as the rich. In my opinion it is a greater crime to serve the former than the latter with this infamous stuff. The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 50%. Rex v. Brady.-The defendant, (Mr. Alexander Brady, grocer and dealer in tea and coffee, Gray's-inn-lane, was charged with having, on the 28th of February last, in his possession 18 pounds of sham coffee, called vegetable powder, and with selling the same for genuine coffee. Lord and Pearson, excise officers, stated, that they purchased an ounce of coffee of the defendant on the 28th of February, and, upon examining it, they dis. covered that it was made up of peas and beans, ground with a small quantity of coffee. Upon examining the mills in his shop, they found both coffee and vegetable powder in them. They also found 18 pounds of vegetable powder mixed with coffee, in a state prepared for sale, wrapped in papers. it for twenty years. You peas, and I know not what other Charles Bowser, of Oxfordstreet, tea and coffee-dealer, was charged with a like offence, and upon the same evidence. This defendant said he certainly kept the composition for sale, but he never disposed of it to respectable persons. He lived in the neighbourhood of St. Giles's, and he sold the sham coffee to the poor Irish people there at a very low price, as they could not afford to purchase the genuine. One of the Commissioners observed, that he knew no reason why the poor should be poisoned any more than the richer part of the community. The defendant should find, at all events, that they were equally entitled to the protection of the proper authorities, when any attempt was made to impose upon them, and to injure their health. The defendant was convicted in the same penalty as the last. OLD BAILEY, Friday, May 8. One of the Commissioners tasted some of the 18 pounds produced by the officers, and declared that it was most infamous stuff, hot to the mouth, and unfit Insanity.-Mathias Maher was for human food. brought to the bar apparently in Defendant. Why, I have sold a state of furious derangement, for the purpose of being arraigned on a charge of forging a power of attorney, with intent to defraud Thomas Moore, under the prosecution of the Board of Admiralty. The prisoner was ducted to the bar by three men, one at each arm, and one behind, having a fast hold of him. He was secured by a strait waistcoat and by weighty chains at his feet. Commissioner. Then you have been for twenty years acting most dishonestly, defrauding the revenue, and the health of the poor must have suffered very much by taking such an unwholesome article. Your having dealt in the article so long aggravates your case; you have been for twenty years selling burnt beans, con When When first brought into the dock, he looked at the surrounding spectators with a hideous grin, and his eyes appeared as if they were starting out of their sockets. His beard appeared not to have been shorne for several weeks, and his countenance was pallid and emaciated. The Clerk of the Arraigns put the usual question to him," Are you guilty, or not guilty?" but the only reply the maniac made, was, "Do you want to murder me? I have been starved here for upwards of a month without eating or drinking." Mr. Justice Bayley repeated the question, and the prisoner still continued to rave and complain of being starved. He endeavoured to stoop down and eat the herbs placed on the board before the dock, but was prevent ed by the keepers. Mr. Justice Bayley. If you do not plead either guilty or not guilty, I must direct the jury to inquire whether you stand mute by the visitation of God, or whether you do it wilfully? Prisoner. Are you going to give me any tobacco? Mr. Justice Bayley repeated the observation. Prisoner. I get up with swords and pistols upon me. You want me to eat nothing but poison. The Jury was then sworn, and directed to judge whether the prisoner was or was not insane, and Mr. Alley, as counsel for the prisoner, called the following witnesses to prove his insanity: Wm. Brown, keeper of Newgate, proved, that about four months ago the prisoner came to the gaol, and during the whole of that time he had been insane. He had no doubt of the fact from his conduct and appearance. He considered him to be so dangerous, that it was thought proper to chain him hands and feet, and three persons constantly attended upon him; when he first entered the prison, he attempted to stab a man, and he was immediately put under restraint. Mr. E. C. Bayle, the surgeon of Whitecross-street prison, proved that in April, 1817, the prisoner was imprisoned there for debt. There was always an incoherency in his manner, but had lucid intervals. The first act of insanity he evinced was that of eating an ounce and a half of ointment which he should have used. On another occasion, the