THE LATE TRIAL AND CONVICTION OF COUNT TARIFF. THE whole nation is at present very inquisitive after the proceedings in the cause of Goodman Fact, plaintiff, and Count Tariff, defendant; as it was tried on the 18th of June, in the thirteenth year of her majesty's reign, and in the year of the Lord 1713. I shall therefore give my countrymen a short and faithful account of that whole matter. And in order to it, must in the first place premise some particulars relating to the person and character of the said plaintiff, Goodman Fact. Goodman Fact is allowed by every body to be a plain-spoken person, and a man of very few words. Tropes and figures are his aversion. He affirms every thing roundly, without any art, rhetoric, or circumlocution. He is a declared enemy to all kinds of ceremony and complaisance. He flatters no body. Yet so great is his natural eloquence, that he cuts down the finest orator, and destroys the best contrived argument, as soon as ever he gets himself to be heard. He never applies to the passions or prejudices of his audience; when they listen with attention and honest minds, he never fails of carrying his point. He appeared in a suit of English broad-cloth, very plain, but rich. Every thing he wore was substantial, honest, homespun ware. His cane indeed came from the East-Indies, and two or three little superfluities from Turkey, and other parts. It is said that he encouraged himself with a bottle of neat port, before he appeared at the trial. He was huzzaed into the court by several thousands of weavers, clothiers, fullers, dyers, packers, callenders, setters, silk-men, spinners, dressers, whistlers, winders, mercers, throwsters, sugar-bakers, distillers, drapers, hosiers, planters, merchants, and fishermen; who all unanimously declared, that they could not live above two months longer, if their friend Fact did not gain his cause. Everybody was overjoyed to hear that the good man was come to town. He no sooner made his appearance in court, but several of his friends fell a weeping at the sight of him: for indeed he had not been seen there three years before. The charge he exhibited against Count Tariff was drawn up in the following articles. I. That the said Count had given in false and fraudulent reports in the name of the plaintiff. II. That the said Count had tampered with the said plaintiff, and made use of many indirect methods to bring him over to his party. III. That the said Count had wilfully and knowingly traduced the said plaintiff, having misrepresented him in many cunningly-devised speeches, as a person in the French interest. IV. That the said Count had averred in the presence of above five hundred persons, that he had heard the plaintiff speak in derogation of the Portuguese, Spaniards, Italians, Hollanders, and others, who were the persons whom the said plaintiff had |