The Express.
London, England, 1848-08-29 00:00:00

opportunities which must of them had had of coeversieg
wits
ti
re him were, however, of e meagre nature, soca
as in, tire loco cesuatly fur few minutes and exchanging
the complioe nts of the eay, or speaking about dogs. hunt-
and Whale, of which spine the uefatunate gentlemaii
weell ,ce.a to have been very fond, as he kept a peek et
hounds and a buoteinair, aod was frequeetly engaged in I
toeir cr.sieexamination, they admitted ,
that Mr. Price was subject to tits of insanity, and one of
them said he knew rem for 63 year', and never saw
him in a rational state but one*. It appeared that
when in his insane state, his habits were very
filthy and ixtraysgant. lie would fill his pocket wit
tike them to his family tomb in Roddry churchyard,
and place them within the palings; he
is would dress himself
rags, run about the country and pick up sticks and put
them in his bosom ; attire himself in a moleskin jacket and
red small clothes, and wear a white hat ornamented with
coloured worsted ; be would go into the river and stand up
to hi, neck in the water, and wodd walk about without
shoes and stockings, and sometimes in a state of nudity.—At
pant eight o'clo,k the court rose, and the hearing was
adjourned till Monday morning,
Mr. Cockburn, on Monday morning, commenced, his ad- ;
dress to the jury fur the deteudant. He contended that his ,
learned friend fierjeant Kinglake had embarrassed the case ,
with a great many matters which did not relate to the only
issue which the jury had to try—the insanity of the late Mo-
r.
Price. With the equity between the parties they had n
thing whatever to do, and those matters must and ought to
be lett to the decision of the equity judge. He should be
enabled to show by a mass of evidence perfectly irresistible,
that the subiect of this inquiry was beyond all question a
lunatic, and that his unfortunate malady was the result of an
unhappy accident. They had heard that at its opening his
life was full of promise. He went to Oxford, acquitted him
self with credit, procured his degree, obtained ordination,
and returned to his native country with a richly-stored
mind, and wi.h an unblemished moral character, prepared
to enter upon that great mission to which he had resolved to
devote his life. It happened, however, that in the year
1790 he was thrown from his horse. pitched upon his head,
and received iejuri‘ s of the brain, and shortly after this time
and doubtless as the result of the accident, by which all his
hopes end exp. ctationa were blighted, symptoms of insanity
manifested themselves. Mr. Price =aerie u they had heard
a women very ntueli his inferior in station and intelligence.
Whether that marriage was the fruit of the first workings of
insanity in his mind he would not say, but he should show
beyond all question that within a few months of that
time the most undoubted evidences of lunacy preseeted
themselves. At first those evidences might not have been of
so violent a character u thou which afterwards manifested
themselves, but he would call a host of witnesses who would
show that, for some time before 1809, he was a miserable,
hopeless lunatic. He became negligent and even filthy in
his dress • he went into the wools where he "meld se-
chide himself fir hours cutting down trees and stripping
them of their bark. This was a practice to which he was so
much add,cted, that he became quite a nuisance and pest in
the neighbeurhood. He seldom moved without his saw,
and he would cut down trees, divide them, break them up
into small bits, and then, after carrying them in his
bosom and about his person, be would burn them
one by one, muttering some incoherent words as he
did so. Another feature of his lunacy was this: he
would gather up pieces of stone, and spit upon them, ima-
gining that the moment he had done so they would acquire
some extraordinary value. Then, again, he seemed to think
that there was eomathing marvellous in snakes, and he had
such a predeliction for these reptiles that wherever he could
find them he would take them and retain them as objects of
veneration. Sometimes he would carry them and lay them
on the tomb of his fathers ; at others he would entwine them
around his neck or hide them in his bosom i and, again, as
they had heard from one of the plaintiff's witnesses, he would
carry numbers of them in his pockets. Another feature of
his lunacy was the extrav•gant desire he had for water. lie
would 'go into the river and stay in it up to his
neck, sem. times he would get iu in his clothes, and
at others he would pull off his clothes which h ,would satun
rate with water before be put them on again. He should
show that the unfortunate gentleman would run about the
country in rags and filth ; that he would be seen in the pub-
licroads without portions of his apparel, and even in a state
of nudity. There were times when his matinees assumed the
most frantic forms, and there were others in which it was
characterised by • love of mischief. In one of these pa-
roxysms he nearly killed • man, and in order to exercise
necessary control over him his keepers were obliged at times
to resort to manual force. There was a strait-waistcoat
kept which they would put upon him to restrain his
violence, and he believed it would appear that at times
they beat him, and that the peculiar comtitution of
his malady was such that towards those persons who so acted
towards him ho manifested the greatest respect, and is,en
reverence, never meeting them without pulling off his hat
and bowing almost to the ground. Indeed the evidence
which he should adduce would beyond all doubt establish the
tact that Mr. Price was • lunatic of the most derided cha-
racter from tha year 1790. The learned gentleman then
proceeded to comment on the evidence adduced on the part
of the plaintiff, than which he had never heard leas
satisfactory testimony adduced. lie particularly dwelt
upon the fact that on the day before the deed
was executed the lunatiz was shown to have been
in such a st,te that he could not be seen, and
yet, upon the following day, the instrument was exe-
cuted, without a sioele question being asked, by the at-
torney who prepared it. lie likewise commented upon the
fact that every shilling of the money allegol to have been
paid foe the property was passed to the hand of Mrs Price,
and net of Mr. Price, and described that Mrs. Price exer-
cised a great infamies over her husband, and could, with
the assimance of the keepers, make him do what she pleased.
But Le should not leave the case upon the general fact of
madam—he should prove that, on the 9th of February,
Mr. Price was beyond all question mad, for he had wit-
nesses living who would be able to prove his state
of mind on that day, and who would show the
jury the circumstances under which the deed was
ezecuted. The deed was to have been executed
on the lith, and the maamen was locked in his room to be
kept there till Mr. Protheroe came, but, impatient of con-
finement, Le escaped from his window and went into the
woods, and he could not be found that day, and a man was
ready to inform Mr. Protheroe when he came that it was of
no ure coming into the house, as the bird had flown. He was
caught during the day, again locked up, and watched more
carefully, and he was brought into the room to sign the
deed, wad his keeper stood In the room with his back to the
door sill he had signed it. Such was the lucid interval
alleged en the other side ; and he might add that no sooner
was the instrument executed than the poor madman escaped
again, went to his favourite haunt the river, and came
back with ts;a clothes dripping with water and bearing a
number of mall none s, which he had spat upon and believed
they had thereby acquired great value. Such was the nature of
the cue he should have to submit to them on the part of the
defendant, and he apprehended that when they had head
his evidence they would have no difficulty in coming to the
conclusion that the unfortunate gentleman when he executed
the deed was a madman.—The learned counsel thin pro-
ceeded to cell a number of witnesses, who spoke to the item-
nity of Mr. Price, and deposed to a variety of acts which
clearly bespoke lunacy.
The wee woe proceeding at sex o'clock lad night when our
report left.

