case, and that he would vacate his seat, for the
present, in favor of the oldest senator. The oldest senator was a man
of at least ninety years. He was bent with age, and his temples were
fringed with thin white hairs; but his eyes were still brilliant, and
his voice was clear and strong.

He began by asking me if I confessed to the murder. I besought him to
give me his attention, and related fearlessly and in distinct tones
what I had done. I noticed that as I proceeded, the Governor first
turned pale and then red; and when I had finished, he sprang up in a
rage. "What, wretch!" he exclaimed to me, "it is your intention, then,
to impute this crime, that you committed in a spirit of avarice, to
another?"

The presiding senator reproved him for this outburst, and reminded him
that he had of his own accord renounced his right to direct the trial;
nor did it appear, he said, that I contemplated robbery, as, by his own
admission, nothing was stolen from his daughter. The senator declared
to the Governor that he must give an account of his daughter's past
life, as this was the only means of judging whether I had spoken the
truth or not. At the same time he would close the court for that day,
in order, as he said, to get some further information from the papers
of the deceased, which the Governor should turn over to him. I was led
back to my prison, where I passed a miserable day, occupied with the
eager wish that some connection might be established between the man in
the red mantle and the deceased.

Full of expectation, I entered the hall of justice on the following
day. There were several letters on the table. The aged senator asked me
whether they were in my hand-writing. I looked at them, and found that
they must have been written by the same hand that wrote me the two
notes I had received. I expressed this belief to the senators, but they
paid no attention to my opinion, and answered that I both could and did
write those notes myself, as the signature at the end of the letters
was certainly a Z, the initial letter of my name. And then the letters
contained threats against the deceased, and warnings against the
wedding which was about to take place.

The Governor seemed to have made some strange disclosures about me, as
I was on this day treated more sternly and suspiciously. To justify
myself, I called for all the papers that were to be found in my room.
But I was told that search had already been made there, and