ricans, said to be barbarously murdered by the king's troops at Lexington and Concord, was a most impudent and malignant libel. That in point of composition it was below notice; it contained no argument, nor was it founded on any rational plea; that he knew not the author, nor had he ever had so great a proof of his talents and abilities, as on the present occasion; but that, if he could at all judge from what he had just heard, the defendant must have purposely drawn it up in so stupid and balderdash a manner, to fit it to the vile occasion it was intended to serve. That it was evidently meant as a defiance to the laws of the kingdom, and a test how far libellers might proceed with impunity. That the author's signing his name to it was an impudent attempt to laugh at prosecution, for that he was as inscrutable, while he skulked behind the bulwark of the printer, as an anonymous writer possibly could be. That the age teemed with libels, no person was now safe from slander; that he was determined, if possible, to check the licentiousness of the press, and therefore he had filed the information now before the court. The witnesses were then examined. The first was - Wilson, who proved the three copies of advertisements, produced by the solicitor to the treasury, to be the hand-writing of the defendant. H. S. Woodfall, printer of the Public Advertiser, proved that Mr. Horne delivered to him one of the copies produced, paid him for the insertion of it in his paper, and commissioned him to send round copies of the same to most of the other papers, which commission he executed, and Mr. Horne defrayed the expence. This being all the evidence called in support of the information, the defendant rose, and addressed the jury in a speech, which took him up four hours in delivery, to the following purport: [Mr. Horne, when he began his speech, produced a pile of manuscripts, written on some quires of paper, folded in the form of a note-book, which he laid before him; and after having spoken for about an hour, he adverted to: his written text.] His exordium went chiefly upon a reply to what had now fallen from the attorneygeneral, which he declared by no means full enough for the occasion; he asserted, that the learned gentleman had not produced a tittle of evidence in support of the charge made against him in the informa tion, that he had rested his argument chiefly upon abusing the advertisement, and that above half of his speech had been merely an eulogium on his own immaculate character. As he had talked so much of his honour, his conscience, and his integrity, he would, he declared, just shew how far the honour, the conscience, and the integrity of an attorney-general extended. He then proceeded to trace the power of that officer from the times of our forefathers, shewed what privileges he had enjoyed in different reigns, and went into a very long discussion of the nature and consequences of prosecutions and informations filed ex officio by the attorney-general, pointing out to the jury both the simple and applied meaning of the words er officio, shewing that the different technical terms of information, in dictment, dictment and declaration; were synonymous, and meant nothing more than accusation, urging the more equitable mode of proceeding by applying to a grand jury by bill of indictment, and contrasting the different benefits deduced by the subject, under the different modes of process, proving that they could acquire none when proceeded against on ex officio informations, and inferring from the whole of his argument on this head, that their origin was oppression, and their end injustice. He asserted, that, armed with this illegal power, an attorney-general might destroy the liberty, and attack the property of any subject, obnoxious either to himself, or to the minister, whose servant and creature the attorney-general might properly be deemed, as he held his office merely during pleasure, and was liable to dismission whenever the minister was himself dismissed, or whenever the minister was displeased with him. He complained of oppression in every stage of the business, and particularly urged, that the striking of a special jury was a mere farce; that an attorney-general could try by what jury he pleased; and that from what he had seen on his own attendance at the Crown-office, it might rather be said, that his was a picked jury, than one fairly and promiscuously chosen. He in stanced what had passed there, but declared he acquitted the master of any unfair conduct, laying the blame on the shoulders of the solicitor to the treasury, and of the officers of the sheriffs, who-attended on the occasion. He treated Lord Mansfield frequently in a manner equally cava lier and extraordinary, nor was be a whit more complaisant to the jury, declaring, he asked them for no favour, that he only desired them to discharge their consciences, and do their duty as honest men, considering fully the intention, which was the essence of all criminality, and abiding by their own feelings, without suffering themselves either to be threatened or wheedled out of their privileges. He avowed being the author of the