The National Register.
London, England, 1820-10-08 00:00:00

322

1

when doors are open, at the height of the time, where
hundreds of persons are uassiug, and where all the world
might enter Witte),phrase. W lien at Terrawina,l3el44llll
was taking his departure on soinimission br his- Boyal,
Mistress, the whole party on board the ship are arsew•
bled on deck; the Princess and Brigand retire to a room
Ist themselves to indulge their passion j but, strange to
tell, they,must needs wait till the tamed Majocci
cut rs,
to bear testimony to all that passes! Nay, till far is the
case carried, that the Queen cannot retire wi h Bergaini
into an anti chamber to change her clothes, to strip
herself naked from bead to toot in his presence, she can-
not commit this monstrous indecency without taking spe-
cial care to have the truly silent. honest, unintrigning
Swiss casithermaid, Mademoiselle Dumont, placed at the
door to bear evidence to the fact, that Bergaihi was with
her the whole time? These deeds of shame were not
done in a corner, not in such hidden haunts as lust has
been often known to appropriate to itself, hot in places
accessible to all intrusion—before observing witnesses,
when the sun was in itrineridian. Was ever before vice
so unwary, folly so extravagant, unthinking—passions so
thoughtless, so reckless, so insane? But all this was no-
thing to what the case, as Stated in evidence went to
prove. Least the precautions which the Princess had
taken fur her own ruin should be thrown away, every
person who could he of use as a witness against them is
causelessly dismissed from her service, and refused to
be taken back when every circumstance combined to
make it of importance to attach them to her Innis ests !
Nor is even this all. Knowing what she had been guilty
of, knowieg the elaborate coutrivances and device. she
bad adopted for bar own undoing, having before her eyes
the inevitable certainty of detection, and remembering
the finishing stroke which she had gives' to this conspi-
racy against herself by the dismissal of the witnesses
from her service, and putting them in the power of her
enemy ; nay more—after being told that it' she dared to
come here and face them, she would be undone—after
being desired, counselled, and implored to bethiuk her
well before she encountered so dreadful a task, the Queen
does come to England, and is is here this day to confront
those witnesses at their Lordship's bar ! She dues la too
in spite of offers made to her, which would have secured
to her a magnificent retreat, the tree indulgence of all
propensities, uncoutrouled license of conduct, and even
milegnard and vindication of her honour by the two
Houses of Parliament ;—lf such were the conduct of 1,
guilt. the lineaments by which vice was to be traced in
the ways of men, then all that he had ever read of the
Inunan character was deception and falsehood. And yet
such was the case which their Lordships were called upon
to believe by the Counsel for the Bill. The Hon. and
Learued Gentleman now proceeded at sonic length, and,
in a very happy train of obset ration, to /Mew that it there
was no conspiracy formed against her Majesty (which lie
for one would not say) the course of proceeding adopted
towards her happened to be exactly that which persons en-
gaged ins deep and foul conspiracy would have followed.
He spoke in severe terms of the selection of witnesses
from a country, notorious, above all others, for the perfidy
of the lower order of its inhabitants; and to spew that he
was not singular in his estimation of them, he read to
their Lordships several quotations, which skewed that in
ancient as well as modern times, the Italians had always
borne the same character for want of moral rectitude.—
He quoted in particular very largely from Rymer 's Fmdera
—that part of the proceedings in the case of Henry the
Eight's divorce from Queen Catharine, which related to
the opinions procured front the Italian Jurists respecting
the legality of that divorce. Nothing could be stronger
than the analogy between that case and the present. The
agent who was employed by Henry the Eighth to go up
down, procuring these opinious, was also oae Coos;
and, in a letter which lie wrote to England, giviug au
account of the success of his mission, be says that—
" albeit be had not been sufficiently furnished with mo-
ney, he had procured one hundred and ten opinions of
Doctors in favour of the Divorce, but that that was no-
thing to the number he could have procured if he had
only bad the means," There was a letter too, from the
Bishop of Worcester to Cook, the agent, in which lie
tells him " not to promise rewards but to those who ex-
pected and who lived by them i" and, alluding to the
sums which had been paid, he adds, with honest simpli-
city, that " all this sheets what prostituted consciences
these Italian fellews must have, to be bought so cheap!"
—" Yea," lie continues, " if you bad money enough, I
doubt not you might procure the subscriptions of all the
Doctors in Italy." The Learned Gentleman laid also
great *tress on a letter published by General Acton, who
was a native of Italy, and who had himself, once nearly
fallen a victim to a conspiracy, got up on suborned tes-
timony, in which lie says, that nothing can be more noto-
rious than the open and public sale of evidence among
his countrymen.

Mr. Brougham now commenced a detailed review of
the evidence adduced for the prosecution. He would
first request their Lordships' attention to the incident
spade so muck of by the Attorney General. the dancing
exhibition of Mahomer. There was no part of the case
which the Attorney Game' had been so anxious to prove
as this. He had returned to it again sod again, and it
was not a little curious to ob e the progress which he
made in establishing it. When Majocci, the principal
witness was asked about it, lie could say nothing but he
had seen the dance, and saw nothing improper in it.—
This was on the 'Tuesday—and on the Friday, Perollo
was produced. The dancing was witnessed by wives and
daughters as pure as those of their Lordships. With
respect to the expression Nun rat ricordo, so frequently
used by Majocci, and which had been dropped alter
the first day's cross-examination, and substituted by other
phrases, lieollid say nothing—but lie should bi May al-
lude to the subject of the payment of money to those who
were the props of this extraordinary case. The moment the
subject of remuneration was alluded to, the witnesses acre
all seised with a spirit of disinterestedness. Their expenses
were merely paid ! They bad au motive fur coming here
beyond their duty ! and they expected nothiug at the Ml*
elusion of their labour, but the pleasure of going b.tck to
their own country again ! One of them declared that he
hadgot nothing hire but trouble! and wrapped up his dis-
interestedness in all epigram. All his reward was in be the
piesnare of going hack to his family and friends! But what
features had this disinterestedues assumed in the course of
the iovestigutiou t One of the witnesses (Sacchi) had sud-
denly burst into the possession of proven), he declared that
he had been always in a state of pi osperity—that he had
been always well dressed. lie must have lived in this
country at the rate of 40W. of 5001. a year, a SOW equal to
14 or 1500 d yc4ll; /gl bir ollos and yet Wort tit cow he►e