantages to his Catholic friend. And
again, under what roof did the hunted Catholic priest first take refuge
from those bloodhounds of persecution? In most cases under that of his
charitable and Christian brother, the Protestant clergyman. Gentlemen,
could there be a bitterer libel upon the penal laws than the notorious
facts which I have the honor of stating to you?
“The facts which have placed the prisoner at the bar before you are
these, and in detailing them I feel myself placed in circumstances of
great difficulty, and also of peculiar delicacy. The discharge, however,
of a public duty, which devolves upon me as leading law officer of the
Crown, forces me into a course which I cannot avoid, unless I should
shrink from promoting and accomplishing the ends of public justice. In
my position, and in the discharge of my solemn duties here to-day, I can
recognize no man's rank, no man's wealth, nor the prestige of any man's
name. So long as he stands at that bar, charged with great and heinous
crimes, I feel it my duty to strip him of all the advantages of his
birth and rank, and consider him simply a mere subject of the realm.
“In order to show you, gentlemen of the jury, the animux under which
the prisoner at the bar acted, in the case before us, I must go back
a little--a period of some months. At that time a highly respectable
gentleman of an ancient and honored family in this country was one
evening on his way home from this town, attended, as usual, by his
servant. At a lonely place on a remote and antiquated road, which they
took as a shorter way, it so happened that, in consequence of a sudden
mist peculiar to those wild moors, they lost their path, and found
themselves in circumstances of danger and distress. The servant,
however, whistled, and his whistle was answered; a party of men, of
freebooters, of robbers, headed by a person called the Red Rapparee, who
has been convicted at these assizes, and who has been the scourge of the
country for years, came up to them, and as the Rapparee had borne this
respectable gentleman a deadly and implacable enmity for some time past,
he was about to murder both master and man, and actually had his musket
levelled at him, as others of his gang had at his aged servant, when
a person, a gentleman named Reilly--[there there was a loud cheer
throughout the court, which, however, was soon repressed, and the
Attorney-General proceeded]--this person started out from an old ruin,
met the robber face to face, and, in short, not only saved the lives of
the gentleman and his servant, but conducted them safely home. This act
of courage and humanity, by a Roman Catholic to a Protestant, had such
an effect upon the old gentleman's daughter, a lady whose name has
gone far and wide for her many virtues and wonderful beauty, that an
attachment was formed between the young gentleman and her. The prisoner
at the bar, gentlemen, was a suitor for her hand; but as the young and
amiable lady was acquainted with his character as a priest-hunter and
persecutor, she, though herself a Protestant, could look upon him only
with abhorrence. At all events, after the rescue of her father's life,
and her acquaintance with Mr. Reilly, the prisoner at the bar was
rejected with disdain, as he would have been, it seems, if Reilly never
had existed. Now, gentlemen I of the jury, observe that Reilly was a
Catholic, which was bad enough in the eyes of the prisoner at the bar;
but he was more; he was a rival, and were it not for the state of the
law, would, it appears, for there is no doubt of it now, have been
a successful one. From henceforth the prisoner at the bar marked Mr.
Reilly for vengeance, for destruction, for death. At this time he was
in the full exercise of irresponsible authority; he could burn, hang,
shoot, without being called to account; and as it will appear before
you, gentlemen, this consciousness of impunity stimulated him to the
perpetration of such outrages as, in civil life, and in a country free
from civil war, are unparalleled in the annals of crime and cruelty.
“But, gentlemen, what did this man do? this man, so anxious to preserve
the peace of the country; this man, the terror of the surrounding
districts; what did he do, I ask? Why, he took the most notorious
robber of: his day, the fierce and guilty Rapparee--he took him into his
councils, in order that he might enable him to trace the object of
his vengeance, Reilly, in the first place, and to lead him to the
hiding-places of such unfortunate Catholic priests as had taken refuge
in the caves and fastnesses of the mountains. Instead of punishing this
notorious malefactor, he took him into his own house, made him, as he
was proud to call them, one of his priest-hounds, and induced him to
believe that he had procured him a pardon from Government. Reilly's name
he had, by his foul misrepresentations, got into the _Hue-and-Cry_, and
subsequently had him gazetted as an outlaw; and all this upon his own
irresponsible authority. I mention nothing, gentlemen, in connection
with this trial which we are not in a capacity to prove.
