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Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection

The arguments of Gerrit Smith and David J. Mitchell, and the charge of...

Smith, Gerrit, 1797-1874.

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Call number: Smith 510

OF

AND

AND THE

CHARGE OF JUSTICE MASON,

IN A

TRIAL FOR MURDER.

OF

AND

AND THE

CHARGE OF JUSTICE MASON,

IN A

TRIAL FOR MURDER.

Mr. John Buck had lived some sixty years upon his farm, situated on the Cherry Valley Turnpike;, in the town of Nelson, County of Madison, and State of New-York. His house was on the north side of the Turnpike, and about twenty feet from it; and its only outer door in use at the time of his death was at the west end. His horse-barn was directly across, and on the south line of, the Turnpike: and in that he was found dead Friday evening, March 14th, 1856. He had a wood-lot, some fifty rods south of his horse barn.

Soon after midnight, Saturday morning, George William Zecher, who lived in the town of Eaton, nearly three miles north-east from the above farm, was arrested for the murder of Mr. Buck. He was examined, and committed to prison to await the action of the Grand Jury. Tuesday, Sept. 16th, 1856, he was indicted for murder at the Madison Oyer and Terminer ; and the next morning he was put upon his trial - Justice Shankland presiding. David J. Mitchell and Henry C. Goodwin were the Counsel for the People. Gerrit Smith, Duane Brown and William H. Kinney were the Counsel for the prisoner. Mr. Smith and Mr. Mitchell argued the case. Saturday morning, the Jury, not being able to agree, were discharged.

Monday, Des 1st, 1856, the prisoner was again put on trial at the adjourned Madison Oyer and Terminer - Justice Mason presiding. The same counsel as before: and Mr. Smith and Mr. Mitchell again arguing the case. Friday evening the Jury acquitted the prisoner.

Mr. Zecher says, that he was born in Frankfort-on-the-Main, in Germany, March 6th, 1830; that he married Mary Bagung, of Harburg, Hanover, August 5th, 1853; that they set sail from Bremen, Nov. 5th, 1853, and landed in New-York December 20th. Their only child, Charles, was born October 80th, 1855.

Mr. Zecher and wife, like their parents, belong to the Lutheran Church.

May it please the Court:

Gentlemen of the Jury:

As you are, aware, the prisoner has once be ore been put on trial for his life.

I was sad, very sad, when I learned that the former jury could not agree. In a few days, however, I was glad of it; for in a few days new testimony turned up in favor of the prisoner, which could not fail to make his innocence more apparent, and to restore him to society an unsuspected man.

You are aware too, that on the former trial also, I took part in defending the prisoner. I did so, because I was convinced then; as I am now, of his entire innocence of the crime laid to his charge. I do not suppose that you, gentlemen, can be as thoroughly convinced of it as I am. Few can be; for few have had my opportunities to witness the manifestations of his harmless, childlike spirit, and to study the beautiful traits of his character.

My conviction of the innocence of the prisoner dates back to my first knowledge of the principal facts in the case of Mr. Buck's death. As soon as I heard of his cutting off of the skirts of his coat, I was persuaded of his innocence. For I could not imagine that a man of sanity and common-sense would go straightway from the perpetration of such a bloody deed, and cut off the skirts of his coat. I could not imagine that such a man would thus advertise himself as the murderer. It is just what a simpleton, an idiot, a madman might do, in such circumstances, but it is the very last thing that a man of sanity and

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common-sense, (and such is the prisoner,) would do. Yes, so it was, that whilst so many others regarded the cutting off of the skirts as a very strong evidence of his guilt, I could not fail to regard it as a very strong evidence of his innocence. By all the laws of mind, by all our knowledge of man, by all the history of human nature, the cutting off of the skirts betrayed not guilt, but proved innocence.

Having heard that the prisoner was a German, I went to see him a few days after he was committed to jail. So occupied is all my time, that but for my having heard of his being a German, I should probably never have seen him. With the help of may little knowledge of his language and his little knowledge of mine, we were able to understand each other pretty well.

His countenance pleased me at first sight; for you see how open, and pleasant, and intelligent it is. Not less was I pleased with his simple, artless manners, and with his straightforward account of himself. I left him with a deeper conviction of his innocence. Since then I have visited him frequently; and have received a great many letters from him written in his own language. I feel that I am now well acquainted with him; that I have read his heart, and understand his character.

Having, before I ever saw him, believed him to be innocent; and having confirmed this belief through the influence of his looks, and lips, and manners, I could not refuse to defend him. He stood before me a stranger in a strange land; a friendless foreigner; above all, an innocent man ; and I saw how frightfully strong the tide of predudice and hatred was running against him. How could I refuse to defend him ?

I would here say that it is the truthfulness of the prisoner, which, more than all his other virtues, has impressed me. It is this, which is in my eye, the chief charm of his character. It is by this, more than by all things else, that he has won my heart.

Out of the scores of instances in which the prisoner has been interrogated in regard to Mr. Buck's death, the Counsel for the People been able to find but one, in which the answer was contrary to truth. That was his "No" at Sherman's - an innocent mistake, as we shall hereafter show. Innumerable are the instances in which persons have visited him in the jail, some of them for the purpose of seeing him cross himself, and of catching him in his words. Had they succeeded, the vigilant Prosecutor would have quickly learned it, and would have been sure to bring his proofs of it before you.

Nothing is more beautiful or sublime than steadfastness in the truth, especially when it is maintained at the hazard of life. A glorious example of sash steadfastness is attributed, I know not how justly, to that celebrated English patriot, Algernon Sidney. After he was condemned to die, the proposition was made to him to save his life by denying his authorship of certain papers. His prompt answer was: "When God by his providence teaches me, that, in order to save my life, it is necessary for me to tell a lie, He teaches me by the same providence, that I have lived long enough. I am ready to die."

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This was indeed beautiful and sublime. And yet I have seen in the humble, prisoner before you instances of adherence to the truth as uncompromising and as self-sacrificing as any which grace the life of the best of men.The Court could not have. allowed us to prove them; and therefore we did not offer to prove them. Very glad would we have been to have you hear from the lip's of several witnesses his noble answer to the formal and solemn proposition, that he should confess the crime of manslaughter, go to State prison for a few years, and save his life. "When," said he, "the Almighty God brings me into a place in which I see I must lose my life, I am willing to lose it. But I am noting to tell a lie to save it. I never hurt Mr. Buck." I wish too, you could have had in proof before you his no less noble answer on another occasion. The witness, Mr. Cole, was sure until a few hours before he came to the stand on the former trial that it was the day of Mr. Buck's death that he saw him and the prisoner sitting together by Mr. Buck's fire. The prisoner knew that it was the day before; and he sternly refused to let Mr. Cole testify under his mistaken impression. He wished to live, but not by letting the witness swear falsely.

I referred to the new evidence which came to light soon aver the former trial. But, gentlemen, it is not only with the advantage of this new, abundant, and decisive testimony that I stand before you. I rejoice in the further advantage of knowing what will be the probable positions and reasonings in the speech that is to follow me. When I spoke to the former jury, I could not know what. would be the Prosecutor's lines of argument. I could not know use he would make of the testimony.; what views her would take of it; what theories he would build upon it; what conclusions he would deduce from it. I felt the disadvantage of going before him.But now, in no unimportant sense and to no small extent, I have the advantage of following him.

The Counsel for the People takes the ground, that Mr. Buck was murdered - not that he was killed in the passion of the moment, but that he was killed with premeditation, with deliberate purpose, with malice. In a word, he takes the ground that this is not a case of manslaughter, but a case of murder. His Honor, Judge Shankland, who presided at the former trial, told the jury, that if here was a crime, it was murder. His Honor was undoubtedly right. Had Mr. Buck been a young man, or any thing less than a very old man, he might, by means of some deeply offensive remark; by means of some intensely insulting or exasperating expression; have provoked a deadly blow. But he was a feeble old man, bent down under the weight of more than eighty years; and surely no person's anger could be roused to strike such a man. It is true, that I have heard of wretches who could slap their mothers, but never of any who could slap their grandmothers.

We proceed then to inquire for what purpose, Buck was murdered. Was it to answer the calls of hatred, and to gratify revenge? But so far as I have learned, there was no person but Blowers, who hated him: and I have no belief, that his was the deadly hatred, which

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prompts to murder. It is true that Blowers had, by his own confession, a pretty earnest quarrel with him; that he swore at him and threatened to sue him. But certainly he might have had such a quarrel without murdering him. Again, if Blowers had been wicked enough to murder him, he surely would not have been so foolish, as to murder him in open daylight, and by the side of a turnpike road. And again, had he been wicked enough to murder him, it does not follow, that he would have been wicked enough to leave this poor innocent foreigner to be arrested and put on trial for the murder. That would have been adding one murder to another, and the last the worst. No, if Buck was murdered, it was not out of hatred, and to gratify a spirit of revenge. What then could he have been murdered for? For what else than his money? But whatever prompted to his murder, it is unreasonable to suppose, that he was murdered at mid-day and in a barn, which stands on the side of a much travelled road. He would have been murdered under the cover of night - in his house - in his bed. He lived alone, and the old hermit might have been murdered without the danger of human witnesses.

But why say Buck was murdered for his money? His money was found upon his person. Yes, but there are proofs that his money was sought for. Are there? If sought for, why not found? If found, why not taken? But it was not taken; and hence, it was neither found nor sought for. What however, are the proofs, that his money was sought for?

1st. Blood was found in the house. But it was not found nor looked for until the next day after Buck's death: and the evening of his death several persons went from the bloody barn and bloody body into the house, taking with them, as it may reasonably be suspected, on their hands and clothes, more or less blood.

But who saw blood in the house? Howard. Poor Howard! so greatly did the occasion play upon his imagination, that he saw blood everywhere. He could see the bloody print of a, whole hand. He saw blood even on the cupboard - thus making his murderer as greedy for meat as for money. But you remember the spirit of his testimony. There are persons - I hope he is not one of them - the highest luxury of whose life is to see a man hung.

Clark testified on this point; and, although he is the son-in-law of Mr. Buck, never did I see in a witness more self-possession, nor a freer play of reason and candor. He looked for blood where Howard saw it - but did not find it. He saw here and there slight stains but in his eye they had no appearance of blood. All the blood he saw on the house was a spot "as big as a wheat corn." He saw also "some specks on the wood" in the chimney corner.

Topliff also testified on this point. He searched for blood, but found none - not even on the wood. He searched for it in the ashes. He searched for it in the snow, wherever he supposed the bloody ax might have been cleaned. But all in vain. No blood could he find. But would it have been the least proof of murder, had even many and large spots of blood been found in the house? The prisoner was in the house every day, or every day or two; and never did I hear of

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a person so subject to the nose-bleed. We have brought physicians before you, who swore that some two years ago they prescribed for his nose-bleed; and other physicians, who have known of his nosebleed during the last year. Dr. Barnett swears that he has seen the prisoner faint from the loss of blood and his shirt saturated with it; and that his turns of nose-bleed were sometimes as frequent as three times a week. Had blood, and, even in considerable quantities, been found upon the wood, it might have got there when he was chopping it.

But why make any account of the blood found in the house, which, at the most, was but a few well-nigh, imperceptible particles? The only question here of the least importance is, whether blood was found upon the chest or upon the chest of drawers? There was none: and I add here, that none was found upon the pocket-book. Just where blood would be most like to be found, had the killing of Buck been for money, there was not a speck.

2d. The next proof that money was sought for, is in the brokenopen conition of the chest of drawers. But this was disposed of by Mr. Jones, who swore that he had, before Buck's death, noticed it to be in this same condition.

3d. The next proof that money or other treasure was sought for, is in the marks that the chest (I am not speaking now of the chest of drawers) had been broken open. But what were these marks? White testified, that there were slight marks on the lid, and slighter on the edge.Clark saw none on the edge.Barnett and Topliff saw none on the edge, and only a little scratch on the lid. Evidence that the mere pin-scratch, which Clark saw, might have been there for years, is in the fact testified to by him, that it looks as new now, as it did the day Buck was killed. So will it look as new ten years hence as now, if, during all that time, the light and air shall be exeluded from it.

But how idle was it to undertake to prove that the chest was pried open! What motive to go to the pains of prying it open, when the key was one of the bunch in Buck's pocket?

I ask again, why believe that Buck was murdered, when his money was found in his pocket, and when too, the money and silver spoons and watch in the chest were all undisturbed? Strange murder this! A MURDER WITHOUT A MOTIVE: A CRIME WITHOUT A CAUSE. But the Prosecutor will perhaps argue, that this is one of those cases, in which the murderer is so horrified at what he has done, as to run immediately after he has struck the fatal blow. Surely, however, it is not competent for him to say so, since a vital part of the hypothesis on which he seeks to establish the guilt of the prisoner, is, that after having killed Buck, he tarried in the barn to make arrangements for hiding the murder; and then took time to wash the bloody ax, and to carry it across the street to its proper place in the most, distant room of the house. No, there is not one sign, that the alleged slayer of Buck belonged to the class of easily affrighted murderers. On the contrary, there is, according to my opponent's theory of the ease, every sign, that he was as self-possessed and defiant, as cool and leisurely a murderer, as ever lived.

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But if Buck was murdered, with what was he murdered? With an ax is an essential, part of the Prosecutor's hypothesis. What ax? That, which was kept in the south-east or most distant room of Buck's house. Is she Counsel in earnest? Does he really mean that the murderer carried the ax from the house to the barn, and then back to the house, accross a turnpike road, on which, according to the testimony, an unusual number of sleighs were passing, during the mid-day hour assigned for the murder? Absurdity of absurdities? Nonsense of all nonsense! Murder seeks concealment. It does not court publicity. But why was this the ax? Because it was bloody when found. Of course: and to be in keeping with this boldest and most reckless of all murders, it should have been very bloody. To correspond with the various other and purposed publications the murder, the ax should have been allowed to drip blood all the way from the barn to the house. Nevertheless so it was, that not one speck of blood was to be found between the barn and the house; and so it was, too, in, the view of the witnesses, that the ax had the appearance of having been "washed or wiped." Most inconsistent murderer! Why, the fellow was as inconsistent as our slavery politicians and pro-slavery divines. He should have been as bold and bloody at the last as at the first.

But to be serious - was the ax bloody? I do not ask whether Howard saw blood upon it. When this poor victim of an inflamed imagination swore that he saw "a chunk of ice and blood" upon the ax, I was more pained than amused by this instance of imagination run mad. No, you do not care to remember what Howard swore. But what did men swear, who had not surrendered their reason to their imagination? White swore that there were slight appearances of blood upon the ax, "diluted and pale." He saw such an appearance "about one eighth inch wide" across one side of the helve. The blood, which Howard swore he saw in a flaw of the ax, White called "a rusty look on the bit of the ax." Clark swore that the slight appearances of blood "looked old."

And now for the explanation of the bloody appearances on the ax.

1^st. Howard did not see the ax until some sixteen hours after the discovery of Buck's death; and the other witnesses saw it still later. But during these sixteen hours blood designedly or undesignedly may have come in contact with it.

2d. As little blood as was found upon this ax, may be found on no very small share of the axes that are in use.

3d. It, may well be supposed that the prisoner, who spent so much of his time at Buck's, used this ax occasionally. And it is only strange that his everlasting nose-bleed did not bloody every thing he touched.

4th. A calf had been "killed with this ax a few weeks, before. I know that Blowers swears that it was not with this ax. But I must judge him to be mistaken, because he is confronted by several witnesses as positive as himself. I do not call in question Blowers' sincerity.

5th. But the testimony of Cole most satisfactorily and beautifully

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explains any and all bloody appearances upon the ax. And when we have such a simple explanation at hand, it is unphilosophical and absurd to go in quest of another. When too we have an explanation that makes for innocence, it is exceedingly unjust, wicked, base, to be mousing after one that will involve guilt. Only the afternoon of the day before Buck's death, Cole worked a long time upon his broken cutter with this axe. His fingers were bleeding from wounds not yet five hours old. The falling snow melted and mingled with the blood of his wounds, and gave it to the "diluted and pale" appearance, of which White spoke. Moreover, this fully accounts for the ax's appearing to have been "washed or wiped."

But it is said that the snow and ice upon the ax would have melted before the next day. And what if this were so? Could not more have collected upon it by Buck's use of it, the morning and afternoon of the day he was killed? He kept it in his room for daily use in clearing off his door-sill, or in doing whatever else an ax might be needed for.

Is it true, however, that the snow and ice would have melted? It is manifestly untrue.

1st. The weather was very cold, and there was but one fire in the house.

2d. Buck's house was too old, dilapidated, and open to be fit to live in.

3d. There was no stove in the house, nothing better for warmth than large fire-places. The ax stood five feet one side from the centre of the fire-place.

4^th. Buck was famously economical of wood.

5^th. Both Wednesday and Thursday nights there was no fire in the house, for both of those nights Buck slept at Howard's. Before one o'clock on Thursday Cole found Buck sitting over and expiring fire. There is no probability that it was re-built. We learn by Hamblin that the fire was not built on Friday until after ten o'clock, and that it was a small fire. Howard makes it ten when Buck left his (Howard's) house.

Now, in the light of these facts, it is simply absurd to say that the ice and snow, which were upon the ax on Thursday afternoon, must have melted off by Friday.

But suppose it is true that Buck was killed with the ax, in other words, that he was murdered, why single out the prisoner as the murderer?

1st. Must he be singled out because he is poor? Indeed, he is poor. On my first visit to him he told me that he had not one cent. But is a man to be suspected of crime, and of the highest crime too, simply because he is poor?

2d. Must he be singled out because he is a foreigner and a stranger? Is a man so much more like to be the criminal, because he is a foreigner and a stranger?

3d. Must be he singled out as the murderer because he was at Buck's the day Buck was Killed? He spent many of his days there in chopping and other work. He was there all the previous day.

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4th. Must he be singled out as the murderer because he disappeared so suddenly from Hamblin's view? Let us, recall the facts regarding this disappearance. As Hamblin was about leaving Buck Friday morning, he saw through the windows a person (evidently the prisoner) pass-west. Hamblin went out, looked: east and west, and saw no one. But, according to Mr. Lincklaen, who surveyed and mapped the localities in question on this trial, the prisoner, had he turned and gone south in the path to Buck's woods, would, in a moment or two, have been out of Hamblin's sight, even had Hamblin looked south also, as well as east and west. The disappearance would, have been owing to the board fence on the south side of the barn-yard, and to the descent of the ground south of that fence. Now, did the prisoner take, that direction, or did he, as the prosecutor would have you believe, dart around Buck's house to hide himself with murderous intent? You have but the prisoner's word for believing that he went to the woods, and was gone some fifteen or twenty minutes for the purpose of throwing into a heap wood he had chopped the day before. But happily you have the Welshman's (Zephaniah Jones') oath, that the prisoner was gone about that length of time; and that instead of being a lurking murderer, he stood out in open day by the side of the road, and exposed to the observation of whoever might pass him. The Welshman, as he went west by Buck's, saw the prisoner in full view. God be praised for this Welshman! But for him there would have been an enduring suspicision that the prisoner was hastening to hide himself, when Hamblin saw him pass so quickly by the windows.

5th. Must the prisoner be singled out as the murderer because he was seen on his way from Buck's to walk fast by one house, (Mr. Westcott's)? But remember, that by one of the next houses, and for a quarter of a mile, he was noticed by Lovina Chapin to walk slow. Remember, too, that Reed testified that he saw him walking fast on his way to Buck's that morning. He added that the prisoner was in the habit of walking fast, and even running, when on his way home. Little conscious was the simple-minded Reed of the beautiful compliment to Zecher, which lay folded up in these words. I was not surprised to hear of this habit of walking fast, and running toward home; for never did I know an instance of stronger love to wife and child. No, it surely should be no wonder, if in the case of the prisoner, as in that of. another homeward bound husband and parent, whom a sweet British poet describes:

But that the prisoner did not hurry home from Buck's that day, is very manifest from the fact that, when he had gone two miles of the three, he went of his own accord into Sherman's, and sat there half an hour.

A few words right here in reply to the position taken by the prosecutor on the former trial, that the prisoner's going into Sherman's was an affectation of ease and unconcern for the purpose of turning off all suspicion from himself as the murderer.That it was such an af-

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fectation the prosecutor argued very ingeniously and impressively from the fact, that the prisoner asked work of Sherman, whilst only that very day he had, on his way to Buck's, declined to work for Wadsworth. On the present trial, however, we have been able to bring forward testimony, which has effectually blocked the way of the prosecutor at this point. Let us see, gentlemen, precisely how this matter stands before you.

1st. It is not true that the prisoner absolutely refused to work for Wadsworth. Wadsworth swears that he asked the prisoner to chop for him, and that he answered: "I have a job of chopping for Mr. Stone."Wadsworth then asked him if he would chop for him when he had done chopping for Mr., Stone. He answered: "I will see."

2d. We have proved by Stone that the prisoner had chopped for him a little time before Buck's death, and was under engagement to chop more for him. We have proved also, in order to justify his preference to chop for Stone, that whilst Stone's woods are only a quarter of a mile from the prisoner's house, Wadsworth's are two miles and a half from it.

3d. To show that he already had chopping enough to do, we have proved, that he was chopping more or less every week for Buck.

4th. But he did not ask for chopping at Sherman's. He proposed there to hire himself out by "the month for the open season of the year to do farm-work.

5th. Remember, too, that whilst Wadsworth's woods are 2 1/2 miles from the prisoner's house, Sherman's farm is less than a mile.

Right here, too, I would notice the .attempt of the counsel for the people to make something out of the fact that, on the prisoner's return home the day of Buck's death, he told Myron Mead, (in a part of whose house you recollect the prisoner lived,) that he had been at Sherman's, but did not tell him he had been at Buck's. That he should tell him of his being at Sherman's, and of his conversation with him about work and wages, etc., was very natural, for this was news.But that he should tell him as a piece of news that he had been at Buck's, when Mead so well knew that he was at Bucks half the time, would provoke him, were he a profane man, to exclaim ironically and derisively: "The devil you have!"

But, gentlemen of the jury, I will return from these digressions to resume the questioning on which I had entered. I had asked why, if Buck was murdered, the prisoner, should be singled out as the murderer. I had asked, was it,

1st. Because he is poor ?

2d. Because he is a foreigner and a stranger ?

3d. Because he was at Buck's that day ?

4th. Because he disappeared so suddenly from Hamblin's view ?

5th. Because Mrs. Westcott saw him walking fast?

You have seen, that for none of these reasons should he be singled out as the murderer. I now proceed to ask you whether he should be so singled out.

6th. Because he said "No" at Sherman's, when he should have said

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"Yes"? Sherman asks him: "Have you been at Buck's today ?" Answer: " I was there yesterday and cut him some two-feet wood." Sherman then says: You have not been there to-day ?" Answer: " No." ;Shir&6n then asks: "How does Mr. Buck get along?" Answer: "He is smart."

