The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 79

The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 79

"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.]

 

"That tribunal of mediation in the first instance, is full of

importance; and whatever subsequent proceedings may be taken in a

case, I do say, for myself and my fellows, that the decision upon

_ex-parte_ evidence requires more circumspection, more care, and more

consideration than a verdict delivered after a case had been argued,

and after witnesses have been heard on both sides.

 

"If, my lord, your lordship concedes this point, I will merely say,

generally, that when the mind is occupied by any important object,

more especially in matters of jurisprudence, it is absolutely

necessary that nothing, if possible, should occur to irritate or

exacerbate the feelings--all should be calm, and at rest."

 

Several people turned their eyes towards his lordship, and some

smiled.

 

"No incidental annoyance should be permitted to interpose itself;

nothing which could divert the judge from the point to which his

intellectual faculties ought to be directed, and to which, my

lord, under suitable circumstances, they would as they should

naturally converge. But, my lord, we are finite beings--creatures of

habit--subject to all the weaknesses of our nature, and liable to be

acted upon by impulses almost unaccountable to ourselves. For myself

and my fellows, I may, perhaps, hope for a favourable interpretation

of our intentions, and a lenient judgment of our conduct. We have,

my lord, struggled hard to do our duty, and I hope we have done it

serviceably and effectually--conscientiously and faithfully, I am

sure we have. But, my lord, we do think it necessary to call your

lordship's most serious attention to a fact which is embodied in

the presentment I hold in my hand. It is one which occurs to us to

be of paramount importance, as far as the tempering of justice with

mercy is involved: we have suffered grievously from the existence

of the evil to which we point; and although at this time of the

year its effects are of course not so heavily felt as in the winter

season, we have considered it a duty we owe to this court, to our

fellow-countrymen, and, we may say, to every man intimately or

remotely connected with the administration of criminal justice,

spread as they may be over the whole surface of the globe, to state

that the chimney in the grand jury-room smokes so much and so

continually, that it is impossible to endure its effects calmly or

patiently; and we therefore think it right to bring the matter thus

formally before your lordship, and to desire that measures may be

taken to abate a nuisance which, by its effects, is calculated to

thwart, impede, and even distort the course of justice, and produce

evils, the magnitude of which it is scarcely possible to imagine, and

certainly not to express."

 

A buzz of approbation from the gentlemen of the grand jury, who had

been undergoing the process of smoke-drying for several days, created

a stir in the court, in the midst of which the learned judge awoke;

and the lord mayor having whispered into his lordship's wig, his

lordship bowed, and the clerk took the parchment.

 

"Mr. Foreman, and gentlemen of the grand jury," said his lordship,

"I am happy to say that your labours for the present are concluded;

there are no more bills for your consideration. Your presentment

shall be attended to, and I have to acknowledge your great zeal and

attention, and to give you thanks for your services:--gentlemen, you

are now discharged."

 

The bows, and scufflings, and cries of "Make way there for the

gentlemen of the grand jury, who are coming out of court," were

resumed, and the orator and his peers retired, leaving the poor girl

at the bar, wondering what had happened, and what could be the reason

that the worshipful community with the cat-skin tippets should have

interposed themselves in the middle of her pathetic defence, in order

to discuss the irritating characteristic of a smoky chimney.

 

I admit that the pompous oratory of the foreman, the "_mons

parturiens_"--a splendid exhibition, and the "_ridiculus mus_," which

eventually presented itself, were to me treats of no common order,

and I regretted that Daly was not with me to participate with me in

devouring the grave absurdities which we should have had before us.

 

The trial of the girl was concluded, and I had no doubt as to her

fate, now that I became acquainted with the principle,--she was

acquitted, and never shall I forget the effect which this result

of her trial produced upon her manners and features. The moment my

friend Zig-zag had pronounced the words, "Not guilty," the pathetic

__EXPRESSION__ which had characterised her countenance turned into the

most humorous, and having winked her eye at the learned judge, who,

poor man, had summed up decidedly against her, she proceeded to place

her two hands extended in a right line from the tip of her nose, in

the direction of his lordship's seat, after the fashion of what is

called "taking a double sight," and then, making a noise which, if

not indescribable by imitation, is certainly irreducible to writing,

something between that which a hackney-coachman utters to encourage

his tired horses, and that which a duck makes when it sees either a

ditch or a drake in dry weather, she turned herself suddenly round

with the least graceful pirouette I ever saw, leaving one of the

hands which she had previously elevated for observation the last part

of her person visible.