“Having forced Reilly into a variety of disguises, and hunted him like
a mad dog through the country; having searched every: lurking-place in
which he thought he might I find him, he at length resolved on the only
course of vengeance he could pursue. He surrounded his habitation, and,
after searching for Reilly himself, he openly robbed him of all that was
valuable of that gentleman's furniture, then set fire to the house, and
in the clouds of the night reduced that and every out-office he had
to ashes--a capital felony. It so happens, however, that the house and
offices were, in point of fact, not the property of Reilly at all, but
of a most respectable Protestant gentleman and magistrate, Mr. Hastings,
with whose admirable! character I have no doubt you are all acquainted;
and all that remains for me to say is, that he is the prosecutor in this
case.
“And now, gentlemen, we expect a calm, deliberate, and unbiassed verdict
from you. Look upon the prisoner at the bar as an innocent man until you
can, with a clear conscience, find him guilty of the charges which we
are in a condition to prove against him; but if there be any doubt upon
your minds, I hope you will give him the benefit of it.”
Sir Robert Whitecraft, in fact, had no defence, and could procure no
witnesses to counteract the irresistible body of evidence that was
produced against him. Notwithstanding all this, his friends calculated
upon the prejudices of a Protestant jury. His leading counsel made as
able a speech in his defence as could be made under the circumstances.
It consisted, however, of vague generalities, and dwelt upon the state
of the country and the necessity that existed for men of great spirit
and Protestant feeling to come out boldly, and, by courage and energy,
carry the laws that had passed for the suppression of Popery into active
and wholesome operation. “Those laws were passed by the wisest and
ablest assembly of legislators in the world, and to what purpose could
legislative enactments for the preservation of Protestant interests be
passed if men of true faith and loyalty could not be found to carry them
into effect. There were the laws; the prisoner at the bar did not make
those laws, and if he was invested with authority to carry them into
operation, what did he do but discharge a wholesome and important duty?
The country was admitted, on all sides, to be in a disturbed state;
Popery was attempting for years most insidiously to undermine the
Protestant Church, and to sap the foundation of all Protestant
interests; and if, by a pardonable excess of zeal, of zeal in the right
direction, and unconscious lapse in the discharge of what he would call,
those noble but fearful duties had occurred, was it for those who had
a sense of true liberty, and a manly detestation of Romish intrigue at
heart, to visit that upon the head of a true and loyal man as a
crime. Forbid it, the spirit of the British Constitution--forbid it,
heaven--forbid it, Protestantism. No, gentlemen of the jury,” etc., etc.
We need not go further, because we have condensed in the few sentences
given the gist of all he said.
When the case was closed, the jury retired to their room, and as Sir
Robert Whitecraft's fate depends upon their verdict, we will be kind
enough to avail ourselves of the open sesame of our poor imagination to
introduce our readers invisibly into the jury-room.
“Now,” said the foreman, “what's to be done? Are we to sacrifice a
Protestant champion to Popery?”
“To Popery! To the deuce,” replied another. “It's not Popery that is
prosecuting him. Put down Popery by argument, by fair argument, but
don't murder those that profess it, in cold blood. As the Attorney*
General said, let us make it our own case, and if the Papishes treated
us as we have treated them, what would we say? By jingo, I'll hang
that fellow. He's a Protestant champion, they say; but I say he's a
Protestant bloodhound, and a cowardly rascal to boot.”
“How is he a cowardly rascal, Bob? Hasn't' he proved himself a brave man
against the Papishes? eh?”
“A brave man! deuce thank him for being a brave man against poor devils
that are allowed nothing stouter than a horse-rod to defend themselves
with--when he has a party of well-armed bloodhounds at his back. He's
the worst landlord in Ireland, and, above all things, he's a tyrant to
his Protestant tenants, this champion of Protestantism. Ay, and fierce
as he is against Popery, there's not a Papish tenant on his estate that
he's not like a father to.”
“And how the deuce do you know that?”
“Because I was head bailiff to him for ten years.”
“But doesn't all the world know that he hates the Papists, and would
have them massacred if he could?”
“And so he does--and so he would; but it's all his cowardice, because
he's afraid that if he was harsh to his Popish tenants some of them
might shoot him from behind a hedge some fine night, and give him a
leaden bullet for his supper.”
“I know he's a coward,” observed another, “because he allowed himself to
be horsewhipped by Major Bingham, and didn't call him out for it.”
“Oh, as to that,” said another, “it was made up by their friends; but
what's to be done? All the evidence is against him, and we are on our
oaths to find a verdict according to the evidence.”
“Evidence be hanged,” said another; “I'll sit here till doom's-day
before I find him guilty. Are we, that are all loyal Protestants, to
bring out a varjuice to please the Papishes? Oh, no, faith; but here's
the thing, gentlemen; mark me; here now, I take off my shoes, and I'll
ait them before I find him guilty;” and as he spoke he deliberately
slipped of his shoes, and placed them on the table, ready for his tough
and loyal repast.
“By Gog,” said another, “I'll hang him, in spite of your _teeth_; and,
afther aiten your brogues, you may go barefooted if you like. I have
brogues to ait as well as you, and one of mine is as big as two of
yours.”
This was followed by a chorus of laughter, after which they began to
consider the case before them, like admirable and well-reasoning
jurors, as they were. Two hours passed in wrangling and talking and
recriminating, when, at last, one of them, striking the table, exclaimed
with an oath:
“All Europe won't save the villain. Didn't he seduce my sister's
daughter, and then throw her and her child back, with shame and
disgrace, on the family, without support?”
“Look at that,” said the owner of the shoe, holding it up triumphantly;
“that's my supper to-night, and my argument in his defence. I say
our--Protestant champion mustn't hang, at least until I starve first.”
The other, who sat opposite to him, put his hand across the table, and
snatching the shoe, struck its owner between the two eyes with it and
knocked him back on the floor. A scene of uproar took place, which
lasted for some minutes, but at length, by the influence of the foreman,
matters were brought to a somewhat amicable issue. In this way they
spent the time for a few hours more, when one of the usual messengers
came to know if they had agreed; but he was instantly dismissed to a
very warm settlement, with the assurance that they had not.
“Come,” said one of them, pulling out a pack of cards, “let us amuse
ourselves at any rate. Who's for a hand at the Spoil Five?”
The cards were looked upon as a godsend, and in a few moments one half
the jury were busily engaged at that interesting game. The other portion
of them amused themselves, in the meantime, as well as they could.
“Tom,” said one of them, “were you ever on a special jury in a revenue
case?”
“No,” replied Tom, “never. Is there much fun?”
“The devil's own fun; because if we find for the defendant, he's sure to
give us a splendid feed. But do you know how we manage when we find that
we can't agree?”
“No. How is it?”
“Why, you see, when the case is too clear against him, and that to find
for him would be too barefaced, we get every man to mark down on a slip
of paper the least amount of damages he is disposed to give against him;
when they're all down, we tot them up, and divide by twelve--“*
*By no means an uncommon proceeding in revenue cases,
even at the present day.
“Silence,” said another, “till we hear John Dickson's song.”
The said John Dickson was at the time indulging them with a comic song,
which was encored with roars of laughter.
“Hallo!” shouted one of those at the cards, “here's Jack Brereton has
prigged the ace of hearts.”
“Oh, gentlemen,” said Jack, who was a greater knave at the cards than
any in the pack, “upon, my honor, gentlemen, you wrong me.”
“There--he has dropped it,” said another; “look under the table.”
