Page:Scribner's Monthly, Volume 12 (May–October 1876).djvu/519

Rh add that at this supreme moment, as the Colonel was lightly waving away with his fat right hand the difficulties of rhetoric, a sepulchral voice audible behind the jury suggested "Robinson County whisky" as the origin of the phenomena the Colonel hesitated to describe. The judge smiled blandly and directed the deputy sheriff to preserve order. The deputy obeyed the mandate by looking over into the crowd behind the jury and saying, in an audible tone, "You'd better dry up thar, Joe White, or git out o' that!" and the Colonel, undismayed, proceeded). "He well understood the confidence placed by the defense in these gentlemen. He had reason to believe that an attempt would be made to show that this homicide was committed in accordance with certain—er—er—principles held by honorable men—that the act was retributive, and in defense of an invasion of domestic rights and the sanctity of wedlock. But he should show them its fallacy. He should show them that only a base pecuniary motive influenced the prisoner. He should show them—er—er—that the accused had placed himself, first, by his antecedent acts, and secondly, by the manner of the later act, beyond the sympathies of honorable men. He should show them a previous knowledge of certain—er—er—indiscretions on the part of the prisoner's wife, and a condonation by the prisoner of those indiscretions, that effectually debarred the prisoner from the provisions of the code; he should show an inartistic—he must say, even on his own personal responsibility, a certain ungentlemanliness, in the manner of the crime that refused to clothe it with the—er—generous mantle of chivalry. The crime of which the prisoner was accused might have—er—er—been committed by a Chinaman or a nigger. Col. Starbottle did not wish to be misunderstood. It was not in the presence of—er—beauty—" (the Colonel paused, drew out his handkerchief, and gracefully waved it in the direction of the dusky Manuela and the truculent Sal—both ladies acknowledging the courtesy as an especial and isolated tribute, and exchanging glances of the bitterest hatred); "it is not, gentlemen, in the presence of an all-sufficient and enthralling sex that I would seek to disparage their influence with man. But I shall prove that this absorbing—er—er—passion, this—er—er—delicious, —er—er—fatal weakness that rules the warlike camp, the—er—er—stately palace, as well as the—er—er—cabin of the base-born churl, never touched the calculating soul of Gabriel Conroy! Look at him, gentlemen! Look at him, and say upon your oaths, upon your experience as men of gallantry, if he is a man to sacrifice himself for a woman. Look at him and say truly, as men personally responsible for their opinions, if he is a man to place himself in a position of peril through the blandishments of—er—er—beauty, or sacrifice himself upon the—er—er—altar of Venus!"

Every eye was turned upon Gabriel. And certainly at that moment he did not bear any striking resemblance to a sighing Amaryllis or a passionate Othello. His puzzled, serious face, which had worn a look of apologetic sadness, was suffused at this direct reference of the prosecution, and the long, heavy lower limbs, which he had diffidently tucked away under his chair to reduce the elevation of his massive knees above the ordinary level of one of the court-room chairs, retired still further. Finding himself during the Colonel's rhetorical pause, still the center of local observation, he slowly drew from his pocket a small comb, and began awkwardly to comb his hair with an ineffective simulation of preoccupation and indifference.

"Yes, sir," continued the Colonel, with that lofty forensic severity so captivating to the spectator, "you may comb yer hair" (hyar was the Colonel's pronunciation), "but yer can't comb it so as to make this intelligent jury believe that it is fresh from the hands of—er—er—Delilah."

The Colonel then proceeded to draw an exceedingly poetical picture of the murdered Ramirez, "a native, appealing to the sympathies of every Southern man, a native of the tropics, impulsive, warm, and peculiarly susceptible, as we all are, gentlemen, to the weaknesses of the heart."

The Colonel would not dwell further upon this characteristic of the deceased. There were, within the sound of his voice, visible to the sympathizing eyes of the jury, two beings who had divided his heart's holiest affections—their presence was more eloquent than words.

"This man," continued the Colonel, "a representative of one of our oldest Spanish families a family that recalled the days of—er—er—the Cid and Don John—this man had been the victim at once of the arts of Mrs. Conroy and the dastardly fears of Gabriel Conroy; of the wiles of the woman and the stealthy steel of the man."

Colonel Starbottle would show that personating the character and taking the name

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