were raised on
that day, though no person should purchase a halfpenny-worth of stock;
in like manner as conspiring to raise the price of commodities in a
market, though no person should purchase, would still be a crime.

_Mr. Serjeant Best._ The commodities in a market are articles of
necessity, which, I apprehend, makes a distinction.

_Lord Ellenborough._ Whether it be an article of necessity, or if
universal sale, comes to the same thing. Besides, as to not stating the
multitude, one would think we had forgotten the number of cases which
have been decided on charges which are in their nature multitudinous; as
for instance in barratry, or the inciting persons to institute and
maintain suits; in those instances you need not state the individuals
injured.

_Mr. Serjeant Best._ The instances of barratry and of common scolds, I
believe, are the only exceptions.

_Lord Ellenborough._ By no means; I remember a case in which it was
held, that where the circumstances cannot be conveniently specified upon
the record, the necessity forms the exception.

_Mr. Serjeant Best._ But in all those cases your Lordship will find the
excuse is stated upon the record; as ignotum, where an unknown person
has been murdered.

_Lord Ellenborough._ In this case the nature and reason of the thing
suggest the excuse, or one must reject one's common sense. The nature
and reason of the thing form an exception, if it could be necessary to
state the name of an individual, as having suffered from an act of this
kind; but it is the tendency of the act, not the success of it, that
constitutes the crime. If there had been an apprehension of pestilence
or commotion, which made it unsafe to resort to the Stock Exchange on
the day on which the fraud was practised, the crime would have been as
complete by the conspiracy, as it was by the damage sustained by
individuals who suffered under it.

_Mr. Serjeant Best._ In whatever way your Lordships dispose of these
objections, I shall be satisfied. I am sure your Lordships will excuse
my mentioning, in a case of this sort, The King v. Robe, 2d Strange, p.
999, though it is not a case of conspiracy.

_Lord Ellenborough._ No doubt they ought in that case to have specified
the persons, they had the means of stating every one of them. The
offence did not consist in the combination, but in doing the very act
they combined to do.

_Mr. Serjeant Best._ Another objection which applies to all the counts
is, t