Coke asserted: 'He is a party and cannot come. The law is
against it.' 'It is a toy to tell me of law,' was the reply, 'I defy
law. I stand on the facts.' At one moment his passionate appeal seemed
to have awed the Court into justice. Cecil asked if he would really
abide by Cobham's words. 'Yes, in a main point.' 'If he say you have
been the instigator of him to deal with the Spanish King, had not the
Council cause to draw you hither?' asked Cecil. 'I put myself on it,'
answered Ralegh. 'Then, call to God, Sir Walter,' said Cecil; 'and
prepare yourself; for I verily believe my Lord will prove it.' Cecil
knew of Cobham's recent reiteration of his charge, and supposed he could
be trusted to insist upon it in Court. The Lords Commissioners, on
consultation, doubted this, and finally decided to keep him back, and
rely upon his letter.

[Sidenote: _Two Witnesses._]

[Sidenote: _A Spider of Hell._]

The trial pursued its course. Popham laid it down that 1 Edw. VI. c. 12,
was repealed by 1 and 2 Phil. and Mary. Mr. Justice Gawdy corroborated
this, uttering the solitary judicial dictum recorded of him, that 'the
statute of Edward had been found inconvenient, and had therefore been
repealed.' The provision cited by Ralegh from Philip and Mary's
repealing statute, Popham ruled, applied solely to the specific treasons
it mentioned. The Act ordained that the trial of treasons in general
should follow common law procedure, as before the reign of Edward VI.
But by common law one witness was sufficient. The confession of
confederates was full proof, even though not subscribed, if it were
attested by credible witnesses. Indeed, remarked Popham, echoing Coke,
'of all other proofs the accusation of one, who by his confession first
accuseth himself, is the strongest. It hath the force of a verdict of
twelve men.' Coke himself later, when, as Mr. Justice Michael Foster
expresses it, 'his disgrace at Court had given him leisure for cool
reflection,' intimated in his _Institutes_ that the statute of Edward
the Sixth had not been repealed, and that the obligation, as specified
by it, to produce two witnesses to charges of treason remained in force.
That was not the view of Elizabethan Judges. At the trial of the Duke of
Norfolk it was laid down that the necessity no longer existed. In
fairness it must be admitted that Popham and his brethren were bound to
assume the law had then been correctly stated. They were equally bound
by a series of