Now the prisoner was aware, that Sherman saw him pass every day, or almost every day, ax in hand, to chop for Buck. How natural then that the should fall into the mistake that Sherman asked him, if he had been chopping there that day! His answer itself shows that he fell into it. That he should interpret then question also to refer to chopping, is still more natural.His answer to the last question speaks of Buck as he was at that time, and not as he was at some former time. His answer implies that he spoke of Buck's condition that day.

It is a shame to make a man an offender for a word, especially a foreigner, who knows our language so imperfectly, as the prisoner does, By the witnesses Mead, Waggoner, Havens, Mayberry, and Barnett, we have shown how blundering was his speech before his arrest, and how blundering it has been since. Some of the witnesses speak of frequent mutual misapprehensions, when conversing with the prisoner.

But there are two other answer to the charge that the prisoner uttered a willful falsehood at Sherman's.

1st. Never anywhere else did he deny having been at Buck's that day. We were ready to prove that he promptly admitted it, when he was arrested. But such proof would not have been admitted. Sure may you be, however, gentlemen, that had he denied it, abundant proof of the denial would have been brought before you.

2d. The other answer to the charge of willful falsehood is, that there would have been no possible motive for it. A dozen people saw him all along the way to Buck's, and a dozen people saw him all along the way back.

What, if on my way home this evening, a man shall ask me if I have been to Morrisville, and I shall answer, "No" - is he, when he learns that I have been there, to set me down a liar? Certainly not. For why should I be so wicked as to lie? Moreover, why should I be so foolish as to tell a lie when there are a thousand witnesses to convict me of of it? The man should take it for granted that I had simply misapprehended his question. And so, too, Sherman should have taken it for granted that his question was misunderstood by the prisoner.

Oh! it is very unjust, very cruel, to seize upon this innocent mistake of the prisoner, and to torture it into an attempt to hide a murder! And in this connection would I speak of the map, exhibited to you by the Counsel for the People. So far as the intent of that map was to show the order of events, and to mark time, I have no complaint to make of it. But when it is used for the purpose of tracking the prisoner as a sly murderer on his way to and from Buck's, then is its effect upon him most unjust, most cruel. For when has the prisoner denied that he went to Buck's, and returned from Bucks, by just

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the routes, and past just the buildings, which the map indicates? Never, never, never. From first to last he has always admitted every thing proposed to be taught by the map. In this connection would I also refer to the attempt of the Counsel for the People to make something on the former trial out of the foot that the prisoner returned home from Buck's by a different way from that, which he took to go there. But it turns out that the two roads are of nearly equal length; that the one, on which he returned, was less drifted, and better beaten than the other; and, moreover, that it had been repeatedly travelled by him before.

The Miss Shermans testified that the prisoner, when at their house, looked pale. That this was only their subsequent imagination seems quite probable from the fact that they confess, they never spoke of the paleness, until after tjey heard that he had killed Buck. But when You recollect how frequent were the seasons of his nose-bleeding, and how pale he was at those seasons, as proved by Dr. Barnett, you will make no account of the Miss Shermans' testimony.

I proceed, gentleman, with my inquiries, why, if Buck was murdered, the prisoner should be singled out as the murderer.

7th. Must he be singled out because he cut off the skirt of his coat soon after returning home from Buck's ? But, as I have already said, his doing so betrayed not his guilt, but proved his innocence. This would be still so, (though I admit not so unqualifiedly,) even if he had burnt the skirt. But he did not burn it. It is preserved until this day, and it reaches all around the coat, except the corner, from which, as Blakeslee and Hageman testified, a large piece had by accident been torn long before Buck's death.

Why did the prisoner cut off his skirt? Happily he assigned the reason in his broken English in the presence of the little girl, who testified before you yesterday. You recollect, gentlemen, that the Counsel for the People objected to her telling the reason, which the prisoner gave for cutting off his skirt. He held that it was not legal testimony. You recollect, too, how quickly I then implored him, for the sake of justice and humanity, to let her tell it ; and you recollect, too, how promptly he yielded to my appeal. His concession, at this important point, did him much honor. In both the trials he had impressed me with his great ability. But when he made this concession for the sake of the poor prisoner, my heart went out to his, and I felt like doing him a thousand-fold more honor for his generosity and goodness, than for all the power of his brilliant intellect. I add, gentlemen, that the liberality of the counsel in this instance was a beautiful example of magnanimity and justice, which the profession would do well to follow. But to return, what was this reason, which the little girl swore the prisoner gave for cutting off his skirt? Why, it was just that most simple and natural reason, which shows how entirely innocent he was in cutting it off. She swore that having cut off the skirt, he ladd the pieces down, saying: "They will be good to mend my coat with." And you, gentlemen of the jury, saw how much his poor old tattered coat needed mending, if, indeed, you thought it worth mending. Never was my heart more touched than

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by a few words, he spoke to me on the former trial. He watched the jurors, as they inspected the coat and skirt. He feared that they could not enter into his destitution, and, sympathize with him, and understand why he should save such rags to mend such rags, and he whispered into my ear: "Oh Mr. Smith! They don't know how poor I am!

Why did the prisoner choose that day for cutting off his skirt? His own account for himself makes this and every other matter plain. Of course, such account is not evidence. Nevertheless It may be useful as one of the hypotheses to aid you in solving the problems in this case. The prisoner says that he did not enter upon this day as one of his chopping days; but that he appropriated it to several necessary little pieces of work.

1st. He would go to Buck's, pile up the little wood that remained to be piled up; settle with Buck; and buy some meat. He says that Buck told him that for lack of change he could not pay him that day, but that if he would work for him the next day, or Monday, he would be prepared to pay him.

2d. He would that day mend his coat; but so it was that when he came to sew, his thread was gone. The German, (Hageman,) who had lived with him, had used the thread without the prisoner's knowledge. So Hageman testified before you.

3d. He would that day write to his parents in Germany. This purpose he fulfilled, as you learned from the testimony of Mead and the little girl.

I pass on now, gentlemen, to the next u query.

8th. Must the prisoner be singled out as the murderer, because his coat was bloody? If all besmeared with blood, would not his habitual nose-bleed, and, what we have also proved, his occasional butchering, satisfactorily account for it? But, gentlemen of the jury, is there any blood upon either the coat or pieces? There is a spot of blood on the under side of one of the buttons, and the button being horn, the prisoner could, of course, have cleaned it in an instant. His cutting the day before the fingers, which one uses in buttoning a coat, explains this spot of blood. Mead swore to the cut, and one of the Miss Shermans noticed that it was bloody. Now, I venture to affirm that, beyond this one spot, no blood is to be seen on either pieces or coat. None else was seen by you. None else was seen by the former jury. You saw two or three very slight and faint stains. So did the former jury. As they appear now, just so did they appear then. It is indeed possible that there may be a little diluted blood in one or more of those stains, but I deny that there is to the eye any evidence of it. New cider, wine, grease, a thousand other things, I can easily conceive, might produce such stains as these; but unless a person is intent on finding blood in them, I care not how keen his vision, he can not find it.

But whence comes it then that, in this state of facts, witnesses could awar positively before you, that they saw blood - blood in several places - on the coat and pieces? It is for them - not me - to

answer. They swore upon their own responsibility. I am glad it was

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not on mine. They did not claim to see blood now. Wit had become of it? They judged that it must have faded out! The cost and pieces have, from the time they were found, been kept under look and key, and excluded from all light and air-and yet the blood has faded out! Superlative nonsense! They have been handled too, say these witnesses. The stains - if indeed such exceedingly slight discolorations may be called stains - have been looked at, not handled. And what, pray, is the sum total of the time, that the coat and pieces have been handled? Not one hour. These witnesses swear now, as they did before, to a great change in the coat and pieces. On the former trial I was disposed to laugh at them - to make fun of them and to quote Shakespeare over them; but I am in a different and sterner mood to-day. I confessed on that trial that there was indeed a change: but I showed them that the change was exclusively in themselves. They went to the prisoner's house for money. Finding none they looked for blood. Their imaginations could not coin money, but they could easily coin blood. Hence they found blood, blood, blood - blood in abundance, blood here, and blood there, and blood everywhere. But when they came into Court, they could no longer see the blood. They could no longer see it, because they stood no longer upon enchanted ground. They could no longer see it, because their burning imaginations had got cool. They could no longer see it, because reason had reasserted her sway over them, and those phantoms of a distempered fancy which had so sadly abused their understandings, had given place to sober realities.

I said that I am in a sterner mood to-day. I could have borne it, had the witnesses testified that. these, slight stains looked somewhat like, or even much like, blood - though. to swear thus would have been very extravagant, and very unjust. But when I heard them swear positively, that they saw blood, and blood, and blood, I confess that a well-nigh irrepressible indignation rose within me. Oh! it is wicked to be eager to adopt the worst constructions, and to form the most uncharitable judgments against our brother! Oh! it is devilish to do so, when the purpose is to aid in compassing his death! Emphatically true is this when the poor perilled brother is a stranger, and a foreigner, and destitute; and therefore lies mute and helpless upon the bosom of our mercies.

But why have I spent so much time upon "the bloody coat," which proves not to be a bloody coat? The theory of the Prosecutor is, that the blood of the murdered Buck flew everywhere - all around, and also upon the joists and floor above. But not one speck of blood was found on the prisoner's pantaloons, and they were light-colored too. Melissa Sherman swore, that her attention was drawn to them because they looked "so clean and new." The prisoner had probably put them on that morning, fresh washed and ironed by his neat and industrious German wife. I dismiss this topic with the simple remark, that to claim that the blood of Buck is on the coat, whilst yet compelled to admit that there is not one particle of it on the pantaloons, is infinite folly and absurdity.

I proceed to my next inquiry.

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9th. Must the prisoner be singled out as the murderer, because he happened to be present the evening that Jason Mead entertained his company with those lies and wonders about Buck.'s treasures - gaping, as you recollect the old lady Mrs. Van Patten testified, that there was money "in every chest, drawer, aid- trunk" in Buck's house - also in a jug in the cellar, and in the cellar walls? For the prisoner's happening to hear this, the Prosecutor would have him hung. ould the Prosecutor consent to be dealt with himself in this wise? Would this Doctor be willing to take his own medicine? The Prosecutor lives in the same village with Dr. Havens. Now, what if he should hear such stuff about the Doctor's riches, as the prisoner heard about Buck's : and the Doctor should afterwards be found killed? Would he admit that to be hung would be but his due penalty for having heard such stuff?

We learn from Mrs. Van Patten's testimony, and it bore every mark of being the testimony of a candid, worthy woman, that the prisoner behaved himself beautifully on the occasion. Mead heaped reproaches on Buck: but the prisoner vindicated him, and deplored his solitary, comfortless life. The prisoner was Buck's friend; and from what the prisoner and Hageman and others have told me, I believe that there were few beings, whom Buck loved as much, as the prisoner's baby. I believe that so person mourned more sincerely than the prisoner on the death of Buck.

The attempt has been made on this trial to show by the witness M. Jones, that the mutual friendship of Buck and the prisoner was interrupted on one occasion. They had an earnest disagreement about a petty matter: and the prisoner said: "You lie, you lie, you lie." But what did the prisoner mean? Simply, that Buck was mistaken. Over and 'over again, has the prisoner, when speaking to me of the testimony, said: "This right" - " that lie. But he would not have used so harsh a word, had our language been more at his command. Doubtless, -gentlemen, you have often observed; that a foreigner, who knows but little of our language, will, when excited and struggling to get out a word, get out one that is offensive, and altogether uncalled for. So, too, you have often observed, that a person ekes out his imperfect knowledge of a foreign language with violent gestures. But Jones testifies, that the gesture, with which the prisoner accompanied his accusation, in this instance, was, only a gentle motion of the hand. The gentleness of the motion proves that anger prompted neither it nor the words. Indeed, Jones says, that Buck and the prisoner were friendly to each other immediately after this disagreement.

It is no small proof of the continued mutual friendship of Buck and the prisoner, that when the prisoner came to remove his family from Buck's to Mead's, they parted on friendly terms, and each invited a visit from the other. So testifies Blakeslee. Hageman lived for weeks in the same room with Buck and the prisoner's family. He testifies to a strong uninterrupted friendship between Buck and the prisoner. He says that the prisoner had the entire freedom of the whole house; and that he had often seen Buck hand his keys to the

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prisoner, and request him to get something from the chest. How absurd the charge, in the light of the last fact, that the prisoner pried open the chest!

I proceed to my next inquiry.

10th. Must the prisoner be singled out as the murderer because of the testimony of Mrs. and Miss Ticker? They believe that they saw Buck, and another man with an ax, going from the house toward the tarp. But if this other man was the prisoner, why not suppose that they were going to the woods, whither they often went: together, the prisoner with his ax? I do not, however, attach very great importance to this testimony of the ladies. They were top far off to be certain of what they saw. For

1st. Although Buck was very deaf and the conversation, therefore, between him and the other man necessarily very loud, the ladies did not hear it.

2d. They cannot tell whether Buck's companion resembled the prisoner.

3d. They disagree as to which hand he carried the ax in.

4th. They, were so far off as to disagree on the important point whether it was Buck or his companion, who was next to them. This disagreement convinces me that they were at least thirty rods off. I have made many experiments on this point; and I find that if two persons are walking nearly abreast of each other, and you have a side view of them, you must be some thirty rods off before it becomes uncertain which is nearer to you. But at that distance an ax can not be distinguished from a cane.

I am strongly inclined to believe that te ladies saw Buck and another man (perhaps the prisoner, for he was there about that time) walking in front of Buck's house. They do not swear to, as the creation of fancy. It is true that they said nothing of it to the gentlemen with whom they were riding, nor to any other persons, until after they heard that Buck was murdered. Nevertheless I think they saw something. How much it is not easy to judge. Not at all do I question their integrity. They are ladies of good character. But if so many men in this case have been swayed by an excited imagination, why can we not suppose that women also may have come under such a disturbing and misleading influence?

But why, because the prisoner was there about that time, suspect him of the murder? Many people were there, or passing there, at that time. Why not suspect some of them? If my clerk is found murdered in my office, why suspect me? I have been with him from day to day, and have not harmed him. So too, the prisoner had been with Buck from day to day, and often ax in hand, and had not harmed him. Why then suspect him?

I ask again, why, because the prisoner was there about the time the ladies speak of, suspect him of having killed Buck ? The prisoner was there but about an hour that day - say from nearly 11 to nearly 12. But the most reasonable hypothesis is, that Buck was killed

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between 5 and 6 o'clock. And now what was the one-relied-on argument of the Counsel for the People at the former trial for rejecting this hypothesis, and for dating Buck's death at from 11 to 12 o'clock? It was, that all were bound to infer from the testimony of the ladies, that Buck, and the prisoner ax in hand, went into the barn; that Buck never came out again; but that the prisoner then and there killed him.

This testimony of the ladies played the all-important part on the former trial. But for it, the jury would, of course, have promptly acquitted the prisoner. So important indeed, was this testimony in the eye of the Prosecutor, that in reply to my criticisms upon it, he frankly said, that he staked the whole case upon it; and that if this fell, he would let the prosecution fall with it. But this testimony has virtually fallen. Certain it is, that testimony discovered since the former trial leaves that of the ladies of no value to the Prosecution. The theory that Buck was killed in his barn immediately after the spectacle sworn to by the ladies, is utterly exploded by his reappearance at his own door, nearly half an hour afterwards. And here, gentlemen of the jury, I would say: believe, if you think it reasonable to believe it, that the ladies saw all, and imagined no part, of what they swore to; believe, if you think it reasonable to believe it, that the prisoner, ax in hand, went with Buck into the barn. Such belief can make for the prisoner only, for it can make only for the prisoner to believe that on that day, as well as on other days, he could be, ax in hand, with Buck, and yet not kill him.

I now take the Counsel for the People at his word - at his word given on the former trial - and I ask him to abandon the prosecution. Will he consent to abandon it? I pause for a reply. He does not consent to abandon it. Perhaps he is not entirely certain that it was after the ladies passed by Buck's, that he was seen alive at his door. Perhaps he would have me prove from the testimony, that it was after. I will accommodate him. And now, gentlemen of the jury, to the proof that it was after the ladies saw Buck, that Norman Felt saw him. I might prove it conclusively by any one of three lines of testimony. But - I prefer to prove it by them all.

In spreading before you those three lines of testimony, I will say nothing of the time of day. That is always more or less uncertain. I will confine myself to the order of events - for in that there is certainty.

A. Eleazer Seymour was in the sleigh with the ladies from Cazenovia to Morrisville. He observed, and has, under oath, minutely described, all the sleighs they met between Tog Hill (two miles west of Buck's) and Buck's. No one of them was at all like Felt's.

B. Half a mile east of Buck's, his sleigh met two others-one of which was drawn by a spirited single horse, and the other by a pair of gray horses. His (Seymour's) sleigh turned out into the deep snow to let the others pass. A whip was cracked, and they passed.

C. Norman Felt swears to these circumstances, which Seymour,

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who was in the sleigh with the ladies, swears presented themselves, half a mile east of Buck's, and he also swears that he is the person who was in the one-horse sleigh.

I need say no more, gentlemen, in connection with this first line of testimony., The demonstration is complete. The ladies and Felt met east of Buck's. He passed Buck's, and saw Buck after the ladies did. And now to the

Hamblin swears that, a quarter of a mile east of Buck's, he saw Rollin Coman in a cutter, and Zephaniah Jones, the Welshman; and that from nearly the same point in the road and at the same moment, Coman went east toward Morrisville, and the Welshman west toward Cazenovia. Coman swears that he met Felt at the Herrick place, one and a quarter miles east of Buck's; and that he drove all that distance quite slow, as he was constantly hindered by a sleigh drawn

by a pair of bay colts. The Welshman met the ladies only three quarters of a mile west of Buck's. Which then got to Buck's first, the ladies or Felt? Coman and Felt combined, had to travel two and a quarter miles, and the Welshman and the ladies combined, but one and three-quarter miles. Have you a doubt? You will quickly dismiss it, when you add to Felt's and Coman's time, that which they consumed in their conversation with each other. They agree in saying, that their conversation extended from ten to thirty minutes. That it was much much nearer thirty than ten minutes is probable from the following facts.

1st. That they: talked about important matters - about banks, and about the cattle business, in which they were both engaged.

2d. That Felt became much chilled by sitting still so long.

3d. That Coman, although driving fast, after he parted with Felt, did not again come in sight of the slow-moving colts.

Gentlemen, the second line of testimony is now before you; and like the first, it proves that it was after the ladies saw Buck, that Felt saw him. You remember, gentlemen, that in an early part of my argument I had occasion to say: "God be praised for this Welshman!" You see that here is another occasion for saying so - for you see how useful is his part in the line of testimony which I have just gone through with. Again then, do I say, "God be praised for this Welsh

man!" Ought we not to build monuments to his memory for the good service which he has rendered on this important trial to the cause of justice and the cause of mercy? But, gentlemen, we proceed to the third and last line of testimony.

Hamblin swears, that it was, at the most, but twenty-five minutes, (Reed makes it less,) from the time the Welshman started from the point a quarter of a mile east of Buck's to go west toward Cazenovia, before the ladies reached that point. But it must have taken them at least five minutes to wine (a pretty sharp hill in the way) from

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Buck's to that point. So, according to Hamblin, it was but twenty minutes from the time the Welshman left him, ere the ladies reached Buck's. But could Coman, who started east at the same time the Welshman started west, could he and Felt travel, between them, two and a quarter miles, and stop for their long conversation, and all this in twenty minutes? Why, their mere conversation took up the whole of the twenty minutes. Felt could not have reached Buck's until nearly half an hour after the ladies did.

And now, gentlemen of the jury, you have before you the three lines of testimony; and I ask you if they do not constitute in Scripture phrase, "a three-fold cord, that is not quickly broken?" Nay, gentlemen, I ask you if they do not constitute an adamantine chain, not one link of which can be severed? As well try to overturn the everlasting hills, as to overturn these solid and immovable structures of truth, which the witnesses have built up before you. And yet the Prosecutor had the temerity to make the attempt, as you saw when he called Mr. Donaldson to the stand. I thought I would say nothing to you of Donaldson's testimony, until I had spread out before you the invincible testimony of Felt, and Coman, and Seymour. In adopting this policy, I acted upon good John Newton's rule in carrying on a discussion: "Fill your bushel-measure with wheat, and then the chaff can't get in." I have preoccupied your minds with the pure wheat of. Felt's, and Coman's, and Seymour's testimony, and there is, therefore; no room in them for the chaff of Donaldon's. I call it chaff, not to disparage my friend Donaldson, who is an intelligent, respectable man, but to indicate the insignificant and valueless character of his testimony.

It seems that Donaldson travelled, the day of Buck's death, from Nelson to Morrisville. He has an impression that the man whom he met three quarters of a mile east of Buck's, was Felt. But he confesses that he did not know Felt, and that if he had not seen him here, and in these circumstances, he should not have conjectured that the man was Felt. He says distinctly, that he could not swear it was Felt. Moreover, he does not know what kind of a horse the man drove; nor does he know who owned. or drove the gray horses; nor whether they, stopped after he passed them.

How idle to confront the certain knowledge of Felt, Coman, and Seymour, with the mere conjectures and ignorance of Donaldson ! - the positive testimony of the one with the negative testimony of the other!

But after all, there is no necessary conflict between Donaldson's testimony and that of the other gentlemen. He saw the gray horses just where Felt and Seymour saw them; and if for any reason the gray horses stopped there a few minutes, then is there perfect harmony between the testimony of the two parties. Gentlemen, the gray horses did so stop. There is a man in this room, not behind any other in integrity, who only a few moments before I rose to address you, informed me that he saw them so stop, and was ready to make oath to it.

Gentlemen of the jury, the Counsel for the People saw that the

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testimony of Felt sad Coman, in establishing the fact that Buck was seen alive after,the ladies saw him, had broken the back of the prosecution, and virtually ended the case. What, in these circumstances, should he do? He hated to drop the case. Hence he resolved on undertaking to impeach the testimony of our witnesses. So far as he attempted to impeach their memory, I do not complain. So far as he attempted to impeach their veracity, I do complain. To assail the truthfulness of such respectable men as Felt and Coman, is to strike a blow at the social fabric itself; for it is to strike a blow at the mutual confidence on which that fabric rests. To deny in the Temple of Justice the claims of such men to credence, is to weaken its moral pillars, which are infinitely mightier and more essential than its marble pillars. Gentlemen, when the time shall have come to distrust the testimony of such men as Felt and Coman, then will the time have come to lock up your Court-houses, and throw away the keys.

And what did the Counsel for the People make out against Coman? Nothing but that he had assumed that H. Dewey kept the tavern where "H. Dewey" was on the sign. This assumption was certainly neither very strange nor very criminal.

And what did he make out against Felt? Nothing but that whilst he especially noticed not any thing else for several miles, he did especially notice Buck and another man standing a few rods from him. And is it strange that he did? Mr. Buck, with his great age, and with his long hair falling down upon his shoulders, was a man of extraordinary appearance, and especially noticeable. The other man he looked at to see if he were not the same, one he had met there a few month before and talked with about mules.

