Gazette, over the signature of Philo Free, a violent attack upon the moral and commercial honesty of Marsden as agent of the Church Missionary Society.[1]
Marsden immediately wrote to Wylde calling upon him as Judge-Advocate to institute criminal proceedings for libel against the printer. Wylde attempted to bring about a peaceful solution of the difficulty and wrote to Macquarie pointing out the impropriety of the publication and suggesting that a public apology should be made. Macquarie, who was quite ignorant of Campbell's part in the letter and was sensible of the wrong done to Marsden, published a Government General Order expressing regret that in the hurry of getting the paper to press the objectionable nature of the contribution had been overlooked.[2] As Marsden had in the interval gathered evidence which showed him quite clearly that Campbell had not only passed but written the letter, it was not to be wondered at that the apology in no wise appeased him. He desired the Judge-Advocate to proceed this time not against the printer but against the Secretary. The Judge-Advocate demurred, and a long correspondence ensued in which Marsden claimed that Wylde must file depositions relating to the prosecution ex officio, and Wylde claimed that he had a discretionary power.[3] The best of the argument seemed to lie with Marsden, for he had the support of the late Ellis Bent's authority, while Wylde could only reply in the confused unintelligible language at his command.[4] In the end Wylde gave way, and the case came on for trial in October. Following the Judge-Advocate's charge, as his summing up may fairly be called, the officers who constituted the court gave a peculiar
- ↑ S.G., 4th January, 1817. Marsden's name is not mentioned, but there was no possible doubt of the application of the libel.
- ↑ G.G.O., 18th January, 1817.
- ↑ For all the correspondence see enclosure to D., 20th March, 1821. R.O., MS.
- ↑ See especially Marsden to Wylde, 24th April, 1817, in above D. "He always gave it as his opinion that it would be extremely dangerous to the administration of public justice if the same authority was vested in the Judge-Advocate for the time being as that possessed by the Grand Jury in England, and I may venture to say that he never acted upon this principle while he had the honour to preside as Judge-Advocate in our Criminal Courts. He considered that it was a matter of too great importance to every member of the community to be left to the discretion of one man to determine whether a cause should or should not be heard before a legal tribunal, and that it was the sole province of the Criminal Court, and not of the Judge-Advocate alone, to decide upon the evidence in such cases."
