t is a
disgrace, that the press of this country has engendered such an avidity
in the public mind to have these things detailed to them; that they
indulge it to a degree subversive of all justice. Hardly a case has
happened within our own observation of late years, that the whole of the
case has not been detailed before it came to trial, so that it is
impossible but that the minds of the jurymen (and men cannot divine
whether they shall be jurymen or not) should receive a bias upon this
subject; but it is very hard that all the obloquy which such
publications merit, should be thrown upon the defendants. Did that
self-constituted Committee of the Stock Exchange, of which I shall speak
much more plainly by and by, and tell you what I think of that
committee; did that self-constituted Committee of the Stock Exchange,
who have brought forward this as a charge against the defendants, make
no publication; did they not placard on the doors of their Stock
Exchange, the names of these gentlemen, members of the legislature, and
persons standing so high in the country? Why did they set so infamous an
example? I admit to follow it was bad; but to set it, I insist, was much
worse.

Gentlemen, whatever blame may have attached upon some of the defendants,
if they have made these publications, my client, Mr. De Berenger, is not
implicated in any such transactions. Those who have published have only
followed the example set them by the prosecutors on this occasion.

Gentlemen, there are certain rules of evidence on subjects of this
nature, with which I am sure you are in a great degree acquainted, but
upon which you will hear more from his Lordship by and by. It is quite
clear that no declarations of one party, though he may be indicted with
the others, can be evidence against the other defendants, unless they be
present at that declaration. My learned friend, the Serjeant, has so
fully gone through the general nature of the case, that it would be
impertinent in me to do it; but I shall observe such things as occur to
me, on the different species of proof on the part of the prosecution,
and I think I shall most decidedly convince you, that even as the case
stands, if it was not to be met by the evidence by which it will be met,
it would be impossible for you to convict any of these parties, for whom
my learned friend and myself are counsel.

Gentlemen, I will presently come to the evidence by which Mr. De
Berenger is supposed to be t