The search was made, and up was lugged the redoubtable ace of hearts
from under one of Jack's feet, who had hoped, by covering it, to escape
detection. Detected, however, he was, and, as they all knew him well,
the laughter was loud accordingly, and none of them laughed louder than
Jack himself.
“Jack,” said another of them, “let us have a touch of the legerdemain.”
“Gentlemen, attention,” said Jack. “Will any of you lend me a
halfpenny?”
This was immediately supplied to him, and the first thing he did was
to stick it on his forehead--although there had been brass enough there
before--to which it appeared to have been glued; after a space he took
it off and placed it in the palm of his right hand, which he closed,
and then, extending both his hands, shut, asked those about him in which
hand it was. Of course they all said in the right; but, upon Jack's
opening the said hand, there was no halfpenny there.
In this way they discussed a case of life or death, until another knock
came, which “knock” received the same answer as before.
“Faith,” said a powerful-looking farmer from near the town of Boyle--the
very picture of health, “if they don't soon let us out I'll get sick.
It's I that always does the sickness for the jury when we're kept in too
long.”
“Why, then, Billy Bradley,” asked one of them, “how could you, of all
men living, sham sickness on a doctor?”
“Because,” said Billy, with a grin, “I'm beginning to feel a divarsion
of blood to the head, for want of a beefsteak and a pot o' porther. My
father and grandfather both died of a divarsion of blood to the head.”
“I rather think,” observed another, “that they died by taking their
divarsion at the beefsteak and the pot of porter.”
“No matther,” said Billy, “they died at all events, and so will we all,
plaise God.”
“Gome,” said one of them, “there is Jack Brereton and his cane--let us
come to business. What do you say, Jack, as to the prisoner?”
Jack at the time had the aforesaid cane between his legs, over which he
was bent like a bow, with the head of it in his mouth.
“Are you all agreed?” asked Jack.
“All for a verdict of guilty, with the exception of this fellow and his
shoes.”
Jack Brereton was a handsome old fellow, with a red face and a pair
of watery eyes; he was a little lame, and crippled as he walked,
in consequence of a hip complaint, which he got by a fall from a
jaunting-car; but he was now steady enough, except the grog.
“Jack, what do you say?” asked the foreman; “it's time to do something.”
“Why,” replied Jack, “the scoundrel engaged me to put down a pump for
him, and I did it in such a manner as was a credit to his establishment.
To be sure, he wanted the water to come whenever it was asked; but I
told him that that wasn't my system; that I didn't want to make a good
thing too cheap; but that the water would come in genteel time--that is
to say, whenever they didn't want it; and faith the water bore me out.”
And here Jack laughed heartily. “But no matter,” proceeded Jack, “he's
only a _bujeen_; sure it was his mother nursed me. Where's that fellow
that's going to eat his shoes? Here, Ned Wilson, you flaming Protestant,
I have neither been a grand juror nor a petty juror of the county of
Sligo for nothing. Where are you? Take my cane, place it between your
knees as you saw me do, put your mouth down to the head of it, suck up
with all your strength, and you'll find that God will give you sense
afterwards.”
Wilson, who had taken such a fancy for eating his shoes, in order to
show his loyalty, was what is called a hard-goer, and besides a great
friend of Jack's. At all events, he followed his advice--put the head
of the huge cane into his mouth, and drew up accordingly. The cane, in
fact, was hollow all through, and contained about three half-pints of
strong whiskey. There was some wrangling with the man for a little time
after this; but at length he approached Jack, and handing him the empty
cane, said:
“What's your opinion, Jack?”
“Why, we must hang him,” replied Jack. “He defrauded me in the pump; and
I ask you did you ever put your nose to a better pump than that?” *
* We have been taken to task about this description of the
jury-room; but we believe, and have good reason to believe,
that every circumstance mentioned in it is a fact Do our
readers remember the history of Orr's trial, where three-
fourths of the jurors who convicted him were drunk--a fact
to which they themselves confirmed upon oath afterwards?
“Give me your hand, Jack, we're agreed--he swings!”
