Colden insisted that this was an attempt of the Executive to interfere with the Judiciary, which ought not to be tolerated. Counsel in criminal cases had always the right to stand face to face with witnesses. It was outrageous that the President should first approve of the conduct of Colonel Smith, then order a prosecution against him and forbid his witnesses to attend the trial. The Court refused to grant an attachment. And later in the trial, when the defence offered Rufus King to prove the President's knowledge and approbation of the enterprise, the Court decided against the admission of the evidence. The history of the expedition in New York, as shown by the testimony, was briefly this:--Colonel Smith introduced Miranda to Ogden; and Ogden agreed to furnish his armed ship Leander, and to load her with the necessary provisions, stores, arms, and ammunition. He estimated his expenditure at seventy thousand dollars. Miranda had brought with him from London a bill of exchange on New York for eight hundred pounds, which had been paid, and had drawn bills on England and on Trinidad for seven thousand pounds, which had not been paid. This was all that Ogden had received. But if the enterprise were successful, he was to be paid two hundred per cent, advance on the ship and cargo. Smith had engaged fifteen or twenty officers, without informing them of the object of the expedition, but expressly stipulating in writing that they would not be employed against England or France, and giving them a general verbal assurance that they would speedily make their fortunes. In this he was sincere, for he took his son from college and sent him with Miranda. Smith had employed John Fink, a Bowery butcher, to engage men who could serve on horseback. Fink enlisted twenty-three at fifteen dollars a month, and fifteen more as a bounty. They were not to be taken out of the territory of the United States. Some of them were told that the President was raising a mounted guard; others, that they were to guard the mail from Washington to New Orleans. One of Fink's papers was shown on the trial, indorsed, "Muster-Roll for the President's Guard." Smith had furnished the bounty-money, but it did not appear that he had authorized these misrepresentations of Fink, who developed a talent in this business which forty years later would have made his fortune as an emigrant-runner. Abundant proofs of the purchase of military clothing, arms, powder, shot, and cannon were produced.