prisoner threw a bottle at his head. The prisoner also pretended himself to be Colonel Berkeley, and wished witness to go down to his estate in Hampshire. Mr. Brown, the keeper of Newgate, here added, that the prisoner, had, while in gaol, attempted to hang himself; when he first came to the gaol, the prisoner was very decently dressed. William Hutchinson Box, à surgeon, had attended the prisoner since 28th January, and gave his decided opinion that the prisoner was not insane, and that it was nothing but pretence. He had much more latterly assumed the character of a madman. His bodily health had been good while in prison. Witness had often seen an extreme violence in the manner of the prisoner. Mrs. Watts, an attendant at Whitecross street-prison, proved the derangement of the prisoner while he was there. Dr. John Weir, a physician, and superintendant of the sick of the Victualling-board. He had found evident marks of derangement in the prisoner. He had visited him 3 times, and upon conversing with him he was extremely incoherent: he was very often irascible, but his bodily health was good. He most certainly assumed the character of a person labouring under mental derangement, and it was impossible for him to decide whether it was real or assumed. An artful man, he was convinced, might pretend insanity, so as to baffle all the inquiries of the most skilful surgeons. It was not one of the characteristics of insanity, to be able to abstain from food, except in rare instances. Absence of fever was a characteristic of insanity. a Dr. Andrew Baird, Inspector of the Naval Hospitals, attended with Dr. Weir the prisoner while he was in Newgate. There were circumstances which made strong impression on his mind, and the conclusion was, the reverse of insanity. The prisoner was furious in the day-time, and quiet in the night-time. This was a circumstance which induced him to think that he was otherwise than insane. The sleep of furious maniacs was not regulated by day and night. John Fisher was then called by the Court. He was one of the turnkeys of Newgate, and visited the prisoner sometimes twice a day. On many nights the prisoner had been extremely noisy and sleepless. He very frequently called out " murder," and rattled his chains in the middle of the night. When the prisoner first entered the gaol, his nights were passed no less sleeplessly. Dr. James Hatch, Medical Superintendant to the Lunatic Naval Asylum.-It was impossible for him to speak with certainty as to the insanity of the prisoner. The period of the apparent insanity had naturally excited the strongest suspicions in his mind. He considered the derangement not to have taken place until after the committal of the offence. If the apparent insanity had existed previous to the committal of the offence, these suspicions would be materially removed. The same motives which induced him to pretend insanity might have so operated upon his mind as to produce the reality. The prisoner obstinately refused to admit that he was mad. He could not speak with certainty, but he was inclined to think that he might possibly be insane. Mr. Alley was about to address the Court in reply, but was prevented by the Jury stating that they had made up their minds upon the question. Mr. Justice Bayley was glad to hear the opinion of the Jury. He had, himself, long ago made up his mind upon the case. If the Jury thought that the prisoner was insane, and therefore was mute by the visitation of God, he would be kept in confinement until the pleasure of his Majesty was known upon this case. The Jury found a verdict.Insanity. The prisoner was immediately taken from the bar back to his cell. COURT COURT OF KING'S BENCH, SA TURDAY, MAY 16. Sittings for Middlesex, before Mr; Justice Abbott and a Special Jury. The King v. Joseph Merceron, Esq.-This was an indictment against the defendant a magistrate, and for many years treasurer of the poor of the parish of St. Matthew, Bethnal-green, for a misdemeanor, in appropriating to his own purposes the sum of 9251. 1s. 3d. Mr. Scarlett opened the case by first stating the offices held by the defendant in the parish, in which he had resided for a long succession of years. Besides being treasurer of the poor, he was a commissioner of assessed taxes, and a principal commissioner of sewers, which gave him such an influence, that it might be truly said the inhabitants of St. Matthew, Bethnalgreen, had been in a state of complete subserviency to his despotic dominion. He was a man of large property, and none dared for many years to doubt his infallibility. At last some circumstances created suspicion, and evidence was procured sufficient to induce a grand jury to find two bills of indictment for misdemeanors in the collection of the rates: the charge was for a conspiracy, in receiving from certain parishioners more than was authorized; but when they came on for trial, no witnesses were produced, and an acquittal was the consequence. The law expenses incurred by the defendant amounted to 9147. 