Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/574

 at the very moment that he is sajang to the court that the suits would not be defended. Well might Mr. Hughes exclaim, "Oh, Mr. Spencer!" at the dramatic surprise; and well may our sympathies be prompted by the apparition on the stage of the poor man come to save his home from the grasp of the spoiler; and yet at last, by the renewed acts and influences of corrupt and powerful men, he is turned from it.

It has been shown that it was the expectation of Hughes to have the Lapsley cases dispatched, and to use the deposition of James Hewitson as to the execution of the power of attorney, taken, as has been seen, surreptitiously, and by a fraudulent contrivance, before any of the defendants or their counsel should be present to protect their rights on the trial at New Orleans. Under any circumstances, the only proper course would have been to attach the power of attorney, which was referred to in the deposition of Hewitson, and made a part of it. But this is not done; it is found that, after the lapse of a year from the filing of the deposition, when the trial of the case comes on, it has not even been filed. It was used in evidence against Spencer, and still not filed; but a copy appears to have been substituted for it.

Let me for a moment regard the scene in court, in which Robert Hughes, who had constituted himself the exclusive custodian of this paper, comes forward to sustain it by his testimony as a witness. Here is the representative of Judge Watrous, by his own evidence, establishing the genuineness of the paper, as that which Hewitson had sworn to, and which, since that time, had been in the possession of said Hughes. He produces the paper from his pocket, without any indorsement, without any file mark, and identifies it.

Thus it appears that the defendants in the Lapsley cases were deprived of opportunity to protect their rights against this forged document, except upon presentation in court.

Judgment had been rendered in the case of Lapsley against Spencer on the 30th of May, 1856, and six days thereafter, the following entry is found in one of the Lapsley cases remaining over, showing the anxiety of the parties for an opportunity to sustain their plea of forgery, and evidencing the persistent attempts of Hughes to deny them such opportunity. I read, from page 649, testimony in the Watrous investigation:

Minutes, April Term, 1856.

", Friday, June 6, 1856.

"

vs.

, and  No. 2458.

"The defendants, by their counsel, this day suggested to the court, that heretofore, to wit: on or about the 25th day of February, 1855, the plaintiff herein took the deposition, de dene esse, of one James Hewitson, to prove execution of a certain power of attorney purporting to have been executed by Thomas Vega, before Juan Gonzales, regidor of Leona Vicario, with José Nazas Ortez and J. M. McMoral as assisting witnesses, dated the 5th day of May, 1832, authorizing Samuel M. Williams to sell the land in controversy