for an hour and thirty-five
minutes, and we learned afterwards that several were anxious to convict,
not so much because of the book as because we were Freethinkers. At last
they agreed to a compromise, and the verdict delivered was: "We are
unanimously of opinion that the book in question is calculated to deprave
public morals, but at the same time we entirely exonerate the defendants
from any corrupt motives in publishing it."

The Lord Chief Justice looked troubled, and said gravely that he would
have to direct them to return a verdict of guilty on such a finding. The
foreman, who was bitterly hostile, jumped at the chance without
consulting his colleagues, some of whom had turned to leave the box, and
thus snatched a technical verdict of "guilty" against us. Mr. George
Skinner, of 27, Great Chapel Gate, Westminster, wrote to me on the
following day to say that six of the jurymen did not consent to the
verdict of "guilty", and that they had agreed that if the judge would not
accept the verdict as handed in they would then retire again, and that
they would never have given a verdict of guilty; but the stupid men had
not the sense to speak out at the right time, and their foreman had his
way. The Lord Chief Justice at once set us free to come up for judgment
on that day week, June 28th--the trial had lasted till the 21st--and we
went away on the same recognizances given before by Mr. Bradlaugh, an
absolutely unprecedented courtesy to two technically "convicted
prisoners".[1]

[Footnote 1: A Report of the Trial can be obtained from the Freethought
Publishing Company, price 5s. It contains an exact report of all that was
said and done.]

XVI.

The week which intervened between the verdict of the jury and the day on
which we were ordered to appear in Court to receive sentence was spent by
us in arranging all our affairs, and putting everything in train for our
anticipated absence. One serious question had to be settled, but it did
not need long consideration. What were we to do about the Knowlton
pamphlet? We promptly decided to ignore the verdict and to continue the
sale. Recognising that the fact of this continued sale would be brought
up against us in Court and would probably seriously increase our
sentence, we none the less considered that as we had commenced the fight
we were bound to maintain it, and we went on with the sale as before.

On June 28th we attended the Court of Queen's Bench to receive judgm