of high station. The military witnesses for the Claimant were very
numerous; and among them were five of Roger Tichborne's old brother
officers, the rest being sergeants, corporals, and privates. There
were Australian witnesses, and medical witnesses, old servants,
tenants of the Tichborne family, and numerous other persons. With the
exception of two remote connexions, however, no members of the
numerous families of Tichborne and Seymour presented themselves to
support the plaintiffs claims; and even the two gentlemen referred to
admitted that their acquaintance with Roger was slight, and that it
was in his youth; and finally, that they had not recognised the
features of the Claimant, but had merely inferred his identity from
some circumstances he had been able to mention. The plaintiffs case
was almost entirely unsupported by documentary evidence, and rested
chiefly on the impressions or the memory of witnesses, or on their
conclusions drawn from circumstances, which often, when they were
inquired into in cross-examination, proved to be altogether
insufficient.

But the cross-examination of the Claimant himself was really the
turning-point of the trial. It extended over twenty-seven days, and
embraced the whole history of Roger Tichborne's life, his alleged
rescue, the life in Australia, and all subsequent proceedings. Besides
this, matters connected with the Orton case were inquired into. Much
that was calculated to alarm supporters of the Claimant was elicited.
He was compelled to admit that he had no confirmation to offer of his
strange story of the rescue, and that he could produce no survivor of
the "Osprey," nor any one of the crew of the "Bella" alleged to have
been rescued with him. The mere existence of such a vessel was not
evidenced by any shipping register or gazette, or custom-house record.
It was moreover admitted that he had changed his story--had for a
whole year given up the "Osprey," and said the vessel was the
"Themis," and finally returned to the "Osprey" again. All the strange
circumstances of the Wagga-Wagga will, the Gibbes and Cubitt
correspondence, the furtive transactions with the Orton family, the
curious revelations of the commissions in South America and Australia,
were acknowledged, and either left unexplained or explained in a way
which was evasive, inconsistent, and contradictory. His accounts of
his relations with Arthur Orton were also vague, and his attempts to
support his assertio