Thrilling also was the earlier evidence, furnished by maid-servants and
police constables in pairs; but here there was no surprise. The maids
were examined not only as to what they had seen and heard on the night
of the murder--and they seemed to have heard everything except the fatal
shot--but upon the previous relations of their master and mistress--of
which they showed an equally extensive knowledge. The constables were
perforce confined to their own discoveries and observations when the
maids had called them in. But all four witnesses spoke to the prisoner's
behavior when shown the dead body of her husband, and there was the
utmost unanimity in their several tales. The prisoner had exhibited
little or no surprise; it was several minutes before she had uttered a
syllable; and then her first words had been to point out that burglars
alone could have committed the murder.

In cross-examination the senior counsel for the defence thus early
showed his hand; and it was not a strong one to those who knew the game.
A Queen's Counsel, like the leader for the Crown, this was an
altogether different type of lawyer; a younger man, with a more engaging
manner; a more brilliant man, who sought with doubtful wisdom to blind
the jury with his brilliance. His method was no innovation at the Old
Bailey; it was to hold up every witness in turn to the derision and
contempt of the jury and the court. So both the maids were reduced to
tears, and each policeman cleverly insulted as such. But the testimony
of all four remained unshaken; and the judge himself soothed the young
women's feelings with a fatherly word, while wigs were shaken in the
well of the court. That was no road to the soft side of a decent,
conscientious, hard-headed jury, of much the same class as these
witnesses themselves; even the actors and authors had a sound opinion on
the point, without waiting to hear one from the professional gentlemen