advertisement in question, asserted it was no libel, and assigned his motive for publishing it, which was to oppose oppression: that he had always acted on the same principles; that he advertised, and caused to be prosecuted, the murderers in St. George's-fields, in 1768, who were also soldiers. That he had, in fact, as the advertisement was worded, made no charge, neither had he accused the king's troops of murder; but that he did not mean to take advantage. of a trifling subterfuge: he did now make the charge; that he had before deemed the affair at Lexington a murder, did then, and would tomorrow, call it by no other name. He told the jury, that, like certain people mentioned in history, who dressed up their victims for slaugter, so the attorney-general had dressed him up in the character of a wild beast, and wanted them to worry him; that his aim was to shut him out from society, and lock him up like a mad dog; but that he defied his malice, and feared not the judges, as he was wellaware they would not venture to punish him as they might wish, even if the jury were to deliver him over to their mercy, but that he was prepared to meet more than they. they ared to inflict in the present cause. With regard to the attorney-ge neral's complaint about the quantity of libels daily published, he beg ged him to put himself in the balance against him, and consider which had been most libelled? For his part, no man had been more so; his picture had been stuck up in the print-shops, with the words, "The Atheist Parson,' subscribed in capitals. He had been made the subject of ballads, and the singers had borne the figure of a spruce parson in miniature, on a stick, with a label, on which was written, The Atheist and Macaroni Parson.' His very clothes had furnished wit for the theatre, and he had even once been present, and seen himself burnt in effigy. He offered some few legal authorities, and quoted many parts of the state trials in support of them. In his attack on the attorney-general, he shewed no sort of respect to person or place; at one time he declared the House of Commons to be the most torrupt body in any state, and said they were the minister's house, who sat between his two brazen pillars, the attorney and solicitor-general, like. Jachin and Boaz, to guard the treasury-bench. then proposed some questions relative to the origin of the cause, and the conduct of it, which Mr. Attorney said were too impertinent for him to answer; he would not therefore be sworn. Alderman Oliver was then called, and sworn as a witness for the défendant. The alderman proved, that the advertisement in question was so far founded in fact, that a meeting of the Constitutional Society was held, that the subscription also was raised, and the money paid to Mr. Horne. Mr. Lacy, clerk to Henton and Co. proved that Mr. Horne paid the money to their shop on Dr. Franklin's account. Lieutenant Gould was examined, respecting an affidavit made by him about the affair at Lexington, and published in one of the Public Advertisers, produced by the defendant. He acknowledged it to be his affidavit, and swore to its contents, giving at the same time a viva voce account of the action. Whence it clearly appeared, that the rebels were armed ready to receive the king's troops, and that the latter heard the alarm-guns firing, whilst they were on their march. The attorney-general observed, that the defendant,, from what he had thrown out, seemed rather to have wished to be stopped, in order to have given birth to a popular tumult, than to have aimed either at disproving the charge, or evincing the innocence of his own intention. As soon as Mr. Horne had finished his speech, he desir the crier to call Lord Germaine and General Gage; but neither of them, though subpoenaed, attended. He then desired the attorney-general to be sworn, but the He ascribed its delay solely to the court desired him first to state the defendant, and answered such part question he meant to ask, as the at- of Mr. Horne's speech as went to the torney-general had a right to de-subject before the court; asserting, mur to being sworn. Mr. Horne that the advertisement charged ia in the information was most clearly a gross and seditious libel, deserving every epithet he had bestowed on it; and told the jury that, if he had failed in proof, the defendant had supplied the defect, for that the whole of the defence went to an admission and aggravation of the libel. Before he sat down, the attorney-general spoke to the other parts of Mr. Horne's speech, which he declared was wholly made up of the abuse of the judge, abuse of the jury, abuse of himself, and abuse of the master of the crown-office, the solicitor of the treasury, and even of the sheriff's officers. perfectly clearing himself on that head, shewed, by quoting the trial of Lord Lovat, when he himself, while solicitor-general, acting as counsel for the house of commons, replied, although the prisoner called no witnesses; that the custom was not new. The jury at half after four withdrew for a short time, and returned finding Mr. Horne GUILTY. Further Proceedings in the case of the Lord Mansfield remarked, that