xxx                  Introduction.

        more, for to Examine her, and then shee Confessed that shee had A Child and
        the Hoggs had Eaten it” (Arch. Md. LIV; 395). Why she was acquitted is not
        clear. Possibly it was a still-born child.
          The trial for infanticide of Mary Marler of Port Tobacco, Charles County,
        spinster, a maid of Mrs. Hannah Price, which took place at the April, 1666,
        court, furnished some dramatic features. She had given birth to twins, a boy
        and a girl, and was indicted and tried before a jury charged with having killed
        the boy twin by having the rather notorious Hannah Price, now indicted as an
        accessory, expose him to the cold. Several witnesses and the two accused testi-
        fied. The jury brought in the following verdict “Though wee cannot by evi-
        dence finde Mary Marler guilty of the murder abovesaid according to the
        words of the Indictment yet by her flight wee finde the law makes her Guilty
        and ought to be indicted and prosecuted, Wee allsoe finde Hannah Price by
        her Concealmt of the murder of the Childe so many dayes to be accessary to the
        said murder". Wlicu the sheriff went to bring the prisoner into court to be
        sentenced, he found that Mary “Had broke prison and fled for it, Whereupon
        Proclamacon made three times that if she came not in, to be Outlawed”—and
        if she did not appear at the three successive courts she was “to be for ever Out-
        lawed” (pp. 74, 75, 99: Arch. Md. LIII; 617). Nothing further appears in the
        record about Mary Marler, whose prosecution may have been dropped, or who
        may have made a successful escape. The record does show, however, that at
        the October, 1666, court, Hannah Price was cleared by proclamation (pp.
        119, 125). Earlier records of the Provincial Court show how very often, the
        unfortunate Hannah and her worthless husband had been previously in the toils
        of the law (Arch. Md. XLI, XLIX).
          Two men charged with rape, although this word is not actually used any-
        where in this record, came before the court. In both instances the accused were
        acquitted. William Key of Selby's Cliff, Calvert County, was charged with
        assault by force and arms and of ravishing against her will Ann, the wife of
        Frances Billingsley of the same place. The assault was said to have taken place
        in her husband's chamber, and the indictment declared that it was an offence
        contrary to the statute passed in the 13th year of the reign of Edward I. It is
        of interest to know that the statute of Westminster II, 13 Edward I (1285),
        made rape a felony with the benefit of clergy, while the statute passed in 1575
        in the reign of Elizabeth, which one would suppose had supplanted the earlier
        act, took away the benefit of clergy. Key, who could probably read, was pre-
        sented under the earlier and milder statute. The trial was conducted in a pecu-
        liar way, in that Key, indicted for rape, and a certain Thomas Corker, indicted
        for murder, had their cases, according to the record, heard consecutively by the
        same jury, which then retired and brought in at the same time verdicts in both
        cases. Key leaded not guilty and asked a jury trial. The jury of “life and death”
        of which Joseph Horsley was foreman, after hearing the evidence of the al-
        leged victim and of another woman and two men, brought in a verdict of not
        guilty, and the jury “being askt if he did not fly for it answered not to our
        knowledge”—a question asked to show whether the accused had attempted
        escape, because, whether found guilty or not, attempted flight by an accused