H.—2l.

on the prosecution of the claimant for sheep-stealing. There was no undue delay on the part of the claimant in taking proceedings for perjury against the said William Lambert. Again, as to the First, Second, Third, and Fourth of the said, Questions. We have answered the said questions according to the wording thereof ; but, having regard to the other terms of the said Commission, and especially to the recitals therein contained, it does not appear to us that the said questions sufficiently raise the real questions intended to be referred to us, upon this branch of the inquiry, and that these questions really are : (a) Has sufficient evidence been adduced before us to show that the claimant was guilty or was innocent of the crime of sheepstealing, whereof he was convicted ? (b.) If the evidence is insufficient to enable us to arrive definitely at either conclusion, is the question of the guilt of the claimant so far left in doubt that, if he were now being retried by us as a jury upon an indictment for the said crime, he ought to be acquitted upon the ground that the said crime had not been sufficiently proved against him ? Before entering into the inquiry directed by the said Commission we intimated to counsel for the Crown and for the claimant that we interpreted the said Commission as being intended to raise the questions last stated, in addition to the questions specifically raised by the said Commission. This interpretation was acquiesced in by counsel for the Crown, and the inquiry has throughout been conducted by counsel for both parties upon that basis. Since then Your Excellency has been pleased, in consequence of delays in making our report herein (caused solely by the manner in which the inquiry has been conducted by counsel), twice to extend the time limited by the said Commission. We proceed then to deal with this branch of the case upon the assumption that the said Commission was intended to raise for our determination the questions (a) and (b) which we have stated. The matters which we have been required to investigate in order to enable us to answer these questions happened over nineteen years ago. Many of the witnesses whom it would have been desirable to examine are dead, and the memories of those who survive have been dimmed by so great a lapse of time. Even if an earnest desire to speak the bare truth, adding nothing and suppressing nothing, could be attributed to all the witnesses, it must be obvious that it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for us to feel any degree of certainty as to the accuracy of the conclusions of fact which we are called upon to form. The difficulty in the present case is enhanced by the fact that the claimant, who is properly claimed by his counsel to be his own chief witness, has proved himself in his evidence before us to be utterly unworthy of credit in any matter affecting his owu interests. The particular matter in respect of which the claimant's reckless disregard of his oath was made clear to us was with respect to illicit relations, which he ultimately admitted, that he has had for some years with a young woman named in the evidence. Upon cross-examination by counsel for the Crown he denied these relations after repeated warnings from both members of the Couit, and after his attention had been pointedly called to the fact, which he admitted, that false evidence upon this point would go to the value of the whole of his testimony. Nevertheless, he denied these relations over and over again, and in every possible form, in the course of such denial blackening, not shielding, the woman's character, and endeavouring to fasten his own transgressions upon his nephew. Counsel for the claimant endeavoured to persuade us that the claimant's natural modesty induced him to swear falsely in these particulars, and that his evidence as to the matters in controversy was still reliable. In our opinion, however, no weight is to be attached to the evidence of the claimant, as evidence, in any particular. The particulars of the claimant's evidence upon this point and of his counsel's argument upon the matter will be found in the printed report of the evidence, as mentioned in the margin. We regret that we are not able to attach much greater weight to the evidence of the claimant's wife. In one particular, as to which it appears to us very difficult to believe that her inaccuracy was due to mistake alone, she is admitted to have misstated the facts to us in her evidence. The particulars of Mrs. Meikle's evidence j upon this point appear in the printed report of the evidence, as mentioned in the margin. The discussion between the claimant's counsel and the Court upon this ' point appears also in the print at the pages noted in the margin. j

Pages 57 to 61.

Page, 155, questions 471 to 474; page 158, questions 600 to 606. Pages 230, 231, 232.

III