they would presently be produced, and the jury would have an
opportunity of examining them, together with a plan of the chimney of
the room in which the murder had been committed; for it was there that
they had been discovered upon a second search instituted since the
proceedings before the magistrates. The effect of this announcement may
be conceived; it was the sensation of the opening day. The whole case of
the prosecution rested on the assumption that there had been, on the
part of some inmate of the house, who alone (it was held) could have
committed the murder, a deliberate attempt to give it the appearance of
the work of thieves. Thus far this theory rested on the bare facts that
the glass of the broken window had been found outside, instead of
within; that no other mark of foot or hand had been made or left by the
supposititious burglars; whereas a brace of revolvers had been
discovered in the dead man's bureau, both loaded with such bullets as
the one which had caused his death, while one of them had clearly been
discharged since the last cleaning. The discovery of the missing watch
and chain, in the very chimney of the same room, was a piece of ideal
evidence of the confirmatory kind. But it was not the point that made an
impression on the man with the white hair; it did not increase his
attention, for that would have been impossible; he was perhaps the one
spectator who was not, if only for the moment, perceptibly thrilled.

Thrilling also was the earlier evidence, furnished by maid-servants and
police constables in pairs; but here there was no surprise. The maids
were examined not only as to what they had seen and heard on the night
of the murder--and they seemed to have heard everything except the fatal
shot--but upon the previous relations of their master and mistress--of
which they showed an equally extensive knowledge. The constables were
perforce confined to their own discoveries and observations when the
maids had called them in. But all four witnesses spoke to the prisoner's
behavior when shown the dead body of her husband, and there was the
utmost unanimity in their several tales. The prisoner had exhibited
little or no surprise; it was several minutes before she had uttered a
syllable; and then her first words had been to point out that burglars
alone could have committed the murder.

In cross-examination the senior counsel for the defence thus early
showed his hand; and it was not a strong one to t