that he had no more doubt of the existence of the horrid and
damnable conspiracy called the Popish Plot, than he had of the treachery
of Judas Iscariot; and that he considered Oates as the instrument
under Providence of preserving the nation from all the miseries of his
Majesty's assassination, and of a second Saint Bartholomew, acted in the
streets of London. But then he stated it was the candid construction of
the law of England, that the worse the crime, the more strong should
be the evidence. Here was the case of accessories tried, whilst
their principal--for such he should call the Countess of Derby--was
unconvicted and at large; and for Doctor Oates, he had but spoke of
matters which personally applied to that noble lady, whose words, if
she used such in passion, touching aid which she expected in some
treasonable matters from these Peverils, and from her kinsmen, or her
son's kinsmen, of the House of Stanley, may have been but a burst of
female resentment--_dulcis Amaryllidis ira_, as the poet hath it. Who
knoweth but Doctor Oates did mistake--he being a gentleman of a
comely countenance and easy demeanour--this same rap with the fan as
a chastisement for lack of courage in the Catholic cause, when,
peradventure, it was otherwise meant, as Popish ladies will put, it is
said, such neophytes and youthful candidates for orders, to many severe
trials. "I speak these things jocularly," said the Judge, "having no
wish to stain the reputation either of the Honourable Countess or the
Reverend Doctor; only I think the bearing between them may have related
to something short of high treason. As for what the Attorney-General
hath set forth of rescues and force, and I wot not what, sure I am, that
in a civil country, when such things happen such things may be proved;
and that you and I, gentlemen, are not to take them for granted
gratuitously. Touching this other prisoner, this _Galfridus minimus_, he
must needs say," he continued, "he could not discover even a shadow of
suspicion against him. Was it to be thought so abortive a creature would
thrust himself into depths of policy, far less into stratagems of war?
They had but to look at him to conclude the contrary--the creature was,
from his age, fitter for the grave than a conspiracy--and by his size
and appearance, for the inside of a raree-show, than the mysteries of a
plot."

The dwarf here broke in upon the Judge by force of screaming, to assure
him that he had been, s