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attendant, and from him it had been more slowly pressed and passed
back; at last it got to Jerry:

"Witnesses."

"For which side?"

"Against."

"Against what side?"

"The prisoner's."

The Judge, whose eyes had gone in the general direction, recalled
them, leaned back in his seat, and looked steadily at the man whose
life was in his hand, as Mr. Attorney-General rose to spin the rope,
grind the axe, and hammer the nails into the scaffold.



III

A Disappointment


Mr. Attorney-General had to inform the jury, that the prisoner before
them, though young in years, was old in the treasonable practices
which claimed the forfeit of his life. That this correspondence with
the public enemy was not a correspondence of to-day, or of yesterday,
or even of last year, or of the year before. That, it was certain
the prisoner had, for longer than that, been in the habit of passing
and repassing between France and England, on secret business of which
he could give no honest account. That, if it were in the nature of
traitorous ways to thrive (which happily it never was), the real
wickedness and guilt of his business might have remained undiscovered.
That Providence, however, had put it into the heart of a person who
was beyond fear and beyond reproach, to ferret out the nature of the
prisoner's schemes, and, struck with horror, to disclose them to his
Majesty's Chief Secretary of State and most honourable Privy Council.
That, this patriot would be produced before them. That, his position
and attitude were, on the whole, sublime. That, he had been the
prisoner's friend, but, at once in an auspicious and an evil hour
detecting his infamy, had resolved to immolate the traitor he could
no longer cherish in his bosom, on the sacred altar of his country.
That, if statues were decreed in Britain, as in ancient Greece and
Rome, to public benefactors, this shining citizen would assuredly
have had one. That, as they were not so decreed, he probably would
not have one. That, Virtue, as had been observed by the poets (in
many passages which he well knew the jury would have, word for word,
at the tips of their tongues; whereat the jury's countenances
displayed a guilty consciousness that they knew nothing about the
passages), was in a manner contagious; more especially the bright
virtue known as patriotism, or love of country. That, the lofty
example of this immaculate and unimpeachable witness for the Crown,
to refer to whom however unworthily was an honour, had communicated
itself to the prisoner's servant, and had engendered in him a holy
determination to examine his master's table-drawers and pockets, and
secrete his papers. That, he (Mr. Attorney-General) was prepared to
hear some disparagement attempted of this admirable servant; but that,
in a general way, he preferred him to his (Mr. Attorney-General's)
brothers and sisters, and honoured him more than his
(Mr. Attorney-General's) father and mother.

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