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please you to answer to justice?"
The sheriff ceased and waited.
The prisoner lay motionless.
The sheriff resumed,--
"Man, silence is a refuge in which there is more risk than safety. The
obstinate man is damnable and vicious. He who is silent before justice
is a felon to the crown. Do not persist in this unfilial disobedience.
Think of her Majesty. Do not oppose our gracious queen. When I speak to
you, answer her; be a loyal subject."
The patient rattled in the throat.
The sheriff continued,--
"So, after the seventy-two hours of the proof, here we are at the fourth
day. Man, this is the decisive day. The fourth day has been fixed by the
law for the confrontation."
"
Quarta die, frontem ad frontem adduce," growled the Serjeant.
The wisdom of the law," continued the sheriff, "has chosen this last
"
hour to hold what our ancestors called 'judgment by mortal cold,' seeing
that it is the moment when men are believed on their yes or their no."
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