riods of English History, to trace the changes in our criminal law, and the steps by which it has advanced to its present state, and to exhibit a fair comparison between the ancient and modern forms of administering justice, it is obviously desirable to go back as far as materials can be found sufficiently complete to be used for those purposes.

One great obstacle to deriving either advantage or entertainment from the perusal of the more ancient trials, is the inaccurate and confused form in which they have been published. Before the full introduction of short-hand, the reports of trials, even by eyewitnesses of the proceedings, were necessarily defective; the Speeches of Judges, Counsel and Prisoners, especially where points of law were involved, could never be perfectly taken down at the time, and as the reporters were not usually lawyers, they could not accurately relate from memory what they did not fully understand; still less could the evidence be correctly given, consisting, as it did for the most part, of written documents read by the officer of the Court, to which the reporter had no access. With respect to the evidence, some reporters, as in the Duke of Norfolk's case, merely referred to it generally, and then honestly laid down their pens while the examinations were read, without attempting to report at all what they knew they could not report accurately: The only ill effect of this was to render the case unintelligible. Others again adopted a more mischievous course; not content with leaving blanks in their report, they filled them up after the trial with facts drawn from a vague recollection of the proofs, or their own imaginations, and thus falsified the whole evidence in the case. Many instances of this might be given; a remarkable one occurs in the Trial of the Earls of Essex and Southampton as published in all the editions of State Trials; the contents of the

different examinations are formally given with every appearance of truth; but on comparing them with the originals in the State-Paper Office, they not only do not correspond with them, but in most instances they are not at all like them, and contain a relation of totally different facts and circumstances. It is in vain, therefore, to expect a complete account of the proceedings on ancient Trials; the only mode of approximating to a complete account is to compare several independent reports of the same case, and to take the written evidence from other authentic sources. In the collections of Mr Hargrave and Mr Howell, the trials themselves are merely given as they were found in previous publications, without any attempt to render them more complete; indeed in those extensive works, the laborious process of collating different reports of each trial, and supplying the deficiencies in the evidence from various depositories of State Papers, would have been almost endless. In the few ancient Trials which are given in this volume, the attempt has been made wherever materials were to be found; different manuscript and printed reports of each Trial have been carefully compared, and the documentary evidence has been procured from published collections of State Papers, and also from originals in the British Museum, and His Majesty's State-Paper Office. The State-Paper Office is a mine of historical treasure, hitherto almost unbroken; and from the abundance of original examinations, letters, and other documents connected with State Prosecutions in the reigns of Elizabeth, James I, and Charles I, which are there deposited, the most important materials for completing the Reports of State Trials during that period may be derived. By the liberal permission of Lord Melbourne and Mr Hobhouse, and the invaluable assistance of Mr Lemon, the Deputy Keeper of the State Papers, we have been

enabled to apply these materials to the elucidation of some of the trials in this selection, which have hitherto been published only as confused and disjointed fragments.

To some of the Trials biographical notices will be prefixed, and notes will in all cases be added where explanations appear to be necessary, or where it may be desirable to call the attention of the reader to points which might otherwise escape his observation ; and historical illustrations of the subjects of the different trials will be given from contemporaneous sources. In general, the trials will not be greatly abridged, except in matters of form in the procedure, unconnected with any principle; for it is obvious that the form of question and answer greatly enlivens the report, and gives it a dramatic effect. It is hoped that by adopting this mode of illustration the series may be advantageously used as a vehicle for history, and made to convey not only useful knowledge, but entertainment.

The series commences with the case of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, which is remarkable as an instance of an acquittal by a jury in a Crown prosecution, and is the earliest trial reported with sufficient fulness to be adapted for the purpose in view. As Throckmorton was a character of considerable eminence during a period of much importance in the history of England, we shall prefix such biographical particulars as we have been able to collect respecting him; introducing, in order to illustrate the subject of the trial, an account of the transactions connected with Wyatt's Rebellion. DAVID JARDINE

Middle Temple,
March, 1832.

MEMOIR OF SIR NICHOLAS THROCKMORTON."

Sir Nicholas Throckmorton was born about the year 1513, and was descended from an ancient and respectable family in Warwickshire. His ancestors for several generations were employed in various offices of State; and his father, Sir George Throckmorton, was a person of some consequence at the Court of Henry VIII, and is mentioned as having taken a part in the coronation of Anne Boleyn, in 1533. About the year 1538 he was sent to the Tower for refusing to take the oath of supremacy he was a zealous Papist, and is said to have excited the ill-will of Cromwell, who was then in the zenith of his influence, and who contrived to direct the King's displeasure towards him.

He remained a close prisoner in the Tower for several years, and during his imprisonment, Nicholas, who was his fourth son, became page to the Duke of Richmond, the King's natural son; who is said by his contemporaries to have been an extremely amiable

*In the Memoirs of the Life and Writings of John Milton,' by Francis Peck, there is published a poetical Legend, called The Life and Death of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton.' The poem, as published by Peck, is extremely inaccurate, but a corrected copy is to be found in the 40th volume of Dr Cole's MSS in the British Museum, where there is also, in a genealogical history of the family of Throckmorton, a short memoir of Sir Nicholas. This memoir, however, appears to be taken almost entirely from the Legend, which, though written by a nephew of Sir N. Throckmorton, not long after his death, cannot be implicitly relied on as to facts; only such statements, therefore, have been taken from it as were confirmed by other authority, and some few anecdotes of a personal and family nature, which it is reasonable to suppose may have been accurately known to a near relation. The Legend itself is a literary curiosity, and deserves to be better known; for though a very humble imitation of Spencer, there are passages in it by no means unworthy of the Elizabethan age.

and accomplished young man, and so much the object of his father's partiality, that a suspicion arose that the King intended to name him as his successor to the exclusion of his legitimate daughter, the Princess Mary.* Nicholas Throckmorton accompanied him, and the celebrated Earl of Surrey, to France, where they remained some time; and he continued in the Duke of Richmond's service until the year 1536, when his young patron died, to the great grief and disappointment of the King, before he had completed his eighteenth year.

On the marriage of the King with Catherine Parr, in 1543, Sir George Throckmorton was released from the Tower, at the intercession of the Queen, who was Lady Throckmorton's niece; and from that time until his death, which happened in 1554, he enjoyed considerable favour with Henry, and different members of his family obtained lucrative preferment at Court; amongst whom, Nicholas was appointed Sewers to the King.

In 1544, Nicholas Throckmorton commanded a troop in the expedition against France, conducted by Henry VIII in person, in concert with the Emperor, and was present at the siege of Boulogne. On his return to England after the surrender of that place, he received a pension from the King for his services in the campaign.

About this time he seems to have made himself

*Lingard, vol. vi, p. 151-328.

† A sewer was an officer who arranged the dishes on the table. Milton uses the word in this sense:

Marshall'd feast

Served up in hall with sewer and seneschal.'

It was the business of the sewer also to bring water for the hands of the guests:

Then the sewer

Pour'd water from a great and golden ewer.'

Chapman's Odyssey