from Scotland only. This last punishment is truly a farcical one. The thief is by this judg-ment permitted to cross the Tweed, or any other part of the boundary between the two united kingdoms, and prosecute his usual depredations upon his Majesty's English subjects, until he meets there, at last, with that punishment which his crimes deserve, and which ought to have been inflicted upon him in Scotland. And thus ends this farcical trial. *

Here we see the judge, and the crown lawyet, conjunctly, exercising the legislative power of altering and amending the laws enacted by the King, Lords, and Commons, in parliament assembled.

But the following example of the legislative powers which the judges and crown lawyers in Scotland have assumed to themselves, and which is the last that will be given at this time, is the most extraordinary of all.

It is well known to all men in this kingdom, that, both by the laws of God and man, every person who is guilty of taking away the life of any of his fellow-creatures, deliberately and wickedly, is ordained to suffer death; this being

*See Records of the Court of Justiciary at Dumfries, April, 1803, and at Edinburgh, 21 July, 1807.

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the only atonement that can possibly be made for that horrid crime.

Child-murder, committed by the unnatural parent, is certainly the most horrid species of this crime. By an act passed in the Scots parliament, 1690, commonly called King William's Act, it is ordained, that " any woman "who shall conceal her pregnancy, during its "whole course, and shall not call for, or make

use of, help, at the birth, is to be reputed the "murderer, if the child be dead or missing."

But, in utter contempt both of the laws of God and man, the records of the court of justiciary will bear ample testimony, that although there is scarcely a year passes in which one or imore of such murderers are not brought before the circuit courts of justiciary, in some part of Scotland, yet it is an unquestionable truth, that there has not a single person in Scotland suffered the punishment of death for this crime for thirty years past,* or, in fact, any punishment at all. The farcical mode of procedure which is observed in these pretended trials is such a daring insult to public justice, and such a daring assumption of arbitrary power, that it seems

* See Records of Court of Justiciary, from the year 1780 to 1807.

altogether unaccountable how it can have escaped the notice of the legislature of these kingdoms for so long a period.

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In these sham trials for child-murder, the libel is founded upon these statutes which have been enacted for the punishment of those who are guilty of this crime, and particularly upon King William's Act, before recited, and concludes for the infliction of the statuary punishment. But the business having been previously settled between the counsel for the prisoner, the king's counsel, and the judge, the prisoner, when she is arraigned at the bar of the court, pleads not guilty. She then presents a written petition to the judge, which had been previously prepared by her counsel; in which she states, that al-though she is perfectly innocent of the crime of which she is accused, yet, on account of the unfavourable impressions which have been unjustly infused into the minds of her friends and neighbours, she finds that she can live no longer, with any degree of comfort, in her own native country, and therefore prays his Lordship, that he will be pleased to pronounce judgment, ordaining her to banish herself forth of Scotland for life. After this petition has been read over by the clerk, the king's counsel rises, and in

forms the judge, that he consents to the prayer of this petition. This concurrence on the part of the king's advocate is sufficient, it seems, to invest the judge with power to dispense with the trial altogether; and, in consequence, without calling a single witness to the bar, to prove whether the prisoner is guilty or not guilty of the crime of which she is accused; and, of course, without permitting the jury to pronounce any verdict whatever, he proceeds to pronounce judgment in terms of the prayer of her petition, ordaining her to banish herself forth of Scotland for life.*

Does not the judges and the king's advocate, in these cases, assume to themselves the legislative power of repealing the acts of the British legislature against child-murder in Scotland, and inforce a law of their own enactment upon the inhabitants of that part of the united kingdom? And have they not also, by their own power alone, abolished the trial by jury, in Scotland, in all cases of child-murder?

But this punishment, farcical as it is, is seldom, if ever, inflicted upon the murderer. Under the pretence of giving her time to prepare

* See Records of the Circuit Court of Justiciary, at Glasgow, May, 1804.

herself for this pretended banishment to Eng land, she is allowed to go home to her friends for ten days or a fortnight, and no further notice is ever taken of her.

It does not appear that the English judges and crown-lawyers have yet assumed to themselves the power of expressly repealing the acts of the British legislature; but if we may believe the accounts that are given in the English newspapers, of the proceedings in their courts of justice, they seem to be very much in the habit of assuming to themselves the legislative power of explaining and amending these laws, and particularly the revenue-laws.

Having shewn the grievous oppression which the inhabitants of these kingdoms are at present subjected to, by those iniquitous practices th were originally introduced into all our courts justice, by the Pope of Rome and his agents, and by the arbitrary dominion which the judges who preside in these courts have thereby acquired-it is now proper to shew, by what means those evils, as well as that grievous oppression which the poor-laws have brought up on the country, may be removed.

The means of obtaining these desirable and important objects are simple and easy. It is

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