jected to an action for libel;—a course, which, in a colony abounding in needy and rapacious lawyers, is not unfrequently resorted to by artful villany and conscious worthlessness, as an approved instrument of torture for honest men,—bribed an emancipated convict compositor in the Herald Office to steal for him a proof or printed copy of the suppressed article; which he immediately enclosed in an anonymous letter, written in a feigned hand, and transmitted through the colonial post to the person to whom it alluded, that its being forwarded through so public a channel might be pleaded as a legal publication. The action was accordingly instituted, but was eventually lost; its main object, however, being gained to a certain extent, in subjecting the parties interested to much inconvenience and considerable expense. It was more than eighteen months afterwards, when Watt's villanous procedure in the whole matter came to light. On its being discovered, he was tried in the Supreme Court on a charge of felony, but was acquitted; the jury consisting partly, if not chiefly, of emancipated convicts. His acquittal was hailed by the worthless portion of the community—convicts and emancipated convicts, of the lowest grade—as the triumph of their principles and party; but his Honour Mr. Justice Burton, who presided at the trial, having
