varied illustration, till they are entangled, and cannot escape. In every criminal trial, and, since the introduction of the Jury Court, in every jury trial, his presence is considered indispensable; and these being the only law proceedings which excite a popular interest, Mr Jeffrey makes thus, in the eye of the public, the most conspicuous figure at the Scottish bar. Opposite to him is usually stationed Cockburn, producing similar effects by a quite opposite strain of oratory-plain, homely, downright, full of clear and forcible reality. This gentleman had given the most unequivocal proof of sincerity, when, the nephew of Lord Melville, he sacrificed in the cause of Whiggism the highest legal honours which government had to bestow, and which would have courted his acceptance. Space would fail us to commemorate Moncrieff, the son of one of the most eminent clergymen in the Scottish church, and himself already rivalling the vigour and legal knowledge of Clerk;-Murray, prompt, shewy, eloquent;-and others who might have been worthy of mention All these, however, had remained for some time in a tolerably quiescent state, and opposed only a tranquil and passive resistance to the measures of administration; but the time was now come, when all their hostile energies were to be roused into action.

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It is worthy of remark, that the separation so total, which we have observed to take place in England between the Whig and the popular parties, never could be said to have extended to Edinburgh. The Whig chiefs there continued always to espouse the side and cause of the people, so far as they could so with any sort of propriety. Ample scope was afforded, when the distress, and consequent discontent, prevalent throughout

the kingdom, began to be felt in full force in the western manufacturing districts. The elements now began to ferment, which afterwards burst forth in such rash and violent attempts to subvert the established authorities. Information being received of desperate designs in agitation, a considerable number of arrests took place in Glasgow, and some other towns in the counties of Ayr and Dunbarton. After due precognitions, a certain number were selected to stand trial for seditious practices, and to deter others, by their punishment, from following this pernicious example. The Whig phalanx deemed it now their part to come forward and tender their voluntary aid to all who might stand indicted for political offences. As the hour of trial approached, the whole body appeared ostentatiously drawn up in battle-array, and presenting a front that seemed sufficient to intimidate the boldest prosecutor. In disturbed times, the most important person in Scotland, and on whom the tranquillity of the kingdom mainly depends, is the Lord Advocate. The circumstances which we have mentioned as so materially affecting the loyalty of the whole body, rendered it difficult to find an individual possessed of those high qualities which the exigency required. Maconochie, son to an able and distinguished judge, was considered a young man of talent; but he had little experience, and could not be expected to muster law sufficient to contend with all the first authorities, at the bar. He was reckoned, moreover, precipitate, and liable to act without that caution and circumspection, so requisite in the presence of the mighty host that stood arrayed against him. The first prosecution, however, that of M'Laren and Baird, was in so far successful; though high admiration

was still commanded by the talents of the Whig advocates who conducted the defence. The case of Neil Douglas had not so fortunate an issue.* But the grand display of strength was made in attacking the indictments raised against Edgar and Mackinlay, particularly the latter. The Whig phalanx, applying the whole power of their ingenuity and legal knowledge to sift these to the bottom, found out forms and expressions which they succeeded in representing as irregular; and the crown officers were obliged to give up two of the indictments against Mackinlay, and to raise a third. This raising of three successive indictments for the same offence, gave occasion to loud complaints, and the subject was even introduced before the House of Commons. Lord A. Hamilton said the suspension of the habeas corpus had been productive of one of the most vexatious prosecutions which had ever come before a court of justice. The case he alluded to had occurred in Scotland. The person who was concerned had been indicted once, and the indictment had been withdrawn; he had been indicted a second time, and the indictment had been a second time withdrawn ; and he understood it was intended to indict him a third time.

Mr Brougham was surprised that his Majesty's ministers had given no answer to his noble friend; no answer to an allegation, that a man had been put three times on his defence. (Hear, hear.) He knew, that by the Scotch law, most unhappily for Scotland, a party might be tried a thousand times for the same offence, if the law officers of the crown thought it advisable. The House had been informed, that the first indictment against this unfortunate man, charged with high treason, had been quashed by the court; there had been one trial, one deten

tion in prison, one solitary confinement, one period of painful suspense; then came a second charge, a second imprisonment, a second period of suspense, a second judgment, and a second indictment quashed. The crown officers, not satisfied with this, were now preparing a third torture for this unfortunate man. It was impossible to say what would now be the decision of the court, but no lawyer who read the indictment could have any doubts as to its inefficacy. If the prosecutors failed on this occasion, would they commence a fourth time?

