On the 28th June Mr Bradlaugh and Mrs Besant attended the Court of Queen's Bench to receive judgment from the Lord Chief Justice and Mr Justice Mellor. My father had thought it likely that there might be a heavy fine, but unlikely that there would be any sentence of imprisonment. He drew £250 from the bank, and showed me the notes as he put them in his pocket-book, bidding me, in the event of a sentence of imprisonment, take the notes from him and pay them into the bank again; and my sister and I accompanied him and Mrs Besant into Court. The Solicitor-General opened by moving the Court for judgment; some discussion arose on the absence of the _postea_, and then Mr Bradlaugh submitted three propositions to the Court: (1) A motion to quash the indictment; (2) a motion for arrest of judgment; and (3) a motion for a new trial. But the Lord Chief Justice would neither consent to a new trial nor to a rule for an arrest of judgment; he left the decision as to quashing the indictment to the Court of Error, declining, however, to stay execution until error was determined. The arguments over these points took up the whole morning, and after luncheon the Solicitor-General, in order to influence the Judge in his sentence, brought forward two affidavits, one asserting that Mr Bradlaugh and Mrs Besant had continued to sell the pamphlet since the verdict, and the other stating that Mrs Besant, in a speech at the Hall of Science on the previous Sunday, had represented the Lord Chief Justice as being favourable to them, and the verdict as against his summing-up. Sir Alexander Cockburn was greatly incensed at the alleged reference to himself, and regarded the continued sale in the light of "a grave and aggravated offence." My father offered that if the Lord Chief Justice would stay proceedings until the writ of error was argued, he would pledge himself that no sort of advantage would be taken of the indulgence of the Court to continue the sale of the condemned book; but as yet the Judge was obdurate. "I think we must pass sentence," he said. "Have you anything to say in mitigation?"
"I respectfully submit myself to the sentence of the Court," my father replied in his gravest tones. "I have nothing to say in mitigation of punishment," added Mrs Besant.