subjects in order to stifle the conspiracy.

A motion being made for leave to bring in a bill to attaint him of high
treason, a warm debate ensued, and the question being put, was carried
in the affirmative by a great majority. He was furnished with a copy of
the bill, and allowed the use of pen, ink, paper, and counsel. When he
presented a petition praying that his counsel might be heard against
passing the bill, they made an order that his counsel should be allowed
to make his defence at the bar of the house; so that he was surprised
into an irregular trial, instead of being indulged with an opportunity
of offering objections to their passing the bill of attainder. He was
accordingly brought to the bar of the house; and the bill being read
in his hearing, the speaker called upon the king's counsel to open the
evidence. The prisoner's counsel objected to their proceeding to trial,
alleging that their client had not received the least notice of their
purpose, and therefore could not be prepared for his defence; but that
they came to offer their reasons against the bill. The house, after a
long debate, resolved, that he should be allowed further time to produce
witnesses in his defence; that the counsel for the king should likewise
be allowed to produce evidence to prove the treasons of which he stood
indicted; and an order was made for his being brought to the bar
again in three days. In pursuance of this order he appeared, when
the indictment which had been found against him by the grand jury was
produced; and Porter was examined as an evidence. Then the record of
Clancey's conviction was read; and one Roe testified that Deighton, the
prisoner's solicitor, had offered him an annuity of one hundred pounds
to discredit the testimony of Goodman. The king's counsel moved, that
Goodman's examination, as taken by Mr. Vernon, clerk of the council,
might be read. Sir J. Powis and sir Bartholomew Shower, the prisoner's
counsel, warmly opposed this proposal; they affirmed that a deposition
taken when the party affected by it was not present to cross-examine the
deposer, could not be admitted in a case of five shillings value; that
though the house was not bound by the rules of inferior courts, it was
nevertheless bound by the eternal and unalterable rules of justice; that
no evidence, according to the rules of law, could be admitted in such a
case but that of living witnesses; and that the examination of a person
who is absent wa