minutes' practice.

"To prove to you how easily this can be done," said he, "I
will volunteer to write a better Kauser signature than Parker
did."

He thereupon seized a pen and began to demonstrate his ability
to do so. Mrs. Parker, seeing the force of this ocular
demonstration, grasped her counsel's arm and cried out: "For
God's sake, don't let him do it!" The lawyer objected, the
objection was sustained, but the case was saved. Why, the
jury argued, should the lawyer object unless the making of
such a forgery were in fact an easy matter?

In desperate cases, desperate men will take desperate chances.
The traditional instance where the lawyer, defending a client
charged with causing the death of another by administering
poisoned cake, met the evidence of the prosecution's experts
with the remark: "This is my answer to their testimony!" and
calmly ate the balance of the cake, is too familiar to warrant
detailed repetition. The jury retired to the jury-room and
the lawyer to his office, where a stomach pump quickly put him
out of danger. The jury is supposed to have acquitted.

Such are some of the tricks of the legal trade as practised in
its criminal branch. Most of them are unsuccessful and serve
only to relieve the gray monotony of the courts. When they
achieve their object they add to the interest of the
profession and teach the prosecutor a lesson by which,
perhaps, he may profit in the future.