I wonder not a little, that the Counsel for the People did not undertake to cheapen the testimony of my excellent friend Seymour also. It would, indeed, have been a fruitless endeavor. Nevertheless, consistency required him to put it forth. For lucid and beautiful as was his testimony, and high as he stands in the public esteem, still he is not to be believed, if such men as Felt and Coman are not to be believed.

Gentlemen of the jury, why need I proceed any farther? I have proved to you beyond all possible controversy, that Buck was seen alive after the time when, upon the former trial, the Counsel for the People insisted that he was killed. And here let me acknowledge the merciful and remarkable providence which has enabled me to prove this important fact. As you are aware, I had, from the first, believed the prisoner to be innocent. Hence was I encouraged and prompted to go about as I have done, days and nights almost without number, hunting for trains of evidence that would prove even to the most skeptical, his entire innocence. It was in one of these hunts, that I found a clue to the fact, that Norman Felt saw Buck alive after the suspicious and imposing spectacle witnessed by the ladies. Never can I cease - never can the prisoner cease to be grateful for the providence which led to the discovery of this fact. But it was not in this instance only that the Divine protection has been strikingly vouch-

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safed to the prisoner. Never can I cease - never can the prisoner cease to be grateful for the discovery of the fact, that a traveller living seventy miles from here had, the afternoon before Buck's death, used with his bleeding fingers the very ax in question on this trial. And what a mercy of Heaven, that Hamblin's testimony, which subjected the prisoner to the suspicion of being a lurking murderer, should be promptly neutralized by the good Welshman, who swore that he saw the prisoner standing in full view by the side of the road not more than fifteen or twenty minutes after the time when he had appeared to hide himself purposely from Hamblin's view.

Gentlemen of the jury, I was asking before this digression, why I need proceed with my argument? The answer is, that I have to, because the Counsel for the People compels me. I have to proceed, because he will not give up. He will not give up whilst he has a "shot in the locker." Though reduced to his stumps, he will still fight. He will come before you with the argument that the other man, whom Felt saw, was the prisoner; and that short as must have been his time for it, he nevertheless killed Mr. Buck. Poor Zecher ! poor Zecher ! are you to be pursued to the very last? and when all legitimate argument against you is exhausted, is its place to be supplied by the most unreasonable fancies and the most cruel suppositions?

I will admit that this other man, whom Felt described as "a farmer-looking man in a frock" was the prisoner. A liberal admission too, is this, considering how many a man in that Welsh community answers to this description. I admit it for the reason that the minute when Felt saw this man, was just about the minute when the prisoner left for his home. I admit it too, because the man whom Felt saw was evidently just going away from Buck's. Felt saw his side, and the side of Buck. Buck was in his door. Felt does not recollect whether with or without his hat. The other man was on the road-side of the gate, standing still. The reasonable supposition is, that he had just left Buck's house; that Buck had followed him to the door, and had spoken or called to him, and that he had turned to answer, just as Felt was passing. Had he, at that moment, been on his way to, instead of from, Buck's house, he would not have been standing, but advancing. And all the more constantly and quickly would he have been advancing, because Buck was so hard of hearing as to make it uncomfortable to converse with him unless near him. Where he stood was more than two rods from where Buck stood.

Yes, gentlemen of the jury, I assume that the Prosecutor will argue that the prisoner killed Buck immediately after Felt saw him. I assume this because he refuses to abandon the prosecution, and because this is the only thing left for him to do toward sustaining it. He must do this or nothing.

But, gentlemen, what time had the prisoner in which to kill Buck, and rob the body, and rob the house? And now we necessarily come to the use of time-pieces.

It must have been nearly or quite noon when the prisoner left Buck's for his houses else he could not, walking slow upon a snow-

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drifted road, have reached Sherman's, two miles, by half-past twelve. The clock there said three quarters past twelve. But it was confessedly ahead of true time. He was at Westcott's, half a mile, some minutes before half-past twelve, by a clock admitted to be too fast. He was at Deacon White's somewhere between twelve and one. As it was quite as late as half-past eleven when the ladies passed Buck's, so it must have been nearly or quite noon, when Felt passed there.

I ask again then, gentlemen, what time had the prisoner in which to do the deeds charged upon him? The time-tables do not spare him five minutes. We will, nevertheless, try to squeeze out fifteen. For the sake of the argument, we will admit that he had fifteen minutes in which to return to the house, and go into the remotest room for the ax, and entice Buck to accompany him to the barn-fifteen minutes in which to do this, and to persuade him after they had reached the barn to take off his cap, which was found to be not at all indented or marred, and to hold still whilst he should kill him - fifteen minutes in which to do all this, and to inflict the death-blow, and then (for the sake of having it appear that an animal had done it) to peel up the scalp, and also to bruise the head in half a dozen to a dozen places. And we will admit too, that he crowded into this fifteen minutes' swift work, the pulling down of the mare's blanket and the loosening of her, and also the taking up of the body and laying it in another part of the barn; and we will admit too, that his lightning speed enabled him to wash his all-bloody ax, within these fifteen minutes, and to carry it back full eleven rods, to the farthest room in the house; and far more than this, and all else, to wash, and dry, and iron by some magic expertness, his all-bloody pantaloons, for nothing less than' this would have given them that "clean and new" appearance at Sherman's. I say, we will try to spare the prisoner fifteen minutes in which to do all this work, that ordinary human powers would have needed hours for. But then if we do spare him the fifteen minutes, how much time will he have left for getting to Sherman's? Not more than twenty minutes.

We have, however, seen but little as yet of the shortness of the prisoner's time for his great work. The house remains to be searched and plundered; and if that should take only ten minutes, it would leave him but ten minutes in which to fly to Sherman's. I say fly, for in that case he would have needed wings to get there by the time he did get there. But we are far, very far, from allowing that ten minutes would suffice for the search and plunder. Ten hours would be needed for it.

You remember that the Prosecutor introduced Mrs. Van Patten to repeat the lies and wonders which the joking, mendacious Jason Mead told in the prisoner's hearing. I presume that some slight blushes of shame tinged his cheek, when he called her to the stand. But he had to call her, or abandon his case; and you know that a lawyer does not like to abandon his case. He had to call her and Rowland Jones, or he could raise no motive for a murder. It would be A MURDER WITHOUT A MOTIVE - A CRIME WITHOUT A CAUSE. Vain would be the magnificent and imposing structure of circumstantial proof, unless he

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could succeed in connecting it with some inducement to the deed. This giant body, which his plastic hand had moulded from his testimony, he would have to see fall a dead carcass, should he fail to vitalize it with a motive to murder. Very far am I from saying, especially in the hearing of the learned jurist who presides on this occasion, that it is always necessary to prove a motive in order to prove a murder. In but too many cases the deed itself proves the motive. If I take up a gun and deliberately kill my fellow man, there need be no going aside from the deed to prove the murderous intent. But in the present case it is just because the Prosecutor feels his proofs of the killing of Buck by the prisoner to be so exceedingly slight, that he struggles so hard and summons such strange help to conjure up a motive.

The Prosecutor proved by Mrs. Van Patten that the joking and mendacious Jason had, a few days before Buck's death, spoken, in the presence of the prisoner, of the immense treasures in Buck's house. To use his words, there was money "in every chest, drawer, and trunk in the house;" "a jug full of it in the cellar;" and "money hid in the cellar walls." He also proved that Rowland Jones, the purchaser of Buck's farm, went, a few weeks before Buck's death, to Buck's house, and proposed, in the presence of the prisoners to pay him a large sum of money. You recollect, gentlemen of the jury, that the Prosecutor claimed that his Honor should allow this Rowland Jones' testimony, because he wished to use it in his argument before you to prove that one motive of the prisoner to murder Buck was to get this Rowland Jones' money. You recollect too, gentlemen, that I immediately rose and asked his Honor to allow it, adding that we would see who would use it most effectively in the argument.

It is true that it turned out, on cross-questioning Jones, that he did not propose to pay until 1st April-that is, eighteen days after Bucks death; and that it also turned out, that the prisoner's demeanor on the occasion was wholly unexceptionable. Nevertheless, the Prosecutor would have it believed, that the prisoner (probably from his very imperfect knowledge of our language) gathered from the interview between Buck and Jones, that the whole purchase money, $3200, or a considerable part thereof, would be paid on the day of the interview, or within a few days.

And now, gentlemen, you have the avowed object of the Counsel for the People in bringing Rowland Jones to the stand. It was the same object, beyond all controversy, that prompted him to bring Mrs. Van Patten there. In introducing these witnesses, he took the position, that the prisoner murdered Buck; and that he was prompted to murder him by the expectation of finding vast treasures in his house--money "in every chest, drawer, and trunk," "a jug full of it in the cellar," " money hid in the cellar walls," and the $3200 perhaps under the floor, perhaps under the hearth, perhaps in the jambs. Gentlemen, I hold the Counsel for the People to his position. He shall not be allowed to abandon it. It is a position of his own choosing, and he must take the full consequences of it upon his case. It

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is too late now to amend his pleadings. He sought to make much for his case out ot these two witnesses. The time has now come for him to see that his case must suffer much by them. He introduced these witnesses to save his case. He is now to see that they have ruined it - or rather what little remained of it. I say little, for it was very little indeed that was left, after the testimony of Felt, and Coman, and Seymour.

The Prosecutor must now admit - his introduction of Mrs. Van Patten and Rowland Jones compels him to admit - nay, is of itself such admission - that the prisoner, after killing Buck and making the alleged arrangements in the barn, and returning the ax, began his search in the house, and went to every "chest, drawer, and trunk," and hunted after the "jug," and broke into the cellar walls, and spared no pains to find the $3200.

Now, gentlemen, what would be a reasonable amount of time for all this work? I said ten hours - though twice ten hours would not be too much. No, twice ten hours would not be too much, even though he were armed with shovel, spade, hoe, and pick, and every other implement that could facilitate his discoveries. Shall we, however, say that one hour would be sufficient? But so far are the timetables from having even one hour to spare him, we see that he could have had but twenty minutes in which, after leaving the barn, to get to Sherman's.

Gentlemen, the Prosecutor must see that the prisoner could not have had one hundredth part of the time which his hypothesis requires him to have spent in searching and digging. If, gentlemen, he shall follow me with an argument, and one of you should be playful enough to ask him if he really believes that the prisoner did, on the day of Buck's death, search his house high and low, and dig into his cellar walls; my confused and afflicted friend would be but too like to drop his brief from his hands, and to dart out of the room, cursing the old lady and Rowland Jones as he went, and cursing himself for his folly in bringing them into Court.

Now, gentlemen of the jury, was there ever an instance in which a lawyer put forth a theory that came back to plague him worse? Was there ever a case in which, to use the great poet's words, an engineer was more emphatically "hoist by his own petard"? - more emphatically blown up by his own contrivance?

No, if the prisoner killed Buck, and made all the arrangements in the barn, and all the searches in the house, which the Counsel's hypothesis calls for, and washed his ax and pantaloons; it is evident that he did so on one condition only - the condition that he had the power, and used it too, to make the sun stand still, and also the hands upon the clocks and watches. For it is not possible that he had one day, no nor one hour, no nor half an hour, no, nor a quarter of an hour, in which to do it. But, gentlemen, I do not believe if the sun did stand still to enable Joshua to achieve a victory, that it follows it would stand still to accommodate the prisoner's or any other man's murderous purposes. I believe that the sun kept on his majestic course that day as on other days, "coming out of his chamber as a bridegroom, and rejoicing as a strongman to run a race."

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I do not fail to give credit to the Counsel for great ingenuity in constructing his hypothesis of this case. It is unhappy that the several parts of the hypothesis: do not hang together. They lack, the cement of congruity. That plaguey old woman and that troublesome Rowland Jones are the great marplots of the Counsel's whole plan. They are more than a disturbing, force. They are the explosive force which has blown the whole plan to atoms.

If the Counsel could only have arranged with the prisoner to murder Buck at 8 or 9 o'clock in the evening, then his hypothesis - at least this part of it - would have harmonized with the possibilities of the case. For then the prisoner would have had some eight or ten hours of darkness, in which to do his work of darkness. Then through all the hours of night, and until "ghosts troop home to churchyards," he could have searched and dug for the Mead and Jones money.

What the Counsel for the People will do under the heavy pressure upon him of his great mistake I can not divine. All I can say is, that he may count upon my friendship in his dilemma. Such is my tenderness for his feelings and his fame, that if he will move the Court for leave to withdraw this testimony of the old woman and Rowland Jones, which is so damaging and damning to his cause, I will. second the motion. But even if it could be withdrawn in this wise, or in any other wise, I see not that he would be any better off. He would have escaped Scylla, only to encounter Charybdis. Blot out this testimony, and not a shadow of proof remains, that the slayer of Buck had any motive to slay him. The case is reduced to A MURDER WITHOUT A MOTIVE: A CRIME WITHOUT A CAUSE.

I said, gentlemen, in an early part of my Argument, that the Prosecutor will perhaps argue, that this is one of the cases in which the murderer, horrified by his deed, foregoes his intended plunder, and runs away. But, as I said then, so say I now-that it does not be come him to argue it. For a vital part of his hypothesis is that the murderer in this case was as cool and self-possessed a villain, both before and after the murder, as ever walked the earth.

I surely, gentlemen, need say no more to show that if Buck was murdered, it was not by the prisoner. There is not only not sufficient proof of the prisoner's having killed him, but there is absolutely not one particle of proof of it. The prisoner is the very last man to suspect. Suspect Mr. Kinney, Mr. Brown, Judge Holmes, myself but not the prisoner. For it is proved, that he could not have been thereto murder him; but it is not proved that we could not. He went home before Buck was killed; and it is certain that he did not return to Buck's.

But who then did kill Buck? That is not for the prisoner to show. All he has to do is to resist the attempts to convict himself of the crime. A neighbor might, have. killed him, a traveller might have killed him. But it is not for the prisoner to show who did it.

Let me here say, gentlemen, that after all the careful and patient thought I have bestowed on this subject, I have come to the conclusion, that Buck was killed by an accident. You will be slow to come

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to it. Most persons will be. But I am confident, that in the end, and ere long, the public will settle down in this conclusion. The hastily adopted and soon wide-spread and established belief that he was murdered, it needs time and reflection to overcome. But time and reflection will overcome it.

When the people first saw Buck's body, they all attributed his death to his mare. They did not look at the ax, nor for the ax, until the next day. They took it for granted, that this mare bad killed him. But after a time they concluded that a man had killed him. Why? Simply because the depressed part of the fracture of the skull was shaped more like an ax than a horse's foot. "O most lame and impotent conclusion!" There would have been some reason in the conclusion, had the resemblance to an ax been both in size and shape. But whilst this depressed part of the skull was not as long, it was nearly. or quite three times as wide, as the head of an ax.

I lay down the proposition that, except in the case of those, which are sharp and cutting, you can not tell what instruments have produced given wounds, provided they were not applied with sufficient force and velocity to mark their passage with their own shape and size. In your and my boyhood, gentlemen, we sometimes jumped upon the ice with such force, as to mark our passage through it with the shape and size of our boots. At other times we made fractures, that extended for feet and even rods around us; and no one could have conjectured from either the form or extent of the fractures what produced them. Now, had Buck's head been found with a small round hole through it, we should all know, that it had been perforated with a bullet; we should all be certain, that he had come to his death by a shot. But it was found with a fracture extending over a large part of the whole left side, more than three inches in length of which along the temple, and more than two inches in width of which were depressed some three eighths of an inch. About mid-way and diagonally across the depressed part of the fracture was "a flap of skin;" some half inch wide, and not at all detached at either end. Now, I confess that, looking only at Buck's head, and at none of the circumstances of the case, I can hardly form an opinion as to the means of his death. It is true, that according to Brigham's testimony, the very long unshod hoofs of the mare had grown into strange shapes, as well as into a very hard and horny substance. But I confess that I can see no resemblance between them and the fracture. The "flap of skin" does indeed greatly favor the idea, that the parted hoof of a cow was the instrument of death; but perhaps in no other respect does the wound denote such instrument. And as to an ax, the "flap of skin" utterly forbids my believing, that the wound was made by it. I can say, gentlemen, that I know it was not made by an ax-certainly not by the ax, that was brought into Court - for in the back of that there is not only no gap or notch to correspond with the "flap of skin," but no gap or notch at all. Heaven be praised for this "flap of skin!" What a consoling assurance Mr. Buck's posterity should derive from it, that their ancestor was not murdered! But, gentlemen, is there not, aside from this, abundant evidence that Mr. Buck was not killed

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with an ax? The theory of the Prosecutor is, that he was struck quite a number of blows. But would not every blow from the ax break this very brittle skull? Undoubtedly - and even if the ax had been wielded by arms no stronger than those of a boy but twelve years old. Nevertheless it was only one blow, that fractured the skull.

One of the theories by which I account for Buck's death is, that whilst sitting in his house, the afternoon of the day it occurred, he heard a disturbance in his horse-barn - went there, and found his animals - perhaps mare and all-striving with each other. It is in proof that he had five cows, and that one of them was found in his horse barn at the time his body was found there. In endeavoring to quiet them, the feeble, clumsy old man may have been thrown down and trodden upon, or kicked. Remember again that the skull of so old a man is very brittle. Moreover, cows kick hard, and press the earth very hard when, in their contentions, they run toward or retreat from each other.

The peeling up of the scalp several inches in width, and from the forehead to the back of the head, is as well accounted for by this means as by any other. How absurd to attribute it to an ax!

Another of my theories to account for his death, and this in my esteem is most probably the true one, is, that when the time came the last day of his life - to go to supper at Howard's, he went into his horse-barn for his mare, had a controversy with her, whipped her, stumbled, and fell a few feet east of the door. Perhaps one of his frequent fits came upon him at that momment. Whether it did or not, he held to the halter; the mare trod on his head, and scalped it; or, impatient of her constrained position, she scalped him by stamping on him. The scalping did not reduce him to insensibility; and he still clung to the halter. She became more impatient of the weight upon the halter, jerked him a few feet south, and extricated herself by giving him his death-blow.

It has been attempted to show on this trial, that the mare is feeble because old, and that she is also kind and tractable: But Brigham swore that she is "large" and "smart;" and we have also proved abundantly that she is very balky, and very bad tempered. She is especially given, after being whipped, to striking with her fore feet. You recollect that Blowers saw her, after Buck had whipped her, turn round and strike at the chain around the log, until she succeeded in striking it off. Now why are we not at liberty to suppose, that whipping her in the barn would excite the like ferocity?

On the former trial the Prosecutor scouted the idea of Buck's being killed by his mare; and he ridiculed me for holding that she struck Buck "seven or eight -times, and always above the eyes, and then took him up in her teeth," and laid him where he was found. Now, gentlemen, I am always willing to be ridiculed at my own expense. As you are aware, I am as used to it as the old woman said her eels were to being skinned alive: but, gentlemen, I am not willing to be ridiculed at the expense of others, especially at the expense of this poor brother, who sits before you. I never said, that the mare took up Buck in her teeth! I have explained by what means he was

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removed a few feet. I never said that the mare struck him seven or eight blows. I believe that she struck him only twice; and that his grasp of the halter limited the range of her striking-foot to his head. Two blows will, in my judgment, account for all the wounds and, bruises upon Buck's head. Remember that the horse-barn floor was covered with very hard frozen manure, which presented a very rough and uneven surface. Such a surface would necessarily produce contusions on the back of the head in answer to a blow on the front, and also contusions on the right side of the head in answer to a blow on the left.

But, gentleman of the jury, if the Counsel for the People may ridicule me for foolish things, which I did of say, surely I might, but for my compassion for him,' ridicule him for the foolish things, which he did say. His theory on the former trial was, that the prisoner killed Buck a few feet east of the door, and that then, in order to put the body out of sight, he threw it to the place where it was found. That is, to put the body out of sight, he threw it right in sight! The Counsel did not learn his ludicrous blunder until after the former trial: and oh! how hard he has worked through this trial to save his cause from the disastrous effects of that blunder! He his sought to bring out from his own witnesses, not that the body was put out of view, (as it would have been entirely, had it been thrown to the north side of the door.) No, he did not presume to attempt all that. But he has sought to bring out from them that it was not put very fully into view. True enough, it was not in quite as full view as it might have been, though indeed it did not lack much of it. For the Counsel's own witness, Isaac White, testified that the legs reached half-way across the open door-way; and his own witness Howardd, testified that he saw the person of Buck as soon as he reached the south side of the road. Ledyard Lineklaen swore that the person would have been entirely out of the angle of vision, had it been put on the north side of the door. He swore too, that he believed that a person standing in the road could see the feet, and a part of the legs, and he knew not how much more of Buck's person.

Is it said that the mare's feet would have been bloody, had she killed Buck? But her dark-colored feet were not inspected until she had been ridden hard through the deep scouring snow some mile and a half or two miles. The cows' feet were not examined at all.

Will it again be argued that the specks of blood on several joists near where Buck's body was found, indicate that he was killed with an ax? But all these specks put together would not be equal to two large drops. Moreover, might not an animal's foot, as well as an ax send up these specks of blood? Again, was it fresh blood upon these joists? James Bailey swears that he examined it and found it "old" and "floury;" to use his very words. That it was old blood, and found its wah there from the killing of calves, or sheep, or fowls, is very probable. These are by no means the only joists of that barn on which there is blood. Remember that Mr Lincklaen found much more blood on a joist near the north door of the stable; "a spot half as big as my hand," said he. He perceived no difference in the color of the blood.

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I am confirmed in my belief that his mare killed Buck by the fact that she came to Howard's about six o'clock on the evening of his death. Never before had she been known to go there alone. Her being there now, and with her blanket dragging on the snow, indicates that something very unusual had taken place with her - that something had driven her into a very unusual mood. What was it? It was her being whipped by Buck, and her struggle with him, and her angry escape from him. She would have witnessed unmoved the killing of a thousand men by a thousand men. But her controversy with Buck greatly excited her, and accounts for her having ran off to Howard's. That controversy also explains the disordered state of her blanket.

That the mare was not seen until about six o'clock, greatly favors the idea that Buck was not killed until near that hour. I do not forget, gentlemen, that a youth of the name of Owens, was brought forward to swear that he saw her at two o'clock. But to my mind he testified to a fancy, and not to a fact. No such testimony was elicited on the former trial. Never before had I learned that the mare had been seen on that day, between the hours of ten and six. Even Stancliffe, who was riding with Owens at the time Owens says he saw the mare, did not see her. Blowers rode by, say half an hour after, and did not see her. Not half an hour behind Blowers, came William White, who, although he looked into the barn-yard, and over the premises of Buck, saw not the mare. I never heard of Owens before, and I have therefore no right to call in question his integrity. But other witnesses in this trial have had their imaginations played upon; and how far his imagination may have been played upon to influence his testimony and to bring him to his conclusions, you, gentlemen, can judge as well as I. Let me here say, however, that, so far as my argument is concerned, I had quite as soon you would believe as disbelieve the witness Owens. He saw the mare feeding quietly with the dews; in the-barn-yard. Nothing had excited her. Nothing unusual had occurred to her. The cow in the horse-barn that Buck was fattening, had probably unhooked the door, if indeed it were hooked, and had gone out followed by the mare. But where was the mare, that not Blowers, nor White, nor any other person but Owens saw

her? Where else but in the horse-barn again? She was out for a few minutes at the time Owens saw her; and then she had been returned to the horse-barn. Who returned her? Who but Buck him

self? Thus making it, that as late as two to three o'clock, Buck was yet alive. And then who but Buck had thrown out the hay, that the mare and cows were feeding on? Thanks, then, for Owen's testimony! Better for my argument that it be true, than false.

