her story runs. It is pretty
for the present; but I hope to destroy the poetry of it very shortly.
That this man stole, not on the first of October, but on the 19th of
October, and subsequently corrected to-day, by the lady of treacherous
memory, to the date of the 20th. At all events, it is perfectly clear,
now, according to her last amended allegation, that on the 20th of
October she claims a larceny to have been committed. But a Mr. Lynch is
supposed to be the owner of the earrings, and not Mrs. Bethune! It
transpires that she had merely borrowed them for a while, as she tells
you; and then on the 20th of October she learns the loss. Why,
gentlemen, did not Mrs. Bethune tell you, that nearly a month after that
and in November, she had met this man on the street with Miss Kate
Fisher? That they had business transactions, that she knew him--the
theatrical manager--that he was to open a theatre--that money was
supplied by her for that express purpose? Did not she know within one
month after this transaction the same state of facts which she deposes
to-day? Why not have had the prisoner arrested on the street then?

No, gentlemen, I will give you my theory of this case; I will render to
you what this man has told me, and if it be not a common-sense view of
it, no logic--no metaphysics--then discard every word uttered and
condemn this man. The pawnbroker throws additional light upon this
transaction, and, gentlemen, if you will refer to the date in his book
of the 17th of November (a month after his alleged larceny), you will
find an important fact which I beseech you to hold, pointedly, in your
own estimation. You will remember that she contradicts herself, and
stated that she had had no transactions with Hemmings after the alleged
larceny. One of the gentlemen on the jury put the very pertinent
question (seeing the force of this), whether she had transactions with
the prisoner after this alleged stealing. You will remember for
yourselves, gentlemen, and I point to it without fear of contradiction,
that at first she stated the ear-rings were taken on the 19th of
October, but, seeing, with a woman's keen perception, the fatal error
she had made in stating that admission, seeing that you, as common-sense
men, would have at once said: "Why not have had him arrested then?" she
quickly drew back, like a snail when the crashing foot is coming upon
it, and drew the horns within the shell which covered it; and,
yesterday, corre