‘My Lord, on about the twenty-second day of August, a messenger came and brought me to Mrs Cellier’s house in Arundel Buildings and told me she had something to be printed. She told me she had been publicly and wrongfully abused and was resolved to publish her case, and wished to make the world sensible of the wrong she had sustained. When I told her I was a stranger to her concerns, she assured me there was nothing offensive in it, that it was only the truth and I might safely print it. Her discourse was plausible, so I was apt to believe her, and agreed with her to have ten shillings a ream for printing, and I was to print two bundles of every sheet…’
‘What is a bundle?’ Weston interrupted and Downing’s fingers momentarily stopped. With his answer they started up again.
‘A bundle is two reams. She wished for four reams of each sheet.’
‘She ordered two thousand books? Two thousand for only herself to read!’
Every other person in the room took his laugh as a signal for hilarity, cursing and damning. Many that had opened the day in a local tavern before passing time here shouted and jeered. I did not catch the specifics since they were lost in the confusion of Babylon’s tongues. The court became so loud the Councillor for the Crown clapped his hands loudly several times, and called out, ‘Silence! Silence! We cannot hear!’ By and by, he was heard and the noise diminished.
Downing continued, ‘I had printed only half the book when a messenger discovered it printing at my house and carried it before Sir Jenkins, the Secretary. He then granted a warrant to bring us both before him and, having been examined, Mrs Cellier and I were bound to appear the first day of next term in the King’s Bench. Since that time, she printed t’other half of her book at another place. And, whereas she promised to indemnify me from all trouble and charge, when I came to pay the fees to the council, she refused to pay them for me. She told me I had betrayed her and so, notwithstanding her promise, I was obliged to pay the fees myself.’
I could not deny that I did renegade that promise, but he had indeed betrayed me. He told them that it was I that had written the book and agreed the publishing of it with him. Though it be the truth, it was not for him to say.
Mr Dormer raised his hand to the still talking crowd and asked, ‘Pray Sir, who corrected the sheets?’
Taken by surprise at the changed direction whence came the examination, Downing’s fingers again stopped. ‘I brought them to her, Sir.’ He frowned at Mr Dormer’s raised hand, pouting lips and narrowed eyes as if he could not see him. Perhaps he could not. It did seem he saw only as far as his hands from his face, for he had been clumsy with the furniture in my house, and had needed to be shown the door on the way out.
‘So she read them and corrected them?’ said Dormer.
‘Yes, Sir.’
Again, not liking the stage to be taken from him, Weston loudly asked, ‘Pray tell me how far it was you printed of the book.’
Quite relieved to see the nearby speaker, Downing said, ‘It was to folio twenty two.’
Weston told the court, ‘All the clauses in the indictment are contained in those pages.’
Mr Clare, one of the jury, said, ‘All but the last in the postscript.’
Weston took no notice of the man and continued, ‘Have you read the book since?’
Downing nodded. ‘So far, my Lord, as I did print.’
Weston said, ‘You take it upon your oath that, to the 22nd folio of that book given in evidence, you printed it by her direction?’
‘Aye, I do,’ said Downing.
Another nail in my coffin.
‘Then set up Stevens,’ said Weston.
I could not help but recoil at the look of malice and satisfaction Stevens flaunted at me as he took the Bible in his hand.
‘May it please your Lordship,’ said Stevens, ‘I saw this book a printing at Mr. Downing’s and, reading some passages in it, I asked him, ‘Mr Downing, do you know what it is you do?’ Barefaced, he told me he printed a truth. Then I asked him for whom he printed it. He said he printed it for Mrs. Cellier…’
I did not know the man but, it seemed, he knew me, and well enough that he wished me harm. Of a certainty, it was my own endeavours that made him busy in my case, for nobody wrote that book but I, but I did not like his enjoyment of my situation. Stevens talked with barely a breath between anything he said, as if he could not wait to reveal everything that would condemn me.
