more unsatisfactory and
uncertain evidence than these examinations. The very fact that a man is
accused throws him off his guard, and he may say what he does not
intend, or which, if he did, in the midst of excitement the witnesses
might not properly understand or correctly remember. It was said there
were contradictions in his statements, but that supposition arose
entirely from a mistake of one of the justices. The other understood it
differently and saw no mistake at all. It respected the manner in which
he brought on the books--one understood him to say that they were all
given to him in New York, and that he brought them here, and they were
all in the jail but about a dozen; and then, at another time, he said
that he had some of them a long time. The other justice understood him
to say that all that he brought into the District were there, and that
they were all he brought from New York, except about a dozen, which he
supposed he had left by the way. Neither of these suppositions were
right. When he said they were all of them, he meant to say all he
brought from New York; that he had distributed none, for even the one
he loaned to Mr. King was taken by the prisoner from Linthicum's shop,
and was then in Mr. Key's possession, though they supposed it was lost;
and when he referred to about a dozen, he meant that he brought them all
with him except about a dozen, which came in a box by water. It had been
said that he admitted he had circulated a dozen; and yet the United
States' witnesses prove that he denied having circulated any, and from
the first disapproved of putting them in circulation. When the learned
counsel asked why the persons were not brought, to whom he had given the
dozen, to show that they were respectable men, he should have remembered
that the testimony was all against such an idea; and that, if he had
distributed any, the zeal and perseverance of the District Attorney and
the officers would have discovered evidence of it.

It was also asked why the person who gave the bundle to him in New York
was not brought to testify in his favor? as if the criminal wretch who
had palmed off these incendiary papers upon an innocent man, without
his knowledge, could be brought here to testify, when he was beyond
the jurisdiction of the court, and had declared that he was afraid to
come. He had requested the Attorney to have a deposition taken, but he
refused; and when he was spoken to, he threatened a prosecution