At this moment an officer came to ask the same question, when, in reply,
the twelve jurymen came out, and, amidst the most profound silence, the
foreman handed down the issue paper to the Clerk of the Crown.
“Gentlemen,” said that officer, after having cast his eye over it, “have
you agreed in your verdict?”
“We have.”
“Is the prisoner at the bar guilty, or not guilty?”
“Guilty!”
Let us pause here a moment, and reflect upon the precarious tenure of
life, as it is frequently affected by such scenes as the above, in
the administration of justice. Here was a criminal of the deepest dye,
shivering in the dock with the natural apprehension of his fate, but
supported, notwithstanding, by the delay of the jury in coming to a
verdict. He argued reasonably enough, that in consequence of that very
delay he must necessarily have friends among them who would hold out to
the last. The state of suspense, however, in which he was held must
have been, and was, dreadful. His lips and throat became parched by
excitement, and he was obliged to drink three or four glasses of water.
Being unable to stand, he was accommodated with a chair, on which, while
he sat, the perspiration flowed from his pallid face. Yet, with the
exception of his own clique, there was scarcely an individual present
who did not hope that this trial would put an end to his career of
blood. After all, there was something of the retributive justice of
Providence even in the conduct and feelings of the jury; for, in point
of fact, it was more on account of his private crimes and private infamy
that they, however wrongly, brought in their verdict. Here was he,
encircled by their knowledge of his own iniquities, apart from his
public acts; and there, standing in that dock, from which he might have
gone out free, so far as regarded his political exploits, he found,
although he did not know it, the black weight of his private vices fall
upon his head in the shape of the verdict just delivered. It would be
impossible to describe his appearance on hearing it; his head fell down
upon his breast listless, helpless, and with a character of despair that
was painful to contemplate.
When the verdict was handed down, the judge immediately put on the
black-cap; but Whitecraft's head was resting on his breast, and he did
not for some time see it. At length, stirred into something like life by
the accents of the judge, he raised his head with an effort. The latter
addressed him as thus: “Sir Robert Whitecraft, you have been convicted
this day by as enlightened a jury as ever sat in a jury-box. You must
be aware yourself, by the length of time, and consequently the deep and
serious investigation which they bestowed--and, it is evident, painfully
bestowed--upon your unhappy case, that your conviction is the deliberate
result of their conscientious opinion. It is obvious, as I said, from
the length of time occupied in the jury-room, that the evidence in your
case was sifted closely, and canvassed with the ability and experience
of able and honest men. In the verdict they have returned the Court
perfectly concurs; and it now only remains for me to pass upon you that
awful sentence of the law which is due to your cruel life and flagitious
crimes. Were you a man without education, nurtured in ignorance, and the
slave of its debasing consequences, some shade of compassion might be
felt for you on that account. But you cannot plead this; you cannot
plead poverty, or that necessity which urges many a political adventurer
to come out as a tyrant and oppressor upon his fellow-subjects, under
the shield of the law, and in the corrupt expectation of reward or
promotion. You were not only independent in your own circumstances, but
you possessed great wealth; and why you should shape yourself such an
awful course of crime can only be attributed to a heart naturally
fond of persecution and blood. I cannot, any more than the learned
Attorney-General, suffer the privileges of rank, wealth, or position
to sway me from the firm dictates of justice. You imagined that the
law would connive at you--and it did so too long, but, believe me, the
sooner or later it will abandon the individual that has been provoking
it, and, like a tiger when goaded beyond patience, will turn and tear
its victim to pieces. It remains for me now to pronounce the awful
sentence of the law upon you; but before I do so, let me entreat you to
turn your heart to that Being who will never refuse mercy to a repentant
sinner; and I press this upon you the more because you need not
entertain the slightest expectation of finding it in this world. In
order, therefore, that you may collect and compose your mind for the
great event that is before you, I will allow you four days, in order
that you may make a Christian use of your time, and prepare your spirit
for a greater tribunal than this. The sentence of the Court is that,
on the fifth day after this, you be, etc., etc., etc.; and may God have
mercy on your soul!”
