certainly appear fatisfactory, and expose the futility of the calumnious allegations of a man who has betrayed the cloven foot, who has in the publick news-papers hinted to our prefent detefted and deteftable ministry, that he is ready and willing to enter into their fervice. Had Mr. Wilkes been fimple enough to have been perfuaded by Stephen to discharge debtors upon bail for the trefpafs only, and not for the whole debt as the writ of apprehenfion directs, he would have fucceeded in his scheme, he would have effectually ferved the miniftry, and deferved a penfion. Mr. Wilkes, as fecurity for the appearance of all his prifoners, would have brought upon his head a debt infinitely greater than that which he formerly incurred by bailing his friends, and through the profecution of the ministry. In a word, he would have been totally ruined, and a prisoner for life. If menaced with a profecution by Stephen on one hand, he was threatened with a worfe on the other. The weapon which this honeft gentleman chofe was two-edged, and cut either way. Situated on a narrow path with a precipice on both fides, Wilkes chole to plunge into the lefs dangerous. Blame him, England, if thou canst.

A LAWYER,

III. The following is an authentic and impartial account of the Conduct of Lord Mansfield in the trial of a cause-Meares and Shepley against Anfell, at the laft Affizes for the county of Surrey.

"THIS was an action brought for trefpaffes committed in the plaintiffs' closes, called Boreman's Mead and Mill-Croft. The defendant pleaded two pleas, 1ft, Not guilty, 2dly, That the defendant committed the trefpaffes by the licence of the plaintiffs.-At the trial the trefpaffes were clearly proved, with this aggravating circumstance, that they were committed after repeated difcharges, and that the defendant had authorifed his fervants wantonly to trample down the plaintiffs' grafs when it was a foot high, and laid up for mowing. There was not the leaft tittle of proof of any licence given by the plaintiffs; but it was urged, on the part of the defendant, that the defendant was in poffeffion of the clofe called Boreman's Mead, and therefore the plaintiffs, as to that clofe, could not maintain an action of trefpafs, it being a poffeffory action. To counteratt which objection, the plaintiffs counsel called one Mr. Hifcox to produce a written agreement made between the plaintiffs and defendant in the year 1765, and one Jofeph Matthews, who was a fubfcribing witness to the fame, to prove the execution of it. The agreement was produced by Hifcox, after which it was taken out of his hand, and a moft daring attempt made by fome perfons on the behalf of the defendant to fupprefs and Atife it,

"The Chief Justice beheld this most aftonishing attempt to fupprefs evidence with the utmost compofure until the general astonifhment of the court called upon him to exert his authority. He then compelled the production of the agreement.-The agreement, when produced, purported to be an agreement between the plaintiffs and defendant and his partner, for the former's letting the latter have the produce of hay" (for that was the very expreffion) of Boreman's Mead, in exchange for a bit of ground of the defendant's. There was not a fyllable in the agreement about Mill-Croft.-The trefpaffes complained of in Boreman's Mead were, for digging and opening large ditches, and converting it into a Callico-ground; and it was thought there could not be the least colour of pretence to fay that the words produce of bay gave the defendants any authority to do that. However, the Chief Justice faid, the very thing the defendant had attempted to suppress made the defence. -Matthews the witness, emboldened by this extraordinary declaration, addressed the Chief Juftice, and defired to give a hiftory of the tranfaction; and being permitted to do so, he then swore, that, although the agreement only expreffed produce of hay of Boreman's Mead, it was meant and understood that the defendants fhould have the general occupation, not only of Boreman's Mead, but of Mill-Croft alfo.-Mr. Hilcox, in a very general manner confirmed the fame. Lord Mansfield received and admitted this evidence, and fummed it up to the jury with all the force he could; and thereupon they found a verdict for the defendant.

"The court of Common Pleas laft term was moved by the plaintiffs for a new trial, for a mifdirection of the judge.--The judge, was called upon for his report, which he could not make without fending to the plaintiffs' attorney for his affidavit of the tranfaction,-He made his report at laft; to which he fubjoined, that he was perfectly fatisfied with the verdict of the jury.-The court of Common Pleas was clearly of opinion, that Lord Mansfield had acted contrary to every principle of evidence, both in law and equity, in admitting Matthews and Hifcox to give parole evidence, contrary to a clear, explicit agreement in writing which they had attested; and that, if fuch a practice was to obtain, it would go a great towards fubverting the ftatute of frauds and perjuries, and would be a most dangerous inlet to perjury, and a means of rendering men's properties very precarious and infecure. The court therefore fet afide the verdict, and ordered a new trial; and it appeared to the court to be fo grofs a mifdirection, that it difpenfed with the ufual terms of payment of cofts.-Although Lord Mansfeld, in his direction to the jury, repreeted the trefpafies as fmall and infignificat, and the ac

tion as litigious, the court of Common Pleas faid the trefpaffes were obftinate, wilful, and malicious,"

On the other fide nothing material bas get appeared.

