Deft.—He might.

Colt (satirically).—Of course he might.
(Laughter). But did he?

Deft. (plucking up a little spirit).—No. He
called me SOFT TOMMY.

This revelation, and the singular appropriateness
of the nickname, were so highly relished by
an intelligent audience, that it was a long time
before the trial could go on for roars. The plaintiff's
ringing laugh was heard among the rest.

The cross-examination proceeded in this style
till the defendant began to drivel at the mouth a
little. At last, after a struggle, he said, with a
piteous whine, that he could not help it: he
hated signing his name; some mischief always
came of it; but this time he had no option.

"No option?" said Colt. "What do you
mean?"

And with one or two more turns of the screw,
out came this astounding revelation:

"Richard said if I didn't put Taff in one, he
would put me in one."

The Judge.—In one what?

Deft.  (weeping bitterly).—In one madhouse,
my lord.

In the peal that followed this announcement,
Colt sat down grinning. Saunders rose smiling.
"I am much obliged to the learned counsel for
making my case," said he: "I need not prolong
the sufferings of the innocent. You can go down,
Mr. Hardie."

The Judge.—Have you any defence to this
action?

"Certainly, my lord."

"Do you call Richard Hardie?"

"No, my lord."

"Then you had better confine yourself to the
question of damages."

The sturdy Saunders would not take the hint:
he replied upon the whole case, and fought hard
for a verdict. The line he took was bold; he
described Richard Hardie as a man who had
acquired a complete power over his weaker
brother: and had not only persuaded him by
statements, but even compelled him by threats,
to do what he believed would be the salvation of
his nephew. Will you imitate the learned
counsel's cruelty? Will you strike a child? In
short, he made a powerful appeal to their pity,
while pretending to address their judgments.

Then Colt rose like a tower, and assuming the
verdict as certain, asked the jury for heavy
damages. He contrasted powerfully the defendant's
paltry claim to pity with the anguish the
plaintiff had undergone. He drew the wedding
party, the insult to the bride, the despair of the
kidnapped bridegroom; he lashed the whole
gang of conspirators concerned in the crime,
regretted that they could only make one of all
these villains smart, but hinted that Richard
and Thomas Hardie were in one boat, and that
heavy damages inflicted on Thomas would find
the darker culprit out. He rapped out Mr.
Cowper's lines on liberty, and they were new to
the jury, though to nobody else: he warned them
that all our liberties depended on them. "In
vain," said he, "have we beheaded one tyrant,
and banished another, to secure those liberties,
if men are to be allowed to send away their own
flesh and blood into the worst of all prisons for
life and not smart for it, in those lamentably few
cases in which the law finds them out and lays
hold of them." But it would task my abilities to
the utmost, and occupy more time than is left
me, to do anything like justice to the fluent fiery
eloquence of Colt, Q C., when he got a great
chance like this. Tonat, fulgurat, et rapidis
eloquentiæ fluctibus cuncta proruit et proturbat.
Bursts of applause, that neither crier nor judge
could suppress, bore witness to the deep
indignation Britons feel when their hard-earned liberties
are tampered with by power or fraud, in
defiance of law; and when he sat down, the jury
were ready to fly out at him with 5000l. in hand.

Then rose the passionless voice of "justice
according to law."  I wish I could give the very
words. The following is the effect as I understood
it. Lawyers forgive deficiencies!

"This is an important, but not a difficult case.
The plaintiff sues the defendant under the law
of England for falsely imprisoning him in a
madhouse. The imprisonment is admitted, and the
sufferings of the plaintiff not disputed. The
question is, whether he was insane at the time
of the act? Now, I must tell you, that in a
case of this kind, it lies upon the defendant to
prove the plaintiff's insanity, rather than on the
plaintiff to prove his own sanity. Has the
defendant overcome this difficulty? We have
had from him hearsay and conjectures of
respectable persons, but very little evidence.
Illusion is the best proof of insanity: and a
serious endeavour was certainly made to fasten
an illusion on the plaintiff about a sum of £14,000.
But the proof was very weak, and went partly
on an assumption that all error is hallucination:
this is illusory, and would, if acted on, set one
half the kingdom imprisoning the other half;
and after all, they did not quite prove that the
plaintiff was in error. They advanced no
undeniable proof that Mr. Richard Hardie has not
embezzled this £14,000. I don't say it was proved
on the other hand that he did embezzle that
sum. Richard Hardie suing Alfred Hardie for
libel on this evidence might possibly obtain a
verdict: for then the burden of proof would lie
on Alfred Hardie: but here it lies on those who
say he is insane. The fact appears to be that
the plaintiff imbibed a reasonable suspicion of his
own father's integrity; it was a suspicion founded
on evidence; imperfect, indeed, but of a high
character as far as it went. There was a letter
from Captain Dodd to his family, announcing his
return with £14,000 upon him, and, while as yet
unaware of this letter, the plaintiff heard David
Dodd accuse Richard Hardie of possessing
improperly £14,000, the identical sum. At least,
he swears to this, and as Richard Hardie was
not called to contradict him, you are at liberty to
suppose that Richard Hardie could not contradict