her pregnancy with the prisoner, and presented a gun at her head. The prisoner had always been a headstrong, wayward, mischievous, eccentric youth--subject to fits of involuntary laughing and crying. He was absurdly vain, boastful, and ambitious; and wished his mother to send him to sea, where he would have nothing to do but walk about the deck, give orders, and by and by become Admiral Sir Edward Oxford! This was the utmost extent of the _facts_ alleged in support of the defence of insanity. The prisoner's whole life had been traced--in evidence--while he was at school, and in three distinct services; and he had never been confined, or in any way treated as mad. His sister spoke to his going out on the day of the outrage, and detailed a conversation evincing no symptoms of wandering. He used to have books from the library--"The Black Pirate," "Oliver Twist," and "Jack Sheppard." On leaving home that day, about three o'clock in the afternoon, he told his sister that he was going to the Shooting Gallery to buy some linen for her to make him some shirts, and to bring home some tea from a particular shop in the Strand. A nur-sery-maid to whom he had written a ludicrously-addressed letter a few weeks before, said, "I considered him in a sound state of mind, but sometimes very eccentric:" than which, no words were fitter to characterise the true scope and tendency of all the evidence which had been offered to prove him insane. Of that evidence, according to the genius and spirit, and also the letter of English law, twelve intelligent jurymen were the proper judges, under judicial guidance; and greatly to be deprecated is any attempt to deprive them of their right, and their fellow-subjects--the public at large--of the protection afforded by its unfettered exercise. We therefore earnestly beg the reader to assume that he is given credit for an average degree of intelligence, and only a moderate amount of moral firmness--to imagine himself a juryman, charged with the solution of this critical problem. We ask--On the facts now laid before you, do you believe Oxford to have been no more conscious of, or accountable for, his actions, in twice deliberately firing at the Queen, than would have been a baby accidentally pulling the trigger of a loaded pistol, and shooting its fond incautious mother or affectionate attendant?