‘…I bid him have a care that he did no more than what he could justify. He desired that I would not hurt him, and I was loath to do the poor man wrong, but away I went to the Secretary…’
It was he, then, the messenger for the press responsible for my being in gaol! Without a doubt, it was certain he set me up to catch me out!
‘…but before I did I asked him what was become of the sheets, he said he carried them to Mrs Cellier, and, said I, did she bring you the copy? Said he, she sent several, and when I came to her, she did tell me it was her book, and that she kept a man to write it, and she dictated it to another that sat by her, and she often owned it was her book, and she the author of it.’
I did not remember this Secretary’s knave coming to the door, nor of telling him about my book. My memory of faces was not so poor I would have forgotten. What travesty of justice allowed – nay demanded – a devil’s heinous instrument such as he to swear on the Bible and spit lies! Yet one that does the Lord’s work and aids every person in all manner of ways, is denied that solemn right simply for being of the Romish faith!
Was this vengeance for some unknown wrong I did him? For whatever reason he had taken this course, I would not allow him tell lies about me under oath!
‘I never said so in my life,’ I said. I chomped my teeth together.
Stevens spoke directly to me.
‘Mrs Cellier, by the same token as when you sent for bail and you had occasion to write a note, I saw you write it. And I said to you, ‘I now find ‘‘tis not your hand-writing for there is difference between the note and the pages of the book’.’
Still looking at me, Stevens spoke to others in the court. ‘Said she, ‘I know that well enough, but I keep a man, by the name of Grange, in the house to write, and I am up very early every morning, preparing and dictating it to him for the press’. One time Grange told me, ‘She has put out two sheets since, and this day, at one a clock, she has invited the fleet-footed mercuries16 and the street hawkers to come and receive a new pamphlet.’’
16 Messengers, particularly carrying news.
Weston said, ‘Did she, in front of you, affirm herself to be the author of the book?’
‘She did, if it please you, Sir,’ said Stevens. ‘She claimed to be the author before the Secretary and before the Council. And I myself have seen her sell several of them on separate days.’
Again, that superior look that condemned me as the worst kind of whore mingled with malice that said I was important enough to matter in the wrong way.
Mr Dormer’s voice carried up and over the again noisy crowd, ‘Swear in Mr Fowler,’ and, when that was done, ‘Show him the book, if you please.’
Fowler took my book, held out to him, and turned it over. Mr Dormer asked him if he did buy any of my books, to which Fowler said he had bought two for the sum of four shillings. He explained how some of his friends were pleased to joke with him that his name was in it.
Fowler then related how, in particular, a visitor of quality, Mr Henry Killigrew, came one day to his house, and called him into the room and there told him he was notoriously in print and that he was known to be in the company of a great Duke and great Lords.
So, he had come to me to buy my books and, when I had brought the books to him, he had exclaimed, ‘Madam, I believe you have forgotten me!’ I had denied having ever seen him in my whole life, and he had become flustered when I further denied his claim that he was the man called ‘F’ in my book, li
ving at the Half-Moon Tavern in Cheape Side.
Mr Attorney General said, ‘You are the man meant by the ‘F’? Is there something in this book you are supposed to have done in prison?’ Again, the attorney general displayed knowledge outside of the courtroom with which he led the witness.
Fowler said, ‘I suppose Corral the coachman laid oath to that, but I also gave my oath for it before the lord-mayor himself.’
The crowd, that I was beginning to see as a single angry beast, growled loudly at the mention of Corral the coachman, and that growling swallowed up the attorney general’s voice. I could barely hear him from where I stood closer by. He gestured with his hands to quieten down, cleared his throat and then said over the remaining grumble, ‘Pray, for the satisfaction of people here today, tell us what you know of this matter.’
Fowler squinted his eyes and wrinkled his nose. ‘The substance of my oath before my Lord Mayor was this: I never did see any of the things that she said in her book, no Duke drew his sword, no Lord proffered five hundred pounds, nor did I whisper to the coachman that if he should name some great persons then he and I would have money enough! The fact of the matter is that the book is a libel so dire.’
