FORTIA’s TRAVELS IN SWEDEN.

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the proofs they afforded could not be looked upon as full and fatisfaclory, the matter , as faras it regarded niyfelf Jhould be referved for further evidence; and that in the interval 1Jhould be transferred, to the.fortrefs of Carljlein , in order there to be kept , and be exhortedby clergymen to make confeffion of the fault with which I am charged.

“ It is not without the deepeft grief that I fee myfelf ful'pected, arrefted, and con-demned for a crime of which I am perfectly innocent, and which the witneffes legallyheard have been unable to prove, fince the parliament itfelf declares, “ that full andfatisfactory evidence is yet wanting.”

*' Your Majefty will be pleafed, therefore, not to take amifs my prayer for a rever-fion of this decree.

cc Equity is the firft virtue of a King and a judge; and internally I feel perfuaded,that the chief defire of Your Majefty is to exercife it, as the moft fecure method of eftab-iilhing your power in the hearts of your fubje&s; and in what does it confift, unlefs inthe fair application of the law, and the true interpretation of its meaning. Harbouringthis perfuafion, I dare flatter myfelf, that Your Majefty will not countenance the proofsaccepted by the parliament, efpecially as, according to all I am able to comprehend,they are in abfolute contradiction to law.

“ The law clearly eftablilhes, by the 17th fe£t. 7th chap, on the fubjedt of trials, that<l the tejiimony of noperfon , being himfelf criminally indicted, is to be taken in evidence , northat of one who turns informer , nor that of an accomplice .” He who is objectionable notbeing allowed to give his evidence, the judge can certainly pay no regard to the teftimonyof a perfon objected to in law, but Ihould on the contrary rate it wholly void of truth;hence is it that the law impofes a penalty on every informer that makes not good hischarge; and if the 9th fedt. of the fame chapter permit, that in criminal caufes the tef-timony of an objedtionable witnefs may be heard, it is only, as is formally declared inthe fame paragraph, “ to enable the court to obtain means of acquiring legal evidencebut it is not laid, that the teftimony of the rejected perfon fhall itfelf be accepted asevidence.

“ As during the courfe of the trial, nothing has appeared againft me but the relationsof perfons accufed, accomplices, and fuch as have participated in the crime, of whathad been imparted to me at private interviews; it appears to me, that had law beeri-duly adminiftered, the judge would have paid no attention to fimilar relations ; and thelefs, from the difagreement in the different teftimonies of the guilty parties, arid fromtheir written varying materially from their verbal evidence, as is declared by the parlia-ment in many parts of its decree: whence it follows, that, if they were objedfionableperfons, their teftimony for that reafon is inadmiflible by the 17th chap. 26th fe£i.;and added to this, the greater part have only related what they had heard from others,which, according to the 14th feel, of the fame chapter, cannot be confidered as legal•evidence.

" All that appears likely is not therefore fa£l. Hiftory points out many examples ofperfons accufed, who have had fo many apparent proofs brought againft them, that thejudge, fully perfuaded of their criminality, has not feen the leaft poffibility of theirbeing innocent; and yet, after their punifhment, the real guilty man has appeared, andIhewm the judge in error; wherefore, unlefs where no voluntary coiifeftion. appears,or legal teftimony, as a ftatefman, the judge has always held it a maxim, to preferJavinga number of guilty to the puniffment of one innocent man.

“ If, in the prefent inltance, the individual relations of fix guilty perfons could fumftha half-proof, it would give birth to the abfurd idea, that the relation of twelve culpritsought to be regarded as entire proof; although, in hopes of mitigating their punilh-

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