glories, we look, less angrily, back to the sad insubordination that preceded them, we may offer up a fervent prayer that, for the honour and vitality of our navy, no such outbreak may ever occur again as the mutiny at the Nore.

THE TRIAL OF GOVERNOR WALL.

JOSEPH WALL, the unfortunate subject of the following trial, was the scion of a very respectable Irish family, and was the eldest son of Garrett Wall, Esq., of Derryknavin. He was born in 1737, and entered the British army at an early age. He was a brave and honourable man, but of a severe and rather unaccommodating temper, and was not popular among the officers and men, though he rapidly advanced in his profession, having obtained early promotion for the gallantry he displayed at the reduction of the Havannah in 1762. It was while Lieut.-Colonel and Governor and Commandant of Goree, an island on the coast of Africa, that he committed the offence which brought him to the scaffold-viz., the murder of one Benjamin Armstrong, by ordering him to receive eight hundred lashes on the 10th July, 1782, of which he died in five days afterwards. Wall's emoluments were, at the time, very considerable, as, besides his military appointments, he was Superintendent of Trade to the colony. His family was Roman Catholic, but, according to the exigency of the then penal laws, he had to conform to Protestanism, to enable him to hold his commission.

Some time after the account of the murder of Arm.

strong reached the Board of Admiralty, a reward was offered for Wall's apprehension, who had come to England, and he was taken. He, however, contrived to escape while in custody at Reading, and fled to the Continent, and sojourned there, sometimes in France and sometimes in Italy; but mostly in France, under an assumed name, where he lived respectably and was admitted into good society. He particularly kept company with the officers of his own country who served in the French army, and was well known at the Scotch and Irish colleges in Paris. He now and then incautiously ventured into England and Scotland. While thus, at one time in Scotland, he made a high match. He wedded a scion of the great line of Kintail-viz., Frances, fifth daughter (by his wife, Lady Mary Stewart, daughter of Alexander, sixth Earl of Galloway) of Kenneth MacKenzie, Lord Fortrose, M.P., and sister of Kenneth, last Earl of Seaforth. Wall came finally to England in 1797. He was frequently advised by the friend who then procured him a lodging to leave the country again, and questioned as to his motive for remaining; he never gave any satisfactory answer, but appeared, even at the time when he was so studiously concealing himself, to have a distant intention of making a surrender, in order to take his trial. It is very evident his mind was not at ease, and that he was incapable of any firm resolution either one way or the other. Even the manner in which he did at last surrender himself showed a singular want of determination, as he left it to chance whether the Minister should send for him or not; for rather than go and deliver

himself up, he wrote to say "he was ready to do so". a less becoming, but not a less dangerous mode of encountering danger. His high-born wife showed him throughout his troubles the greatest devotion: she was with him in Upper Thornhaugh Street, Bedford Square, where he lived under the name of Thompson when he was apprehended. It is most probable that, had he not written to the Secretary of State, the matter had been so long forgotten, that he would never have been molested; but once he was in the hands of the law, the Government had but one obvious course, which was to bring him to trial. This was accordingly done, and the judicial investigation took place, at the Old Bailey on the 20th January, 1802. The judges who presided were The Right Hon. Sir Archibald MacDonald, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer; the Hon. Sir Soulden Lawrence, one of the justices of the Court of King's Bench; and the Hon. Sir Giles Rooke, one of the justices of the Court of Common Pleas.

The counsel for the Crown were the Attorney-General, Sir Edward Law (afterwards Lord Ellenborough and Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench); the Solicitor-General, the Hon. Spencer Perceval (afterwards First Lord of the Treasury, and, while so, assassinated by Bellingham); Mr. Wood (afterwards Sir George Wood and a baron of the Exchequer); Mr. Plumer (afterwards Sir Thomas Plumer, and successively Vice-Chancellor of England and Master of the Rolls); Mr. William Fielding (afterwards a metropolitan police-magistrate, son of Henry Fielding, the novelist); and Mr. Abbott (afterwards Lord Chief

Justice of the Court of King's Bench and Lord Tenterden).

The counsel for the defence were Mr. Knowlys (afterwards Recorder of London), Mr. Gurney (afterwards Sir John Gurney, a baron of the Exchequer), and Mr. Alley.

The indictment was opened by Mr. Abbott; and while he was stating the charge, the prisoner from the dock said to the Chief Baron, "My lord, I cannot hear in this place; I hope your lordship will permit me to sit near my counsel." In which the Chief Baron replied, "It is perfectly impossible; there is a regular place appointed by law-I can make no invidious distinctions."

The Attorney-General stated the case for the prosecution in a remarkably able and lucid speech, which so fully details the whole horrible affair, that I cannot do better than give the greater portion of it. After a few preliminary remarks on the nature of the crime, the Attorney-General's address proceeded as follows:

"Gentlemen of the jury,-The crime imputed to the prisoner I have stated to you to be murder; the prisoner is charged, upon the present indictment, with the murder of a person of the name of Benjamin Armstrong, who was a soldier and serjeant in the garrison at Goree, of which the prisoner at the bar was, at the time of Armstrong's death, the commander and governor. The circumstances that led to the punishment which was the cause of the death of this person it will be for me presently to state to you; and it will be for me, after I have so done, to discuss in some manner that which is the probable, and which is not only the probable, but