breach could proceed from any natural decay; that it was not a recent fracture by the instrument with which it was dug up, but seemed to be of many years standing.

It should seem, that Houseman and Aram murdered Clark, and did jointly drag his body into the cave, where it was found in the posture described by Houseman; and that they returned home with the cloaths, which they burnt, according to the testimony of Aram's wife, who found the shreds, and overheard their conference. Aram being asked what motive could induce him to commit the murder? answered, that he suspected Clark to have had a criminal correspondence with his wife. It appeared further on the trial, that Aram possessed himself of Clark's fortune, which he got with his wife, a little before, about 1601. And thus, after 14 years concealment, this notable discovery was made by two skeletons being found much at the same time. Having thus in brief given the substance of the trial and conviction of Aram, we shall give his defence, which he delivered into court in writing.

"First, my Lord, the whole tenor of my conduct in life contradicts every particular of this indictment. Yet I had never said this, did not my present circumstances extort it from me, and seem to make it necessary. Permit me here, my Lord, to call upon malignity itself, so long and cruelly busied in this prosecution, to charge upon me any iminorality, of which prejudice was not the author. No, my Lord, I concerted ho schemes of fraud, projected no violence, injured no man's person or property. My days were honestly laborious, my nights intensely studious. And I humbly

conceive, my notice of this, especi ally at this time, will not be thought impertinent, or unseasonable; but, at least, deserving some attention: because, my Lord, that any person, after a temperate use of life, a series of thinking and acting regularly, and without one single deviation from sobriety, should plunge into the very depth of profligacy, precipitately and at once, is altogether improbable and unprecedented, and absolutely inconsistent with the course of things. Mankind is never corrupted at once; villainy is always progressive,and declines from right, step by step, till every regard of probity is lost, and every sense of all moral obligation totally perishes.

The

Again, my Lord, a suspicion of this kind, which nothing but malevolence could entertain, and ignorance propagate, is violently opposed by my very situation at that time, with respect to health; for, but a little space before, I had been confined to my bed, and suffered under a very long and severe disorder,and was not able, for half a year together, so much as to walk. distemper left me indeed, yet slowly and in part; but so macerated, so enfeebled, that I was reduced to crutches; and was so far from being well about the time I am charged with this fact, that I never to this day perfectly recovered. Could then a person in this condition take any thing into his head so unlikely, so extravagant? I, past the vigour of my age, feeble and valetudinary, with no inducement to engage, no ability to accomplish, no weapon wherewith to perpetrate such a fact; without interest, without power, without motive, without means.

Besides, it must needs occur to every one, that an action of this atrocious

atrocious nature is never heard of, but when its springs are laid open, it appears that it was to support some indolence, or supply some luxury; to satisfy some avarice, or oblige some malice; to prevent some real, or some imaginary want: yet I lay not under the influence of any one of these. Surely, my Lord, I may, consistent with both truth and modesty, affirm thus much; and none who have any veracity, and knew me, will ever question this.

In the second place, the disappearance of Clark is suggested as an argument of his being dead; but the uncertainty of such an inference from that, and the infallibility of all conclusions of such sort, from such a circumstance, are too obvious, and too notorious, to require instances: yet, superseding many, permit me to produce a very recent one, and that afforded by this castle.

In June 1757, William Thompson, for all the vigilance of this place;in open day-light,and doubleironed, made his escapes; and notwithstanding an immediate enquiry set on foot, the strictest search, and all advertisement, was never seen nor heard of since. If then Thompson got off unseen, thro' all these difficulties, how very easy was it for Clark, when none of them opposed him? But what would be thought of a prosecution commenced against any one seen last with Thompson?

Permit me, next, my Lord, to observe a little upon the bones which have been discovered. It is said, which perhaps is saying very far, that these are the skeleton of a man. It is possible indeed they may; but is there any certain known

criterion, which incontestibly distinguishes the sex in human bones? Let it be considered, my Lord, whether the ascertaining of this point ought not to precede any attempt to identify them.

The place of their depositum too claims much more attention than is commonly bestowed upon it; for of all places in the world, none could have mentioned any one, wherein there was greater certainty of finding human bones, than a hermitage; except he should point out a church-yard; hermitages, im time past, being not only places of religious retirement, but of burial too. And it has scarcely ever been heard of, but that every cell now known, contains, or contained, these relicks of humanity; some mutilated and some entire. I do not inform, but give me leave to remind your Lordship, that here sat solitary sanctity, and here the hermit, or the anchoress, hoped that repose for their bones, when dead, they here enjoyed when living.

All this while, my Lord, I am sensible this is known to your Lordship, and many in this court, better than I. But it seems necessary to my case that others, who have not at all, perhaps, adverted to things of this nature, and may have concern in my trial, should be made acquainted with it. Suffer me then, my Lord, to produce a few of many evidences, that those cells were used as repositories of the dead, and to enumerate a few, in which human bodies have been found, as it happened in this in question; lest, to some, that accident might seem extraordinary, and, consequently, occasion prejudice.