An hour ago or more, I said that Buck was probably not killed until five to six o'clock. Since then, I have sought to convince you that he was killed about that time by his mare. I will now proceed to argue that whether he was killed by his mare or his cow, or by a man, he was not killed until about that time. He may have been killed by a man. That possibility it is not for me to deny. But whether killed by man, or mare, or cow, it was not until near or quite six o'clock.

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I know it will be argued that Buck was not seen from twelve to six. But what, of that? Was he missed in all that time? Did any one go to his barns, and not find him? No Did any one go to his house, and not find him? No.

Buck must have been killed before noon, if killed by the prisoner. But surely the rigidity which follows death would have been complete in seven hours; and surely, too, seven hours of that "very cold day," to use the precise words of the Prosecutor's witness Howard, would have been sufficient to freeze the person entirely stiff. But how idle, how absurd is it to say, in the face of the testimony, that either the rigidity or the freezing in this ease was complete! Rigidity had in deed begun; but freezing had scarcely begun. To justify what I have here said, I will quote from; two of the Prosecutor's own witnesses, and from no others. Hamblin says: "The arm was not perfectly limber" - "it bent at the shoulder."Isaac White says: " The body sagged, dropped, bent at the hips." Now, will any one pretend to say, that there was no greater degree of rigidity the next day, when, to prepare the person for the coffin, it was necessary to cut off the clothes? and when, as N. T. Palmer swore, "it raised up stiff from head to foot, and I observed no bending ?"

It is undoubtedly true, as Judge Shankland said in his charge on the former trial, that the arms retained much the same position which they had when the person was discovered. But this only proves that rigidity had begun; and not at all that it was perfected.

I have argued, from its only partial stiffness, that Buck could not have been dead seven hours when his body was first taken hold of. He probably had not been dead more than one hour.

I will now proceed to argue from the condition and appearance of the blood, that he had, not been dead seven hours, no nor more than one. And here again I will quote none other than the words of the Prosecutor's own witnesses. Hamblin says: "The blood on his hair did not look perfectly dry; it had the appearance of clotted blood. It was dry on his face." Morse says: "The blood on his face was dry; on his hair it appeared moist. Near the wound, (meaning the deadly wound,) moist, damp - different from blood on his cheek - darker - I thought it was not dry." Who can doubt from these descriptions, that when the body of Buck was first examined, blood had just been oozing, and perhaps was still oozing, from his wounds ?

I much regret that Isaac White and Howard did not testify on this trial, as they are recorded to have testified upon the examination of the prisoner before Mr. Kern, the justice of the peace. When Mr. White came to the stand and presented his tall dignified noble form, and fine intelligent face, I whispered to my friend Goodwin, one of the Counsel for the People: "That man was born to be a prince!" But ere my prince had get through testifying, I found he was as frail as other men. He confessed, as soon as we began to cross-question him, that his recollections were not as fresh as immediately after Buck's death; and yet, as soon as we came to remind him, that his testimony at the time of the examination differed widely from his present testimony, his indignation, not to say his anger, kindled; and he re-

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pudiated his past recollections and past testimony, and clung to his present recollections and present testimony. Oh! how different a course did reason and humanity call for! Instead of falsifying the record, he should have been thankful for, its preservation. Instead of impeaching Mr. Kern, he should have pronounced a God's blessing upon him. Especially and infinitely glad should he have been to give up his present for his past recollections, when he saw that his present recollections were making against, and that his past recollections would make for his poor brother, who sat before him. Mr. White is an earnest religionist. Alas, when will men learn that the truest religion is that, which is the most true to reason, and the most true to the human brotherhood!

Upon the examination Mr. Howard spoke repeatedly of "pools of blood" in the stable, thus showing how recently the blood had been shed. And Mr. White also spoke of "pools of blood," and a large quantity of it. He said too: "When I first saw the wound on the temple, I did not know but it might be from the kick of a horse. I then examined the horse's feet." He also said: " I took hold of one of his limbs, and it was not very rigid."

And now, gentlemen of the jury, I will state my last reason for believing, that Buck had been dead but a short time-but an hour when his person was first examined; and let him gainsay this reason who can. Remember the fresh and moist appearance of the blood upon the hair, as testified to, by Hamblin and Morse. Remember, too, that Buck wore a great deal of hair, and that, it fell down upon his shoulders. Now, what if that bloody hair had lain upon the snow, and ice, and manure seven hours - would it not have been frozen down so hard that the raising up of the body must have torn it out? - and yet, gentlemen, not a hair of his head was found where he had lain; and not a particle of ice or frost was seen upon his hair, whilst he lay there !

I have now, gentlemen of the jury, given you my reasons for believing that Buck was killed by an animal. Of course, I can not be absolutely certain that he was. I again admit that he may have been killed by a man, though it could not have been by the prisoner. Bear in mind, too, that he may not have been killed by his mare, or by his cow, and still have been killed by an accident. We must not fail to remember that, in the wide compass of probabilities and possibilities, he may have been killed in one of many ways, and yet not by a man. We must remember that there are ten thousand ways in the limitless range of Providence, in which he may have been killed, and yet with out human agency. Should it be revealed to us, this moment, by an angel from heaven, how Buck was killed, we might all be astonished, for it might turn out that he was killed in a way, that no man, or woman, or child ever thought of, or dreamed of; and in a way, too, that attaches no blame to any human being.

Gentlemen of the jury, I have done with the testimony. I have summed up the case. And now, if you view the testimony as I do, there are, at least, two things, which greatly surprise you. In the first place, you are greatly surprised, that so confident a report should

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have gone out that Buck was murdered. For, in the light of the testimony, there is no probability that he was murdered; and there is a strong probability that he was killed by one of his own animals. I know not, gentlemen, what you may think of what I am about to say. Nevertheless I do not hesitate to say, that, were I a juror, I would conclude that Buck was killed by an animal, even though the testimony to that end were not half as strong as it is. Every particle of testimony to that end I would magnify. Not one particle of it would I disparage. We owe it to the honor of human nature, and to the claims of charity, and mercy, and reason also, to resist, as far as we honestly can, the belief that Buck was killed by a man. Is there any probability - nay, I had. almost said, is there any possibility that he was killed by an animal then, for the honor of human nature, and out of respect to the claims of charity and mercy, ay, and reason also, we are to, conclude that he was not killed by a man.

I repeat, that I firmly believe, that no human hand had a part in the death of Buck. Yes, gentlemen, it is my great privilege to rejoice in the conclusion, that this aged man, whom I had known from my early childhood, went into the eternal world with no accusation upon his lips, that a brother had slain him.

I said, gentlemen, that if you view the testimony as I do, there are, at least, two things, that greatly surprise you. One of these two things I have just mentioned. It is, that so confident a report went out that Buck was murdered. The other is, that so confident a report went out, that it was the prisoner, who murdered him. For you now see that if Buck was murdered, it was certainly not by the prisoner.

Whence sprang the suspicion that the prisoner murdered him? Solely from the fact of his having been at Buck's for one hour in the forenoon of the day, that Buck was killed. The suspicion, once started, it could, of course, find things enough to feed on. It could feed on the wrong answer, which the prisoner gave to Sherman's question, and it could torture that innocent mistake into a willful falsehood - into a lie. Above all, it could grow and fatten on the old ragged coat, and transmute its stains and dirt into Buck's blood. But, gentlemen, you see nothing in the blunder of his German tongue at Sherman's, and nothing in the tattered coat, that makes at all against the prisoner. All that remains on which to convict him, is his having been at Buck's for that one hour. But would you convict him for that? Oh ! no. Nor would you even had he been there all the day. It was his business to be at Buck's. He was laboring for him. Only the day before he was there from morning until near night.

No, gentlemen, you will not convict the prisoner because he was so unfortunate as to be at Buck's that hour. Dearly enough already has the poor fellow suffered for it! Owing to that misfortune, he has been shut up in jail nine months; and denied his usual means and facilities for getting a subsistence for his wife and child. It is not strictly true, that he was shut, up all this time. The sheriff saw that his health, especially after the shock it suffered from the disagreement of the jury on the former trial, absolutely demanded indulgence, and to the honor of the sheriff the prisoner was suffered to go freely about

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the house and yard. If the sheriff is to be blamed for showing this mercy, let me share in the blame, for I begged the mercy, which he was so willing to grant. Well might he and his family repose such unbounded confidence in the prisoner. For one reason especially might they do so. So great is the prisoner's love of his wife and child, that even if he were disposed to run away from the gallows, he would never consent to run away from them. When I first became acquainted with him, I told him solemnly that he must not run away. "What!" exclaimed he, "I run away from my wife and child!" Let me here say that all, who get well acquainted with the prisoner, love him and confide in him.

I repeat, there is no reason whatever to suspect the prisoner of murder. But what if there were room for a slight suspicion to attach to him! You would not then convict him. No, nor would you convict him, even if there were room for a strong suspicion to attach to him. You well know that a jury has no right to convict on mere suspicions, however strong the suspicions may be. There must be a positive, clear, well-settled, undoubting belief of guilt, in order to justify conviction. I say undoubting, for if the juror has so much as one reasonable doubt of the guilt of the accused, he is bound to pronounce him innocent .The distinction between suspicion and belief, can not be too strenuously urged on such an occasion as this. It is true that suspicion serves the valuable purpose of starting one on the road to belief. Nevertheless suspicion, however strong, is not belief.

I said that the suspicion against the prisoner, which sprung from his being at Buck's for an hour, soon found much to feed on. On nothing however did it feed and grow more than on the fact that the prisoner is a foreigner. A foreigner, from his strange manners and unintelligible language, is but too often regarded as a dark and mysterious being, who is capable of any and all plots against property and life. Nevertheless foreigners have hearts as well as we. Poor Zecher has a heart, and it is a heart that loves his wife and child. It is a heart, that bleeds under a sense of the disgrace done to himself, and wife, and child, and parents, by his being imprisoned under this terrible accusation., His aged and afflicted parents reside in Germany. With what intense interest must they await the news of your verdict I said, that poor Zecher has a heart. We can best reveal our hearts in our own language. The prisoner has written many letters to me in the German language, and he has also spoken mnay [sic] words to me in it; and although my knowledge of that language is small, it has nevertheless helped me get access to his heart - to his heart of childlike simplicity and innocence.

I have referred to the prejudice which exists against the prisoner because he is a foreigner. I do not, however, fear that you will let it enter into your hearts. As one proof of this prejudice - the story got into wide circulation, that the prisoner was a pauper and a criminal; and as such, was sent to America at his country's expense. This paper which I hold in my hand, and which the prisoner brought from Germany, was quoted to justify the story. But when I came to translate it, I found it to be nothing more nor less than an ordinary pass-

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port-such as the authorities of Continental Europe furnish all kinds of travellers with, or rather all kinds of unsuspected and respectable travellers with.

Gentlemen of the jury, my plea is well-nigh ended. You will bear me witness, that it has been a plain, simple, straightforward plea. If I have these powers of oratory, which the Prosecutor so flatteringly attributed to me on the former trial, you need not be told that I have not studied to employ them on this occasion. I have set things before you just as they lie in my own mind; and if I, erred in any thing, it was simply because I knew no better.

From first to last, gentlemen, this case has been one of deep interest to my heart, and of great instruction to my understanding. It has taught me a new lesson in human nature. I could not before have believed, that a whol community, and one so intelligent, and sober, and staid, could have been suddently carried away by appeals to prejudice and to the imagination. Yes, even our men of best hearts and of most vigorous and cultivated understandings, were conquered by these appeals. I speak within bounds, when I say that forty-nine fiftieths of the people of this neighborhood believed the prisoner to be guilty, when he was committed to jail. They heard he was a foreigner; they heard of the bloddy ax; and of the cutting off of the bloody skirts. That was enough. They needed to hear no more to assure them of his guilt. And even after the former trial, there were not a very few left, in whose bosoms lingered the suspicion of his guilt. Their prejudices were not yet entirely subdued. Their imaginations were not yet restored to an entirely healthy tone. But now, who is there, that has heard the testimony to show the innocence of the prisoner has been immeasurably stronger on this trial than on the former. Nevertheless, I must insist that had men, even on the former trial, held their imagination in check, and kept themselves free from prejudice, they could not have believed the prisoner to be guilty. The free play of their reason would have saved them from a belief so unreasonable-not to say so absurd.

Was there ever before in any Court a case made up, so wholly as this is, of imagination and, prejudice? Indeed, gentlemen, I have sometimes though that the history of this case would furnish the materials for a very valuable school-book. Where could our children and youth have for their study a more striking or instructive instance of the power of prejudice and of a disordered imagination.

On an occasion like that which led to the arrest and imprisonment of the unfortunate Zecher, nothing is more to be feared than an excited imagination, and especially that form of it, which a French writer (Madame de Stael) very suitably calls a "superstitious imagination." It was only a few days since that I was reading her account of the burning of a town in Italy, and of the entreaties of certain Christian women, that the Jews, who were shut up in one part of it, might be suffered to burn up. She adds, perhaps with excessive charity, that those were wicked women: "Ce n'etaient point de

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mechantes femmes." Their only misfortune was, that they hid superstitious imaginations - "imaginations superstitieuses." Now, gentlemen, Italian Christiansare not the only kind of Christians who are liable to be swayed by a superstitious imagination. Its deluding, not to say malignant, power, has sometimes been known to control American Christians also. Our good orthodox, people are peculiarly liable to be carried away by this superstitious imagination. Let a man be found dead, and an orthodox Christian will not be the last Christian to elongate his face, and roll his eyes, and solemnly exclaim: " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." And if we tell him that perhaps the man was not murdered, he replies: "But perhaps he was; and whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." And if we then tell him that some other than the suspected man may be the murderer, he shakes his head, looks wise, turns up the whites of his eyes, and again exclaims: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." He has gospel for hanging some man. He would, it is true, have it the right man. But to verify the Bible, and to appease the claims of his pious soul, there must certainly be some man hung.

After all, it is not so much to be wondered at, that the execution of the prisoner has been so loudly called for. The hanging of a man in a country county, is a rare occurrence; and we are all apt to get hungry for what is rare.

Gentlemen of the jurty, I am to be followed by one who has an acute and rapid mind. It is not too much to say, one of the most acute and rapid minds that I ever encountered. He has, withal, great ingenuity, strong will, unyielding perseverance, and remarkable force of speech. What he will say to you I can not certainly tell, for I can not certainly tell, how far he may or may not vary the positions which he took on the former trial. I thought that he ought not, upon that trial, to. ask the jury to convict the prisoner, but he did. It seems impossible that he should do so on this trial, after all the new and decisive testimony in favor of the prisoner. But in my judgment, he will not do his whole duty if he but forbears to ask you to. convict the prisoner. It is not enough for him simply to leave this matter to your judgment, and to withhold from you his own clear conviction that the prisoner has not been proved to be guilty. I know that, as a man he would be glad to have you acquit the prisoner. Why then should not say so as a lawyer? Why should we ever sink

the man in the lawyer? Why should we ever refuse to let our manhood assert its claims? The glory of a man is not in his lawyerhood, nor doctorhood, nor priesthood, nor in any other of his professions or occupations; it is in his simple manhood.

I know that many layers are in the bad habit of defending their cases, even when there is nothing left to defend - like the village schoolmaster, of whom Goldsmith says:

But I trust that the Counsel for the People will show not only that he is not himself in this bad habit, but that he dares to set a noble exam-

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ple on the present occasion, which will rebuke those lawyers who are in it.

There is one favor which I must ask at the Counsel's hands. On the former trial he likened the present case to that of Lewis Wilber, who was hung in this county, some eighteen years ago. Wilber was one of the very worst of men. His murder of poor Barber was cold-blooded, atrocious, diabolical to the last degree. Hence, to liken a man to Lewis Wilber, or his case to Lewis Wilber's case, is to take the most effectual means to arouse prejudice, and get up the

"mad dog cry" against him. The Counsel, in his zeal and haste, said that the testimony against Wilber was not so strong as is the testimony against the prisoner. Hence if Wilber deserved to be hung, much more does the prisoner deserve to be hung. Now, I beg that the Counsel will not, on this trial, compare this case with the Wilber case. I beg that he will not repeat that deep and cruel injury to my innocent client.

What 'similarity is there in the two cases? There is the widest dissimilarity between them.

1st. It was apparent from Barber's wounds that he was killed by human agency. Stabbed to the vitals was he several times; and stones were piled upon him. But no one can tell from Buck's wounds by what means he was killed.

2. Wilber left the country, and turned up in Ohio under the feigned name of Lewis Lee - the name which he bore when he was arrested. But Zecher went home; betrayed no discomposure; set about mending his coat; wrote a letter to his father; and went to his bed as usual. There was he found when the officers came for him.

3d. Wilber's whole character was infamous to the last degree. But the prisoner's character is spotless.

4th. Wilber could not converse five minutes respecting his connection with the murder of Barber, without crossing himself and revealing his guilt. But the prisoner is never known to contradict himself; he is never caught in his words; and such is his unflinching adherence to truth, that, were all the inquisitions of earth to try to wring a lie from him, they would torture him in vain.

Said I not right then, gentlemen, that there is the widest dissimilarity between this case and the Wilber case? And, gentlemen, do I ask what is at all unreasonable, when I ask the Prosecutor to show so much justice and so much compassion to this my poor brother and his poor brother, as to admit to you that the present case and the Wilber case are not only not similar, but are in all essential respects, dissimilar! God forbid, that on the great day of judgment to which we are all hastening, and when we shall all be gathered in that great court of eternity, compared with which this and all earthly courts are insignificant - God forbid, I say, that on that day, and in that court, the Prosecutor shall have to remember that he refused this measure of justice and compassion, which I ask for my deeply, cruelly wronged client.

Gentlemen of the jury, I have done. With all my heart do I rejoice, that you will find it so entirely easy, in view of the testimony,

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to acquit the prisoner. I beseech you, gentlemen, not only to acquit him, but to acquit him promptly. I would, indeed, that you might acquit him, without leaving your seats: - for the more prompt his acquittal, the more will he be freed from suspicion, and the more entirely the disgrace, which has been brought upon him, his wife, and child, and parents, be wiped out. Yes, the shorter your deliberations, and the sooner you say "Not guilty," the better will be the new start in life, which you will give him. Make that start, gentlemen, the best you run. Others will do their duty to him, as soon as you have done yours. I know those, who are impatient: to take this unfortunate brother by the hand, as soon as you have acquitted him, and to help him onward and upward to that position of respectability, which his virtues entitle him to. Yes, gentlemen, they stand ready to discharge their duty to the prisoner. But it is not in their power to do as much for him as you can. No other men have it in their power to do as much as you can. For nothing can avail as much for him, as the most emphatic and influential testimony in behalf of his innocence: and it is the speedy rendering of your verdict, that would be such testimony. Prove yourselves thus, gentlemen, the greatest possible benefactors of the prisoner: and sure may you then feel, that the Great and Good Being, who loves the protectors and -helpers of the innocent, will bless you for your benefaction, and regard you for your prompt and righteous verdict.

D. J. MITCHELL, District Attorney, then addressed the Jury as follows.

May it please the Court:

Gentlemen of the Jury:

IT now behooves me to perform the most responsible duty with which I have ever been charged. That duty, fully, faithfully, and without the least hesitation, I shall endeavor to meet. As the Public Prosecutor of your county, I shall to-day, in the presence of this honorable Court, lay before you both the law and the evidence which appertain to this cause. I need not speak of the importance of this trial, for that you have long since well considered, and I doubt not, are now willing faithfully to execute those laws, upon a prompt and judicious execution of which, by all those who have them in charge, depends the safety of every person within the borders of our common country.

The duty you have this day to discharge is one, not only of vast importance to the prisoner, but to the people. On the one side you are to protect the rights of the accuse, to guard his interests with a watchful eye, and see to it that no injustice is done, him, that no virdict [sic] is rendered against him, unless that verdict be fully sustained by the evidence before you. On the other side lies the interest of the people. Their rights you will guard with equal solicitude, and see to it that the prisoner, if guilty of the crime wherewith he stands

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charged by the Grand Jury of the county, does not escape from that punishment with which the law visits the guilty, while the innocent have naught to fear.

This is the temple of justice, and in it no verdict should be delivered unless found in accordance with the law and the testimony, and I greatly err, gentlemen, if this day we shall be compelled to listen to a verdict, which shall be an invasion upon the sacredness of the time and the place.

Long ere this you beheld the safeguard which the law throws around the prisoner in a case like the present. You have seen that it allows him well nigh to select his own jury. By giving him twenty peremptory challenges, it is within his power to send away from the jury-box whomsoever he chooses, and to put there whomsoever he may desire. Did you not see with what freedom the learned gentleman upon the opposite side used this great advantage thus given him? By the liberal exercise of this right, many honest and upright jurors were thus challenged and set aside. Indeed the counsel for the defense has selected just such a jury as pleased him. The people have no such privilege granted to them. We were not and are not by law allowed any such prerogative. We have no peremptory challenges; we must be content to lay our evidence before a jury drawn under the humane statute to which I have just referred; and this, gentlemen, we have cheerfully done, implicitly relying upon your intelligence and your integrity.

The prisoner is possessed of a better fortune than falls to the lot of most men who are arraigned at this bar. It has been his to have the services of, and be defended by, the honorable gentleman who has just addressed you; a man of great influence and incomparable logistic power, whose reputation as an orator and advocate is coëxtensive with the country in which he lives. In behalf of his client, he spared no time, no expense, no exertion. I was much interested and I doubt not you were - in the delivery of the very able and eloquent argument which he has just concluded.

With great pleasure I noticed that you gave to it that careful attention which it becomes you as a jury to give to all that can be said in favor of any person arraigned for, and charged with, being guilty of crime. In this, I say, I was well pleased, for it is my desire that the jury should carefully listen to and well consider every argument which is in the power of even the learned counsel himself to urge in behalf of this man.

Moreover, gentlemen, I ask, and doubt not I shall receive, the same candid hearing and attention at your hands, while I present the views the people entertain, of this case. And in the presentation of those views, I hope to be governed by the testimony. I shall not travel out of and beyond the evidence, as the learned counsel has done. You must have observed, that he himself became a witness while speaking to you; that he testified what he had seen and what he had heard, from the beginning to the end of his argument.

Out of respect for the gentleman, I neglected to interrupt him, but allowed him to go on acting the part of witness without oath, and that

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of counsel addressing the jury, both at the same time. But you will allow me to say; that it becomes your duty to throw entirely out of view and in no manner entertain any statements made by the counsel which have not been proved by the witnesses examined upon the stand.

