finally complete, it did great credit to the counsel for the defence.

So far as Mr. Braham knew, only two could read, one of whom was the

foreman, Mr. Braham's friend, the showy contractor. Low foreheads and

heavy faces they all had; some had a look of animal cunning, while the

most were only stupid. The entire panel formed that boasted heritage

commonly described as the "bulwark of our liberties."

The District Attorney, Mr. McFlinn, opened the case for the state. He

spoke with only the slightest accent, one that had been inherited but not

cultivated. He contented himself with a brief statement of the case.

The state would prove that Laura Hawkins, the prisoner at the bar, a

fiend in the form of a beautiful woman, shot dead George Selby, a

Southern gentleman, at the time and place described. That the murder

was in cold blood, deliberate and without provocation; that it had been

long premeditated and threatened; that she had followed the deceased from

Washington to commit it. All this would be proved by unimpeachable

witnesses. The attorney added that the duty of the jury, however painful

it might be, would be plain and simple. They were citizens, husbands,

perhaps fathers. They knew how insecure life had become in the

metropolis. Tomorrow our own wives might be widows, their own children

orphans, like the bereaved family in yonder hotel, deprived of husband

and father by the jealous hand of some murderous female. The attorney

sat down, and the clerk called?

Henry Brierly."

582

The Gilded Age