from the transcript of your trial, sir… rather a short one, given the fact that the entire proceedings did not last much more than three hours, from 'Oyez' to verdict, to sentencing, and the justice's 'God have mercy on his soul, wheresoever he may be at this moment'!'
'Three… hours?' Lewrie blanched, that wonderful coffee curdling in his stomach. 'Three bloody hours?'
'Not as odd as you'd think, sir,' MacDougall replied, laughing again. 'Why, the first complex criminal case in King's Bench, with a slew of witnesses on both sides, that actually lasted more than a lone day, did not occur 'til 1794! Sat in on it, whilst I was 'eating my terms' at Grey's Inn, and what a show it was, ha ha! Fascinating!'
'Oh, Christ,' Lewrie weakly croaked.
'Nought to fear, Captain Lewrie,' MacDougall soothingly said. ' 'Eating my terms' was not all I did before being called to the bar.'
MacDougall then proceeded to lay out the usual cursus lex that most aspiring attorneys were required to pursue… which did nothing much to reassure Lewrie that any lawyer was worth a pinch of pig shit.
A first or second son, usually from a well-to-do family, might attend university for a decent grounding in a gentlemanly education in rhetoric, Latin, and Greek. Whether graduate or not, anyone wishing to become a proper lawyer would approach one of the great Inns of Court-Lincoln's Inn, Grey's Inn, Middle Temple, or Inner Temple-whichever suited his tastes, and where the members seemed more of a like mind to his than any of the others, then ingratiate himself by merely hanging about, reading precedent from past proceedings on his own time with no real schedule of instruction, and dine-in often enough for the elder members-those called 'Benchers' who had already earned their honourifics of 'King's Counsel'-to 'vet' them and decide, usually after a period of three years of social dining 'in hall' with other members, whether they should be 'called to the bar' or not! Oh, some more aspiring might spend their time as 'special pleaders,' the ones who wrote up presentations to be submitted to court for their elders, but it wasn't really all that necessary, after all. There were many well-born aspirants who avoided the drudgery of such menial work, but became lawyers on the strength of their supper conversation, and their ability to look sober after those communal dinners!
Andrew MacDougall, though, was the son of a Scottish magistrate who had actually bothered to read the law, and for a time apprenticed himself to a real, successful attorney before inheriting the estate and becoming a respected local magistrate. The father's respect for the law, and his incessant talk of what had occurred in his local court, his explaining the intricacies of the differences between English Common Law and Scottish-and long evenings in his study spent wrangling what current law was, and what a fair-minded man felt it should be-had enflamed young Andrew MacDougall to be a barrister. He had spent time at a good public school (or what passed for one in Scotland), then had done two terms at university in Edinburgh before coaching down to Oxford to complete his studies, then had approached Grey's Inn. And while 'eating his terms,' he had deeply immersed himself in studying, in attending Court sessions, in long and earnest discussions with the 'Benchers' and writers of his lodge, eagerly offering to take on the drab finger-pinching work of a special pleader for more than a year before being called to the bar, and, MacDougall was quick to inform Lewrie, had been successful in most of his cases, since!
'My gown's yonder, sir,' MacDougall concluded with a hint of pride as he pointed to that spooky black robe with outstretched arms on the stand in the corner, 'though I am still required to wear one of 'stuff,' not silk, and have yet to earn the title of King's Counsel, yet I do assure you that I will do my absolute best to represent your cause, Captain Lewrie, and my absolute best is, dare I say it, rather a cut above what you may encounter from some other of my colleagues, whether I held strong personal views on the justice of your actions in recruiting those slaves and making free men of them, or not… which act I not only approve, but applaud, by the by, ha ha!'
'Though… whether you approve or not, Mister MacDougall, you sound to me more than capable,' Lewrie told him. 'Thank God for it!'
'Thankee kindly for your words, Captain Lewrie, and I trust you will be of the same mind once your time before the bench is over,' Mr. MacDougall said. 'Now. We may need send Sadler for a second pot, or a third, as we get to the meat of the matter. For I must glean all I may from you concerning the theft… well, shall we say, rather, the 'obtaining' of those dozen former slaves, ha ha! How, and when, was the idea concocted, and with whom… every last particular that happened on the night you, ah… closed the coast, what evidence still in your possession I might present as testimony, that sort of thing? I know you are fitting out a new ship of war, and your time is short, so today, perhaps tomorrow as well but no longer, it is vital that we make the most of your presence here in London.'
'Let's be at it, then,' Lewrie was quick to agree.
Surviving witnesses; there were plenty of them, for Lewrie's old crew and wardroom had mostly turned-over entire from Proteus to Savage. MacDougall was delighted to hear that all Lieutenants and Midshipmen were required to keep daily journals noting wind, weather, sea states, and what happened during their times on watch, or out-of-the-ordinary events that their ship met. While Lt. Catterall was dead and gone and his journals were unavailable, Adair and Grace could testify, and Lt. Langlie, no longer on the ship but still fitting out his own new warship, could send his old journals to MacDougall, if he was quick to ask for them. 'Hell's Bells,' Lewrie spat, 'I'll be seeing Langlie before that… he's to wed my ward, Sophie de Maubeuge, this weekend in Portsmouth!'
'And did you keep journals of your own, sir? Did you write down what your purposes were that evening?' MacDougall pointedly enquired.
'Not reallyl' Lewrie explained, squirming. 'Once a commission is done, logs and journals are sent to Admiralty for perusal and storage, so…'
'No, it wouldn't do, would it, to write down 'May first at Eight p.m., turned slave-monger,' hey?' MacDougall said with a moue, followed by a schoolboy's
'I noted the course steered from Kingston, closing the coast at night, dousing all lanthorns… how far offshore it was when we came-to, sending boats ashore under Mister Langlie, and, ah… being received of a round dozen… volunteers,' he concluded, blushing a bit.
'What? Doused all lanthorns?' MacDougall suddenly enthused as he scribbled that down on a sheet of foolscap, so madly that he slung ink droplets. 'Now that's extremely interesting!'
'It is?' Lewrie asked, at a loss.
'And,' MacDougall eagerly pressed, 'did you, or any of your surviving witnesses, see any lights ashore, sir?'
'Well, there were some porch lamps and such, a half-mile or so back from the beach,' Lewrie recalled. 'Where, I assumed, the overseer had his lodgings, perhaps one or two round the main house's porch gallery, where the Beaumans would reside, if they'd been there. It wasn't their only plantation, d'ye see, but the one nearest to my friend Christopher Cashman's plantation. I'd not have tried it on, else, for he'd sent word to them that, if they wished to run and join the Navy, they'd get the Joining Bounty as volunteers, and get the same treatment as any White volunteer. Could've taken twenty or more, the whole lot of 'em, if Admiralty wouldn't notice sooner or later that I was paying twice the number of hands that Proteus was rated.'
'But… other than those few lamps, did you see any other light ashore?' MacDougall squirmed like a puppy as he insisted on an answer.
'Nary a one, sir,' Lewrie could firmly aver, for he had spent the hours from sunset to dawn in a funk-sweat to be discovered, and it had been a huge relief at the time for Proteus to have stolen in, then stolen out, without waking a cricket.