ON Wednesday morning, Nov. of all the cases he had ever known, this lay in the smallest compass. There were but two points for the jury to consider, the proof of the publication, and the proof of the charge in the information. The difficulty of the first was removed, for that was fully admitted by the defendant; with regard to the second, they would take out the paper, read the advertisement, and judge for themselves. His lordship lamented the present unhappy war, and enlarged a little on the nature of the charge made against the king's troops, in the advertisement; particularly explaining the application of the phrase wellbeloved.' He said, the jury would readily see why he passed over a great deal which had been said on the occasion, and which ought not to have been said; but that he could not let them, or the audience, go away, without enabling them to contradict any misrepresentation respecting one point. His lordship then explained his conduct on the trial of one of the printers, and, after Ο 19, between ten and eleven o'clock, the Rev. Mr. Horne attended the court of King's Bench, agreeable to a notice issued by the attorney-general. The several documents being read, necessary to substantiate the charge against him, and the grounds of his conviction being then stated to the court, the attorney-general prayed judgment in behalf of the crown. Lord Mansfield was about to pronounce the sentence, when Mr. Horne intreated the attention of the court to a matter which he should urge, in arrest of judgment. He grounded his motion on the following arguments: First, that the information, on which he had been tried, did not specifically charge him with any crime. That the whole of the charge was of a constructive nature. But it was an established maxim in law, that indictments and informa tions should so expressly set forth the nature of the crime, as not to leave any thing to the construction of the court. In the present case, Mr. Horne contended, that there had not been any thing averred in the the information which could amount to a crimination; he was only charged with having printed and published, or caused to be printed and published, a certain advertisement, which had been deemed a libel. This was the act charged. The guilt or innocence of the paper, deemed a libel, depended on construction. Not any thing of guilt being charged in the information, the conviction might reaonably be supposed a mistake of the jury, which the judges, as guardians of the law, would rectify. The attorney-general, in reply, confessed he expected a very different kind of argument would have been insisted on by the defendant. To say that not any thing like a criminal charge had been averred in the information, was surely to be attributed to a perversion of the understanding. The charge was too obvious to be mistaken. The information did not merely set forth that the defendant had printed and published a paper, but that he had printed and published a false, scandalous, and seditious libel, which set forth, that the king's troops, employed by government, had murdered our American brethren, for no other reason than because they had been faithful to the character of Englishmen, in preferring death to slavery? Of such an act the defendant had been found guilty. The information had expressly charged him with it. The crime had been substantiated by the verdict of a jury. The exception was now, therefore, improper in point of time, and frivolous in point of weight. So frivolous, that the attorney-general expected the defendant would have Tested his motion on a very different VOL. XX. ground. He expected to have heard it contended, that the libel was not of the nature which it had been stated to be in the information. That it was not false. That it was not scandalous. That it was not seditious. That government had not been maligned. Nor the king's troops charged with having committed murder. Those were the propositions he expected. And the argument in support of them he was well prepared to answer. Not any thing which bore the smallest affinity to such arguments having fallen from the lips of the defendant, the attorney-general repeated his prayer that the court would proceed to judgment. Mr. Horne, in reply, observed, that however the expectations of the attorney-general might have been excited, he would answer for it that his wishes had not kept pace with them. Mr. Attorneygeneral might expect it to be proved that the advertisement was neither false, scandalous, nor seditious. But he could not wish for such proof. It would entirely defeat the design of the prosecution.-— The attorney-general had therefore spared him the trouble of advancing such arguments with effect, by not chusing to combat them on the trial. The crown officer had also been extremely obliging in another respect. He had not perplexed the business with cases and precedents. Nor had he enlivened the dulness of the argument by either his oratory or his wit. Both Mr. Attor ney-general might possess; but he had not chosen to make a display of either. It was so much the more for the advantage of the defendant to have the cause thus sim[Q] plified, |