Nevertheless, the case came on at the Durham Assizes. Within the last
two months Browborough had become quite a hero at Tankerville. The
Church party had forgotten his broken pledges, and the Radicals
remembered only his generosity. Could he have stood for the seat
again on the day on which the judges entered Durham, he might have
been returned without bribery. Throughout the whole county the
prosecution was unpopular. During no portion of his Parliamentary
career had Mr. Browborough's name been treated with so much respect
in the grandly ecclesiastical city as now. He dined with the Dean on
the day before the trial, and on the Sunday was shown by the head
verger into the stall next to the Chancellor of the Diocese, with a
reverence which seemed to imply that he was almost as graceful as
a martyr. When he took his seat in the Court next to his attorney,
everybody shook hands with him. When Sir Gregory got up to open his
case, not one of the listeners then supposed that Mr. Browborough
was about to suffer any punishment.
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