MR. MAYHEW IN REPLY TO MR. MAYOR. 
349 
meaning. I am not yet so deep in wickedness but I can bear to 
hear my failings honestly characterized, and I am not yet so steeped 
in politeness that my admiration yearns towards the mincing gen¬ 
tility that, under a pretence of refinement deals with insinuation. 
My informants were men, and all human testimony, of course, is 
subject to inquiry. Unless there be an authority which is in¬ 
fallible, there can be no evidence that is not questionable, and no 
person has a right to feel hurt if his statements or opinions should 
be questioned. I therefore did Mr. Mayor no wrong when I did 
not regard him as superhuman, and he fixes no stigma upon my 
informants by a term which, when properly considered, implies 
only that they were mortal. 
Mr. Mavor begins by narrating what he said to Mr. Buckle, 
with whom he rightly states I had no communication upon the 
subject. As my words, therefore, did not directly allude to the 
gentleman named, and as my information was, to Mr. Mavor’s 
knowledge, derived from another source, it becomes somewhat 
difficult to comprehend in what way any thing Mr. Buckle may 
have been told is a conclusive answer to something which another 
person may have heard. People give utterance to very different 
opinions at different times, and the corroborated assertion con¬ 
cerning that which one party may not have heard can be no evi¬ 
dence with regard to what another person may be able truthfully 
to certify; therefore, granting Mr. Mavor’s account, and having 
no disposition to contradict it, nevertheless it goes for nothing, 
since it does not bear upon the point. 
Alluding to what he is pleased to term my mis-statements, Mr. 
Mavor asserts, that when the horse was submitted for his exa¬ 
mination, he “ unhesitatingly, after due observation, affirmed that 
the tumour was melanotic in its character .” The declaration is 
positive, and I at once admit it. I regret that I should have been 
misinformed. The person who told me what I made publicly known 
was not personally prejudiced against Mr. Mavor : on the contrary, 
he seemed to entertain a very great respect for that gentleman’s 
judgment. There was no evidence of motive likely to make me 
suspect Mr. Mavor would be misreported by one so very well 
disposed towards him. I did not think a person influenced by 
friendly feeling would, after having heard what he was interested 
to remember, give a false report. Mr. Mavor does not directly 
say, he never allowed any individual, by what he at any time 
might have said, to conjecture his opinion was never such as he in 
his reply asserts it ultimately became; but I am willing to give 
the most generous interpretation to his language, and however im¬ 
possible it may be to account for so strange a mistake, nevertheless, 
