6

HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

CHAP.

xxv.

1G99.

taking away the lives of men was treated by these philo-sophers with just disdain. The stupid judge asked Garthwhat he could say in answer to the testimony of theseamen. “My Lord,” replied Garth, “I say that theyare mistaken. I will find seamen in abundance to swearthat they have known whistling raise the wind.”

The jury found the prisoners Not guilty; and the re-port carried back to London by persons who had beenpresent at the trial was that everybody applauded theverdict, and that even the Stouts seemed to be con-vinced of their error. It is certain, however, that themalevolence of the defeated party soon revived in allits energy. The lives of the four men who had justbeen absolved were again attacked by means of themost absurd and odious proceeding known to our oldlaw, the appeal of murder. This attack too failed.Every artifice of chicane was at length exhausted; andnothing was left to the disappointed sect and the dis-appointed faction except to calumniate those whom ithad been found impossible to murder. In a successionof libels Spencer Cowper was held up to the execrationof the public. But the public did him justice. Herose to high eminence in his profession: he at lengthtook his seat, with general applause, on the judicialbench, and there distinguished himself by the humanitywhich he never failed to show to unhappy men whostood, as he had once stood, at the bar. Many whoseldom trouble themselves about pedigrees may be in-