692 V. BENCH AND BAR he had sustained great damage and Infamy in serving the King. On the ruins of that abbey his grandson Thomas Howard erected the stately Ehzabethan mansion of Audley End. When the Cathohcs returned to power under Mary, the Protestants in their turn suffered the penalties of heresy. One trial, however, stands out in this reign as the only in- stance where, under the Tudors, a prosecution for high trea- son resulted in a verdict of not guilty. Sir Nicholas Throck- morton was prosecuted by the learned Dyer, then Attorney General. The defendant completely outtalked the Attorney General, and made him appear something of a simpleton. He modestly compared himself to the Savior, and pictured Dyer in the character of Pilate. His self-confidence en- abled him to interrupt Chief Justice Bromley's charge to the jury, Throckmorton craved " indifferency " from the judge, and helped out the judge's poor memory by his own recital of the facts. The jury that acquitted Throckmor- ton was imprisoned and heavily fined. The judges, who were Protestants, on the accession of Mary conveniently became Roman Catholics ; one of them, Sir James Hales, had scruples but was induced by his asso- ciate, Judge Portman, to recant. This act so worked on Hales' conscience that he drowned himself. The coroner's jury returned a verdict of suicide ; and in two cases ^ a number of hair-splitting subtleties were uttered by the court as to the effect of the suicide in forfeiting the Judge's estates. Shakespeare makes the learned gravediggers in Hamlet discourse over Ophelia in words that are almost a literal parody on the arguments of the judges. Elizabeth's reign produced one very great judge. James Dyer was really appointed to the bench under Mary, but the most of his judicial service was under Elizabeth. He presided in the Common Pleas for twenty-three years. He took no part in the disgraceful political trials of this reign, but directed his court with efficiency and learning. The poet Whetstone has these lines upon Dyer :
- Bishop of Chichester v. Webb, 2 Dyer 107; Lady Hales v. Pettit,
Plowden 253.
