Page:Bentley- Trent's Last Case (Nelson, nd).djvu/370

362 'I never have done so, for my part,' said Trent. 'To hang in such cases seems to me flying in the face of the perfectly obvious and sound principle expressed in the saying that "you never can tell". I agree with the American jurist who lays it down that we should not hang a yellow dog for stealing jam on circumstantial evidence, not even if he has jam all over his nose. As for attempts being made by malevolent persons to fix crimes upon innocent men, of course it is constantly happening. It's a marked feature, for instance, of all systems of rule by coercion, whether in Ireland or Russia or India or Korea; if the police cannot get hold of a man they think dangerous by fair means, they do it by foul. But there's one case in the State Trials that is peculiarly to the point, because not only was it a case of fastening a murder on innocent people, but the plotter did in effect what Manderson did; he gave up his own life in order to secure the death of his victims. Probably you have heard of the Campden Case.'

Mr. Cupples confessed his ignorance and took another potato.

'John Masefield has written a very