xx Introduction.

Gerard Slye took the attorney, who was his uncle, into custody, and that same
day a grand jury "or Inquest of the body of the said Province," acting on
nothing but the testimony of Husbands, presented the lawyer for assaulting the
doctor. Blakiston was arraigned, "pleaded not guilty & for his tryall putt
himselfe upon the Countrey ..... [the] Jury to passe upon the life & the death
of the said Nehemiah" heard the sworn charges of Husbands and said upon
their oaths that Blakiston was not guilty, and that he had not withdrawn
himself. He was forthwith allowed to go without day, but he felt that he had
been so injured by the charges that he sued Dr. Husbands for ioo,ooo pounds
of tobacco (post, 121-125).

When, on March 13, 1678/9, the case came to trial, Husbands reiterated his
charges. On March 26, 1676, Blakiston "the said hatt called a ffrench hatt &
one perriwigg to the value of three pounds eight shillings sterl then & there
from the person of the said Edward with force & armes feloniously did take &
carry away" (post, 125). This Nehemiah again denied, and he prayed that the
charges "may be inquired of by the Countrey And the defend^t [Husbands]
also [.]" The jury supported Blakiston and assessed the damages done him
at five thousand pounds of tobacco, plus 2192 pounds more for costs (post, 126).
What really happened on the high way near Mattaponi that March day in 1676
no one knows.

Husbands's charges resulted in the acquittal of the defendant in June 1678.
In the interval between that time and the suit for damages, Husbands got
himself into real trouble. On the evening of November 8, 1678, members of
the Lower House of Assembly ate a duck pie and fell ill. Chirurgeon Husbands
was thrown into jail on a charge of having put some poison or unwholesome
drug into the pie, and, at the request of the Assembly the Governor made sure
Husbands would be on hand for the trial. The Lower House said that, though
there was not absolute proof of the poisoning, there was exceedingly strong
suspicion, and they desired that Husbands be forever disabled from practising
in the Province. For the threats and curses he had used against the Assembly,
the Lower House said he ought to apologise on his kneew to both houses, or
that, in default of that, he be given forty lashed on his bare back. The Upper
House concurred (and the Upper House did not always agree with the Lower
House), and ordered that a bill of attainder be drawn up against the Doctor.
When this act came to passage, it forbade him to practise medicine, and, for the
"Crime of Threatening menaceing & Curseing this Assembly as afores^d The
said Husbands be whipped on the bare back with twenty Lashed by the hand of
the Comon hangman" (Archives VII, passim). What happened to him after
this no one knows now.

SHIPS AND SEAFARING MEN

There were no cases heard in admiralty this year: indeed the word admiralty
does not once occur in these pages. There are only one or two cases involving
ships and seamen, and in these the settlement was according to the law of land.
In 1675 and again in 1676, Thomas Clarke told Captain John Longden that, for
the transport of himself and of his manservant from England to the Province,