As Counsel for the People, I shall stand solely upon the evidence elicited during the long and tedious trial through which we have passed. I shall cautiously and minutely examine the ground taken by the other side, and I doubt not I shall be able to show that many of the positions assumed by the counsel are unwarrantable, extravagant, and fallacious in the extreme.

The gentleman has thought it proper to refer to the former trial of this case, and to claim that seven of that jury were for the acquittal of the defendant; with this you have nothing to do, and the counsel had not the least right to make reference thereto. But as the gentleman has thus referred to the former jury, I will content saying that my understanding of the position of that jury is far different from that stated by the counsel.

You must have observed the manner with which the gentleman has been pleased to speak of the People's Counsel throughout his entire argument. How often, how exultingly it has been claimed - and you did not fail to discover the useless and abundant repetitions indulged in that the People's Counsel had been trapped and caged by the consummate ingenuity of the defense. When I shall have finished my argument, then it will be a proper time to judge whether the gentleman had any reason thus to exclaim. I am the victim of no such ingeniously constructed stratagem, and I think, I shall find but little difficulty in emerging from all such traps - in which it has been so repeatedly and so vauntingly assumed that I am caught.

And equally easy will be the the task, unless I greatly mistake the force of the evidence, clearly to show the manifest untenableness of the strange, wild, and unsupported positions so boldly taken in the argument just concluded.

I warn you, gentlemen of the jury, from being misled and drawn away from rendering a true verdict in this case by the eloquence of the defendant's counsel, or by relying upon the positive statements of the gentleman unsubstantiated by the testimony. While I have unshaken confidence in his honesty and correctness of purpose, still I verily believe that he is possessed of and has used great art in the conducting of this defense, and that to rely upon his positive assertions and opinions, which have been so freely and so gratuitously showered upon you, would be subversive of the true ends of justice. In his plea the learned counsel informed you; that he pronounced the prisoner innocent before he was made in any way acquainted with the evidence or the facts of the case; and that he based his opinion upon the simple circumstance of the prisoner's having cut off his coat the same day of the commission of the homicide - a fact, which, to my mind, tends to show the guilt rather than the innocence of the accused: and he further states that no evidence can can change this opinion. Would you have your verdict the result of a calm and dispassionate examina-

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tion of each and every point, the which indeed it should be, you will be slow to be influenced by his naked statements and opinion, thus hastily formed as to the prisoner's innocence.

Let us now candidly approach the merits of this trial. The prisoner stands charged in the indictment with having, on the 14th day of March,1856, at the town of Nelson, feloniously taken the life of John Buck.

The discussion of this ease involves two questions:

First, Was John Buck at the time aforesaid murdered, or was he killed by animals?

Second, Did the prisoner murder John Buck?

And first, as to the evidence bearing upon and the positions assumed by the counsel, with reference to the former of the two questions.

The evidence shows that John Buck at the time of his death, and for the last forty years previous hereto, had resided about three miles west of Morrisville on the turnpike leading to Cazenovia; that he was a man about eighty years of age; that he had no family then living with him; that the prisoner moved into Buck's house the 3d of January, 1856, and left there with his family, and went to reside with Myron Meade the 11^th of February; after which time Buck resided alone, except when he staid at his neighbor Howard's, until the time of his death; that for two nights previous he staid at Howard's, and on the morning of the 14^th he ate his breakfast at Howard's in usual health; that between 9 and 10 o'clock, he left Howard's, which was about eighty rods from his house, upon his old mare, to return home; that Hamlin went to Buck's house on business, about 10 o'clock, and remained with him about one hour, and he was then as well as usual. Buck was found dead between five and six o'clock the same day, by Howard, lying upon his back in the horse-barn, with his head to the south, and feet to the north, and his feet came about even with the door which opened to the west into the barn-yard.

Dr. Maybury examined the body, and the wounds upon the head. He testifies that one wound extended backward from the outer corner of the left eye four and a half inches, three quarter of an its deep at the corner of the eye, and one and a half inches wide, and that the skull or bone was fractured three inches long in this wound, and in the centre was two inches wide, terminating to an obtuse angle at both ends, and with a depression of bone in this wound three eighths of an inch. This wound was covered with a gap of skin half of an inch wide, unbroken, and run angular across the wound,

2d. A wound on, the same' side of the head a little above, between the, temporal wound and the top of the head, two inches long and one half wide, which wound run parallel with the first.

3d. A wound four and half inches long, two and a half broad on the top of the head., running l backward from the front of the head,

4th. An angular wound on the beak end left side of the head one and a half inches long, shaped like a triangle.

5th. One bruise over the external angle of the right eye.

6th. Discoloration and swelling of the upper and lower eyelids of the right eye.

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7th. Right ear much swollen and discolored, the effect of a bruise.

8th. Abrasion of the skin over the outer corner of the left eye, three quarters of an inch long.

9th. One wound in front of the lower lobe of the left ear. It was a cut through the skin one and a half inches long.

10th. One contused wound with extensive detachments of the skin above and behind the right ear.

11th. A fracture of the orbit of the left eye.

Now, gentlemen, you will remember that Dr. Maybury took down in writing at the time he made the post-mortem examination, an accurate description of the wound to which I now refer, as he gave them to us on the Stand. You will also remember that the Doctor drew a diagram of the first three wounds which I now, present you, and which clearly shows that said wounds were made with an ax. You will discover that the first wound has two parallel lines of fracture just about as long and as far apart as would be made by the head of an ax, together with a crack and depression of the bone above. I claim that that wound and fracture were made by striking Mr. Buck with an ax, and that the person using the ax stood behind him at the time the blow was dealt. Now I submit to you that this wound and fracture, as described by Dr. Maybury, is just such as we should expect to have been produced by a blow thus given. How could those parallel lines of fracture have been produced in any other way than by a blow inflicted with an instrument of the description I have mentioned? The wound upon the top of the head was unquestionably made with the head of an ax. It was a glancing blow which drove the skin sidewise, and left the skull bare, as is fully proved by the evidence. The wound upon the top of the head was unquestionably made with the head of an ax. It was a glancing blow which drove the skin sidewise, and left the skull bare, as is fully proved by the evidence. The wound upon the back of the head must have been made with the corner of the ax which tore down the skin and left it in a triangular form. The bruise upon the right ear was produced by the fall, which was caused by the first blow given upon the temple, as we have before seen .Now, gentle men, I call your attention to the ninth wound as mentioned by Dr. Maybury, which to my mind settles the question beyond all doubt, that John Buck was feloniously killed, and that the person who committed the deed held in his hand some sharp instrument, which we say was an ax. That wound was a cut below the left eye, through the skin one inch and a half. How came that cut upon the cheek ? There was no sharp instrument in the barn when Buck was found by Howard. This incontestably proves that the person who dealt the other blows with the head of the ax, inflicted this cut upon the cheek with the blade of the same instrument. We claim that these wounds all show that he was murdered - brutally, cruelly, cowardly murdered.

But, gentlemen, we will not stop here; this is but a tithe of the evidence tending to show the homicide. The testimony shows that there were drops of blood upon the beams above; that all those drops were upon the bottom and west side of the beams, and seemed to have been sent in a driving direction, spreading to the east upon the joist, showing that the blood was sent from the west. How account for those drops of fresh blood upon the beams above? I will

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tell you. The first blow that was inflicted upon John Buck, was the one which, received upon the temple, cut off the temporal artery, and Buck fell dead upon the floor; the other blows were given after he had faIlen, and while down. The severing of this artery caused much blood to flow upon the floor, and in striking the other blow the ax was struck into the blood, which threw the same upwards and upon the timbers above. Again, we have still stronger evidence to establish this point of the people's case. It has been proved by several witnesses, that in front of the door, and about four or five feet from the same was a pool of blood that had dried down somewhat into the manure. This portion of blood was near where Buck's cap was found, and showed that he had freely and largely bled there, and from that pool of blood to the door, and round to where his head lay when found, was a circular sprinkle of blood profusely scattered all the way round.

Now, all will concede that the first amount of blood was where the old man first fell, and that the large quantity there found must have issued from the wound upon the temple which, as we have said, severed the temporal artery, for no other wound could have so freely and plentifully bled.

Now, the evidence shows, and no one will doubt, that the first blow was instantly fatal, and, having fallen in front of the door, there he bled. Afterward he was moved and turned round by the door to the south side of the barn, his head being eight or ten feet from were it lay when he bled this large pool of blood where he first fell. For remember that we trace the sprinkle of blood all the way round from the first pool where his cap was found, to where his head lay when found by Howard. That the first blow was fatal no man can deny, and now comes the question, How came Buck moved round to another part of the barn? Did he move himself after he was dead?

That circular appearance of blood brings home to my mind a conviction irresistible that he was moved by human agency. It cannot be otherwise.

Can you doubt then, gentlemen, that he who moved him, from that first pool of blood in front of the door into another part of the barn, was his murderer? Why was he moved ? I answer that having been knocked down and instantly killed, the assassin, becoming alarmed and fearful lest some one in passing the road might discover his victim, seizes the old man by the collar, and drags him round out of sight; meantime the blood oozes and drips upon the floor, whence obtains the circular appearance of blood of which we have before spoken. But, gentlemen of the jury, I'll not stop here; the blood upon the ax which was found in the house is indeed a powerful circumstance to show that he was murdered. When you remember that the two Misses Tucker swear that they passed there in a sleigh about half past eleven o'clock that day; that they saw John Buck and another person crossing the road, going directly from his house to the barn; that the young man then with Buck had in his hand an ax; that he was carrying that ax in company with Buck to the, horsebarn; that he was, when last seen by those ladies, within two rods of

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the very place where the old man was found dead; and when, you remember that the ax when found had been carried back into the house, bearing appearance of having been washed, and some blood still upon it, can you hesitate a moment to believe that it was the ax, yes, the ax, severed the brittle thread of life?

Again, we say that the blood spattered upon the sticks of recently split wood that stood in the corner near where the ax was placed, greatly supports and strongly substantiates this point of our case. The wood had been there but a day, and the blood must have been carried in when the ax was taken back and washed. I claim also that the prying open of the chest, the marks of search upon the house, powerfully argue the felonious killing of John Buck. I will now call your attention to the evidence given as to the state of the blood, and the condition of the body when it was removed on the night of the 14th of March, to the house of Lanson Clark, the son-in-law of Mr. Bucks. The whole testimony goes to show that the body was as rigid when taken, up and removed to Clark's as it ever would become. The witness Isaac White says that the blood was dry upon the face and hair, and that the body was stiff; that he helped put it into the sleigh, and that it only bent a little at the hips, which the evidence shows any dead body would do. Norman Wescott swears that the body was stiff-imd rigid when he assisted in removing it to the sleigh, and that the blood looked dry upon the person.

Hamlin swears that the body was stiff and rigid; that he helped remove it to the sleigh; that after the body was placed in the sleigh, he tried to rare the head, in order to examine one of the. wounds; that the body was so inflexible that, in simply endeavoring to lift the head, he raised the whole person. All the witnesses agree that, when the body was first discovered, the legs were a little drawn up, one arm curled up, and the other extended; that after he was carried to Clark's, the body, legs, and arms were in the same position as when found in the barn; thus proving beyond all question that the body was entirely rigid when taken up at the barn, or, most assuredly, the handling and carrying of the same would have changed the position of the limbs.

Again, all the witnesses swear, and especially Howard and White, that the blood in the barn had dried down, and become somewhat absorbed by the manure.

Thus the people have proved, by all who assisted in removing the old man, to Clark's, that the body was cold, stiff, and inflexible, and the blood hard, dry, and well-nigh congealed; which facts, we think, conclusively show that John Buck must have been dead a number of hours when first discovered by Howard; and that he was killed between hours of ELEVEN and TWELVE we hope clearly to establish when we come to discuss the second branch of this case. The counsel opposed cannot claim, in any point of view that can be taken of the evidence in regard to the rigidity of the body, that it furnishes any plausible reason for supposing that Buck was killed later than 12 o'clock; for Dr. Maybury testifies that bodies become rigid from two to three hours after death, and that an aged person would become

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so much quicker than one younger. Dr. Havens says that a person of Buck's age. Having freely bled, and lying exposed to the cold, would become as rigid in three quarters of an hour as ever; and that the body would bend a little, even after it had become as stiff and unyielding as it ever would become. Now, it is proved by Howard, that he discovered the body before sun-down, and Hamlin and others state that the body was not touched or removed until between seven and eight o'clock, thus showing that Back had been dead to their knowledge about two hours before removed or handled by any one.

Accordingly, if Drs. Havens, Maybury, and Putnam, together with other witnesses, are correct in their statements as to the time that a body requires after death in which to take on its full amount of rigidity, then manifestly this body was as rigid when removed as it ever would be. For we prove Buck to have been dead a longer time before being handled or examined by any one, than would be required for him to become completely stiffened. Hence the learned gentleman's argument that the condition of the body and blood furnishes great reason for believing that Buck was killed later than 12 o'clock, falls to the ground, and avails him nothing.

And now, gentlemen of the jury, I propose for a few moments to examine the theory advanced by the learned counsel on this part of the case. And here it is that he complains of me, and says that, in addressing the former jury, I was guilty of ridiculing his argument and positions. I have no desire to ridicule the gentleman, standing upon any ground which he may choose to take. But allow me to say, that such is the character of his arguments upon this branch of the case, that to consider them at all is to involve them in ridicule. The counsel gravely informed us, and consumed much time in endeavoring to prove to this jury, that John Buck was not killed by human agency, but that either the cows or his old mare committed the fatal deed. The gentleman's theory is this: that Buck went into the barn about supper-time ; that having got into a fracas with the old mare, she threw him down; feet toward the east, head to the west, and still holding to the halter, she swung him round to where he lay when found, and thera, in the plentifulness of her wrath, dealt him the deadly blows; and that those blows numbered only two. The evidence shows that this animal was about 25 years old; that Buck had raised her from a colt; that he was; and had been for a long time, accustomed to ride her wherever he decided to go; that he frequently rode her with asimply strap fastened round her neck; that in the stable, and while riding her she kind and obedient; that before a load she was balky.

It is also proved that on the 14th of March, she had only one shoe on, and that was on one of the fore-feet. Also, that her feet were all examined the same night; that they exhibited no appearance of blood, and that she had one white hind foot. Gentlemen; "'tis strange - 'tis passing strange," that this old mare; Buck's' old friend; with whom he had been acquainted at least a quarter of a century, who had never raised a foot to injure him, who had never been known

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even to attempt to injure him, should make up her mind that Buck had lived out the measure of his days, that she would commit this horrible deed; and was actually guilty of attacking him on whose bounty she had so long subsisted, throwing him down upon the floor, and there kicking and striking him some eight or ten times, and with so much expertness and skill, as. in fact to hit him every time upon the head, and above the eyes.

True, there was one wound upon. the cheek, a sharp cut, one and a half inches long, which must have been made with a sharp instrument, and which doubtless the old culprit had with her to expedite the deed. With what prudence gentlemen, she must have executed her work of death, for she: dtd not even touch his body, nor his clothing. Her aim was high up, she struck for the brain, save when she used the sharp instrument then only did she consent to strike as low as the cheek. Having thus dispatched her luckless victim, she throw the blood upon the joist, above seven feet from the floor, returns the sharp instrument that cut the cheek - yea, the ax- to the house, breaks open the chest, and then flees to Howard's, to avoid detection, and to prevent being hung.

O wonderful beast! with which Iron Quixote's Rozinante celebrated, in story, bears no comparison. But again, we ask you, by what contrivance did the mare or cows succeed in moving Buck to another part of the barn from that in which he received the first blow, producing. a wound which Dr. Maybury says must have been instantly fatal, and, out of which issued the large amount of blood discovered in front of the door? Did the old mare, think you, take him in her teeth and carry his head round some eight or ten feet? or did cows take him upon their horns, as the learned counsel claimed upon the former trial? You have listened to a very glowing description of the wonderful power of cows when enraged, and of the great strength they possess, as they, back up, paw, and scrape, to prepare for a contest; and, says the counsel, perhaps this deed may have been committed, and these injuries received by their powerful tread. This supposition is based upon the evidence given by Howard, who says that, when he. first entered the barn a cow stood in the door but apparently as unconscious and unconcerned as though nothing had happened.

But I will detain. you no. longer, gentlemen, in holding up to view the utter absurdity of the argument put forth to convince an intelligent jury that Buck was killed by animals. I would, however, say a few words in reply to one other point. The counsel claims that the fact of the barn door's being open, and the mare's being seen at Buck's about five, o'clock P:M., is evidence that the deed had just been committed; that something extraordinary had taken place, at which, being frightened the animal fled to Howard's, where she had never been before alone; nay, more - he claims from this circumstance that the animal itself had been engaged in the affray. Now this will hardly do, for we show by Howard that the barn door was open at two o'clock, when he left home to go to Nelson Flats.

Mrs. Howard says she saw it open several times during the after-

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noon. Jones states that it was open when he passed there, between two and three o'clock; that the mare was in the yard with the blanket on her; and other witnesses establish the fact that the door was open in the afternoon. My view is that Buck put the mare into the horse-barn unhitched, when he returned from Howard's in the morning, as the proof shows he was accustomed to do, for he rode her even to do his chores; that when murdered. between eleven and twelve o'clock of that day, the door was left open by the person who committed the homicide; that the mare came out into the barn-yard, as seen by Jones at two o'clock, and being discontented, went to Howard's toward night, by whom, as he was returning from the Flats, she was found, feeding on a bare spot of ground. It is no evidence that the animals killed Buck, because the door was open. For the counsel can not maintain, as he did upon the former trial, that if a person had killed Buck, he would have shut the door; for if the door had been closed, that would have been positive evidence that a murder had been committed, and suspicion would have attached at once; and then the learned counsel could not have plead to satisfy a jury that Buck was killed by animals, unless he had gone one step further and closed his argument upon this branch of the case, by proving to you that the old mare wound up the tragedy by shutting the door herself.

I now assume, gentlemen, that I have proved to you, beyond any and all question, that John Buck was feloniously killed and murdered by some one on the 14^th day of March, 1856, and did not come to his death by animals. I have no fear that the prisoner can escape upon this point of th case. For if the counsel has succeeded in convincing you that Buck was not murdered, but on the contrary, came to his death by animals, then indeed, there is no proposition too absurd for him, by his eloquence and ingenuity, successfully to maintain before this jury.

I now proceed to discuss the great and all important question in this case. Did the prisoner at the bar feloniously kill and murder John Buck on the 14th day of March last?

And here it becomes important for me to state to you under what circumstances the law pronounces the person committing the homicide to be guilty of murder. It is not necessary that the prisoner should have premeditated the murder of John Buck, when he started from his home on the morning of the 14th, or even at the time he reached the residence of his victim.

It is enough that he intended to destroy life at the instant he struck the blows. I call the attention of the court and jury to the case of the People vs. Clark, 3 Selden's R. 385; the marginal note of which case is as follows: "In cases of homicide when there is an intention to take life, the offense is murder. It makes no difference whether the design be formed at the instant of striking the fatal blow, or months before. It is enough the intention precedes the act, although that follows instantly."

Can there be any doubt but that the person who dealt the blows which have been so particularly described to you, intended to take the life of John Buck? The blow given upon the temple furnishes

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the clearest evidence upon this point. It must have been given with great force and power, sufficient to break and fracture the skull largely, and in the language of Dr. Maybury must have produced instant death. When you take into consideration the large number of other blows inflicted with the same instrument upon the head of the deceased, it seems to me that you have before you clear and satisfactory proof, that the person who dealt those blows intended at the time to take life. If this be so, then upon the principles of the decision of the Court of dernier resort, to which I have just referred, and which no one will dispute is now the law of the land, the present must be a case of murder. But if you should come to the conclusion that the person committing this offense, did not premeditate the taking of life, and did not intend to kill the deceased at the time the fatal blows were dealt, but that the same were inflicted in the heat of passion and with a dangerous weapon, then the offense is one of manslaughter in the 3d degree.

I will not occupy your time in the discussion of the questions of law involved in this case, for it seems to me to be too clear for argument that the case is one of murder, and not of manslaughter. It is more properly my duty to confine my argument to the testimony here adduced, for his Honor, the presiding officer of this Court, will fully present to your view the law applicable to the case. And after you shall have been instructed by the learned Court upon the principles of law which govern this case, you will find no difficulty in determining that the prisoner, if he committed the deed, is guilty of the crime wherewith he stands indicted.

The people who have proved their ase before by the aid of circumstantial evidence, which consists of a large number of circumstances elicited and sustained by very many witnesses, each and all of them point directly to the prisoner's guilt. This class of evidence is generally resorted to by the people, in the trial of persons arraigned for crime, and more especially, as the high and monstrous crime of murder is scarce ever committed in the presence of witnesses.

Hence it becomes impossible for the people to resort to positive and direct evidence to uphold the prosecution. The fatal blows are dealt when no human eye beholds the deed. So it was in this case. The old man's life was taken in the barn with no one present save the murdered and the murderer.

But, gentlemen, you will not be suspicious of this class of evidence when you learn that it is the class held in high estimation by the learned judges who expound and present the law.

It is in its nature the safest of all evidence upon which you can rest, rely, and base your verdict.

A large number of circumstances proved by different witnesses, and all tending to establish the people's hypothesis, can not be otherwise than satisfactory and convincing. In this there is far less danger of perjury than in cases of positive evidence; there a single witness may be corrupt and give to you perjured statements, and thus you be easily misled and the prisoner greatly wronged; for it were better to suppose that one witness would commit perjury than that many would falsely swear.

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It is an old maxim and: entitled to great force, that circumstances can not lie. Allow me now to call your attention to the judicial language of a late Chancellor, used when acting in the capacity of Circuit Judge of this State, presiding in a trial of this character and in a similar case. I present his language to aid and sustain you in the discharge of a duty great and important to all concerned, and which you will soon have committed to your charge. I refer to and read from the 1^st Parker, Crim. Reports, 603: "The decision of this case depends altogether upon what is called presumptive or circumstantial evidence.

"This evidence is admitted both in civil and criminal cases, but more especially in the latter. In cases of murder and other crimes of the higher grades which are usually committed in secret, it is frequently the only evidence that can be adduced to substantiate the fact of the commission of the crime.

"Phillips, in his excellent treatise on the law of evidence, says that in prosecutions for some of the worst species of crimes, this kind of evidence will often be the most satisfactory and convincing that can be produced; and the remarks of this: elementary, writer have been sanctioned by the opinions of many of the most eminent judges. There can be no doubt of the truth of this observation in those cases where there are: many separate circumstances proved by several different witnesses, all tending to the same point, and necessarily producing the same result.

"For it is a valuable maxim of the law that circumstances can not lie. In most cases of conviction upon circumstantial evidence, there are many different witnesses swearing to several distinct circumstances, all tending to the same results each of which circumstance is a necessary link in the chain of evidence required to produce a conviction of the accused; and there is therefore less danger of perjury in such cases, in consequence of the number of perjured witnesses, which it would be necessary for the prosecution to produce, to effect an unjust conviction.