NORTHERN CIRCUIT.—LrveneooL, Auo. 28.
Ceowe thrtT.—Before Mr. Justice CreseirelL
TRIANONABLR CONSPIRACY AT LIVIRPOOL.—J. Cuddy,
3/. Somers, J. O'Brien, F. O'Donnell, and E. Murphy, five
confide: atm, were charged with treasonable conspiracy at
Liverpool. O'D 'smell and Somers asked his lordship for
copies of the informations sworn 'wind them, as in all pro-
bability they would have to defend themselves.—Mr. Justice
Cresewell said that if they chose to have the indictor nt read
fully to them it should be done. He must gamma that they
knew the ehsrirs exainat them when they pleaded to it —By
the advise •.f Mr. Srrjeant Wilkins, who had keen retained
for two i,n rs, the whole ..1 these arrui.in.d,
the exception of Murphy, agreed to traverse till the next
as His lordship said that Murphy's trial must stand
over.
TRIAL OF OIL M'DOUALL FOR SEDITION.
' •

---
Peter Murray AP/Joann, the chartist leader, was next
pl ic. d in the deck, charged with having made a sedition'
speech nn the 10th of July, at Ashton under-Lyme.
Mr. Knowles, haying opened the case,
Mr. ItMert Newton, chief constsnle, of Ash.on-under
Lynn, was the first MiMebt called. He proved that he went
to the chartist meeting, at the Charlestown meeting.bouse
on the 10,11 of July, but was stopped on the staircase by •
man named James Milliga 1, who refused him admission.
Milligan told him that it was Dr. M'Dosall's wish, as polic.-
men had given ,tech wrong evidence in some recent cases, that
no policeman should he allowed to enter any meeting he
attended.
Abel Swan a tailor and draper, was present at the meeting
in question. He saw a reporter named Kerrison and the
police turned lack. M*Divall in his speech referred to the
land, s...yisig tie people must return to it again, and that the
parks of the aristocracy must be brought into cultivation.
Be fore the. meeting broke up a person (not the prisoner) rose
up and requested th 4 the young men present would go, on
a day named, to the Chartist Room, and join the national
guard.
Fleury Taylor, a policeman, went to the meeting room,
but was refused adinimdin. lie waited about, however,
and, at the close of the meeting, saw the procession formed.
He followed to the Odd Fellows' Arms, and heard what
MElouall &duress. dto the crowd from the window. Wit•
ness made notes next morning of some sentences in the
speech which be remembered. (The same as stated in the
learned Attorney-General's speech, with the addition, " I
tell you the re are only 10,000 available troops ; and what ale
they to five millions of people ?") The speech did not
terminate till a quarter past 11 o'clock, the crowd before
dispersing living three cheers.—Cross-questioned by Mr.
Serjeant Wilkins, the witness stated that he had not been long
in the police force, out had for 20 years previously been a
marine. Ile never remembered having reported • speech
before.
Inspector Daglish took notes under the same circum-
stances, and spoke to the same tenter ces as the previous
witness had deposed to. Witness had written down his
notes the same night, when he got home.—Cross-questioned
The witnrss could not positively swear that what was said
about the troop, might not be Windsor instead of Wool-
wich. Mr Pollock created some amusement by testing this
witness's reporting capabilt•ies. Ile read to him a lengthy
paragraph from a political pamphlet, and asked witness what
sort of a report be could give of that ?--The inspector con-
fessed that he did not even know the mea"ting of what had
been reed.
Matthew Maiden, another police inspector, alio to,oh not"
of the aseneaimarks, which he wrote out &herrn/us in the
pollee court, 1/4 stated that he saw two men praise who
had what appeared to be pikes in their pockets.
After another witness had been called to prove that he
saw sticking out of the Are art of a man at the meeting some-
thing glittering, which he took to be • pike,