sible
fate of Amanda, had lost both recollection and temper; and for the
first time when conducting a cross-examination, had been not merely
baffled, but successfully bearded and insulted by an irritated
witness, to relieve himself from whom, he was obliged abruptly to
bid him leave the box. The occurrence stung him to the quick, though
he strove to hide his chagrin;--no wonder. Taken at disadvantage,
and in a moment of weakness, the old pleader was obliged to perceive
that the wager of mental duel between himself and the witness had
been decided against him; and to feel that, in an unsought encounter
and fair affray, he had been publicly worsted. To add to his
mortification, the witness walked from the box with the air of a
conqueror, and cast an insolent look of triumph around the court
and upon his antagonist, whose discomfiture was so signal as to be
evident to judge, jurors, witnesses, spectators, all. Still more
to increase the advocate's perturbation, the heat of the court had
become excessive, and the rebuff--which, at an earlier period of
his career, and with an unwounded heart, would have provoked only
such a grim and threatening smile as a powerful wrestler might
wear, when, in the careless security of proud contempt, he had been
thrown by a boy--now, in the self-esteem of age and the anguish
of bereavement, moved him almost to madness. Seizing his gown, he
half cast it from his form, regardless of decorum, and stood the
picture of misery, rage, and scorn.

Just then the court arose for a brief recess. Glad to breathe for
a moment the fresher air, the spectators retired, the jury returned
into their room, the sheriff and the crown prosecutor sauntered to
their respective offices, the panel of petit jurors escaped in a
body, the prisoner withdrew from the front of the dock, and sat
unseen, pondering his chances between the gallows and an
acquittal;--even the criers of the court abandoned their posts,
and the younger members of the bar, who usually gathered round the
advocate on these occasions, greeting him with pleasant compliments,
and polite and reverent attentions, seeing him thus moody, drifted
to the lobby, and in it paid court to some other, and secondary
legal luminary who was there holding his levee. For awhile the
advocate was left alone; then, emerging through the large folding
doors into the corridor or lobby, now cumbered with the gossipping
groups, through which he passed, solitary and in his g