Mr Finlay felt disgusted and disappointed, as did the whole Scotch nation, that an individual should be confined to a solitary prison, and tried over and over again, merely because the Lord Advocate was unable to draw an indictment. He complained that the legal affairs of that country were placed in such hands, that it was impossible such circumstances should not frequently recur. An indictment had been three times quashed, and might, perhaps, meet with the same fate a fourth time. Was it to be endured that his Majesty's ministers should allow the law to be in the hands of a person who could not draw an indictment? while the consequence might be, that, after all, the man would escape, whether innocent or guilty? The law of Scotland was right enough in itself—it allowed an indictment to be repeatedly amended in point of form and before trial; but who ever heard of an indictment being preferred three times for the same offence, after the case had been argued? On these grounds, he thought the thanks of the honourable gentlemen were due to the noble lord who had brought the subject before the notice of the House.

Ministers declared that they could

not be expected to answer every question started as to events that took place at the distance of four hundred miles. They felt the highest confidence in the Lord Advocate, and were convinced, if there was any defect, it was in the law itself. In a few days, however, the Lord Advocate himself appeared in the House, and entered into a full justification of his conduct. He observed, that by the law of Scotland, sixty days may elapse after a party is indicted, before he is tried. The prisoner, Mackinlay, was charged with treason and felony; and, there fore, if separate indictments were framed, the prisoner might have been delayed above a hundred days; but he (the Lord Advocate) had joined the two offences in one indictment, for the ease and advantage of the prisoner. So far from the friends of the parties being refused admission to the prison, the greatest facilities were afforded, and the Lord Advocate himself, though pressed with business, attended to their situation minutely. They were placed in a particular prison, because it was the most healthy in Edinburgh, and the district prison was extremely unwholesome. It was not the law of Scotland, that an individual could be tried a thousand times for the same crime; but the public prosecutor can abandon an indictment before trial. The indictment is laid before the court before trial, and the judges first consider the law, and whether the facts bear out the indictment; at that period the court may, if they think fit, refuse to grant the motion for the prisoner's trial. A prisoner, therefore, could not be brought to trial twice. The administration of justice in Scotland had been falsely arraigned, and that during a trial. Ás to oppression, he could not have been guilty of it, unless the court had been in a conspi

racy with him. So far from two in dictments having been quashed, not one was quashed. He had never delayed bringing prisoners to trial.— Within a week after the prisoner had been committed, he attended to the settling of the indictment. It was at first drawn up to a charge of felony. He thought it fair that every thing should be put on the record, to give the prisoner a fair notice; and this was done. There were long debates on this addition to the indictment; and in consequence of this, though not of any thing that fell from the court, a new indictment was framed; and so far from any complaint being made on the score of delay, the prisoner asked 15 days more. The court then desired to consider whether the felony were merged in the treason, (for the English law of treason was not well understood there,) and subsequently suggested an alteration in the form of the indictment; and no objection was made to the relevancy of this latter altered indictment.

Little was said in answer to these

observations; the Lord Advocate returned to Scotland, and the trial proceeded. It then, however, appeared that the principal witness, who was in the interest of the pannel, had contrived to inveigle the law officers into something like a promise of reward, in case of his testimony being favourable to the prosecution. The witness, on being brought to the bar, disclosed all the circumstances of this transaction; in consequence of which, his testimony was rejected, and the prisoner acquitted.*

The public interest excited by these proceedings, and the splendid displays of talent on the popular side, threw a lustre on a cause, which seemed to absorb within itself all the ability of the most intellectual body in Scotland.

Other symptoms were not wanting of a considerable change in the sentiments of the great body of the people. The Scottish newspapers had hitherto been conducted in a plain and unpretending style; nothing was expected from them beyond a simple record of facts, interspersed with occasional panegyrics on the existing administration. The present year was marked by the commencement of a journal devoted solely to discussion, and in which the highest doctrines of Whiggism, not untinctured with democracy, were daringly and ably supported. An extensive circulation proved its adaptation to the public taste; nor were there wanting provincial papers which struck a still bolder note, rivalling the most licentious effusions of the London press. The flame, however, might have insensibly evaporated, had not a question occurred, by which it was concentrated into one focus: this was Burgh Reform.

