ting such a design against Serjeant Davies: That they were not
so much as suspected of murdering him at the time of his being
amissing, or for several months thereafter, when many different
accounts were given, and suspicions raised and entertained concerning
that matter. THEY also objected and alleged for the panels, that as
murder was the only crime charged against them in this indictment, no
vague or general allegation of robbery, or other crime or accusation
against their characters, could be allowed to go to the knowledge of an
assize, though they were noways apprehensive of the consequences of it,
other than from the false and malicious reports, raised and propagated
against them, since their commitment for the foresaid crime; and the
panels had great reason to complain of the undue delays in bringing
them to trial for this offence: In so far as, after they were committed
for the same in September last, and had taken out letters of
intimation, and upon expiry of the days, had also obtained letters of
liberation, they were again committed upon a new warrant for alleged
theft, upon which new commitment they raised new letters of intimation,
and when the sixty days were just expiring, they were served with an
indictment for the theft, which was fixed to within a few days of the
expiry of the forty days allowed by law, and then allowed to drop; and
after all, there was again a new warrant of commitment obtained against
them for wearing the Highland dress; and last of all they were served
with this indictment; all which steps plainly show the oppression they
have met with, which the panels do by no means lay to the charge of the
prosecutor, but are willing to allow the same to be owing to the
malicious information of some private informer, which they hope to be
able to make appear if they were allowed an exculpatory proof, and that
very undue means had been used both before and since the citation of
the witnesses to influence them to give evidence against the panels in
this matter; and the panels, amongst many other things for their
exculpation, would be able to prove, that after they returned from the
hill upon the day upon which the Serjeant is said to have been
murdered, he, the Serjeant, was seen with his party in that hill. So
that it is impossible the panels could be the perpetrators of the
murder.

LORD ADVOCATE, &c., answered, that as the defence resolved altogether
into a denial of the libel, it was sufficient