Pomeroy weekly telegraph. [volume] (Pomeroy, Meigs County, Ohio) 1860-1866, 1865-08-10
The Volunteer Counsel.

John Taylor was licensed, when a youth o
twenty-one, to practice at the bar. He wa!
poor, bnt well educated, and possessed extraor
dinary genius. He married beauty, who af
terwards deserted him for another
On the 18th of April, 1910, the Court house
in Clarksvllc, Texas was crowded to over
flowing An exciting case was about to bt
tried. Geo. Hopkins, a wealthy PLATTER, hat
offered gross insult to Mary Ellison, the
young and beautiful wife of his overseer. The
husband threatened to .chastise him fol
the outrage, when Hopkins went to Ellison's
house, and shot him in his own door, The
murderer was arrested and Jailed to answer
the charge. This occurrence produced a grea
excitement, and Hopkins, in order to turn the
tide of popular indignation, had circulated re
ports against her character, and she had sued
him for slander. Both suits were pending
for SANDER and murder.
The interest became deeper when it was
known that Ashly and Pike, ofArkansas, land
S. S. Prentiss, of New Orleans, by enormous
fees, had been retained to defend Hopkins
Hopkins was acquitted. The Texas law
yers were overwhelmed by their opponents -
1t was a fight of dwarfs against giants.
The SANDER suit was for the 9th, and the
throng of spectators grew in number as well
as excitement, public opinion was setting in
for Hopkins his money had procured witness.
es who served his powerful advocates. When
the slander case was called, Mary Ellison was
left without an attorney-all had withdrawn.
Have you no COUNSEL? inquired Judge
Mills, looking kindly at the plaintiff
mo sir, they have all deserted me, and l
am too poor to employ any more, replied the
beautiful Mary, bursting into tears
In such case, will not some chivalrous
member of the profession volunteer said the
Judge, glancing round at the bar.
The thirty lawyers were silent
4 will, your honor said voice from the
thickest part of the crowd behind the bar
At the sound of that voice many started
it was so unearthly, sweet and mounful.
The first sensation was changed into laugh
ter when tall gaunt, spectralfgure elbowed
his way through the crowd, and placed him.
self within the bar. His clothes looked SO
shabby that the court hesitated to let the ease
proceed under his management
Has your name been entered on the rolls
of the State? demanded the Judge.
1T is immaterial, answered the stranger,
his thin, bloodless lips curling up with fiend-
sh sneer. Here is my license from the high
est tribunal in Americap and he handed the
Judge small parchment The trial went on.
He suffered the witnesses to tell their own
story, and he allowed the defense to lead off,
Ashley spoke first, followed by Pike and Prem
tiss. The latter brought the house down with
cheers, in which the jury joined.
1twas now the stranger turn, he rises
before the bar, not behind it--and SO near the
wondering jury that he might touch the fore
man with his long bony finger. He proceed
ed to tear to pieces the arguments of Ashley,
which melted away at his touch like frost be-
fore sunbeam; every one looked surprised
Anon he came to the dazzling wit of the pceett
lawyer Pike. Then the curl Of biz ips grew
sharper, his smoothe face began to kindle up
and his eyes to opeE dim and dreary no long.
er, but vivid as lightning, red as Ere globes s
and glaring as twin meteors. The whole soul
was in the eye; the full heaft streamed out Of
his face. Then without bestowing an allusion
to Prentiss, he turned short round on the per
jured witnesses of Hopkips-tore their testi-
mony into shreds, and hurled into their faces
such terrible ipyectiYes that all trembled like
aspens, and two of them fed from the court
house. The excitement of the crowd was be-
coming tremendous Their united life and