11s. 3d., being the sum charged in the bill of Messrs. Dann and Crosland, his solicitors; and the charge in he had improperly and illegally the present indictment was, that procured this sum to be paid out of the parish monies, together with ten guineas which he had added as his own coach-hire, and other private expenses. The bill was paid by him' on the 10th July, 1813, and the facts out of which this proceeding arose occurred between that date and April, 1814. If it appeared singular that transactions of so old a date were now introduced to the notice of the Jury, it was to be attributed to the artful and too successful mode in which the defendant had accomplished his fraud, for the discovery was not made until a disclosure was compelled before a committee of the House of Commons. Mr. Merceron effected his purpose in the following manner :-On the 16th of August, after his payment of the bill of Dann and Crosland, a meeting of the vestry took place upon matters totally unconnected with that subject: for some reason or other it was adjourned until the 23rd of the same month, but still no notice was given to the vestrymen that any thing was to be brought forward respecting the expenses Mr. Merceron had incurred in defending the two indictments. The meeting was attended by Mr. May, the vestryclerk, and many other parishioners; and after the ordinary business had been disposed of, and all but six or seven of Mr. Merceron's friends were gone, a resolution was proposed by a dissenting minister of the name of Platt, whom Mr. Scarlett charged as being particeps criminis (though not indicted) with the defendant: in this resolution the highest compliments, as might be expected, were paid to Mr. Merceron, and the most vehement abuse heaped upon his prosecutors, and it concluded by declaring that the expenses he had incurred (no sum being named) should be paid out of the parish funds. This was clearly illegal in itself; for the whole vestry had no such power, much less a select few of the private partisans of the defendant. This resolution having been thus smuggled through, it was copied by Mr. May's clerk in the usual book, in the regular course, without exciting particular attention; but it soon got abroad, and of course excited considerable disapprobation; and it was determined by the great majority of the parishioners to resist the payment of the bill when the matter should again be brought forward, as in the regular course it must be, at the vestry for auditing the accounts of the treasurer. It was, however, believed by many, that the object of Mr. Merceron was not pecuniary, and that having carried this resolution, he would not think of enforcing it, as he was known to be a man of fortune, and anxious principally for a party and a temporary triumph. The meeting of the vestry for the audit of the treasurer's accounts took place, pursuant to public notice in the church, on the 6th of April, 1814, and the meeting was more numerous than it had been for many years. The ordinary course of business on an occasion of the kind was this The treasurer's private book was produced, wherein were entered, on one side, sums paid by him by order of the vestry, or in pursuance of directions of five or more governors of the parish appointed under the act of parliament by which the parish was regulated: on the other side were entered the sums received by the treasurer from the various collectors: this book was held by one of the vestry, and the amounts being called over, the various vouchers were produced, and the sums were regularly ticked off as they proceeded. On this occasion Mr. Merceron took care that his friend Mr. Platt should have possession of his book, and that reverend gentleman, instead of calling over the amount of Dann and Crosland's bill, omitted it entirely, but took good care to place opposite it the usual tick, to denote that it had been regularly agreed to, and the vouchers produced and verified. This was the mode in which the fraud was accomplished, and the whole sum of 9251. 1s. 3d. (including the 10 guineas added by himself for coach-hire, and entered on the back of the bill of Dann and Crosland) was repaid out of the parish money to the defendant. It was true that the book of the treasurer, containing the entry, had been copied by a clerk of Mr. May, the vestry clerk; but it was merely a matter of form, and Mr. May would swear that, when two or three years afterwards the matter was brought to light in the House of Commons, he was astonished, as well as many of those who had attended the audit vestry on the 6th of April, for the |