The LORD JUSTICE-CLERK--It is enough to satisfy any sensible man.
Mr. JOHN CLERK--It is for the jury, my Lord, to judge of that.
[To Witness]--You mentioned your having on a great-coat when you broke
into the Excise Office; pray, sir, was that great-coat your own, or to
whom did it belong?
WITNESS--It belonged to Michael Henderson, stabler in the Grassmarket,
and I carried it home to him the following night.
Mr. JOHN CLERK--Did you carry anything to Mr. Henderson along with it?
WITNESS--I did not.
The LORD JUSTICE-CLERK--John Brown, you appear to be a clever fellow,
and I hope you will now abandon your dissipated courses, and betake
yourself to some honest employment.
WITNESS--My Lord, be assured my future life shall make amends for my
past conduct.
The LORD ADVOCATE--My Lord, the parole evidence on the part of the Crown
being now closed, the declarations and other writings, which have been
authenticated in the presence of your Lordships, fall now to be read to
the jury, but as there are some parts of Smith’s declarations which
relate to matters not immediately connected with the subject of the
present trial, I do not desire that these parts of his declarations
should be read by the Clerk of Court or communicated to the jury.
[After some conversation, this proposal, which did much honour to his
Lordship, was agreed to, and such parts of the declarations as were not
read in Court were pasted over with paper, that they might not be looked
into through mistake by the jury after they were inclosed.]
Declarations of George Smith.
No. I.
At Edinburgh, 8th March, 1788.
The which day compeared, in presence of Archibald Cockburn, Esq., His
Majesty’s Sheriff-depute of the shire of Edinburgh, George Smith, grocer
in Edinburgh, who, being examined and interrogated by the Sheriff,
declares,
That it is about a year and a half since the declarant came to Scotland;
that he was never in it before; that he was born at Boxford, within four
miles of Newburgh, Berkshire; that the declarant and his wife travelled
the country of England as hawkers, with a horse and cart; that he
brought a horse to this country but no cart; that, when he first came to
Edinburgh, he put up at Michael Henderson’s, having heard his house
mentioned by travellers in England as a traveller’s inn; that he was
taken ill after his arrival in this country, and confined for about four
months in Michael Henderson’s, which obliged him to send for his wife to
this place; that he sent for goods from England, which he sold, as also
his horse, in order to support himself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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