The learned judge further adds: "From my knowledge of criminal jurisprudence, both from reading and observation, I have no hesitation in expressing the opinion that where there has been one unjust conviction upon circumstantial evidence alone, there. have been three innocent persons condemned upon the positive evidence of perjured witnesses.

"I speak more particularly in reference to that country from which our laws have been mostly derived."

And while upon this subject, .gentlemen, I desire to call your attention to the language, made use of by that learned commentator upon evidence, Thomas Starkie's Ev., vol i., 432.

"The consideration of the nature of circumstantial evidence, and of the principles upon which it is founded, merits the most profound attention. It is essential to the well-big at least, if not to the very existence of civil society, that it should be understood that the secresy [sic] with which crimes are committed will not insure impunity to the

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offender. Fortunately for the interest of society, crimes, especially those of great enormity, can rarely be committed without affording vestiges by which the offender may be traced and ascertained. The very means which he adopts for his security, not unfrequently turn out to be the most cogent arguments of guilt."

Again the learned commentator says on page 435:

"Happy is it for the interests of society that forcible injuries can seldom be perpetrated without leaving many and plain vestiges by which the guilty agent may be traced and detected. Instances of this nature, when apparently slight and unexpected, circumstances have led to the detection of offenders."

At page 436 he further says:

"The same observations apply in general where appearances are proved against an accused person, which he refuses to account for or explain; such as marks of blood, and violence on his dress and person, the possession of concealed weapons, and the like."

On page 439 is the following:

"Thus, in a criminal case, where all the circumstances of time, place, motive, means, opportunity, and conduct concur in pointing out the accused as the perpetrator of an act of violence, the force of such circumstantial evidence is materiall. strengthened by the total absence of any trace or vestige of any other agent."

On page 453 we find the following:

"On the other hand, the virtue of circumstantial evidence is its freedom from suspicion, on account of the exceeding difficulty of simulating a number of independent circumstances, naturally connected, and tending to the same conclusion. In theory, therefore, circumstantial evidence is stronger, than positive and direct evidence, wherever the aggregate of doubt arising, first, upon the question whether the facts upon which the inference is founded are sufficiently established; and secondly, upon the question whether, assuming the facts to be fully established, the conclusion is correctly drawn from them, is less than the doubt, whether, in the case of direct and positive evidence, the witnesses are entirely faithworthy." Having proved from high and standard authorities, that the class and species of evidence upon which the people rely are of such kind and character as to commend itself to you, and upon which you will place implicit reliance, you will not, I trust - and I shall refer to and apply these authorities, as I proceed with the argument- be misled by the ingenious method adopted by the learned counsel in the discussion of this kind of evidence. You did not fail to discover that he reviewed each and every circumstance, upon which the people rely as evidence to convince you of the prisoner's guilt, separately and independently of all others; and then he gravely inquires: "Will you convict the prisoner upon and in consequence of this single circumstance?"

With the fallacy of this style of logic no one is more conversant than the learned counsel. It will not be denied that many of the circumstances here proved, standing separately, would only amount to a slight presumption of the guilt of the accused.

But when proved and connected in one case, they amount to violent

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presumptions of guilt. Taken together, we claim that they carry irresistible conviction to all minds, that the prisoner took the life of the old man. This is what is called a chain of circumstances. And, in proportion to the number, the strength, and the close connection of the links of which that chain is composed, must be its power to draw your minds to the conclusion of fact which it is intended to establish.

Let us now examine the facts and circumstances as established by the evidence. You all remember, I doubt not, the location of the premises, house, barns, etc., etc., of Mr. Buck, and the roads and surrounding country as laid down on the map, which the people put in evidence before you. Also, that the road running east and west by the residence of the witness Henry Sherman, is parallel with the turnpike, and that said Sherman road was about one mile north of the turnpike. Also, that a cross-road extended from the turnpike where the witness Hamlin resides, which is perhaps one half of a mile east of Buck's premises, north, and intersecting the Sherman road. Also, that a road commences between Buck's house and Howard's, and about 40 rods west of Buck's house, which road intersects the Sherman road at White's Corners. The prisoner, on the 14th of March, resided with Myron Meade, about three miles northeast from the residence of Buck. On the 13th of March, the prisoner was at Buck's, and did some chopping for him, and left about night to return home. On the morning of the 14th, between 9 and 10 o'clock, he left Meade's, informing him that he was going to get some meat for his family. When he left he had on an old gray coat, that had been patched, a blue frock under the same, a pair of blue overalls, and a cap. He was seen by J. Clark Sims crossing down through Meade's lot, and to strike the Sherman road. The Misses Sherman saw him pass their house going west. He was next seen by the witness Stephen Wadsworth as he passed his house, which is upon the road that intersects the turnpike at Hamlin's. Wadsworth asked him to do a job of chopping; prisoner replied he could not, for he had a job for Stone.

Wadsworth then asked him to chop after he had finished at Stone's, and he said he would see. Wadsworth then showed him the direction in which his woods lay, and the prisoner went on toward the turnpike alone and on foot. He was next seen to pass the house of David L. Jones, on the Hamlin road, going the same way. Silas Reed, who was chopping near the road, next saw him on the turnpike, passing down through the wood through which the turnpike runs, and which lay between Hamlin's and Buck's; the prisoner was then going towards Buck's, and was within 60 or 70 rods of his house.

Hamlin testifies, that at this time he was at Buck's doing business with him; that he was in the south east room, sitting facing the window and could see the road ; that Buck was quite deaf and that he was talking loud to him; that just as he rose to leave he saw a man pass along the road west, having on blue over-alls; that he came immediately out of the house and looked both ways in the road, and the man was not to be seen whom he saw pass the window; that

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he then came back east into the woods where Reed was chopping; that it was about 10 o'clock when he left Buck's to return to his work in the woods; that when he reached the woods Keith's one-horse sleigh, loaded with wood, was headed west, and that a two-horse sleigh came up with a horse and cutter behind it, and that they were headed east; that he assisted those two teams by the wood-sleigh and then went to work; that just as he started from the road to go into the woods to commence chopping, David L. Jones got out of a two horse sleigh, in which he had rode with Thomas Jones from said David L. Jones's house to the woods, where he left the sleigh and went into the woods with him; that Thomas Jones went on west by Buck's with the team; that he chopped down one tree, the circumference of which, was three feet and six inches, and then cut off three logs from the same, and then started for his home; that when he got near the turnpike, David Jones threw a snow-ball which hit him (Hamlin) on the side of the head.

Now remember, gentlemen, that just as this snow-ball was thrown, the sorrel team driven by the witness Tucker was passing, headed to the east, on their way from Cazenovia to Morrisville, and all in that sleigh saw the snow-ball thrown, and spoke of it then. Hamlin thinks he was in the woods chopping, after his return from Buck's, about twenty-five minutes. Hamlin was drawing wood the rest of the day.

Thomas Jones swears, that when he passed Buck's on his way west, which was, as you will recollect, but a very few minutes after Hamlin left Buck's and after he saw the man, having on the blue over-alls and cap, pass the window, he saw the prisoner standing alone, at the west door of the house, which was the door used to enter the house. Jacob Tucker, who drove the sorrel team, testifies, that, when he passed Buck's coming east, and which was but a short time after Jones went west, who saw the prisoner, and which was about half- past eleven o'clock, as Tucker thinks, he saw an old man with long hair hanging low down upon his shoulders, with a cane in his hand, standing at this same west door, which was partly open, looking into. the house and appeared to be talking with some one.

Emily and Lucy Tucker, who rode in the same sleigh, both testify that they too saw the old man as thus described by Tucker, and that after the sleigh had got by and east of the house about five or six rods, they saw the old man come out of the yard from the house, in company with a young man; that they walked side by side across the road going toward the barn-yard; that when they last saw them they had crossed the beaten path and were headed into the yard in which was the horse-barn; that the old man had his cane and the young man an ax in his hand, which he held by the handle, and down by his side.

They further positively swear, that the team was going slow; that they saw the ax and then spoke of it; that they noticed the old man more particularly at the door, and then they saw them go across the road toward the barn-yard; also that when they reached Morrisville, it was, by the town clock, half past twelve, and that it must have been about half past eleven, when they passed Buck's. Now gentlemen,

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having traced the prisoner from his own home, three miles distant, to the home of Buck, and having proved and identified him at different points on his way thither and without business; we ask you, why did he not, having reached, go into the house? Hamlin saw him pass the window and then immediately disappear. I think he secreted himself. And why secrete himself? The reason is obvious. Buck was very deaf, and when he came in front of the house, (which stands close to the road,) hearing Hamlin talking with the old man in a loud tone of voice, and thereby knowing some body must be within, and desiring not to go in and be seen, he turns into the horse-barn or somewhere else until Hamlin left. The counsel says, that he went through the barn-yard, down behind the barn into a small piece of woods, where he had been chopping the day before, to pile up the wood in order to get his pay of Buck; that he had returned to the house when Thomas Jones passed, and stood at the west door when Jones went by.

By what right does the counsel thus assert and state to you? Where is the proof that he went to the woods? It had not been adduced when the evidence closed. It is nowhere, save in the wholesale statements made by the gentleman when he addressed you.

It is his own naked assertion, with which you have nothing to do.

But the evidence shows directly the reverse. Howard swears that there was only one cord of wood cut, and that not corded, but only thrown together in a heap. Believe you that he went into the woods purposely to do that, which might have been done the night previous in five minutes? He could judge no better of the quantity, after it was thrown together in a heap, than before. The condition of the wood shows clearly that he did not go there when he turned out of view.

Why then did he hide? When he reached there, Hamlin was talking loudly with Buck in the house. I submit to you, that I have given the true and only true solution to the question.

He is next seen at the west door standing still, by Jones as he passed, and that too a few minutes after Hamlin left. Not to exceed twenty minutes from the time Jones saw him at the west door, the sorrel team driven by Tucker, passed by, going east; and then the old man was seen by all, standing on the door-step, leaning upon his cane and looking into the house. After the team had passed the house about six rods, the old man, in company with the young man having the ax, yes, the ax, was seen going directly to his horse-barn, which stood just across the road, and in which barn the old man was murdered and afterward found dead by Howard.

Who was that young man who thus crossed the road with Buck? Was it not the prisoner? No one else was there. The prisoner was there at that time, for between twelve and one o'clock, he was seen upon the Lindsley road, going with quick pace towards White's Corners and that route home. There is no pretense that he stopped anywhere upon that part of his route, except at Buck's.

Assuredly he was the man. For had any one else come there and taken the old man across the road, with that ax to murder him, so soon after Jones saw him at the west door, certainly the prisoner

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could name the man. Buck was then alone. No one lived in his house, and no neighbors nearer than Howard's.

No one had passed down through the woods, for Reed and others were there chopping. It is clearly proved, that the accused did not leave Buck's until after the Tucker family had passed.

Then, again I ask, who did cross the road with Buck, with an ax, as seen by the two Misses Tucker?

You will answer, the prisoner at the bar.

Thus we show the prisoner away from his own home, having come 3 miles over a hard road, without business, at Buck's house, at half past eleven, in company with Buck, in possession of the very instrument with which the wounds must have been made, going directly to and within one rod where the murder was committed, and no one else about the premises.

Gentlemen of the jury: Who murdered John Buck? You answer, the person who secreted himself when Hamlin was in the house.

Who dealt those blows? You answer, the man whom Jones saw at the west door. Who committed the homicide? Again you answer, he who crossed the road, with Buck, with ax in hand, hastening to the very spot of the fatal deed.

Now I inquire, who was that man? Is there any doubt that it was the prisoner at the bar? If, upon the evidence, you do doubt it, then indeed may you doubt your own existence. Why did the accused cross the road with the ax?

Nothing was done with it in the barn save the slaying of Buck. Afterward it is found back in the house, with blood around the helve next to the ax, and blood and ice upon the halve where it comes through the eye, and the ax, as the witness White and others state, bearing the appearance of having been washed.

The counsel seeks to escape from the effect of this overwhelming, and to my mind conclusive evidence, by assuming the startling position, that you should not rely upon the statements made by the Misses Tucker. In fact, he arrays himself against the positive and sworn statements of these two ladies. Desperate must be the case that drives counsel to such ends. He admits that they saw the prisoner and Buck cross the road, but denies that the prisoner had an ax in his hand at the time. And to establish the assumed fact, he and his associates, Kinney and Brown, have gone through with divers amusing and remarkable evolutions. Indeed he has made a profert in curia of them to show what, it is difficult to understand, but I suppose to establish the fact, that it would be difficult for an observer a little distance off, to determine which of the two gentlemen is farthest removed, and therefore, he argues that the ladies could not have told an ax from a cane. He assumes that the ladies were 40 rods away when they crossed the road. Here again the council converts himself into a witness, and is contradicted by the whole, evidence. The ladies both say they were not more than 6 rods off when they saw the ax. Again the counsel says that he has tried to make the prisoner own that he had an ax when he crossed the road, but he refuses to do so, and therefore he believes the ladies mistaken. Do you wonder that

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the prisoner thus refuses to confess? As well might he ask him to confess the murder and sign his own warrant of death. Because the accused will not acknowledge the possession of this bloody ax while going to the very spot whence Buck never returned, the counsel boldly attacks the evidence of two truthful and respectable ladies. Certainly the gentleman must be a very credulous person to rely upon the statements of the prisoner, in preference to the testimony of two credible witnesses. But you will not be surprised at this. It is but a piece of the counsel's whole reasoning. From the beginning to the end of this case, has he discarded all evidence that in any way conflicts with the prisoner's story, as detailed to him. Away with such reasoning! You have taken an oath to render a verdict according to the evidence, and not upon the prisoner's statements given you by the counsel, without oath.

It is now conceded that they crossed the road at this time. And for what? No wood was chopped or piled up. Nothing was done. I am surprised to see the gentleman change his position upon so vital a point. Well does he remember how long he argued upon the former trial to convince us all that the prisoner never left the house with Buck. But I will not pursue that argument, as it is not proven here; nor will I deny the counsel the right to change his ground now or hereafter. To convince you that the women were further off than they state, it is claimed that they did not hear any conversation between Buck and the prisoner, while they were crossing the road, and that too since Buck was so deaf that it required loud talk to make him hear.

I do not perceive the force of this argument. We have not claimed that there was any conversation between them as they crossed the road together. Indeed, if the prisoner was going to that barn to take the old man's life, I am the last one to believe, he would have gone screaming, or even talking loud to the place of death. Well might his thoughts have engrossed his mind for that short journey! Again it is argued to you, that there is no proof that they were going to the horse-barn, when they crossed the road. The proof shows that they were going directly toward it, and were within one rod of the same when last seen.

It will hardly be denied that Buck went there, for there he was found dead.

These two ladies either saw the young man have an ax, or else they have committed willful and corrupt perjury, for both swear positively to the fact.

What motive could they have to swear falsely? They were strangers to all concerned in this trial, and have been brought here again and again by the force of the process of this court. You observed them upon the stand highly intelligent, modest, and truthful, and upon their evidence you will rely with implicit confidence; and it is idle for the counsel to attack them in any manner. But the learned counsel gravely asks, whether you believe that the prisoner would go into the house, get this ax, put it upon his shoulder and cross the road with teams in view, to commit this deed of violence. To this

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inquiry does not the evidence furnish a complete reply? Hamlin swears, that when a team is in the hollow between Howard's and Buck's, it is wholly out of view of a person standing at Buck's. When the prisoner was in the house after the ax, and the old man standing upon the door-steps as first seen by the Tucker family, this team was coming up the hill, out of the hollow, and was not seen by the accused. Then again before he came out of the house with the axe, the team had got east of the corner of the house, and he, coming out of the west door, could not have seen the team until he nearly reached the road. Then again who can tell whether he saw the team or not? If he did, it was too late to return; it were as well to keep on as flee back. He did not carry the ax upon his shoulder as has been assumed, but, as the ladies both swear, he carried it down by his side. And very likely he carried it in that position, hoping thus to exclude it entirely from view.

Turn now your attention to the next piece of evidence on which the people rely. Isaac White, Howard, and others testify that the next morning after Buck was found dead, they went into the southeast room, being the one in which Buck lived, and found the ax standing three or four feet from the fire-place in the corner; and that blood was upon the ax, as before described. How came that blood upon the ax, together with the ice and blood upon the bottom of the same? It was not there in the morning, and during the forenoon of the 14th; for the ax stood in the corner near the fire-place in which Buck had a fire that forenoon, as Hamlin swears.

Therefore, if the ice and blood had been there during the forenoon, and the ax stood as it did within a few feet of the fire, the ice, and blood mixed with ice, would have melted off from the ax. Thus showing clearly that the blood was not on the ax until about noon of that day, and after Buck's fire had gone down. Having before this proved to you that the prisoner crossed the road about half- past eleven o'clock, with the ax, in company with Buck; that no blood was then upon the ax; that afterward Buck was found dead, by reason of wounds which we have shown were in all human probability inflicted with an ax ; that the ax is found carried back into the house, with blood upon the helve, and ice and blood on the bottom of the ax; that the ax presented the appearance of having been washed; we have only to ask, what is the irresistible conclusion to be drawn from this state of facts ?

Is it not that the person who carried the ax used it to deal the blows, then returned it to the house, and, in the hurry and excitement, failed to wash it quite clean; that the water used in washing it mingling with the blood congealed upon the bottom of the same, and, no more fire being made in the house, of course the ax was found in the condition described? Here again the learned counsel is fruitful in devising ways and means to account for the blood upon the ax. First, he says that the fact of the prisoner's being occasionally afflicted with the nose-bleed would account for it. Is this so? How then can the counsel argue that the prisoner did not handle the ax at all, on the 14th day of March?

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He first denies that the prisoner touched the ax, and then says "He might have had the nose-bleed, and thus blooded it." Where is the proof that the accused had the nose-bleed that day, or even for a month before? It can hardly be true that his nose is capable of bleeding blood and ice combined. The blood and ice were frozen upon the ax. It will hardly be contended that the prisoner took up this ax, bled ice and blood upon the bottom of it, and upon the helve close down to the eye.

If his nose had bled in the house, plain marks thereof would have been visible; if out of doors, the stained snow would certainly have informed us of the spot.

I leave it with you to determine upon the validity of such a wild, incoherent solution of this appearance of blood upon the ax.

But the counsel himself well understood the feebleness of his position, and therefore gives us another solution. He says, that the killing of a calf in the barn, about the first of January, will explain it. In this he is singularly unfortunate. Blowers swears, that at the time the calf was killed, he had the ax in his possession, that then there was no helve in it, and that he afterwards put in the present helve, which he knows to be the same one, as he smoked hams upon it before it was put in; and the helve one, see, for there it stands, having the appearance described by Blowers. But it is claimed that Blowers is mistaken as to the time when he carried the ax home. This in no way aids the gentleman; for, taking the statement of William White and Duell, his own witnesses, who speak upon this point, and by them it is proved, that the ax was not carried back to Buck's till after the calf was killed. Thus, it is very manifest that this ax was not at Buck's, but at Blowers's, afar off when the fatted calf was killed.

How then did the killing of the calf, in the other and larger barn, get blood upon an ax which was not there, but quite a distance away to a neighbor's house? It would also require great credulity to believe that a little ice and blood would remain upon the ax from the first of January to the 14th of March, and that, too, when Buck kept this ax, after it was returned home by Blowers, standing within three or four feet of the fire.

But not satisfied with this solution, the counsel has imported a witness from Little Falls, upon whom he faintly relies to aid him upon this vital point. He, however, does not seem exactly contented with his own witness; for, in commenting upon his evidence, he calls him "Old Guess," for the reason that he will not swear to any thing positively. This witness says, that on the 13th of March he passed Buck's, and, having broken his cutter-phills near there, he got this ax to repair them. That on the same morning, (to wit, the 13th) at Bouckville, he smashed one of his fingers with his cheese-press, and it bled ; that he put several rags round it, and that it was in that condition when he used this ax; he can not say whether his gloves were on or off.

Now, why pretend that this finger, injured hours before, and by that time must have been dry, blooded this ax? Again, if he blooded the ax, why did he not the helve, where he took hold of it?

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Could this finger, thus wrapped up, make a small streak of blood round the helve next to the ax, also mix blood and ice, and put it on the bottom of the same, or where the helve comes through the eye? If " Old Guess" got this blood and ice upon the ax when he used it the day before, why did it not melt off during the forenoon of the 14th, as it stood in the corner near the fire? I am not able to conceive how the witness "Guess" could have succeeded in getting ice upon the ax by simply repairing his phills. I have thus disposed of all the positions worthy of notice, taken by the counsel in relation to the blood upon the ax.

And, having established the following facts: 1st. That the ax was free from blood and ice when Hamlin was at Buck's, on the morning of the 14th. 2d. That the prisoner took the ax, and crossed the road with Buck to the barn.3d. That Buck was killed and murdered with an ax in the barn.4th. That the ax was found the next morning in the- house, with blood and ice upon it, and not the slightest evidence that anyone else was in or about the house, or had any thing to do with the ax, and no other possible opportunity for the ax to become bloody, I claim that from these terrible facts only one conclusion can be drawn, and it is your duty, gentlemen, to draw that conclusion, and to mark well that you do so correctly.

Again, all the witnesses who went into the S. E. room, agree that there were four or five sticks of newly-split wood standing in the corner of the fire-place; that upon some of them were fresh drops of blood. Hence the question-how decipher this bloody problem? They certainly could not have been there .longer than a day or two, and nothing had been killed or slaughtered upon the premises. Obviously they came from the same source as the blood upon the ax, and, in washing it sprinkles of blood were thrown upon the wood. Next we find the chest; in which Buck kept his money and valuable papers, broken open and, in so doing, it would seem that this very ax had been used; for a large number of witnesses testify, that upon the lid of the chest was a circular indentation of the size of the blade of an ax, which appeared new; also, a corresponding one on the side of the chest, thus clearly showing that an ax had been used to pry the same open. Even the defendant's witnesses admit this cut upon the lid, but think it to be of less magnitude. Still another circumstance, which is the fact sworn to by Howard and others, that they saw upon the door that leads to the S. E. room, the prints of a man's hand seeming to have been made in taking hold of the door, and while wet and bloody. Let us now refer to the evidence given in reference to the prisoner while on his way, and after he reached his home. Mrs. Westcott saw him on the Lindsley road, between twelve and half past twelve o'clock. He was then about half a mile from Buck's, walking very fast: as the counsel says:

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William Wright testifies to the same fact. Louisa Chapin saw the prisoner, as she states, between 12 and 1 o'clock, on the Lindsley road. She saw him turn on to the Sherman road at White's Corners, and go east toward his home. Henry Sherman and his two daughters all testify that he came into their house, which is but a short distance from where he resided, at 15 minutes to one o'clock. They all testify that he inquired of Sherman if he wished to hire; that Sherman then asked the prisoner if he had been to Buck's; that he answered, I was there yesterday, and cut him some two feet wood. Sherman then asked him, Have you been there to-day? To which the prisoner replied - No. Sherman asked him, How Buck got along, and he said, He is smart. Sherman then said, I suppose Buck will move soon? And he replied, Buck wants to let out his farm on shares.