 

A short case of pot-stealing followed--the prisoner was found guilty

in ten minutes; and then came _the_ case. It was a curious and

intricate one, and I felt quite assured, when I saw the prisoner, a

genteel-looking young man, take his place under the inverted mirror,

contrived with an almost diabolical ingenuity, so as to refract and

reflect the light upon his face from the huge window at his back; I

said to myself, having got both hardened and hungry during my short

probation in court, "We shall not dine at six to-day."

 

It might, perhaps, injure the feelings of the individual himself,

or, if he is dead, those of his friends and relations, to detail the

particular case, the more especially as nothing could be clearer than

that the crime laid to his charge was amply and satisfactorily--to

everybody except himself--proved and substantiated.

 

Just as the last witness for the defence was under cross-examination,

I saw one of the lord mayor's servants put his powdered head in a

little hole, and whisper something to the ordinary of Newgate, a

remarkably pious-looking man, in full canonicals, with a bag-wig,

which, to use Foote's phraseology, speaking of Dr. Simony (by whom,

as of course everybody knows, he meant the unfortunate Dr. Dodd),

"looked as white as a curd, and as close as a cauliflower." It struck

me that either the pretty wanton who had just been acquitted desired

some serious conversation with the clergyman, or that the last

convicted pot-stealer felt some qualms of conscience, and had sent

for spiritual assistance; but no,--my friend Mr. Sheriff Bucklesbury

relieved my mind from any such apprehensions, by inviting me to a

whisper, with an __EXPRESSION__ of countenance which convinced me that it

was nothing of so serious a character which had suddenly summoned the

reverend divine from the court.

 

"Good news!" said the sheriff; "land is in sight."

 

"What?" said I, not exactly catching the idea.

 

"Dinner is not far distant," said the sheriff, "the ordinary has been

sent for to dress the salad."

 

Well, thought I, that ever a man so dressed, and so addressed, as the

reverend divine opposite, should quit the seat of justice tempered

with mercy, to mix oil and vinegar in a salad-bowl, does seem

strange. It was evident to _me_, from the manner in which my friend

spoke of the chaplain's secular vocations, that his respect for the

table was infinitely greater than that which he entertained for the

cloth, and never from that day have I seen painted over suburban

inns, "an ordinary on Sundays at two o'clock," without thinking

of the reverend functionary so styled in the Old Bailey, and the

probable duties he would be called upon to perform.

 

The evidence having terminated, and the clock pointing to fifteen

minutes after six, his lordship began summing up. I have already

mentioned that his lordship was deaf, and the strange blunders

which I noticed in his early charges will perhaps serve to inform

the reader of these papers, whoever he may be, that his lordship's

handwriting was utterly unintelligible, even to himself; indeed,

so completely illegible were his notes, that the only resource his

lordship had, if ever they were called for upon motions for new

trials (which perhaps I need not here add, was in his lordship's

case by no means an unfrequent occurrence), was to send them to be

printed--printers being proverbially the best decypherers in the

world.

 

His lordship's charge--barring the inevitable blunders and

hesitations, rendered absolutely necessary by this almost hopeless

illegibility--was exceedingly minute and elaborated. He recapitulated

the evidence of the three first witnesses verbatim, and continued

thus of the fourth:--

 

"Now, gentlemen of the jury, here is Amos Hardy--Handy--no, not

Handy--Harding--Amos Harding tells you, that on Tuesday--no,

not Tuesday--I see--Friday the 14th--that is, the 24th--he

was going along Liverpool--no--Liquorpond Street--near Gug's

Island--Guy's--no--Gray's Inn Lane--yes--going along Liquorpond

Street, Gray's Inn Lane--at about eight o'clock in the morning--and

saw the fire break out of Mr. Stephenson's windows. This, gentlemen

of the jury, is a very remarkable fact--and in connection with some

other circumstances to which we shall presently come, is quite worthy

of your particular attention--you perceive that he swears to eight o'clock in the morning."