There can be no doubt that the prisoner is a man
of resolution---too much resolution---I wish to
Heaven that he had less, or rather that he had had
a better education to regulate it.
``Gentlemen, as to the laws my brother talks of,
they may be known in the Bull-ring, or the Bear-garden,
or the Cockpit, but they are not known
here. Or, if they should be so far admitted as
furnishing a species of proof that no malice was
intended in this sort of combat, from which fatal
accidents do sometimes arise, it can only be so admitted
when both parties are _in pari casu_, equally
acquainted with, and equally willing to refer themselves
to, that species of arbitrement. But will it
be contended that a man of superior rank and education
is to be subjected, or is obliged to subject
himself, to this coarse and brutal strife, perhaps in
opposition to a younger, stronger, or more skilful
opponent? Certainly even the pugilistic code, if
founded upon the fair play of Merry Old England,
as my brother alleges it to be, can contain nothing
so preposterous. And, gentlemen of the jury, if
the laws would support an English gentleman,
wearing, we will suppose, his sword, in defending
himself by force against a violent personal aggression
of the nature offered to this prisoner, they
will not less protect a foreigner and a stranger,
involved in the same unpleasing circumstances.
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