o cast as much ridicule on the affair as they could. J.E.
and W.M. led the defense, and, although the talents of the former were
rather adapted to grave discussion than pleasantry, he agreed to doff
his heavy armor for the lighter weapons of wit and ridicule. M. was in
his element. He was at all times and on all occasions at home when fun
was to be raised: the difficulty with him was rather to restrain than to
create mirth and laughter. The case was called and put to the jury. The
witness, one Burwell Shines, was called for the prosecution. A broad
grin was upon the faces of the counsel for the defense as he came
forward. It was increased when the clerk said, "_Burrell_ Shines, come
to the book;" and the witness, with deliberate emphasis, remarked, "My
Christian name is not _Burrell_, but _Burwell_, though I am vulgarly
denominated by the former epithet." "Well," said the clerk, "Bur-_well_
Shines, come to the book, and be sworn." He _was_ sworn, and directed to
take the stand. He was a picture!

He was dressed with care. His toilet was elaborate and befitting the
magnitude and dignity of the occasion, the part he was to fill, and the
high presence into which he had come. He was evidently favorably
impressed with his own personal pulchritude; yet with an air of modest
deprecation, as if he said by his manner, "After all, what _is_ beauty,
that man should be proud of it; and what are fine clothes, that the
wearers should put themselves above the unfortunate mortals who have
them not?"

He advanced with deliberate gravity to the stand. There he stood, his
large bell-crowned hat, with nankeen-colored nap an inch long, in his
hand; which hat he carefully handed over the bar to the clerk to hold
until he should get through his testimony. He wore a blue
single-breasted coat with new brass buttons, a vest of bluish calico,
nankeen pants that struggled to make both ends meet, but failed, by a
few inches, in the legs, yet made up for it by fitting a little better
than the skin everywhere else. His head stood upon a shirt collar that
held it up by the ears, and a cravat, something smaller than a
table-cloth, bandaged his throat; his face was narrow, long, and grave,
with an indescribable air of ponderous wisdom, which, as Fox said of
Thurlow, "proved him _necessarily_ a hypocrite; as it was _impossible_
for _any_ man to be as wise as _he_ looked." Gravity and decorum marked
every lineament of his countenance and every line of hi