Part 49 (1/2)

This made the first impression on my mind, and I knew there _must_ be something beneath it which only _he_ could explain. I waited patiently. It was much more than life and death to this man.

The next thing that impressed me was that there was not the least confusion in his evidence or in himself. His tone, his language, could only be the result of conscious innocence.

It was not very long before I gathered that he was the victim of a cruel and cowardly conspiracy. It was absolutely a case of _blackmailing, and nothing else_.

I believed every word the man said, and so did the jury. His evidence _acquitted him_. He was saved from an ignominious doom by the new Act, and from that moment I went heart and soul with it: however much it may be a danger to the guilty, it is of the utmost importance to the innocent.

This case was not finished without a little touch of humour. When half-past seven arrived--an hour on circuit at which I always considered it too early to adjourn--the jury thought it looked very like an ”all-night sitting,” although I had no such intention, and one of their body or of the Bar, I forget which, raised the question on a motion for the adjournment of the house.

I was asked, I know, by some impatient member of the Bar whether a case in which _he_ was engaged could not go over till the morning.

This gave immense encouragement to an independent juryman, who evidently was determined to beard the lion in his den, and possibly shake off ”the dewdrops of his British indignation.”

I never believed in British lions, except on his Majesty's quarterings; and although they look very formidable in heraldry, I never found them so in fact. Indeed, if the British lion was ever a native of the British Isles, he must have become extinct, for I have never heard so much as an imitation growl from him except in Hyde Park on a Sunday.

The British lion, however, in this case seemed to a.s.sert himself in the jury-box, and rising on his hind legs, said in a husky voice, which appeared to come from some concealed cupboard in his bosom,--

”My lord!”

”Yes?” I said in my blandest manner.

”My lord, this 'ere ---- is a little bit stiff, my lord, with all respect for your lords.h.i.+p.”

”What is that, sir?”

”Why, my lord, I've been cramped up in this 'ere narrer box for fourteen hours, and the seat's that hard and the back so straight up that now I gets out on it I ain't got a leg to stand on.”

”I'm sorry for the chair,” I said.

He was a very thick-set man, and the whole of the jury burst into a laugh. Then he went on, with tears in his eyes,--

”My lord, when I went home last night arter sittin' here so many hours I couldn't sleep a wink.”

I could not help saying,--

”Then it is no use going to bed; we may as well finish the business.”

That was all very well for him, but another juryman arose, amidst roars of laughter, and lifted up a hard, wooden-bottomed chair, and beat it with his heavy walking-stick.

The chair was perfectly indifferent to the treatment it was receiving after supporting the juryman for so many hours without the smallest hope of any reward, and I then asked,--

”Is that to keep order, sir?”

The excitement continued for a long time, but at last it subsided, and I suggested a compromise.

I said probably the gentlemen in the next case would not speak for more than one hour each, and if they would agree to this I would undertake to sum up in _five minutes_.

The husky lion sat down, and so did the musician. The jury acquitted and went home.

These are some of the caprices of a jury which a Judge has sometimes to put up with, and it has often been said that Judges are more tried than prisoners. Perhaps that is so, especially when, if they do not get the kind of rough music I have mentioned from the jury-box, they sometimes receive a by no means complimentary address from the prisoner. One occurs to my mind, with which I will close this chapter.