Harriet Sherman noticed that he was whiter than usual.

Here observe that we have three witnesses swearing that he denied having been to Buck's on that day, and when first inquired of, if he had been to Buck's that day, he gave an equivocal answer by saying he was there yesterday. The counsel, ever ready with an excuse, insists before you, that the prisoner did not understand what Sherman said, and relies upon the fact of his being a foreigner, and some persons having had difficulty in conversing with him. To controvert this position we have the testimony of Sherman, who says that he never experienced any difficulty in talking with him. Besides, the evidence shows the prisoner an intelligent man; that he has been in this country a time sufficient to obtain a fair knowledge of our language. Again, the way he answered Sherman shows he well understood the question, and sought to answer evasively; but when pressed with a repetition of the same question, he flatly denied being at Buck's. It is for you to say why he denied being at Buck's the 14th.Well might he deny it. It would have been better had he not been there. The argument that he went into Sherman's voluntarily is of no force. He had near ly reached his home, and had been frequently seen. Well might he suppose that suspicion would be less likely to attach to him if he made one stop, rather than take this large circuit and not make any stops except at Buck's. And yet that was an unfortunate call, for it was a series of lies from beginning to end. He lied about being at Buck's, and he lied about his wishing to rent his farm, well knowing that the farm was already sold. It is pretended that he stopped at Sherman's to obtain employment. It is in proof that he had been there before, and frequently saw Sherman; that he was there to get apples but a short time previous, and said nothing about employ. If he wanted employment, why did he refuse in the forenoon of that day to chop for Wadsworth? If he wanted employ on a farm, why did he not solicit it of him; why did he not of others upon this route? Why did he not stop at Sherman's when he passed in the morning? Why take this long journey for nothing, and then as a mere excuse on his way back from Buck's, seek employment of Sherman, and that too when he had agreed to work some for Meade? Why take the Hamlin road on his way to Buck's and the Lindsley road back, which was further? The counsel says that he took the longer route home in

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order to see Wadsworth's woods, who had asked him to chop on his way down. This can not be; for he is proved to have turned toward home at White's Corners, and therefore did not go in sight of Wadsworth's woods.

I will give you a different version of his motive for going another way home. He knew that Reed, Hamlin, and others were at work in the woods upon the turnpike just east of Buck's, and that he could not return that way without being discovered, and therefore took another route home, travelling fast, made no stops until he reached Sherman's, which is east of the Hamlin road. The prisoner having reached home, he immediately cuts off from the bottom, two or three inches of his coat. When the coat and pieces were found by Tillinghast, Allen, and Martin, on the 15th of March, blood was found upon the pieces; one streak on the coat, and one spot on one of the buttons. The coat and pieces have been presented before you. All the witnesses agree that the blood does not show as much now as when the garment was first discovered. They are also corroborated by Root and Williams, who examined them carefully soon after.

Blood is still to be seen upon the button and upon the pieces.But the pieces and coat have been much handled, and do not present the same fresh appearance now as then, and this the whole five witnesses state.

Did you not listen with pain to the onslaught and attack made upon those men by the learned counsel, and for no other reason than that they had simply sworn as to the then appearance of the coat and pieces ? Did you not hear him apply opprobrious epithets to them, and boastingly assert that he would " train them," and that a " training " they deserved? Did you not observe, how but a few minutes before he had bitterly complained of me, for simply subjecting the witness Felt to a somewhat rigid examination?

How eloquently he declaimed against me for discharging my duty and endeavoring to elicit the truth in this case! If, says he, men honest and true, the very ground-work of society, are to be thus assailed, and their integrity questioned, it were better to lock the courthouse, throw away the key and apply the torch; and this he says while the echoes of an unprovoked attack upon my witnesses are still ringing in his ears.

Who could have supposed that the counsel would thus quickly change his position, and make a wanton, gross, and bitter attack upon, and by his powers, endeavor to cover with infamy five upright, honest, and truthful witnesses? It was a bold and ruthless assault, and will recoil upon the author's head. I leave him to extricate himself as best he may, from the pitiful dilemma.

But these men need not me to defend them; for, beyond the attacks of the counsel, they stand grounded upon the truth, which is ever a shield to the honest witness.

But the counsel says, that the blood on the button was caused by a cut on the prisoner's finger; another of his naked statements, and

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entitled to no force. Who saw him cut that finger? When did he do it ?Was it cut on purpose, or otherwise? Was it ever wrapped up? If so, when ?Is it not a little strange, that a cut upon the finger should badly stain the lower part of his coat, and that, too, in different places ?

We are asked why his pantaloons were not bloody. 'Tis nothing unaccountable. The prisoner had on a long, gray frock-coat that came about to his knees, before cut off, and which, doubtless, was but toned up. When he raised Buck up to turn him round, he held him above the bottom of his coat, and thus blooded it, and not his pants. No necessity of getting blood upon them! Again, we are told that he cut off his coat, in order to patch it with the pieces. This is queer; for the coat was already patched with different kinds of cloth.

It is said that, as the prisoner did his own mending, he set apart this day on which to patch his coat. As a reason why he did not mend his coat, it is said that the German witness, John, had used up all the thread before they left Buck's.

Why did he not inquire for thread? Emily Wade was there, but heard no inquiry for thread. There was another family in the house, of whom thread enough could have been obtained. But I will not further pursue these vague and unsupported positions. Is not the reasonable conclusion, that blood was upon the coat; that having reached home he immediately cuts off the same, so that when he went forth, the blood of John Buck thereon, would not cry out against him?

I have now referred to and discussed the evidence connected with the prisoner, from the time he left home until his return.

It now becomes important to inquire, for WHAT did the prisoner go to Buck's that day ?

Why travel six miles, on foot and without business? He had work to do for Stone near his own home. It is alleged, that the reason why he had chopped for Stone so little, was, that the weather was bad. This .was a good day to chop; but the prisoner sees fit to leave his work that he had to do for Stone and go to Buck's without any business. He did no work there on the 14th.And here again the counsel converts himself into a witness, and informs you, that Buck owed the accused a few shillings, and told him to come after it. Is this reasonable? If Buck owed him the small sum, why did he not pay him the night before? Buck had money; for over $40 were found upon his person. Again, we are answered that Buck told the prisoner the night. before, that he had nothing less than a $5 bill. This was not so. For a one dollar-bill was found in his pocket-book, together with some change. Again, the prisoner told Meade, on the morning when he left, that he was going after meat.

He did not get any, neither made any inquiries for meat. If meat was what he started for, why not ask for it at Sherman's, which was the only house he entered except Buck's? Why not inquire of Wadsworth for meat, if that was his business ? - for he was the only other person to whom he spoke upon the whole route. No; he makes no inquiries for meat anywhere, but travels six miles, going and return-

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ing without any business whatever. Yes, goes directly to Buck's, the very place he had left only the night previous.

In this whole case, there is not one scintilla of evidence, that he had any errand at Buck's, or that he was engaged to chop for him. And there is no pretense of this; for he did not take his ax, which he had done before. If he was to return there to chop, why did he not leave his ax, and not carry it so far? Or if it be said, he went to chop, and was to use Buck's ax, or to pile up the wood, then, I ask, why not go to chopping, or to piling up the wood when he reached there? Why be seen going home another route, so quick and rapidly, not even stopping to pile up the single cord of wood, that he had cut the day before ?

Or is it claimed, that he went to Buck's to pile up the wood and continue his chopping; but, having reached there, first hid himself, and then being informed by some supernatural agency, that the old man - though alone, and no one else upon the premises save himself - was so soon to be assassinated, and, seized with alarm, fled for home, having his journey for naught?

When the prisoner had reached home, he was inquired of by Meade, where he had been. He answers, to Sherman's. He is careful to avoid making any statement by which it could be inferred, that he had been to Buck's. Perhaps here, too, it is claimed that he misunderstood Meade, as it is alleged he did Sherman.

We are asked, whether the prisoner should be convicted, because he was at Buck's, a place where he was in the habit of going?

And here the counsel interrogated me in substance as follows: Suppose my clerk should be murdered in my office, where he was accustomed to stay, would the fact, that I was at or near my office, where my business calls me, be sufficient evidence to convict me of the crime? I answer: No. And I insist, that the case put is entirely dissimilar to the one at bar. I will make a case with the counsel and his clerk.

Supposing that his clerk, having lived with the counsel, should leave and move three miles away; afterward, on a certain day, should be seen going back to the residence of the counsel, and when near, having ascertained that some one was within besides the gentleman, should secrete himself; after all had left should then be seen going into the house, taking an ax; next going with the counsel toward the office, and within two rods thereof, with an ax in hand; shortly afterward the counsel is found dead, murdered with an ax, and this ax seen with the clerk, should be found back in the house, with blood upon it; the house rifled; no one but him on or about the premises to the knowledge of any one; shortly after the clerk was seen going to the office, should be discovered on his way home, and upon another route; walking fast, and denying that he had been there that day; with blood upon his clothes; and immediately should cut off those portions on which blood is found; that he had been there the day before, and had no business to call him back on this day, and, in fact, no business there on the day of the homicide; should declare on the morning when he left home, that he was going away to obtain some kind of

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provision; should make no inquiries during the day, anywhere, for that, which he said in the morning he was going in pursuit of; should, on his arrival home, in answer to the inquiry, where he had been, mention every other place but the residence of the counsel: What conclusion, I ask, should be drawn from a state of facts like these? The answer is at hand, and I need not repeat it. A much stronger case is the one at bar, than the one I have supposed, for only the leading circumstances have been grouped in the supposition just made.

But it is alleged that this is a "crime without a cause, a murder without a motive."Let us consider the evidence bearing upon the motive. Morah L. Jones testifies that he was at Buck's house the 11th of February, when the prisoner moved away. That he moved the prisoner there, and went after his pay; that Buck and the prisoner disputed about which should pay; that the accused became angry, and advanced toward the old man, and told him he lied three times, with his fists extended. This was the very day he left Buck's house, that this quarrel occurred; left there angry, and claiming Buck wronged him, and Buck claiming that he was to stay till the first of April.

Eveline Van Patten testified, that she heard a conversation between the prisoner and Jason Meade, a short time before the homicide; that Meade told the prisoner that Buck had money; prisoner inquired if that was so; and that Meade replied, that he had no doubt but that he had money laid up in the house. Meade said, that he presumed there was not a chest or drawer in the house but what had money in it. Prisoner then said: "You think Buck has a good deal of money on hand?" Meade said, yes, and that he could cash a $1000 note any time. Meade spoke of a jug that stood in the cellar, that he believed was full of money. Prisoner replied, that he did not remember the jug, and asked the second time, where it stood. Meade told him. Prisoner said, if he ever went there again, he would know where it stood, and what was in it. Meade told him, that Buck had always been called a rich old miser. Prisoner said, a man called to beg enough to buy a meal of victuals, and that Buck refused him, and he knew he had $30 then. Prisoner said, that he was a singular man, to live alone when he had so much money, for he might some time be found dead, having lain three or four days undiscovered. Rowland Jones testified, that he bought Buck's farm for $3200, in the fall, and was to pay in the spring. That he went to see Buck, when the prisoner lived there, about taking his pay all down, and that he commenced talking about the money in the S. E. room, where the prisoner was; that Buck called him away from prisoner into the kitchen, and then commenced talking; prisoner followed them there. Then Buck called the witness into the S. W. room. alone, and then they commenced talking, and prisoner followed them in there. Buck refused to talk further, and said, he did not like the motions.

Now, gentlemen, the evidence of Morah L. Jones clearly shows, that the prisoner did not like Buck, and that he left before his time was out, in a quarrel; but still back there at work. Why back there to chop for a man with whom he had quarrelled, and who, as

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he said, bad cheated him? Why go three miles, on foot, over a hard road to obtain work, when he had plenty to do for Stone, near where he lived? Does it not seem as though he intended to hang around Buck till he had revenged himself upon him, either by robbery or otherwise? Hence we think it is, that he was willing to go the three miles, on foot, to work for a man with whom he had wrangled, and who, he claimed, had wronged him, in preference to working at home for those against whom he had naught. Again, the evidence of Rowland Jones shows that he was watching the money affairs of Buck with intense anxiety, when he lived there. Or why follow Buck from room to room in the house, where he must have known that Buck desired him not to come, in order to learn when this large sum of $3200 was to be paid? Why continue to intrude himself upon them, till Buck refused further to negotiate; and, 1becoming suspicious, said, I do not like these motions? If the prisoner's knowledge of jour language was as meagre as the counsel insists, he might have obtained a mistaken idea as to the time when this money was to be paid.

Again, you have seen, by the testimony of Mrs. Van Patten what anxiety he evinced with reference to this matter. How eagerly he inquired about the money in the house, declaring he would examine and see about this money, when he next went there; also remarking that Buck might remain dead a number of days, before he was discovered.

This whole evidence shows that his mind was intently fixed upon the large amount of money he supposed Buck possessed. Thus we show the strongest possible motive for the commission of. this homicide, developed and proved in various ways throughout this trial.

The inquiry has been made, why the money in the pocket-book, upon the person of Buck, was not taken, if money was that for which he sought? I answer, it was not found. The testimony of White, Hamlin, and Howard, shows that they all looked for the money in the pocket-book, but did not discover it when they first examined it. It was found in a private apartment which they all overlooked.

Think you that the prisoner, laboring under the excitement and terror of murder, would have examined more fully than did these three witnesses after the homicide? So it was in the case of the murder of Barber by Lewis Wilber, in this county. A murder committed with a single view to robbery. He did not find the money which was in one pocket-book upon the person of Barber. He fled, and without that for which he committed the fearful deed; and that too when he was in the woods alone with Barber, and had every opportunity for a faithful search. Wilber, like the murderer of Buck, became alarmed, was seized with terror, and beholding his own hands bloody with the deed, hastily fled from the scene.

Thus in this case, the search was light. He went to the house, washed the ax, by which to cover up the evidences of guilt, made a hasty search of the old man's chest, and then fled for home.

Whether he obtained any money, no one knows; for Buck's financial situation was known only to himself. And here we are informed

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that Buck loved the prisoner's baby.'Tis wonderful! And to use the learned counsel's own classic language: The devil he did! Who does not love the sweetness and innocence of infancy? This argues no virtue for the prisoner, but rather the kindness and sympathy of the old man's heart. Much stress is laid upon the fact that Buck and the prisoner smoked together the day, previous to the murder, as sworn to by the counsel's witness from Little Falls. It is not perceived why any force should be given to this fact. It is exactly the course the prisoner would pursue to obtain the confidence of, and the necessary influence over his intended, doomed, and marked victim.

It was here assumed that the evidence shows that Buck was alive after the Tucker team, containing the Misses Tucker, had passed; and here, to sustain this point of the case, the counsel consumed much time, and presented his three lines of argument.

He relies upon the evidence of the witnesses, Felt, Seymour, and Coman, to establish the hypothesis.

In answer to this I shall use two lines of argument.

First. That the balance of testimony shows that Felt passed Buck's a very short time before the Tucker team.

Second. Conceding the counsel's own position to be correct, which is, that Felt passed Buck's, going west, shortly after the ladies passed going east, still it in no way tends to establishes the innocence of the prisoner, but is strong evidence to corroborate other people's case. Let us now consider my two lines of argument.

First. That the balance of evidence shows that Felt passed Buck's a very short time before the Tucker team.

The learned counsel's first line of argument is, that Seymour, who rode with the Tuckers, describes all the teams east of Tog Hill; and that when he got to Hamlin's, which is east of Buck's, that he found himself in a cluster of teams. That Seymour testifies he met a gray team with a horse and cutter behind it, at Hamlin's. Also that Felt says, he met a team or more near Hamlin's. Hence it is argued, that Felt was in the cutter behind the gray team, and that they passed the Tucker team at Hamlin's; therefore that Felt went by Buck's after the ladies.

It is a mistake to suppose that Seymour describes all the teams-he. met, east of Tog Hill; and if he was able so to do, it would be of no avail, unless he could describe the place where he met them. The, place of meeting is the all-important fact, in the decision of this branch of the case. Seymour expressly swore on his cross-examination, that he could not fix the place where he met the various teams of which he spoke. Also that a few weeks since, was the first time his attention was called to the teams he met, or the place where he met them. Now it needs no argument to satisfy you, that no one could, eight or nine months afterward, without having had his attention previously called to the fact, state, with any reliance whatever, what teams he met upon a certain road; especially when all who drove the teams were strangers to him. How could Seymour tell that he met the gray team with the cutter behind it, at Hamlin's corners? He did not then know where Hamlin lived. And we have

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shown in the clearest manner, and by evidence that no doubt can exist in regard to, that he did not meet the gray team at Hamlin's. At this length of time afterward, we submit that it would be impossible for Seymour to say, whether he met the gray team by the road that turns off by Hamlin's, east of Buck's, or by the Lindsley road that strikes the turnpike just west of Buck's. He might possibly remember that he met the gray team, with a cutter behind it; but whether it was by the Lindsley corners, or Hamlin's corners, no man (not even the counsel's friend Seymour, whom he strived so hard to have sit upon this jury) could tell, this long time afterward; especially, when Seymour s mind was not aware of the importance that would attach to the exact place of meeting.

Suppose one of your number travelled over that road most a year ago, and I should now ask you, whom you met. Could you answer? But suppose you should remember of meeting me, could you state within a hundred rods of the spot; and that too, when I was a stranger to you, and our attention in no way called to each other, and we passed without even speaking?

Again we show Seymour mistaken. He says, that when he came through the woods, the wood-sleigh was in the road, in the woods. Now the evidence shows, Keith was the only person that was drawing wood at that time from the woods; and he was at this time west of Buck's, and probably at home with a load of wood, which Hamlin assisted the double sleigh and Coman by Donalson saw the wood-sleigh west of Buck's, when be came along; and it could not have been back to the woods when the Tuckers were there.

Felt's evidence does not in any manner help this line of argument, as made by the counsel.

Felt is very indefinite. He can not tell a single person that he met from Earlville to Cazenovia, except Coman. He can not even tell where he met Coman. He can only say it was between Morrisville and Cazenovia. He can't say which side of Buck's it was, and has not the least recollection of meeting the Tucker team at all.

He barely thinks he met a team, east of the woods, near Hamlin's when he was behind another sleigh. He did not at the time know where Hamlin lived. Felt's attention too, was in no way called to the facts until recently. In fact, it is all a blank to him, where he did meet teams upon the road. If he met a team at the Hamlin road, what certainty is there that it was the Tucker team? If Felt can't tell a single person he met that day, going from Earlville to Cazenovia and back, and does not know where he met Coman, how can he tell whether he met a team at Hamlin's, or the Lindsley corners; and that too when they are not much over half a mile apart? This kind of evidence, and reasoning of the counsel, put forth in his first line of argument, I submit to you, is without force and wholly unreliable.

Felt does give some evidence, valuable in the extreme, to determine this question. He says he left home in good season in the morning, and took dinner at Cazenovia; that he drove a smart horse, and did not stop until he reached Nelson Flats, except to talk with Coman a short time; that he did his banking business, and was at

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home again before dusk. Now if so, he must have passed Buck's, which is three miles west of Morrisville before half- past eleven o'clock. But the people have proved by Donalson, a highly respectable and intelligent witness, who resides at Nelson Flats, that he saw the Tucker team when it passed through that place; that he started in behind the team at the Flats, before they got out of sight; on his way to Morrisville with a horse and cutter; that he drove fast, and they slow, and that about one mile east of the Flats he passed them; that he met Keith, with his load of wood, west of Buck's; and talked with him; that Thomas Jones came up and passed west, and that Jones is mistaken in saying that he stopped there to wait for another team to come up, He saw no one when he passed Buck's, showing clearly that the prisoner, whom Jones had just seen at the west door, had gone into the house or somewhere else out of view. He came up through the woods, and saw Hamlin and others chopping; when he reached Hamlin's corners, he met the gray team, which was standing there, headed west, waiting for him to come up and pass; when he passed, the gray team went on west; he next met a cutter, in which was John Evans, going west; he next met Felt, at Lanson Clark's, going west; he came on to Morrisville, but did not overtake Coman.

That when he got to Morrisville, he took out his watch, and it was just twelve o'clock; he looked, at the town clock, and it varied only five minutes from his watch. Thus showing Coman to be mistaken, when he told us that it was after twelve o'clock; when he reached Morrisville. Coman was east of Donalson, and was not overtaken by him on his way to Morrisville. Donalson reached Morrisville at twelve o'clock. Hence Coman must have arrived, at Morrisville before twelve o'clock. Coman did not look at any time-piece at Morrisville; Donalson did, at two. Here, gentlemen, we get at the truth of this whole matter, and by this positive evidence of Esquire Donalson, in which there can be no room for mistake, we explode and demolish all three of the counsel's lines of argument. This ends all the guess-work of Seymour and others, as to the place of meeting; also all the counsel's talk and argument about the length of time that Felt and Coman conversed in the road. Manifestly, they had got through talking at the Heric place, when Donalson passed there; for he met Felt west of there, and did not overtake Coman at all. Again, Donalson reached Morrisville half an hour before Tucker, gaining half an hour over Tucker in driving six miles, as you will remember that Donalson passed Tucker, one mile east of Nelson Flats; and in this he can not be mistaken, for he started away from Nelson Flats behind Tucker, and while Tucker was in sight.

Again, Donalson can not be mistaken about meeting the gray team near Hamlin's, for the reason that all concede the gray team was west of Felt, going west, and Donalson met him at Clark's, which is but a short distance east of Hamlin's; and there can not be any doubt that Donalson met Felt near Clark's, for Coman, the prisoner's own witness, swears that he met and talked with Felt at the Herric place, which is but, a short distance east of Clark's; and when Donalson got there, Coman had gone on toward Morrisville. Thus it is indisput-

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ably proved, that Donalson met Felt west of the Herric place, and just as certain is it that Donalson met the gray team before he met Felt.

This being so, then surely Felt and the gray team could not have met the Tucker team at Hamlin's, for the obvious reasons: First, that Donalson, as I have shown, must have met it about there; and he was a long distance ahead of Tucker. Donalson passed Evans, and then met Felt at Clark's. Of course Felt would have driven quite a distance west of Hamlin's before he could have overtaken it, (the gray team.).

The Tucker team, being so far behind Donalson, could not have met the gray team at the same place. Donalson said John Evans was in a cutter, between Felt and the gray team, going the same way. Felt did not overtake and go by any one. How then could Felt have been the man in the cutter behind the gray team and next to it at Hamlin's, as the learned counsel has so often asserted? But the counsel undertakes to extricate himself from this dilemma by asserting that the gray team might have stopped.