It appears not a little remarkable, that, among a people so prompt both with the pen and the sword-whose nobles claimed a peculiar independence, and almost equality with the monarch, and were so forward to rise in arms to avenge real or supposed wrongs, the system of political institution should have been so much less liberal than in England. The establishment of the Lords of Articles, and the whole constitution of the Scottish parliament, was such as to afford to the sovereign an almost unlimited power in the enactment of laws. To these rude barons, the residence of the metropolis, and the forms of legislative assemblies, were peculiarly irksome; and they willingly acquiesced in arrangements, by which all public measures were previously prepared, and waited only their formal sanction. Even the rude independent power of which they boasted, rendered them, probably, little studious of constitu

tional liberty. Whatever wrongs they might sustain from the legislature, their own good sword was always ready to afford them redress. They, therefore, quietly permitted the sovereign to make almost such laws as he pleased, only reserving to themselves the liberty of obeying them or not, as they might find convenient. This delusive facility in passing laws, and peril in executing them, was probably one main cause of the disasters with which the fate of the Stuarts was so deeply chequered.

The chief monument now remaining in Scotland, of the legislative despotism which was combined with so fierce a practical independence, appears in the construction of her burgh polity. In the infant state of trade and the arts, the insignificance of the towns secured them, probably, from any interference, and they were allowed to govern themselves by magistrates of their own appointment. As they grew into importance, the disorders to which the exercise of liberty is more or less liable, afforded a pretence for the act of 1469, establishing the system of self-election, in which the old magistrates chuse the new ones, and the council continues still "another and the same." This system, in whole or in the greater part, has ever since continued to be that of all the burghs of Scotland. There might not be room strongly to object to a certain degree of permanence in the municipal councils of a city. In the freest republics, it has been found advantageous to have some senate, something fixed, which might prevent pub. lic measures from varying with every breath of popular opinion. But whenever this permanent or self-elected body forms, as in all the Scottish burghs, the majority of the council, the natural combination which takes place between its members enables them to absorb the whole administra.

tion, and throws out the representative members, even when pretty numerous. A species of oligarchy is thus formed, not founded on any natural or substantial basis, nor likely to feel always a common interest with the rest of the citizens. Even in the few representative members admitted into the councils, the appointment was subjected to a capricious and tyrannical restriction. The trade was required to draw up a list or leet, which was delivered to the old council, who struck out one-half of the names; in which mutilated state it was delivered to these worthy persons, to make their election out of. Thus the members of a trade could not chuse as its deacon the person who held the first, or even the second or third place in their es

teem.

These defects in the burgh system of Scotland had long been viewed with affliction by those who undertook to advocate her national rights. So early as 1783 and 1784, delegates from all the burgesses of Scotland met at Edinburgh, with the view of obtaining sets on a more liberal and rational plan. The lead was taken by Mr Fletcher, a most respectable advocate, round whom rallied all the Whigs of Scotland, not forming then so imposing a body as they do now. Laudably stu dious, however, rather of gaining the object in view, than of gratifying party animosities, they used all their efforts to have the subject brought under the consideration of parliament, by a member supposed to possess the confidence of ministry. The independent spirit and zealous patriotism of Mr Dempster of Dunnichen seemed to point him out as the individual from whom most was to be hoped. From Mr Dempster, however, they met with an unexpected repulse; that gentleman declaring his obligations to the Scottish town councils to be so great, that he could not honourably become

an instrument in their overthrow.Lord Melville was next applied to, but frankly declared that he would not support, but oppose, any change in the Scottish burgh constitution. They were constrained, therefore, to have recourse to the opposition members, by whom they were received with open arms. Mr Sheridan espoused their cause with peculiar zeal, and though the affair was delayed from year to year by difficulties of form, and protracted investigations, yet in the year 1793, they obtained a report, which seemed to promise the happiest success. At that critical moment, the French revolutionary excesses rose to their utmost height, and created in the minds of all sober men a panic dread of every shade of reform. It became evident, therefore, to the most zealous advocates of the measure, that this was not a time when it was possible to attempt carrying it through. The proposition, therefore, was entirely withdrawn, and seemed to have sunk into total oblivion, when a single circumstance, acting upon the inflammable spirit of the nation, caused the zeal for reform to burst forth with tenfold energy.

The burghs of Scotland, in the limited and undisturbed sphere within which they had carried on their elections, were apt to slide into a somewhat lax observance of those forms which had been demanded by the original set. Montrose appears to have taken a most extraordinary latitude; the election in that burgh having, for two successive years, been made, without any authority, by ballot. The last election thus made was appealed against by several members of the former council; and though it was alleged, that they, having acquiesced in the measure at the time, had no title now to complain, the Court of Session declared the course of proceeding illegal, and the present magistrates to