1. The bones, as was supposed, of the Saxon, St. Dubritius, were

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discovered

discovered buried in his cell at Guy's Cliff, near Warwick, as appears from the authority of Sir William Dugdale.

2. The bones thought to be those of the anchoress Rosia, were but lately discovered in a cell at Royston, entire, fair, and undecayed, though they must have lain interred for several centuries, as is proved by Dr. Stukeley.

3. But our own country, nay almost this neighbourhood, supplies another instance: for in January, 1747, was found by Mr. Stovin, accompanied by a reverend gentleman, the bones, in part, of some recluse, in the cell at Lindholm, near Hatfield. They were believed to be those of William of Lindholm, a bermit, who had long made this cave his habitation.

4. In February, 1744, part of Woburn-abbey being pulled down, a large portion of a corpse appeared, even with the flesh on, and which bore cutting with a knife; though it is certain this had laid above 200 years, and how much longer is doubtful; for this abbey was founded in 1145, and dissolved in 1538 or 9.

What would have been said, what believed, if this had been an accident to the bones in question?

Further, my Lord, it is not yet out of living memory, that a little distance from Knaresborough, in a field, part of the manor of the worthy and patriot baronet, who does that borough the honour to represent it in parliament, were found in digging for gravel, not one human skeleton only, but five or six deposited side by side, with each an urn placed on its head, as your Lordship knows was usual in

ancient interments.

About the same time, and in another field, almost close to this borough, was discovered also in searching for gravel, another human skeleton; but the piety of the same worthy gentleman ordered both pits to be filled up again, commendably unwilling to disturb the dead.

Is the invention of these bones forgotten, then, or industriously concealed, that the discovery of those in question may appear the more singular and extraordinary? whereas, in fact, there is nothing extraordinary in it. My Lord, almost every place conceal such remains. In fields, in hills, in highway sides, in commons, lie frequent and unsuspected bones. And our present allotment of rest for the departed, is but of some centuries.

Another particular seems not to claim a little of your Lordship's notice, and that of the gentlemen of the jury; which is, that perhaps no example occurs of more than one skeleton being found in one cell; and in the cell in question was found but one; agreeable, in this, to the peculiarity of every other known cell in Britain. Not the invention of one skeleton, then, but of two, would have appeared suspicious and uncommon.

But then, my Lord, to attempt to identify these, when even to identify living men sometimes has proved so difficult, as in the case of Perkin Warbeck and Lambert Symne, at home, and of Don Sebastian abroad, will be looked upon perhaps as an attempt to determine what is indeterminable. And I hope too, it will not pass unconsidered here, where gentlemen believe with caution, think with reason, and decide with humanity, what interest their endeavour to do this is calculat

ed

red to serve, in assigning proper personality to these bones, whose particular appropriation can only appear to eternal Omniscience.

Permit me, my Lord, also very humbly to remonstrate, that, as human bones appear to have been the inseparable adjuncts of every cell, even any person's naming such a place at random as contain ing them, in this case shews him rather unfortunate than conscious prescient, and that these attendants on every hermitage accidentally concurred with this conjecture. A mere casual coincidence of words and things.

But it seems another skeleton has been discovered by some labourer, which was full as confidently averred to be Clark's as this. My Lord, must some of the living, if it promotes some interest, be made answerable for all the bones that earth has concealed, or chance exposed? And might not a place where bones lay be mentioned by a person by chance, as well as found by a labourer by chance? Or, is it more criminal accidentally to game where bones lie, than accidentally to find where they lie?

Here too is a human skull produced, which is fractured; but was this the cause, or was it the consequence, of death? Was it owing to violence, or the effect of natural decay? If it was violence, was that violence before or after death? My Lord, in May 1732, the remains of William Lord Archbishop of this province were taken up, by per mission, in this cathedral, and the bones of the skull were found broken: yet certainly he died by no violence offered to him alive, that could occasion that fracture there.

Let it be considered, my Lord, that upon the dissolution of religious houses, and the commencement of the reformation, the ravages of those times both affected the living and the dead. In search after imaginary treasures, coffins were broken up, graves and vaults dug open, monuments ransacked, and shrines demolished; your Lordship knows that these violations proceeded so far, as to occasion parliamentary authority to restrain them; and it did, about the beginning of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. I entreat your Lordship suffer not the violences, the depredations, and the iniquities of those times to be imputed to this.

Moreover, what gentleman here is ignorant that Knaresborough had a castle; which though now run to ruin, was once considerable both for its strength and garrison. All know it was vigorously besieged by the arms of the parliament: at which siege, in sallies, conflicts, flights, pursuits, many fell in all the places round it; and where they fell were buried; for every place, my Lord, is burial earth in war; and many, questionless, of these rest yet unknown, whose bones futurity shall discover.

I hope, with all imaginable submission, that what has been said will not be thought impertinent to this indictment; and that it will be far from the wisdom, the learning, and the integrity of this place, to impute to the living what zeal in its fury may have done; what nature may have taken off, and piety interred; or what war alone may have destroyed, alone deposited.

As to the circumstances that have been raked together; I have nothing to observe; but that all cir,