he Lord Mayor, Sir Whittaker Ellis, took his seat on the Bench, every
inch of standing space in the Justice Room was occupied. Mr. Bradlaugh
took a seat near Mr. Lickfold and frequently tendered us hints and
advice. Mr. Ramsey, Mr. Whittle, and I took our places in the dock as
our names were called out by Mr. Gresham, the chief clerk of the court.
Our summons alleged that we unlawfully did publish, or caused to
be published, certain blasphemous libels in a newspaper called the
_Freethinker_, dated the 28th of May, 1882.

Mr. Maloney, who appeared for the prosecution, seemed fully impressed
with the gravity of his position, and when he rose he had the air of a
man who bore the responsibility of defending in his single person the
honor, if not the very existence, of our national religion. His first
proceeding was very characteristic of a gentleman with such a noble
task. He attempted to hand in as evidence against us several numbers
of the _Freethinker_ not mentioned in the summons, and these would have
been at once admitted by the Lord Mayor, who was apparently used
to accepting evidence in an extremely free and easy fashion, as is
generally the case with the "great unpaid"; but Mr. Lickfold promptly
intervened, and his lordship, seeing the necessity of carefulness, then
held that it would be advisable to adhere to the one case that morning,
and to take out fresh summonses for the other numbers. Mr. Maloney then
proceeded to deal with the numbers before the Court. There were numerous
blasphemies which, if we were committed for trial, would be set forth in
the indictment, but he would "spare the ears of the Court." One passage,
however, he did read, and it is well to put on record, for the sake
of those who talk about our "indecent" attacks on Christianity, what a
prosecuting barrister felt he could rely on to procure our committal.
It was as follows: "As for the Freethinker, he will scorn to degrade
himself by going through the farce of reconciling his soul to a God whom
he justly regards as the embodiment of crime and ferocity." Those words
were not mine; they were from an article by one of my contributors;
but I ask any reasonable man whether it is not ludicrous to prate
about religious freedom in a country where writers run the risk
of imprisonment for a sentence like that? As Mr. Maloney ended the
quotation his voice sank to a supernatural whisper, he dropped the
paper on the desk before him, and regarded his lordship