Very humorous was some of the evidence by which the sale of the masterships was proved. Master Elde deposed that he bought his office for 5000 guineas, the bargain being finally settled and fulfilled after a personal interview with the accused lord. Master Thurston, another purchaser at the high rate of 5000 guineas, paid his money to Lady Macclesfield. It must be owned that these sums were very large, but their magnitude does not fix fraudulent purpose upon the Chancellor. That he believed himself fairly entitled to a moderate present on appointing to a mastership is certain; that he regarded L2000 as the gratuity which he might accept, without blushing at its publication, may be inferred from the restitution of L3250 which he made to one of the purchasers for L5250 at a time when he anticipated an inquiry into his conduct; that he felt himself acting indiscreetly if not wrongfully in pressing for such large sums is testified by the caution with which he conferred with the purchasers and the secrecy with which he accepted their money. His defence before the peers admitted the sales of the places, but maintained that the transactions were legitimate. The defence was of no avail. When the question of guilty or not guilty was put to the peers, each of the noble lords present answered, "Guilty, upon my honor." Sentenced to pay a fine of L30,000, and undergo imprisonment until the mulct was paid, the unfortunate statesman bitterly repented the imprudence which had exposed him to the vengeance of political adversaries and to the enmity of the vulgar. Whilst the passions roused by the prosecution were at their height, the fallen Chancellor was treated with much harshness by Parliament, and with actual brutality by the mob. Ever ready to vilify lawyers, the rabble seized on so favorable an occasion for giving expression to one of their strongest prejudices. Amongst the crowds who followed the Earl to the Tower with curses, voices were heard to exclaim that "Staffordshire had produced the three greatest scoundrels of England--Jack Sheppard, Jonathan Wilde, and Tom Parker." Jonathan Wilde was executed in 1725--the year of Lord Macclesfield's impeachment; and Jack Sheppard died on the gallows at Tyburn, November 16, 1724. Throughout the inquiry, and after the adverse verdict, George I. persisted in showing favor to the disgraced Chancellor; and when the violent emotions of the crisis had passed away it was generally admitted by enlightened critics of public events that Lord Macclesfield had been unfairly treated. The scape-goat of popular wrath, he suffered less for his own faults, than for the evil results of a bad system; and at the present time--when the silence of more than a hundred and thirty years rests upon his tomb--Englishmen, with one voice, acknowledge the valuable qualities that raised him to eminence, and regret the proceedings which consigned him in his old age to humiliation and gloom.