_ that act. 
fs 
APPENDIX 
had never before been brought 
ainst any individual, either in a 
_ civil or criminal court of judicature. 
The learned counsel next alluded to 
the removal of the money from the 
bank to Messrs. Coutts’s, and .also 
to the chest and current accounts 
spoken of; with which he said the 
public had nothing to do, provided 
they suffered no loss. Tle also re- 
marked, that the managers had never 
contended that the money was not 
taken from the bank for naval ser- 
vices outright, but that it was not 
_ taken for the immediate service of 
the navy. He would ask, where 
could the money be more securely 
_ placed, while in the progress of pay- 
ment, than at Conutts’s? or more 
Mdsfely deposited than in an iron 
£ chest, ready for issue when the pub- 
_ lic service required it? He then re- 
ferred to what he termed the unjust 
popular clamour raised against lord 
- Melville for violating an act of par- 
liament, which he was himself the 
principal instrument in framing. In 
_ reply to which, he would contend, 
{and he firmly believed he did not 
“mistake the meaning of that act,) 
that the noble defendant had neither 
violated the spirit nor the letter of 
lord Melville, he said, 
_ never meant, when he framed that 
bill, that it should interfere with the 
course of office; and its principal 
object was to secure the transit of 
money from the exchequer to the 
bank, and not to direct the applica- 
tion of that money after it was 
_ dzawn from the bank, provided it 
was ultimately applied to the pub- 
lie service. He thought hehad said 
_ enongh to obliterate from their lord- 
_Ship’s minds all ideas of a corrupt 
We th on the part of the no- 
le defendant, or that he confede- 
2: Tated with Mr. Trotter to plae the 
to the CHRONICLE. 
619 
public money out at interest for 
their mutual advantage. There was, 
however, another charge of great 
magnitude, he meant the destruction 
of vouchers: to which he should 
only reply, that the evidence 
brought to support it (as far as re- 
garded the noble defendant) had 
most completely refuted the impu- 
tation derived from the att. Mr. 
Trotter had distinétly -avowed the 
act to have been his own; that it 
was done without the knowledge of 
lord Melville, and with no view 
whatever to promote the interests of 
his lordship. Such was the evidence 
of Mr. Trotter, who had every in- 
ducement to speak against lord Mel- 
ville, if in his conscience‘he could 
have done it, as by that means he 
would have cleared his own charac~ 
ter from imputation. But that was 
was not all ; he: had as distinctly 
sworn that the.use made of the pub- 
lic money was for his own exclusive 
advantage; and that he never ren- 
dered the noble defendant any ac- 
count of the gains he had made, or 
intimated, in the slightest manner, 
that he was deriving any such advan- 
tage from the use of the public 
stock. ‘The learned counsel then 
went through the whole of the evi- 
dence, commenting, as he proceed- 
ed, upon its import, and contended, 
that the only thing that could he 
urged against his lordship with any 
colour of j ustice, was the charge of 
negligence, and that was in a degree 
excused by the many important ave- 
cations he wasengaged in. He had 
to provide against domestic danger 
and foreign alarm ; and it was not te 
‘be wondered at if he was negligent 
of calculating with extreme accu- 
racy the pounds, shillings, and 
pence, of accounts rendered him by 
an individual who possesged his un- 
bounded 
