The same measure was now meted out to Algernon Sydney as had been dealt to Russell. In the eyes of the bench, conspiring to levy war and conspiring against the King’s life were considered one and the same thing. It was in vain that Sydney asserted that he had not conspired to the death of the King, that he had not levied war, and that he had not written anything to stir up the people against the King. It was in vain that even the Rye House plotters had to confess they knew nothing of him, and had never seen him at the different meetings. Canting Nadab, however—as Dryden, in his immortal satire, calls Lord Howard—was there, ready to swear away a colleague’s life or do any other dirty trick provided his own skin and estate were not forfeited for past misdeeds; his evidence was the chief trump card on which the court relied to score the game. Accordingly his lordship began his testimony by relating what had passed at the meetings of the Six, as to the best means for defending the public interest from invasion, and the advisability of the rising breaking out first in the country instead of in the city. He also stated that it was the special province of Algernon Sydney to deal with the malcontent Scots, and had carried out this task through the agency of one Aaron Smith, who had gone north and been provided with funds for the purpose. This assertion, though Howard candidly said he only spoke from hearsay, was deemed sufficient by the advisers of the Crown to place Sydney’s head in jeopardy. As the law, however, demanded that in all trials for high treason there should be _two_ witnesses against the prisoner before sentence could be passed, and as no other witness had the baseness to act the part so well played by Lord Howard, it was necessary for the court to resort to some expedient which would sufficiently answer its purpose of convicting Sydney. The Court was equal to the emergency. Search was made among Sydney’s papers, and it was discovered that he had written a treatise—his famous discourse on Government—which particularly discussed the paramount authority of the people and the legality of resisting an oppressive Government. A few isolated passages of the work were read here and there, the extracts given were garbled, and, thanks to the coloring of the prosecution, the case against the prisoner looked black indeed. Entering upon his defence, Sydney, like Russell, denied that he had ever conspired to the death of Charles; nor was he a friend of Monmouth, with whom he had spoken but three times in his life: he objected to the evidence of Howard, which was based upon hearsay, but if such testimony were true, he was but one witness, and the law required two. As for regarding a mangled portion of his treatise as a second witness, it was iniquitous. “Should a man,” he cried, “be indicted for treason for scraps of papers, innocent in themselves, but when pieced and patched with Lord Howard’s story,