this gentleman that the telegram came which brought the civil action to such an abrupt termination. Having read in the newspapers that the plaintiff in the Smyth case had referred to a mourning ring, and had sworn that it had the inscription, "In memory of Jane, wife of Hugh Smyth, Esquire, married May, 1796; died February, 1 797," Mr. Cox thought it his duty to com municate with the legal advisers of the Smyth family, as he recollected engraving a ring, "Mary, wife of Sir Hugh Smyth; m. 1796; d. 1797." Had this ring been pro duced in court, it would, of course, have at once stamped the case as a fraud, in con sequence of the substitution of the name "Mary " for " Jane," and describing Hugh Smyth as "Sir" at a time when his father was still alive. It can easily be understood why this ring was not forthcoming at the trial. Mr. Cox had also engraved for the defendant the word's on the brooch, "Jane Godkin." The brooch, like the ring, was therefore a "relic" of recent date, manu factured for the purpose of imposing upon the Judge and misleading the jury. But perhaps the most crushing piece of evidence related to the old family Bible, of which the prisoner had made so much, and which he had positively sworn was taken by old Provis out of his bureau in his bedroom and handed to him (the defendant) in 1838. It ap peared from the evidence of a bookseller, whose place of business was next door to Mr. Moring, in Holborn, that he had purchased from a Mr. Vandenburgh an old Bible, and that the prisoner had bought it of him in February, 1853, only six months before the trial, and Mr. Vandenburgh proved that the Bible itself had belonged to his deceased father, and that the words on the title page, "John S. Vandenburgh," were in his father's handwriting.
As to the prisonor's identity. His sister was called, and proved that he was her brother, Thomas Provis, the son of old Provis, the carpenter, and that he was mar ried in her presence to Mary Ann Whittick at St. Michael's Church, Bath, in 1814, and that the portrait which the prisoner had de clared to be that of Sir Hugh Smyth, hung for years in her father's house, and was, in reality, a likeness of her brother John. Other evidence was produced to prove that the documents of 1822 and 1823 could not possibly be genuine, as both the parch ment and the ink showed that they were not of the age alleged. The defendant had made a great parade of the Vandenburgh Bible; but, evidently to his horror, another Bible was now produced, in which was an entry of his marriage with Mary Ann Whittick in Ins own handivriting. The boldness of some impostors almost passes credulity. This one had actually sworn at the trial of the civil action, that such a marriage had not taken place! The prisoner was not represented by counsel, but conducted his own defense, cross-examining the witnesses for the pros ecution with some ability. The statement that the previous trial had cost the Smyth family nearly seven thousand pounds seemed to cause him much pleasure. He made a long speech in his defense, and raised what he evidently imagined was a novel question of law, viz : that a man could not be con victed of forging the name of a deceased person. The Judge ruled against him upon that point, and the jury, after a few minutes' deliberation, found him guilty, and he was sentenced to twenty years' transportation— that system of punishment for long term criminals being then in vogue.
