"No," says Codd, "not in particular; my client wished to make a clean
breast of it, and put them all before the jury; and I should be much
obliged if those gentlemen will adopt any one of them."[A]
The jury acquitted the prisoner, not because they chose any particular
defence, but because they did not know which to choose, and so gave
the prisoner the benefit of the doubt.
The client was happy, and Codd famous.
[Footnote A: Sixty years after this event, in the reply in the great
Tichborne case, Mr. Hawkins, Q.C., quoted this very defence as an
illustration of the absurdity of the suggestion that one of several
_Ospreys_ picked up Sir Roger Tichborne--as will hereafter appear.]
CHAPTER XII.
GRAHAM, THE POLITE JUDGE.
Just before my time the punishment of death was inflicted for almost
every offence of stealing which would now be thought sufficiently
dealt with by a sentence of a week's imprisonment. The struggle to
turn King's evidence was great, and it was almost a competitive
examination to ascertain who knew most about the crime; and he, being
generally the worst of the gang, was accepted accordingly.
I remember when I was a child three men, named respectively Marshall,
Cartwright, and Ingram, were charged with having committed a burglary
in the house of a gentleman named Pym, who lived in a village in
Hertfordshire, Marshall being at that time, and Cartwright having
previously been, butler in the gentleman's service.
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