The importance of obtaining his services had been strongly represented to the Bishops by Johnstone; and Pollexfen, it is said, had declared that no man in Westminster Hall was so well qualified to treat a historical and constitutional question as Somers.
The jury was sworn; it consisted of persons of highly respectable station.

The foreman was Sir Roger Langley, a baronet of old and honourable family.

With him were joined a knight and ten esquires, several of whom are known to have been men of large possessions.

There were some Nonconformists in the number; for the Bishops had wisely resolved not to show any distrust of the Protestant Dissenters.

One name excited considerable alarm, that of Michael Arnold.