For an hour he had stood unmoved while Alexander Wedderburn, the wittiest barrister in the kingdom, poured upon him a torrent of abuse.

Even the Judges, against all traditions of decorum in the high courts of Britain, laughed at the cleverness of the assault.

That was the speech of which Charles James Fox declared that it was the most expensive bit of oratory which had been heard in England since it had cost the kingdom its colonies.
It was alleged that in some manner Franklin had stolen the letters and violated their sacred privacy.

It is known now that an English nobleman had put them in his hands to read and that he was in no way responsible for their publication.

The truth, if it could have been told, would have bent the proud heads of Wedderburn and the judges to whom he appealed, in confusion.