for his misfortunes and his wit.

Had his audience been his judges, he had undoubtedly been acquitted; but
Mr. Page, who was then upon the bench, treated him with his usual
insolence and severity, and when he had summed up the evidence,
endeavoured to exasperate the jury, as Mr. Savage used to relate it,
with this eloquent harangue:

"Gentlemen of the jury, you are to consider that Mr. Savage is a very
great man, a much greater man than you or I, gentlemen of the jury; that
he wears very fine clothes, much finer clothes than you or I, gentlemen
of the jury; that he has abundance of money in his pocket, much more
money than you or I, gentlemen of the jury; but, gentlemen of the jury,
is it not a very hard case, gentlemen of the jury, that Mr. Savage
should, therefore, kill you or me, gentlemen of the jury?"

Mr. Savage, hearing his defence thus misrepresented, and the men who
were to decide his fate incited against him by invidious comparisons,
resolutely asserted, that his cause was not candidly explained, and
began to recapitulate what he had before said with regard to his
condition, and the necessity of endeavouring to escape the expenses of
imprisonment; but the judge having ordered him to be silent, and
repeated his orders without effect, commanded that he should be taken
from the bar by force.

The jury then heard the opinion of the judge, that good characters were
of no weight against positive evidence, though they might turn the scale
where it was doubtful; and that though, when two men attack each other,
the death of either is only manslaughter; but where one is the
aggressor, as in the case before them, and, in pursuance of his first
attack, kills the other, the law supposes the action, however sudden, to
be malicious. They then deliberated upon their verdict, and determined
that Mr. Savage and Mr. Gregory were guilty of murder; and Mr. Merchant,
who had no sword, only of manslaughter.

Thus ended this memorable trial, which lasted eight hours. Mr. Savage
and Mr. Gregory were conducted back to prison, where they were more
closely confined, and loaded with irons of fifty pounds' weight: four
days afterwards they were sent back to the court to receive sentence; on
which occasion Mr. Savage made, as far as it could be retained in
memory, the following speech:

"It is now, my lord, too late to offer any thing by way of defence or
vindication; nor can we expect from your lordships, in this court, but
the sent