Baron Weston moved closer, perhaps to be better heard, and asked, ‘Was Corral the coachman apprehended for carrying away the dead body of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey on your accusation?’
Fowler said, ‘As to that, I will tell you the occasion of all our discourse, if it may not be too tedious.’ Weston nodded and Fowler went on, ‘One day some gentlemen in my Inn called for a coach, but the coachman that came was made to wait too long and so went away again, which the gentlemen were not happy over. There upon another coachman was called, which was the man, Corral, mentioned in this libel. When he went upstairs to fetch the gentlemen, they engaged him to stay and, to make sure he did so, secured his whip.
‘While he waited…’ He raised his voice for the court to hear him. I doubted they did so even then, for there was such a to-do amongst them. ‘…he came down to the bar and begged a pipe of tobacco from my wife. ‘Aye’, said she, ‘thou lookest like a good honest fellow, and I believe thou hast no hand in the plot’, a common pleasantry at that time. Whereupon the man begins to tell her how he had escaped that danger!
‘He swore damn to her that four men had accosted him at St. Clement’s Church wall and they would have him do no good and carry Sir Godfrey’s body in his coach. He saw the body with his own eyes in a sedan and, loathing to be dragged in, shammed them that he could not carry him for the axletree of his coach was broke.
‘Overhearing the fellow talk, I came out from my room and asked him, ‘Are you sure of this?’ He swore damn the truth of it. Then I asked him if he were master for himself or drove for another. The fellow, being sensible he had been too lavish in his discourse, pretended to light his pipe in haste, and to run out and see if the seats of his coach were not stolen out. I took a candle with me and went after him, but by the time I got to the door, he was already driving away, even though he had left his whip with the gentleman as security for his stay!’
Fowler looked to the court for their blessing he had done right by his questions. It was difficult to tell if they thought it so, for they were to busy talking and jeering amongst themselves.
‘The day after, Captain Richardson and the Secondary of the Compter were drinking a glass of wine at my house, so I told them the story, whereupon the captain took the number of his coach that I had set down. They blamed me very much I had not stopped the fellow. Then, the next day, Richardson sent his Janizaries17 abroad and secured Corral. I believe they kept him in custody for two or three days.’
17 Policemen
Baron Weston listened well, then asked, ‘When was this?’
Fowler scratched his head. ‘Two or three days after the murder was publicly known. To the best of my remembrance, it was Tuesday night that this fellow told me the story, and the next day I told the captain and the secondary.’
Baron Weston said, ‘Was that Tuesday after the murder, or the Tuesday seven night after?’
Frowning deeply, Fowler said, ‘It was the Tuesday seven-night after. The next day I was ordered to wait upon the lords at Wallingford-house, where the Duke of Buckingham, Lord Shaftsbury, the Marquis of Winchester, two other lords, and Major Wildman, the secretary, examined me upon this thing. And what I have declared to Your Lordships now, I declared to them then. And they brought the fellow in face to face, and there he did confess the whole matter was told to him by two others.’
I wondered at that. If Corral had heard it from two others, surely Fowler this minute inadvertently proved his innocence.
Fowler stopped talking when the crowd became too loud and he was drowned out. Weston turned to the persons making the most noise and waved his hands at them but, again, it took Mr Attorney General as well to hush them. Fowler, impatient for a gap to talk into, begun talking regardless.
‘The Lords sent for the two persons Corral named and were well satisfied they were both of good reputation, one of them keeping a victualling-house, but they were of the opinion it was mere sham, and that Corral merely named the first persons that came into his mind. Getting nothing out of him, my Lord Duke of Buckingham told him, ‘Sir, if you will confess, the king hath promised you shall be protected. My Lord Shaftesbury told him the same, but added that, if he would not confess, and tell them who set him to work, then nothing should be severe enough for him.’
Baron Weston cast the significance of this statement upon the court in a haughty look, his eyebrows raised so high they hid beneath his periwig. ‘Upon this accusation was he sent to prison?’
Fowler nodded. ‘He was re-ordered to Newgate and there continued for several months.’