At first there was a dead silence in the Court, and a portion of the
audience was taken completely by surprise on hearing both the verdict'
and the sentence. At length a deep, condensed murmur, which arose by
degrees into a yell of execration, burst forth from his friends, whilst,
on the other hand, a peal of cheers and acclamations rang so
loudly through the court that they completely drowned the indignant
vociferations of the others. In the meantime silence was restored, and
it was found that the convict had been removed during the confusion
to one of the condemned cells. What now were his friends to do? Was it
possible to take any steps by which he might yet be saved from such
a disgraceful death? Pressed as they were for time, they came to
the conclusion that the only chance existing in his favor was for a
deputation of as many of the leading Protestants of the county, as could
be prevailed upon to join in the measure, to proceed to Dublin without
delay. Immediately, therefore, after the trial, a meeting of the
baronet's friends was held in the head inn of Sligo, where the matter
was earnestly discussed. Whitecraft had been a man of private and
solitary enjoyments--in social and domestic life, as cold, selfish,
inhospitable, and repulsive as he was cruel and unscrupulous in his
public career.
The consequence was that he had few personal friends of either rank or
influence, and if the matter had rested upon his own personal character
and merits alone, he would have been left, without an effort, to the
fate which had that day been pronounced upon him. The consideration of
the matter, however, was not confined to himself as an individual, but
to the Protestant party at large, and his conviction was looked upon as
a Popish triumph. On this account many persons of rank and influence,
who would not otherwise have taken any interest in his fate, came
forward for the purpose, if possible, of defeating the Popish
party--who, by the way, had nothing whatsoever to do in promoting his
conviction--and of preventing the stigma and deep disgrace which his
execution would attach to their own. A very respectable deputation was
consequently formed, and in the course of the next day proceeded to
Dublin, to urge their claims in his favor with the Lord Lieutenant.
This nobleman, though apparently favorable to the Catholic people, was
nevertheless personally and secretly a bitter enemy to them. The state
policy which he was instructed and called upon to exercise in their
favor differed _toto coelo_ from his own impressions. He spoke to them,
however, sweetly and softly, praised them for their forbearance,
and made large promises in their favor, whilst, at the same time,
he entertained no intention of complying with their request.
The deputation, on arriving at the castle, ascertained, to their
mortification, that the viceroy would not be at home until the following
day, having spent the last week with a nobleman in the neighborhood;
they were consequently obliged to await his arrival. After his return
they were admitted to an audience, in which they stated their object
in waiting upon him, and urged with great earnestness the necessity
of arresting the fate of such a distinguished Protestant as Sir Robert
Whitecraft; after which they entered into a long statement of the
necessity that existed for such active and energetic men in the then
peculiar and dangerous state of the country.
To all this, however, he replied with great suavity, assuring them that
no man felt more anxious to promote Protestant interests than he did,
and added that the relaxation of the laws against the Catholics was
not so much the result of his own personal policy or feeling as the
consequence of the instructions he had received from the English
Cabinet. He would be very glad to comply with the wishes of the
deputation if he could, but at present it was impossible. This man's
conduct was indefensible; for, not content in carrying out the laws
against the Catholics with unnecessary rigor, he committed a monstrous
outrage against a French subject of distinction, in consequence of which
the French Court, through their Ambassador in London, insisted upon his
punishment.
“Very well, my lord,” replied the spokesman of the deputation, “I beg to
assure you, that if a hair of this man's head is injured there will be
a massacre of the Popish population before two months; and I beg also to
let you know, for the satisfaction of the English Cabinet, that they
may embroil themselves with France, or get into whatever political
embarrassment they please, but an Irish Protestant will never hoist a
musket, or draw a sword, in their defence. Gentlemen, let us bid his
Excellency a good-morning.”
This was startling language, as the effect proved, for it startled
the viceroy into a compliance with their wishes, and they went home
post-haste, in order that the pardon might arrive in time.