But at the time when they made this order it was well known that he could not obey it.

A few days before he had been challenged by a Mr.Martin, who till very recently had been one of the Secretaries of the Treasury, and who was generally believed to have prepared himself for the conflict by diligent practice with a pistol; and in the duel which ensued Wilkes had been severely wounded.

It was not only notorious that he had been thus disabled, but he sent a physician and surgeon of admitted eminence in their profession, and of unquestioned honor, to testify to the fact at the bar of the House; and subsequently he forwarded written certificates to the same purport from some French doctors who had special knowledge of gunshot wounds.

But the Commons declined to accept this evidence as sufficient, and directed two other doctors to examine him.

Wilkes, however, refused to admit them: his refusal was treated as a sufficient ground for pronouncing him "guilty of a contempt of the authority of the House," and for deciding on his case in his absence; and, on the 19th of January, before the case had come on for trial, a resolution was carried that "Mr.Wilkes was guilty of writing and publishing _The North Briton_ (No.