In 1827, at the Kent Assizes, a Gretna Green marriage was the subject of a curious trial before Mr Baron Hullock. The action was taken against one Mrs Wakefield and her two sons, for conspiring "to take away by subtle stratagems" a young lady named Turner, who had not yet left school. The David Laing above mentioned was called as a witness on behalf of the defendants, and he affirmed that the couple were married lawfully according to the Scottish fashion--namely, by putting on the lady's finger a ring. The witness said he was seventy-five years old, and had spent more than half of his life in the performance of marriages. In cross-examination by Mr Brougham, he admitted obtaining L30 for this particular ceremony, or even L50, but could not remember exactly, "being somewhat hard of hearing." The accused was found guilty of causing this young lady to "contract matrimony without the consent of her father, and to the great disparagement of the King's peace." The chief prisoner, E. Gibbon Wakefield, was convicted of abduction, and the marriage, which excited considerable public attention, was afterwards rendered invalid, and annulled by an Act of Parliament specially obtained. After this flagrant case Gretna Green marriages fell into disrepute, and the business showed a steady decline, though cases of the employment of pseudo-parsons are on much later record. In 1853, a person named Thomas Blythe, a witness before the Court of Probate at Westminster, stated that he lived at Springfield, Gretna Green, and that he obtained his livelihood by means of agriculture, but that he not unfrequently took advantage of opportunities to increase his income by small strokes of business in the "joining" line. Again, the demise of another "joiner" was announced so late as 1872, when the obituary of Simon Laing appeared in the _Glasgow Herald_. It is probable, however, that the pursuit of his "clerical" profession ceased long before the date of his death, for, in 1856, the old law by which the mere verbal declaration of consent before witnesses was sufficient to constitute a Scottish legal marriage became effete through the passing of the Act of Parliament, 19 and 20 Victoria, cap. 96. By this Act the laws of Scotland and England were brought into assimilation, and in that year the occupation of the northern hedge-parsons was virtually gone. It may be said such marriages as those we have described were considered as clandestine and ill-advised in Scotland, as in more southern parts, the Church of Scotland doing all that lay in its power to discourage and prevent them. The only punishment, however, which it had for transgressors being excommunication, the restraint by the Kirk was very slight, its injunctions and fulminary condemnations being treated with contempt.