Baron Weston asked, ‘Were you ever in Newgate, and saw him?’
Fowler, ‘Never, not I.’
Baron Weston, ‘Did you never see him outwith the chamber with the Lords, and at your own tavern?’
Fowler, ‘Never.’
Baron Weston, ‘Were you ever in Newgate with him my Lord Duke of Buckingham, or my Lord Shaftesbury, or any other Duke, Lord or nobleman whatsoever?’
Fowler, ‘No.’
Baron Weston, ‘Did you see any sword drawn, or money offered or laid down upon a table?’
Fowler, ‘There was never a sword drawn, nor any money offered.’
To the judges and then to the jury, Baron Weston summed Fowler’s statements. ‘He answers very fully to that and denies what Mrs Cellier writes in her book, that he is accused to be in Newgate in the presence of a Duke and another great Earl, that the Duke drew his sword, and the other nobleman laid down a great deal of gold, amounting to five hundred pounds. This is consequently denial of the whole charge.’
The room was filled with so many shouts and threats, I was enraged by their so despising of me. Though I should not speak, Weston having instructed me so, I could not hold my tongue. ‘I did not write that this was true, but I writ that the fellow told me so!’
Baron Weston demanded that the counsellor of the crown should read aloud the passages relating to Fowler’s story, and we were made to listen to them for, though it proved nothing, he said, ‘Compare it with the record, for she shall have a fair trial, by the grace of Almighty God.’
Baron Weston, ‘Now, I must inform you, Mrs Cellier, we have already proved against the clauses in your book that cast great infamy upon our religion and on the whole government.
‘Where you say Fowler was barbarously used in prison by nobles, first by drawn sword, next by the temptation of gold, in order to force confession, your words of their bad usage have already been proved false and libellous. Where you allege Prance was tortured in prison to compel him to commit perjury, he will prove against you this day.
‘That you accuse the king of making it safer to be a hangman’s hound, or to become an accuser for a pension, is a publi
c calumny on the nation, but then to say such things as ‘it is not meritorious for a person to speak the truth than to do otherwise’ this is a slander that ought earn public rebuke.’
Weston’s demeanour became more fervent the longer he stayed on the stage. He played to the audience, but forgot they came not to see him but me.
‘Mrs. Cellier has insinuated that the murder of the late king, Charles the First, was sufficient ground to pervert her from Protestantism, when all the world knows that, in that ill period, there were Protestants that were far better subjects, and more loyal, than ever any Papist was in the world. And there were those that suffered as greatly, nay, far more, for their opposition to that dreadful villainy than the Papists can boast of for their loyalty. It is well known there were underhand villains that did encourage all that roguery,’ said Weston.
He turned about and addressed me directly.
‘You have set a fayre upon the damnable lie that the most arrant rebellious rogues that ever lived are great saints in comparison to Protestants. This, no honest man will believe.’
‘I said they call themselves Protestants.’ I had to raise my voice to be heard. ‘I know the Protestants were great sufferers for the king, and I myself felt it. My family were Protestants, and were several times stripped and plundered for their loyalty. I grant this.’
Weston, his face red and sweating with heat from both without and within, scorned, ‘Do you? Then you are an impudent lying woman, or else a villainous lying priest has instructed you to begin your book with such base insinuation against the best of religions! This lie will go upon the public infamy attending your party of notorious liars, among whom falsehood does so much abound. Call Corral and Prance.’
In that way, Weston summarily dismissed me and what I had to say. He took a white lace hand-kerchief from his pocket and wiped the drops of sweat that trickled from beneath his periwig. I clenched my teeth, surprised, once more, he had not pointed to my admittance that I wrote the book. His words had so prodded and riled the mob-Beast, barely held back behind the wooden bar, that it roared and shook and thirsted for my blood. I thanked the Lord that there were soldiers standing by, for it looked as if that bar might not hold, and I would be devoured by the Beast clamouring for my throat.
The Popish Midwife: A tale of high treason, prejudice and betrayal Page 30