of clothing are found
buried in my garden. But how can it be shewn that they belonged to
Clarke? Who can swear to, who can prove any thing so vague? And if found
there, even if belonging to Clarke, what proof that they were there
deposited by me? How likely that the real criminal may in the dead of
night have preferred any spot, rather than that round his own home, to
conceal the evidence of his crime!

"How impotent such evidence as this! and how poor, how precarious, even
the strongest of mere circumstantial evidence invariably is! Let it
rise to probability, to the strongest degree of probability; it is but
probability still. Recollect the case of the two Harrisons, recorded by
Dr. Howell; both suffered on circumstantial evidence on account of the
disappearance of a man, who, like Clarke, contracted debts, borrowed
money, and went off unseen. And this man returned several years after
their execution. Why remind you of Jaques du Moulin, in the reign of
Charles the Second?--why of the unhappy Coleman, convicted, though
afterwards found innocent, and whose children perished for want, because
the world believed the father guilty? Why should I mention the perjury
of Smith, who, admitted king's-evidence, screened himself by accusing
Fainloth and Loveday of the murder of Dunn? the first was executed, the
second was about to share the same fate, when the perjury of Smith was
incontrovertibly proved.

"And now, my Lord, having endeavoured to shew that the whole of this
charge is altogether repugnant to every part of my life; that it is
inconsistent with my condition of health about that time; that no
rational inference of the death of a person can be drawn from his
disappearance; that hermitages were the constant repositories of the
bones of the recluse; that the proofs of these are well authenticated;
that the revolutions in religion, or the fortune of war, have mangled
or buried the dead; that the strongest circumstantial evidence is often
lamentably fallacious, that in my case, that evidence, so far from
being strong, is weak, disconnected, contradictory; what remains? A
conclusion, perhaps, no less reasonably than impatiently wished for.
I, at last, after nearly a year's confinement, equal to either fortune,
entrust myself to the candour, the justice, the humanity of your
Lordship, and to yours, my countrymen, gentlemen of the jury."

The prisoner ceased: and the painful and choking sensations of sympathy,
compassion,