I answer, there was no house at which the team might stop, until it reached White's, near the woods, some distance west of Hamlin's. Grant that the team stopped there; then indeed is the counsel's whole argument prostrate before us. If the gray team stopped, as the counsel informed you this morning he had learned the fact to be, it must have stopped at White's, near the woods; for that was the only stopping-place between Hamlin's and Bucks; then surely Felt could not have been behind it at Hamlin's; and the Tucker team could not have met it there. If the team stopped, then Felt passed it while it stood at Whites, quite a distance west of Hamlin's. Thus Felt proceeded on west till he met Tucker, which was probably at the Lindsley road, west of Buck's. As he passed Buck's, he discovered the old man at the door, and the prisoner by the road. The prisoner not seeing the Tucker team, which was in the hollow just west, went into the house after the ax. The old man turned round and was looking into the door, when the Tucker team came up.

Just as they got east of the house, the prisoner and Buck came out and crossed the road to the horse-barn, the former with ax in hand. Then as the Tucker team passed by Isaac White's, they saw the gray team there, or just starting, which was the time Seymour met it and heard the crack of the whip, and perhaps saw John Evans in his cutter just behind. Thus both Felt and Seymour saw the gray team a little distance west of Hamlin's; and at this long time afterward, could not remember the exact place where the gray team was, or the precise situation of it.

Thus you see, gentlemen, how forcibly Felt's evidence sustains the ladies. Felt says he saw the old man at the door, the prisoner at the road. Then after Felt passed, and the "coast was clear;" the prisoner goes in after the ax. How natural for the old man to turn round and look into the house! The Tucker team approaches as the old man was looking in to see what the prisoner was doing, having simply turned round after Felt passed, and then stood leaning on his cane.

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Thus you see, gentlemen, that the evidence of Donalson, taken in connection with Felt, Coman, and Seymour, throws a great light upon our view, and places in your hand the key with which you can unlock this whole transaction.

Now, gentlemen, I will not detain you long in discussing the gentleman's second and third lines of argument, as I think you will see at a glance the weakness of both, and that the argument I have just put forth, is not only an answer to his first line of argument, but that it meets, refutes, and destroys the second and third also.

It is claimed that the probabilities exist in favor of the Tuckers' reaching Buck's long before Felt; and the distance that each travelled is referred to, to prove this. This is based upon the supposition that Jones went west from the woods, at the same time Coman went east. No reliance can be placed upon this line of argument, as there is no certainty where Jones met the sorrel team. Seymour thinks that they met him by Keith's, but he is not at all certain of that. This too, is one of his inferences, a long time afterwards; and this can not be so, unless Jones stopped there; for it was at Keith's that Donalson met Thomas Jones, and he must have been quite a distance ahead of Tucker, for he drove very slow, most of the way on a walk; Donalson drove fast, so much so as to gain the half hour in reaching Morrisville, and he had driven by Tucker between two and three miles west of where he met Jones; thus showing clearly that Tucker's team was not at Keith's when Donalson met Jones there, and Seymour does not pretend that they overtook Donalson or came near him after he went by. This shows conclusively that the Tucker team did not reach Keith's as soon as Jones.

Again, Jones says he was ordered by Donalson to stop there, until other teams came up. If he did stop there, of course we have no means of knowing how long he remained there before the Tucker team came up.

Donalson thinks he did not tell him to stop, and that he went immediately on west.It this be so, then of course Seymour is mistaken as to the point he met Jones. So that in either case, there is not the least certainty which had the furthest to drive, Tucker or Felt. And as Felt and Coman both were in cutters with single horses, they both drove much faster than Tucker. So that it is entirely clear upon this point alone, the force of the gentleman's second line of argument is utterly annihilated. But it is claimed that Coman and Felt talked together some little time. We have not the least evidence how long that conversation was, for neither can tell. The strong presumption is, that it was very short, as they had no business to do with each other, and this was a cold day. And again, the conversation had closed, and each on his way, when Donalson reached the spot where they met. Again, Coman passed the wood-team in the woods, before Jones came to the woods, and Hamlin may have remained in the road a few minutes before Jones came. Therefore no reliance can be placed upon this line of argument.

The counsel's third line of argument is based upon the evidence of Hamlin.

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Hamlin says he thinks it was about twenty-five minutes from the time Coman left the woods till the Tucker team came; therefore the counsel argues to, you that Coman had not time to drive from the woods to the spot where he met Felt, hold the conversation with' him, and then for Felt to reach Buck's within the time stated by Hamlin. The counsel claims that, within that time Felt and Coman must have driven two and a quarter miles, the stop they made to converse in addition thereto. They did undoubtedly perform the driving in fifteen minutes, which would allow them ten minutes to stop, which is twice the length of time you will believe they occupied in that conversation. Again, there is no certainty of the length of time that transpired after Coman passed the woods before the Tucker team came up. Hamlin swears that in the mean time he chopped down a tree three feet and six inches in circumference, and out off three logs from the same. You will hardly believe this was done in twenty-five minutes. Again, David L. Jones was with him, and how much time they spent in conversation, not even they can tell. But little reliance can be placed upon the opinion of any witness when speaking in relation to time. It is easy to be mistaken, as we have seen in the case of the counsel's witness, Coman.

He says that it was after noon when he reached Morrisville, and even said that he spoke to Mr. Dewey about dinner, and was informed that they had then dined.In all this we have proved him to be mistaken by indisputable evidence.It is proved by the town-clock of Morrisville, by the watch of Donalson, that he reached there before 12 o'clock. There cannot be any dispute but he reached there before Donalson; and Mr; Dewey, the person to whom he says he spoke for dinner, testifies that he was then, in the State of California. He was probably about as much mistaken in the length of time he conversed with Felt, upon the road, without any business witli him, upon a cold day, as he was in regard to the time he reached Morrisville, and of the person upon whom he called for dinner.

I hardly think you will believe that hotel-keepers in Morrisville, on the 14th day of March, (a season of the year when people do not breakfast until late.) were through dinner, so that they could 'not accommodate Coman with a bite of something to eat, and that, too, before the village town-clock had struck 12.

I have referred to this to show you how glaringly Coman was mistaken in regard to time, as proved by the clearest testimony.

Thus you will see that no reliance can be placed upon the gentleman's, third line of argument. Indeed, gentlemen, the evidence' given by Flt, Seymour, and Coman, when taken in connection with the testimony of Donalson, forms a chain which even the counsel can not sever.

You will agree with me, I have no doubt, that the three lines of argument, put forth by the counsel, and the evidence by him adduced to sustain them, in no manner aid the prisoner; upon the contrary, they form a powerful auxiliary to the people's case. To use the counsel's own words, was there ever an instance when arguments and

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evidence comeback to plague the author thereof, like this before? few words more in regard to my, second line of argument.

Granting, for the sake of the argument, that Felt passed Buck's soon after the Tucker team had gone by, and that he then saw Buck at the doer, does this in any manner establish the prisoner's innocence, or in the least conflict with the people's case, or evidence?

Suppose that Felt did meet the Tucker team near Hamlin's, then he would have been at Buck's within ten minutes after Tucker passed, as the distance shows, and then saw Buck at the door and the prisoner by the road.

This only shows them together, within two or three rods of the barn in which Buck was murdered, ten minutes later than seen by the ladies. Suppose Buck did turn back to the house on some errand, when seen by the ladies to cross the beaten track; for surely he went across the road again very soon and was murdered. Is the counsel right in saying, that they have, probed Buck alive after the prisoner left?

Is not that the boldest of assertions? All agree that the Tucker team passed there about half-past eleven, and Felt could not in any event, upon the counsel's own hypothesis, that they met at Hamlin's, have been at Buck's more than ten minutes later, for the distance as given you by Ledyard's map, shows that if the Tucker team had walked all the way from. Buck's to Hamlin's, and Felt, driving at ordinary speed, on the descending ground from Hamlin's to Buck's, must have reached there in less than fifteen minutes after the women passed, and probably in less than ten.Why then did he state to you that Felt passed Buck's half an hour after the Tucker team did? Did the gentleman believe that statement when he put it forth? Call it ten minutes, then Felt passed Buck's twenty minutes before twelve o'clock. Is it pretended that the prisoner had left then? He did not leave there until after twelve o'clock ? For he is first seen a little way from Buck's, between twelve and half-past twelve o'clock, upon the Lindsley road, by Mrs. Wescott, going very fast, which shows that he must have been at Buck's from twenty minutes to half an hour after Felt passed. Therefore, if the counsel's position be correct, then Felt's evidence only establishes and proves the prisoner with Buck ten minutes later than the people have been able to prove; and whether Buck, for some reason to us unknown, went back to the house, after the Misses Tucker saw him cross the road, before he crossed the second time with the prisoner, for certain it is, he did again cross the road, if Felt saw him this short time later than the women; for he was there found murdered.

I say, gentlemen, if he did return to the house for some reason to us unknown, and thus extend the period of his life a few minutes, it certainly can be of no avail to the prisoner.

But the counsel has again and again stated that Buck was alive until about five o'clock that day. This statement, I assert, is made without the first particle of evidence to sustain it, and it is at war with the whole testimony. If Buck was alive during that afternoon,

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I inquire, where was he? Not at Howard's, for Mrs. Howard tells us he was not. He did not go east, up through the woods; for the wood-choppers were there all day. He could not pass without being seen. There can be no pretense then, that he went either east or west.

Again I ask, where was he from noon till five o'clock? It can not be that this old man, eighty years of age; was out upon his farm in the snow, for people were passing all day, and no one saw him.

Where was he that afternoon? AH! driven to extremity, the counsel will perhaps exclaim, (though has not dared to tell us so,) in the house alone!

Is that so? Hamlin says when left the house about eleven o'clock that day, that only four or five sticks of wood were there; that they stood in the corner; the next morning the same four or five sticks of newly-split wood still remained. If in the house, he had no fire. Believe you that the old man remained in that house alone that cold day, (so cold Felt stopped at the Flats to warm,) all that afternoon, without fire, not seen by any one, waiting alone for five hours, either to freeze himself to death or be murdered?

Where was John Buck from twelve o'clock till five that day?

I stand upon the evidence, and answer. Not in that house, alone, no fire, but lying upon his back in that cold horse-barn, obscured from view by the snow and side of the barn, brutally and cruelly murdered. Yes, that old defenseless man, whose gray locks should have been not only a safeguard against murder, but a shield from jeers, taunts, and insults, was that day deprived of his life by the bloody hand of the assassin.

But it has been said that the prisoner had not sufficient time to commit this homicide, after Felt passed, and then search the house and reach Sherman's at a quarter to 1 o'clock. Here the counsel consumed much of your time in describing the cages into which the prosecuting counsel had entered.

Here it was that he spoke of Mrs. Van Patten's evidence, and that the same came back to plague the prosecuting counsel.

Did you not hear him claim, that if the prisoner believed what Mrs. Van Patten said Jason Mead had informed him, in regard to there being money in all parts of the house, that he would have been hours in making the search? Indeed, that he would have required the spade and pick-ax to remove the walls and complete the search? Why all this parade? Do you, or does the counsel believe that any person would, after having committed this fearful crime, remain to tear down the walls of the house, even if he knew money was to be found there, or even to search but lightly in the house? No! No! 'A change had then come over him.

Alarm and terror seized him.He saw before him his own bloody and cruel deed. Wealth, yea the charms of glittering gold, had departed. He was in no condition or state of mind to use the spade or pick, or in any other manner to search for treasures. As in the case of Lewis Wilber, so in his, he could not bear to remain around so near his murdered victim, and hence the search was quick and cursory, and

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then he fled to safer and less bloody scenes. Hours, the learned gentleman claimed, must have been consumed in dealing the blows, in returning to the house, washing the ax, searching the chest and then leaving the premises! Fifteen, yes, less minutes were ample, and the evidence shows nearly double that time. I will not dwell longer upon the question of time, for it seems to me that the learned gentleman could not have been serious on this part of his argument.

Thus, gentlemen, having shown that John Buck was murdered between 11 and 12 o'clock of the forenoon of the 14th of March last; having shown a powerful motive for the prisoner to commit the deed; also, that he went of purpose to commit the crime; that having reached the premises he secreted himself; that he is next seen alone with Buck, (no pretense of any other person being upon the premises,) having in his hand the very weapon with which the crime was committed, going in company with the old man to the very spot where the deed was done; and having proved the blood of the deceased still upon that weapon, last seen in the prisoner's hand while going to the place of death; having shown the prisoner, soon after, fleeing from the spot where the old man was murdered, with blood upon his clothes; having proved that he denied on his way home, that he had been to Buck's that day; that he is next seen cutting off and disfiguring his bloodstained clothes; and having proved many other facts and circumstances tending to establish the prisoner's guilt, we are nearly ready to resign this case into your charge. And I leave it for you to say, whether the people's case is not fully, completely, and triumphantly proved and sustained, by a chain of circumstances, which carries with it to your mind, an irresistible conclusion of the prisoner's guilt? How beautifully has the evidence in this case, exemplified the truth and force of those principles of the law, which I have read in your authorities. Thus showing in this case, from the evidence, as well as from the books, that circumstantial evidence is oftentimes much more satisfactory and convincing than positive evidence. By its aid, when presented to an intelligent jury, the people are often, as in this case, enabled to bring to full view high and monstrous crimes committed in secret, and to deal justly with the guilty and innocent, thus protecting the rights and fire-sides of all.

Moreover, gentlemen, you have heard the counsel make frequent and repeated references to the public prosecutor, during his lengthy and able address. You have heard him exclaim: "But the prosecutor does not give it up yet." In that he was right. And so long as I remain the public prosecutor of your county; so long as it is to me committed, to aid in upholding the law, and protecting the rights of all, even to the humblest individual, who doth within our borders reside, I shall not give it up; nor submit to a violation of the laws, or consent that public justice be trampled in the dust, and made to bleed within the walls of her own temple.

"The prosecuting counsel does not yet give it up."Give it up! and why? To please the counsel and heal the prisoner's wounded heart.

Gentlemen, I am not boasting, when I say, that I possess, as I trust

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you do, a pulse that beats, and a heart that throbs for the unfortunate everywhere; and yet no sympathetic tear that has moistened the eye, no honeyed words that have fallen from the lips of the learned counsel, should swerve me from my duty, nor you from rendering such a verdict as your consciences shall sanction and justice approve. True it is, that the gentleman's eloquence is well nigh irresistible; his appeals most searching; but his words

Again I warn you, gentlemen, from being unduly influenced by his eloquence or his appeals.

To your duty, your duty, though the walls of the Court House tumble about you. Then shall it never be said of you:

"Ye knew your duty, but did it not."

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Gentlemen of the Jury:

THE prisoner at the, bar, Geo. W. Zeeher, has been indicted for.the murder of John Buck, at the town of Nelson, in the county of Madison.

In the discharge of the duties which the law devolves upon the presiding judge of this court, the duty has been cast upon me to preside upon the trial of this traverse; and upon you, as citizens of the county of Madison, duly summoned, empanneled, and sworn as jurors, is imposed the duty of ultimately determining between the government and the prisoner the question of his guilt or innocence. The indictment charges the prisoner with the murder of John Buck, on the 14th day of March last, at the town of Nelson in this county. Our statutes declare murder to be the unlawful killing of a human being, when such killing is perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed, or of some human being; or 2d, when perpetrated by an act eminently dangerous to others, and evincing a depraved mind, regardless of human life, although without any premeditated design to effect the death of any particular individual; or 3d, when perpetrated without any design to effect death by a person engaged in the commission of a felony. If the case before you falls under either of the classes designed in the statute, it is the first, the unlawful killing of a human being, when perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed. I understand that on the former trial of this case, the learned judge who presided upon that trial, charged the jury, that the offense disclosed in the evidence in this case, was murder or nothing, and that, if the jury found the prisoner guilty of feloniously killing John Buck, they should find him guilty of murder.

In this he undoubtedly committed an error, as he assumed a responsibility which does not belong to the court. Upon the court is devolved the duty of instructing the jury in regard to the law of murder, and what constitutes the offense under our statutes; and whether there was a felonious killing, and whether such killing was perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed, are questions of fact which belong exclusively to the jury to determine from the evidence in the case; and this is peculiarly so in a case like the one before us, where there is no positive evidence, even as to the killing, or the means employed to effect the death; but

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where the unlawful killing is to be inferred from a mass of circumstantial evidence; and ere also the motives which controlled the guilty agent in the perpetration of the offense, if any such there is u. the case, is to be sought from the consideration of a large number of circumstances; and where, furthermore, the question, whether the killing, if unlawful, was perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed, is also to be determined from the consideration of a mass of circumstances, and the survey of a very wide field of circumstantial evidence; and where those circumstances have received quite different degrees of descriptions from the different witnesses that home been examined; in such a case I entertain no doubt that it, is the duty of the court to instruct the jury, as to what constitutes the crime of murder, and leave the question to the jury to, determine, whether the unlawful killing was perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person, or not. If, then, gentlemen of the jury, you find in this case, that there has been an unlawful killing of John Buck, from a premeditated design, by some human agent, to effect his death, the crime is murder. If you fail to find that the death was caused from a premeditated design, and there has been an unlawful killing, then the offense falls down to some of the lower degrees of manslaughter, as you shall find from the evidence the case actually to be. The Judge then instructed the jury in regard to the different. degrees of manslaughter, and then proceeded.

There are two questions, gentlemen of the jury, for you to determine in this case. The first question is: Have the government established by their evidence that John Buck came to his death at the town of Nelson, on the 14^th day of March last, by criminal human agency; of if so, does the evidence show the offense to be murder or manslaughter in some of the lesser degrees, and if so, what degree?

The second is: Have the Government established by their evidence, that Geo. W. Zecher, the prisoner at the bar, killed John Buck, as alleged in the indictment, under such circumstances as constitute either murder or manslaughter in some of the lesser degrees? The public prosecutor claims that they have established both. He claims that the first branch of the case is established beyond any reasonable doubt; while, on the other hand, the counsel for the prisoner claims and insists, that he was killed by his own animals. In determining the question, whether he was killed by criminal human agency, you must look to all the facts and circumstances of the case, and consider them in their connection, the one with the other: the situation of the body when found, and the character and description, of the wounds, and the pools of blood which were discovered upon the stable-floor, where he was found.

These wounds are minutely described by the medical witnesses, who attended the post-mortem examination. The first wound extended backwards from the outer corner of the left eye, four inches and a half in length, three quarters of an inch deep, and one and a half inches in width. Another wound on the side of the head between this wound and the top of the head, a little above the first-

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described wound, two inches long, and a half inch wide. This was a gaping wound, and it run parallel with the other wound. There was another wound, four and a half inches long, and two and a half inches wide on the top of the head, commencing on the top of the forehead just on the edge of the hair, and extending backwards over the top of the head. There was also an angular wound on the back part of the head, one and a half inches long, and torn down in the shape of two sides of a triangle. There was also a bruise over the external angle of the right eye. A discoloration of the upper and lower lids of the right eye, with the right ear much swollen and discolored. There was, in addition to this, an abrasion over the outer corner of the left eye, three quarters of an inch long. There was also a wound in front of the lower lobe of the left ear, one and one quarter of an inch long. This appeared like a cut. There was also one contused wound with extensive detachments of skin, above and behind the right ear. Under the wound first described, there was a fracture of the skull three inches long in the centre, and two inches wide, and terminating in obtuse angles at both ends. The depression of the skull was three eighths of an inch, and there was also a fracture of the orbit of the eye. This wound, the physicians say, would have caused instant death. There was, a short distance from the stabledoor, and upon the inside, a considerable of a pool of blood, and near this the cap of the deceased lay. There was also another smaller pool of blood, where the head of the deceased lay when the body was found, and there were sprinkles or drops of blood scattered along from one pool to the other, in somewhat of a circular form, as if made by carrying the upper part of the body around. The public prosecutor claims and insists that this evidence shows that the body fell where this first pool of blood was found, and that it must have been moved by carrying the head around, and that there must have been some human agency here; and also that the character of these wounds shows, that they must have been made by the ax which was found with blood upon it in the house; and that, in fact, this as well as all the evidence in the case shows that the deceased was killed by human agency; and that the character of the wounds is such, that whoever inflicted them, must have intended to kill him. That there were also evidences of blood found in the house, and that the house had been searched for plunder. The case has been so elaborately and ably argued, both in behalf of the prisoner and the government, that I will not go over the evidence in detail. You have heard it all, and the deductions which are claimed from it by counsel on each side, and you will determine this first question as your convictions are upon the evidence in the case.

If you find this issue in favor of the defendant, that ends the case. If, on the other hand, you find it against the prisoner, the next question for you to determine, will be: Have the government proved that Geo. W. Zecher, the prisoner at the bar, is the person who committed the offense? The counsel for the people claims and insists that he has proved a case, establishing the guilt of the prisoner.

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That he has established those circumstances in this case by the evidences which are regarded by writers upon criminal evidence as amongst the strongest in circumstantial evidence.

That they have proved:

1st. A motive to commit the crime, to wit, to obtain old Mr. Buck's money.

2d. That they have proved the prisoner at the bar at the place where the alleged murder was committed, at a time and under circumstances that he might have committed the murder.

3d. That he was proved to have had in his hands, a weapon of the kind it is alleged the murder was committed with.

4th. That they have proved blood upon the ax with which it is claimed, the murder was committed; and that this must be the ax the prisoner had, when crossing the road.

5th That they have shown blood upon the prisoner's garments.

6th. That they have shown that the prisoner used means and precautions to avert suspicion of the crime from himself.1st. In the cutting off the skirts of his coat on the evening of the same day, on which there was found to be blood; and 2d. In declaring to Mr. Sherman, on his way home from Buck's, that he had not been there that day.

The Judge then adverted briefly to the main features of the evidence in the case, and to the explanatory evidence given by the prisoner, and to the deductions which the counsel for the people, and also the counsel for the prisoner claimed from the evidence; and without going over the evidence in detail, left the case to the jury, with the remark that the case was one of vast concern to the prisoner. It was with him a question of life or death, if the crime was found to be murder, and the case was one of no little moment to the public interests. If the prisoner is guilty of the crime alleged, the highest considerations of public interest require his conviction; for in the certainty of punishment for the guilty, is alone to be found security for life and property, and the good order of society. If, however, there are reasonable doubts as to the guilt of the prisoner, the law in its clemency demands his acquittal. It has been said in our day, that this clemency of our criminal law, which gives the prisoner the benefit of a rational doubt, is the brightest jewel of the law. Certain it is, our law secures to the prisoner the benefit of such a doubt. I ought to say to you, however, gentlemen of the jury, that the doubts which are to acquit the prisoner, are reasonable doubts. They are not such doubts as may arise in a speculative mind, after the reason and judgment is convinced, that the case against the prisoner is proved. They are not doubts which may arise after the reason and judgment of the jury are thoroughly convinced that the prisoner is guilty of the crime charged. With these remarks, I leave the case with you, gentlemen of the jury, trusting that you will be led by the light of truth to a correct verdict in this case; one which, when the secrets of all hearts are made known, you will be able to approve, and which will enable you to say in that day: I made true deliverance between the people and Geo. W. Zecher, the prisoner at the bar.