126 



PERU. 



sible enough ; but the manner in which the 

 scheme was carried into execution was highly 

 characteristic. The Government considered that 

 they had done every thing towards the advance- 

 ment of justice, in originating the idea of this 

 cross-evidence ; and, therefore, merely gave an 

 order for the deserters to be sent to Callao, with- 

 out stating that they should be kept apart from 

 the first witnesses : so that they absolutely were 

 placed, for a whole night, in the same room with 

 the very men whom they were sent to confront. 



I attended next morning, along with the offi- 

 cers, whilst the declarations of all the witnesses 

 Were taken, by the commission appointed for that 

 purpose ; when fifteen men swore on the cross to 

 the fact of these two gentlemen, whom they point- 

 ed out^ having served upwards of two years with 

 Lord Cochrane. They were all men of the most 

 abandoned character, and well known at Callao as 

 such ; but that circumstance mattered little, as 

 their evidence ministered to the heated imagina- 

 tion and violent prejudices of the people : as far, 

 therefore, as this sage inquiry went, it would cer- 

 tainly have left matters worse than it found them. 



