deposes and says: That he
is forty-three years old, a waiter by occupation, and resides in
the city of Baltimore, Maryland; that he was married to the defendant
herein on the eighteenth day of June, 187-, and thereafter lived
with her as man and wife until the month of December, 1882, when
for some reason unknown to deponent the defendant left his house
and did not thereafter return; that he has recently learned that
said defendant, in July, 1887, procured a decree of divorce against
him in the county and State of New York, upon grounds of which
deponent is totally ignorant, and that thereafter said defendant
contracted a marriage with one Rufus P. Dillingham, the plaintiff
therein; that deponent was never served with any summons or complaint
in said action of divorce and had no knowledge or information that
any such proceeding was pending against him; that he never appeared
in such proceeding and until recently always supposed that the
defendant was his lawful wife.

"Sworn to before me this fourteenth )
day of September, 1894 ) ARTHUR P. HAWKINS
"ISAAC M. COHEN,
"Notary Public, New York County."

There was something about this seedy rascal that filled me with
disgust and suspicion, and he looked at me out of the corners of
his evil eyes as if he knew that by some trick of fate he had me
in his power and was gloating over it. Even while he was swearing
to the paper he had a sickly sneer on his pimply face that sickened
me, and when Cohen, my clerk, administered the oath to him he had
the audacity to wink in his face and answer:

"It's the truth--_not!_"

Cohen, who knew a thing or two and had taken affidavits before,
merely laughed, but the words sent a shiver down my spine and I
snarled out:

"Be careful what you're saying! Do you swear that this affidavit
of yours is true?"

"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he hastened to answer, somewhat chagrined
at my not taking as a joke what he had intended for one.

"Very well," I said to Cohen. "Show the gentleman out. I'm very
busy. Good-day."

Afterward I would have given all the money I possessed to undo what
I had done.

The case of Dillingham _versus_ Dillingham duly came on for trial,
with Oscar Willoughby Bunce as the chief witness for defendant.
He had visited our office several times in an attempt to convince
us that we were entirely misinformed in regard to the service of
the papers in the original action and had insisted vehemently that