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Show 290 ATROCIOUS J UDGES. (A. D. 16£1. Jeffreys remained in a state of painful anxiety during Charles's la t ""\Vestminster Parliament, and during tllc few days of the Oxford Parlia1uent. The popular party had such a majority in the House of Commons, and seemed t:;O powerful, that it is said the renegade again expressed deep regret that he bad left them; but late at night, on Monday, the 28Lh day of l\.Iarch, 1681, news arrived in London, that early that morning the king had dissolved the Parliament, and had declared his firm determination never to call another. If Jeffreys was still sober, and got drunk that night, we ought to excuse him. Now his talents were to be brought into full play. In the conflict, the ranks of the enemy being thrown into disorder, the brigade of the lawyers, who bad been k ept back a: areserve, was marched up to hang on their broken rear, insulting, and to sweep the1n fr01n the field. First came on the trial of Fitzharris for hio-h treason. Jcf- o freys, as counsel for the crovvn, argued the demurrer to the plea of the pendency of the i1npeachmcnt; and then, llaving assisted the Duchess of Portsmouth to evade the questions which were put to her for the purpose of "'bowing thaL tlte prisoner had acted under the king)s orders, he ndclre. sed the jury with great zeal after the solicitor general, anu wat; 1nainly intitrumental in obtaining the conviction. Next came the trial of Archbishop Plunkett, the Roman Catholic Primate of Ireland, in which Jeffreys was so intemperate that the attorney general was obliged to check him, that the pri oner might have some how of fair play. But it was on the trial of College, "the Protcslant joiner," * that he * See the account of this trial in the life of North, Lord Guilford, ante, p. 210. A. D. 1682.] GEORGE Jt-.:F.FHEYS. 2Jl gave the earliest spceimen of hi. characteristic rihalclry, and his talent for je ting in ca"'cs of life and d.eatl1, which shone out so conspicuou ly when he was lord chief ju8tice of the King's Bench. lie began with strongly j u ·tif ying the act of taking from the prisoner the papers he was to use in his defence, saying, that to allow hin1 to see them would be "a sio-n-o ing counsel to him with a vengeance." A witne8s having stated that pistols were found in the pri oner's hoJ ~ tcrs when l1e was attending the city members at Oxford, he exclaimed with a grin, "I think a cldsel might have been more proper for a joiner." There was called a a witnes , by the pri oner, one L un, who, being a waiter at the Devil Tavern and a fanatic, haLl some years before been caurrht on his knee prayino- ao-ain.-st 0 0 0 the Cavaliers, saying, " Scatter thc1n, good. Lord! Scatter them!" from whence he had ever after borne the nicknanw of "Scatter' em." Jeffreys thus begins his cro 'S-cxaminalion : "We know you, 1\fr. Lun; we only a k question about you that the jury too may know you as well a ~ we." Lun.-" I don't care to give evidence of any thing but the truth. I \\'a , never on my knees before the Parlian1cnt for any thing." Jeffreys.-'' Nor I neither for 1nueh; yet you were once on your knees when you cried, ' Scatter the1n, good Lord!' ""\Vas it not so, Mr. Scatter' em?" He had next an encounter with the famous Titus Oates, who was called by Collerrc and who when cross-examined by b ' ' him, appealed to Sir George Jeffreyti's own knowledge of a fact about which he was inquiring. Jqtf'reys.-" Sir George Jeffreys docs not intend to ue an evidence, I assure you." Dr. Oates.-" I do not desire Sir George Jeffreys to be an evidence for me; I had creel it in Parliaments, and Sir George |