TORONTO OV OLD. 89 



diminutive jury room, eitlier through perplexity fairly arising out of the evidence, or through 

 the dogged obstinacy of an individual. Once, as we have heard from a sufferer on the occa- 

 sion, the late Colonel Duggan was the means of keeping a jury locked up for a night here, 

 he heing the sole dissentient on a particular point. That night, however, was converted 

 into one of memorable festivity, our informant said, a tolerable supply of provisions and 

 comforts having been conveyed in through the window, sent for from the homes of those of 

 the jury who were residents of York. The recusant Colonel was refused a moment's rest 

 througliout the livelong night. During twelve long hours pranks and sounds were indulged 

 in that would have puzzled a foreigner taking notes of Canadian Court House usages. "When 

 10 o'clock a. m. of the next day arrived, and the Court reassembled. Colonel Duggan sud- 

 denly and obligingly effected the release of himself and his tormentors by consenting to make 

 the necessary modification in his opinion. — Of one characteristic scene we have a record in 

 the books of the Court itself. On the 12th of January, 1S13, as a duly impanelled jury were 

 retiring to their room to consider of their verdict, a remark was addressed to one of their 

 number, namely, Samuel Jackson, by a certain Simeon Morton, who had been a witness for the 

 defence: the remark, as the record notes, was in these words, to wit, "Mind your eye !" 

 to which tlie said Jackson replied "Never fear !" The Crier of the Court, John Bazell, duly 

 made affidavit of tliis illicit transaction. Accordingly, on the appearance in court of the jury, 

 for the purpose of rendering their verdict, Mr. Baldwin, attorney for the prosecution, moved 

 that the said Jackson be taken into custody : and the Judge gave order "that Samuel Jackson 

 do immediately enter into recognisances, himself in £50, and two sureties in £25 each, for his 

 appearance on the Saturday following at the Clerk of the Peace OfBce, "which," as the record 

 somewhat inelegantly adds, "he done." He duly appeared on the Saturday indicated, and, 

 pleading ignorance, was discharged. 



In the Court House in 1822 was tried a curious case in respect of a horse claimed by two 

 parties. Major Heward of York and General Wadsworth, commandant of the United States Gar- 

 rison at Port Niagara. Major Heward had reared a sorrel colt on his farm east of the Don ; and 

 when it was three years old it was stolen. Nothing came of the offer of reward for its recovery 

 until a twelvemonth after the theft, when a young horse was brought by a stranger to Major 

 Heward at York and instantly recognized by him as his lost property. Some of the major's 

 neighbours likewise had no doubt of the identity of the animal, which, moreover, when taken 

 to the farm entered of its own accord the stable, and the staU, the missing colt used to occupy, 

 and, when let out into the adjoining pasture, greeted in a friendly way a former mate, and ran 

 to drink' at the customary watering place. Sliortly after, two citizens of the United States, 

 Kelsey and Bond, make their appearances at York and claim the horse which they find on Major 

 Howard's farm as the property of General Wadsworth, commandant at Fort Niagara. Kelsey 

 swore that he had reared the animal ; that he had docked him with his own hands when only a 

 few hours old ; and that he had sold him about a year ago to General Wadsworth. Bond also 

 swore positively that this was the horse which Kelsey had reared, and that he himself had 

 broken him in, prior to the sale to General Wadsworth. It was alleged by these persons that a 

 man named Docksteader had stolen, tlie horse from General Wadsworth at Fort Niagara and 

 liad, conveyed him across to the Canadian side. 



In conseqiieuce of the positive evidence of these two men the jury gave their verdict in favour 

 of General Wadsworth's claim, with damages to the amouut of £50. It was nevertheless gene- 

 rally held that Kelsey and Bond's minute narrative of the colt's early Iiistory was a fiction ; and 

 that Docksteader, the man who transferred the animal from the United States side of the river 

 to Canadian soil, had also had something to do with the transfer of the same anunal from Canada 

 to ti^ United States a twelvemonth previously. 



The subject of this story survived to the year 1861, and was recognized and known among al 

 old inliabitants as " Major Heward's famous Toby." 



Within the Court House on Richmond Street took place in 1818 the celebrated trial of a num- 

 ber of prisoners brought down from the Red River Settlement on charges of " high treason, 

 murder, robbery and conspiracy," as preferred against them by Lord Selkirk, the founder of the 

 Settlement. When our neighbourhood was itself in fact nothing more than a collection of small 

 isolated clearings, rough-hewn out of the wild, "the Selkirk Settlement" and "the North 

 West " were household terms among us for remote regions in a condition of infinite savagery, in 