IV. As the public are anxious to hear the particulars of the caufes between the Duke of Portland and Sir James Lowther, which have made fo much noife in the world, we have obtained the following relation from an impartial hand.

AFTER the council was drawn up ten deep on each fide, and the judges feated in their robes, and the special jury from Cumberland impannelled, and the mufty rolls of parchment fcattered round the court from all the offices in the kingdom, Mr. Wedderburne opened a fhort cafe for Sir James Lowther, in the caufe of the foreft of Inglewood, fhewing, that the foreft of Inglewood and the Honor of Penrith had been held as

separate and diftin&t manors from the earliest times down to the grant to the Earl of Portland by King William, when their feveral rights had been blended together, and ever fince enjoyed by the Portland family, under a grant for the Honor of Penrith. This he endeavoured to prove, to the fatisfaction of the learned jury, by a hundred pipe-rolls, in the most crabbed Latin that ever grated the ear of man. He then called for fome leafes, to prove the defendant in poffeffion under the Duke of Portland, and fome parole evidence that proved the premises contended for to be within the foreft of Inglewood; and, laftly, the leafe from the crown to Sir James Lowther, to establish his right.

In reading this paper, after all the faid and aforefaid furze, heaths, waftes, shrubs, water-ways, rights, members, appurtenances, courts, royalties, regalities, &c. &c. they came to the words, "thirteen fhillings and four-pence," as the referved rent to the crown. At which words the judges started inftantaneously, as if ftruck with an electrical fhock, declaring the leafe was contrary to the civil-lift act of the firft of Queen Anne, which enacts, that in all leafes from the crown there fhall be referved the antient or most usual rent, the rent paid for twenty, years back, a reafonable rent, or one third of the clear annual profit, none of which were fulfilled by thirteen fhillings and four-pence. The objection feemed to be totally new to encil for Sir James Lowther, who apthe cou be more fhocked than even the peared t

mfelves. The court gave them an judges th over their fenfes, and confult tohour to re the mean while, the folemn exgether. of the audience were changed to pectation laughter. The jurymen dined in ridiculo the fatisfaction of the fpectators, court, to Woodhoufe, the duke of Portwhile Mray, with the agility of a waiter, land's attornerepaft, When the fatal clock

Served

up the

had founded the hour, Sir James Lowther's council returned in a train like a mourning proceffion from the abbey. They endea voured to mutter forth fuch arguments as no body would then liften to, alledging, "that one third of the profits was referved to the crown by covenants in the leafe; that this was the only mode of complying with the intent of the law where the rent was fluctuating or uncertain, and could not be ascertained, as was the cafe of courts and royalties; that the refervation intended by the law was to be taken in a liberal fenic, the fecuring fuch and fuch profits to the crown without eftablishing, by a narrowed construction, fuch principles as must defeat the execution of the act; that, with regard to the rent for the last twenty years, the fum referved was many millions of times more than that, which indeed had been nothing; that with respect to a reasonable rent, there was hardly a man in court, when he beheld the council, briefs, proceedings and pipe rolls, and calculated the charges they must have coft Sir James Lowther, for recovering the eftate for the Crown after the expiration of three lives, who would not think, that including these circumstances, thirteen and four-pence was as much as Sir James Lowther ought to pay; that refpecting the antient rent there was no evidence on the rolls to fhew that the royalties and courts have ever ftood in feparate charge."-But the Judge, without a reply, ordered the cryer to rear aloud for John Dent, who making no anfwer was nonfuited.

Thus to the honour of the laws of this country, the civil lift act, which was made to protect the property of the crown, for the benefit of the public, was the means of depriving the public for ever of the benefit of

large eftate which had been ufurped from it; and the fame act, which had been made in confequence of the exorbitant grants to the first Earl of Portland, was now the means of confirming his ufurpations to his pofterity.

The day following, the caufe for the Soccage Manor of Carlife came on to be tried. It was opened by Mr. Wedderburne with great elegance and force, feeming to rife on his former defeat and his retreat to the castle. He faid, that it had been given out by the other fide, to cover the weakness of their cause under popular clamour, that his client had chofen this frot to try the queftion upon from fome particular circumftances which might render the poffeffion of the Duke of Portland doubtful; that he difclaimed every fubterfuge of that kind; that he admitted and allowed the Duke of Portland in poffeffion; that he wished to try the fair merits of the queflion, What right his Grace had to fuch poffeffion? which had been much mifreprefented to the world. He boldly afferted that the title of the Duke of Portland

