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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
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