e question for the lawyer
is whether it is better to satisfy the client or the jury. In this
quandary the lawyer may forget that the main point is to win the
battle. When the case is lost the client does not care at all how
brilliantly the lawyer looked, acted, or fought.

If the lawyer reasons he will say:

"If the object of my cross-examination is to show that the witness is
not telling the truth, have I much chance of getting him to confess
the fact?" The witness knows something about perjury. He is afraid and
he has heard about those pitfalls of cross-examination. Does the
lawyer remember his own hopeful son and how only yesterday he could
not get him to admit stealing the cake even with the prospect of
immediately impending punishment? Only that little rim of chocolate
about the ears was the proof. Even the deaf little child, who is not
as intelligent as the witness, will not admit that he was untruthful.
But still he goes on cross-examining.

If the witness is finally shown a paper which he or she signed when
the investigator of the railroad came to see her, and in which she
said she was sitting on the sixth seat, there is not such a great deal
to be proud of.

"Ha, Ha," thinks the lawyer "at last," "didn't you just now say you
were sitting on the fourth seat?" "I don't remember," says the
witness. "What," thunders the lawyer, "you don't remember; then your
memory is poor. I will read you what you said on your direct
examination," and he does. "Now which was it, the sixth or the fourth
seat."

The other object of cross-examination is to elicit new facts. This is
a dangerous risk for the lawyer, and unless he is sure of his ground,
he had better not take it. He will do better to let his own side tell
the facts than to bring them out through an unwilling witness who is
on his guard and thinking the opposing lawyer is trying to trap him.

The mistake that most lawyers make in cross-examination is to ask the
witness to repeat what he said in his direct testimony. Telling the
same story over again merely accents the facts in the minds of the
jury. The lawyer asks:

"You say that you saw the driver whip up his horses when the car was a
block away." The lawyer may doubt the truth of the statement but the
mere repetition of the words affects the memory of the jury. Unless
he has a distinct object in going over the testimony, either to show
the direct contrary strongly, or the fact that the witness has learned
th