know?"

"How should I? I've taken it at different times, just as I wanted it,
and have kept no account."

"Now, if you had had any wish to harm the prisoner, couldn't you have
raised twenty-five dollars to put in her trunk?"

"No, sir," she replied, with virtuous indignation.

"Then you have not laid up any money since you have been there?"

"No, sir--only what Mrs. Naseby may owe me."

"Then you didn't have twenty-five dollars when you came there?"

"No, sir; and what's more, the money found in the girl's trunk was the
very money that Mrs. Naseby lost. You might have known that, if you'd
only remember what you hear."

"Will you tell me if you belong to this State?" I asked next.

"I do, sir."

"In what town?"

She hesitated, and for an instant the bold look forsook her. But she
finally answered:

"I belong in Somers, Montgomery County."

I next turned to Mrs. Naseby.

"Do you ever take a receipt from your girls when you pay them?" I asked.

"Always," she answered.

"Can you send and get one of them for me?"

She said she would willingly go, if the court said so. The court did say
so, and she went. Her dwelling was not far off, and she soon returned,
and handed me four receipts, which I took and examined. They were all
signed in a strange, straggling hand, by the witness.

"Now, Nancy Luther," said I, turning to the witness, "please tell the
court, and the jury, and tell me, too, where you got the seventy-five
dollars you sent in a letter to your sister in Somers?"

The witness started as though a volcano had burst at her feet. She
turned pale as death, and every limb shook violently. I waited until the
people could have an opportunity to see her emotion, and then I repeated
the question.

"I--never--sent--any," she fairly gasped.

"You did!" I thundered, for I was excited now.

"I--I--didn't," she faintly uttered, grasping the rail by her side for
support.

"May it please your honor, and gentlemen of the jury," I said, as soon
as I had looked the witness out of countenance, "I came here to defend a
youth who had been arrested for helping to rob the mail, and in the
course of my preliminary examinations, I had access to the letters which
had been torn open and rifled of money. When I entered upon this case,
and I heard the name of this witness pronounced, I went out and got the
letter which I now hold, for I remembered to have seen one bearing the
signature of Nancy Luther. This letter was