circumstances based on a fallacy. As to the christening and the
registration of baptism, what easier than for a woman to declare
whatever she pleased as to the paternity of her child? It was true he
was written son of Montague Bramleigh: but when we once agree that there
was no marriage, this declaration has no value. He barely touched on the
correspondence and the transmission of money abroad, which he explained
as the natural effort of a man of high station and character to suppress
the notoriety of a youthful indiscretion. Political animosity had, at
that period, taken a most injurious turn, and scandal was ransacked to
afford means of attack on the reputations of public men.

I barely give you the outline of his argument, but I will send you the
printed account of the trial as soon as the shorthand writer shall have
completed it for press. Baron Jocelyn's charge was, I must say, less
in our favor than I had expected; and when he told the jury that the
expressions of attachment and affection in Mr. B.'s letters, and the
reiterated use of the phrase "my dear, dear wife," demanded their
serious consideration as to whether such words would have fallen from a
man hampered by an illicit connection, and already speculating how to be
free of it; all this, put with great force and clearness, and a certain
appeal to their sense of humanity, did us much disservice. The length
of time he dwelt on this part of the case was so remarkable, that I
overheard a Q. C. say he had not known till then that his Lordship was
retained for the plaintiff.

When he came to that part where allusion was made to the fact of the
claimant being a foreigner, he made an eloquent and effective appeal to
the character of English justice, which elicited a burst of applause in
the court that took some seconds to repress; but this, I am told, was
more owing to the popular sympathy with the politics of old Lami, and
his connection with the rebellion of '98, than with any enthusiasm for
his Lordship's oratory.

The jury were three hours in deliberation. I am confidentially informed
that we had but five with, and seven against us; the verdict, as you
know, was not agreed on. We shall go to trial in spring, I hope with
Holmes to lead for us, for I am fully persuaded the flaw lies in the
history subsequent to the marriage of Mr. B., and that it was a mistake
to let the issue turn on the event which had already enlisted the
sympathies of the jury in its favo