Page:Melville Davisson Post--The Man of Last Resort.djvu/233

Rh his composure, replied that the State had nothing more to offer, and resumed his seat.

The counsel for Gilmore at once moved the court to direct a verdict of not guilty, which was accordingly done and the prisoner discharged.

Mystic, and varied, and without premonition are the ways of Providence. When the negro miner went down into the sunless temples of the earth on this Wednesday of July, Salathiel Jenkins was a person of high estate, crowding mightily the orbit of his employer. And when the negro miner came up at evening, this same Salathiel Jenkins was a crestfallen underling, shrinking like a rotten value. The ordeal was frightful. The pride of young Mr. Jenkins had gone through a process of sublimation most excruciating. And yet how abominably indifferent nature was. The books in the office of the sheriff were the same. The trees, the river, and indeed the entire outside world were quite as large as they had been. Only the importance of the deputy had shrunk, and was shrinking. Master of folly! Would it stop short of microscopic? The vice of his