was

was fo faulty in every respect, and his ufur-
pation fo late as the year twenty-nine, with
out a colour of right, and that no modern
conveyancer would have depended on it be-
tween man and man, much less against the
rights of the public which had ever been held
facred. That the pity and compaffion which
had been called forth on this occafion was
wholly unmerited, and could only arife from
the perfonal qualifications of the noble Duke,
forgetting the circumstances of his prede-
ceflors. That the queftion before the court
was not that of a perfon who had paid a va-
luable confideration for property, but that
of a family who after having received the
most unbounded grants from King William
in perpetuity over half the counties of Eng-
1and larger than ever had been bestowed on
a fubject, had likewife ufurped large pof-
feffions and even the demefne lands of the
ancient crown of England, without any juft
pretence whatfoever. That he undertook to
prove from the earlieft period of our records
in the northern counties, that the caftle and
manor of Carlile had been in the poffeffion
of the crown, and regularly continued till
the year 1729, when the Duke of Portland
under colour of his grant, of the honour of
Penrith had got poffeffion.-That fo far
from the honour or manor of Penrith con-
veying the cafle and manor of Carlisle,
that he would show they had ever been held
by feparate grants even when poffeffed by the
fame perfons.

Mr. Wedderburne then called his evi-
dence, which chiefly confifted of ancient
records, dry, tedious and unentertaining in
the reading: all parties were now bufily em.
ployed endeavouring to catch at every doubt
ful word or entry. But at laft on the Fri-
day following at eleven o'clock in the
morning Mr. Wedderburne compleated his
proofs:

Then began the war of tongues.

The council for the Duke of Portland
refted their defence wholly on the defects in
Sir James Lowther's leafe. They firft ob-
ferved that gol. the referved rent in the
leafe, was not the ancient or moft ufual
rent, or any rent within the defcription of
the Civil Lift act.-That the leafe to the
Earl of Cumberland, it is true, referved sol.
rent, and that all the leafes from Queen
Henrietta-Maria and Queen Catharine stated
that fum. But the learned gentlemen ob-
ferved, that the Earl of Cumberland had
the caftle in his leafe which Sir James Low-
ther had not; that therefore the premises
could not be the fame.-That Sir James
Lowther had mines included in his leafe,
which the Earl of Cumberland had not.
-That altho' it was true there were no
mines open on the premises, yet they might
be found in the courfe of the three lives or
thirty years.-That, befides, trees were both
granted and excepted in Sir James Lowther's
App. 1771.

leafe, which was not the cafe in the Earl of
Cumberland's; and tho' it was also true,
that there was not a tree on the whole pre
mifes, yet they likewife might grow up in
the time of the leafe, as the life of a man
in the eye of the law was a thousand years.

Mr. Wedderburne anfwered these objec
tions by fhewing, that Sir James Lowther's
leafe could not be deemed difcordant to the
Civil Lift act by containing a leís quantity
of the fame premifes, and paying an equal
rent as the antient lefior.That with refpect
to mines, as there were none on the pre
mifes, there could be no rational difpute
about them. But he was well informed,
that the first lawyer that ever fat in Weft
minfter-hall (hinting Lord Hardwick) had
given his opinion that mines were not in-
cluded within the poffible meaning of the
Civil Lift act, more efpecially when un-
opened, fince they could be subject to no
rational calculation whereby to fix the rent
to be reserved. That all leafes of mines
from the crown had, ever fince paffing the
act, been let under covenant in the leafe to
account for certain profits as were the terms
under which Sir James Lowther held, with
a condition of forfeiting the leafe in cafe of
failure.-That fuch was the beft and only
method of fecuring the intereft of the pub-
lick on fuch property as afforded no me-
thod of calculation, fo as to comply with
the exact words of the Civil Lift a&t.-
That, in cafe the judges determined other-
wife, fuch a decifion would fet half the
property of the kingdom, held under leafes
from the crown, afloat.-That all trees be-
ing fully excepted in the leafe, and no trees
being on the premifes, the answer was com-
pleat.—The judges declared their opi-
nions against all other parts of the excep-
tions, except one, but referved this point,
namely, the mines for a special verdict.-
The council for the Duke of Portland then
proceeded to ftate another objection to Sir
Jamos Lowther's leafe, by thewing he had
not fet forth the value of the premises in
his petition, neither the other leafes he had
received from the crown, both which were
required by the firft of Henry IVth.-
Mr. Wedderburne replied, to the fatisfaction
of the court, that this ftatute, if not obso-
lete, was virtually repealed by the first of
Queen Ann; that Sir James Lowther had
actually fet forth in his petition that the
lands in question had been ufurped, and
were then of no value to the crown, which
was undoubtedly the fact; that the report
of the Surveyor-General, which was re-
fufed to be read though united to the petition,
fet forth the expence Sir James Lowther
must be at in recovering the lands in question
for the crown, which had been fully confi-
dered at the time of granting the leafe, nor
could any man fay the King had been de-
ceived.