Presently I noticed a great gilt anchor above the judges’ heads. I wondered why it was there, until I remembered it was an Admiralty Court. I thought suddenly, “Ah! if I had thought to tell my father to go and see if the _Lion_ had come in in the night!” A man was bawling out a number of names.... “Peter Plimley, gent., any challenge.... Lazarus Cohen, merchant, any challenge....” The turnkey beside me leant with his back against the spikes. He was talking to the man who had called us in. “Lazarus Cohen, West Indian merchant.... Lord, well, I’d challenge....” The other man said, “S--sh.” “His old dad give me five shiners to put him up to a thing if I could,” the turnkey said again. I didn’t catch his meaning until an old man with a very ragged gown was handing up a book to a row of others in a box so near that I could almost have touched them. Then I realized that the turnkey had been winking to me to challenge the jury. I called out at the highest of the judges: “I protest against that jury. It is packed. Half of them, at least, are West Indian merchants.” There was a stir all over the court. I realized then that what had seemed only a mass of stuffs of some sort were human beings all looking at me. The judge I had called to opened a pair of dim eyes upon me, clasped and unclasped his hands, very dry, ancient, wrinkled. The judge on his right called angrily: “Nonsense, it is too late.... They are being sworn. You should have spoken when the names were read.” Underneath his wig was an immensely broad face with glaring yellow eyes. I said, “It is scandalous. You want to murder me, How should I know what you do in your courts? I say the jury is packed.” The very old judge closed his eyes, opened them again, then gasped out: “Silence. We are here to try you. This is a court of law.” The turnkey pulled my sleeve under cover of the planking. “Treat him civil,” he whispered, “Lord Justice Stowell of the Hadmir’lty. ’Tother’s Baron Garrow of the Common Law; a beast; him as hanged that kid. You can sass him; it doesn’t matter.” Lord Stowell waved his hand to the clerk with the ragged gown; the book passed from hand to hand along the faces of the jury, the clerk gabbling all the while. The old judge said suddenly, in an astonishingly deep, majestic voice: “Prisoner at the bar, you must understand that we are here to give you an impartial trial according to the laws of this land. If you desire advice as to the procedure of this court you can have it.” I said, “I still protest against that Jury. I am an innocent man, and------” He answered querulously, “Yes, yes, afterwards.” And then creaked, “Now the indictment....” Someone hidden from me by three barristers began to read in a loud voice not very easy to follow. I caught: