The weekly Panola star. [volume] (Panola, Miss.) 1857-1881, 1870-07-09
The Judges "Spirlted Women"

THE following is from Mark Twain's
" Memoranda" In the June Gdldry:
A correspondent quotes IN incident in
the Pierre Bonaparte trial as IAN unu-
sual instance of spirit in a woman "a
young and gentle woman, unaccustomed
to tumultuous assemblages of strange
men, and therefore likely to be the very
reverse of spirited in a place like that
High Court Of Tours. She described the
scene between herself and Victor Noir
and his betrothed, when Victor was put.
ting on and buttoning his neat new
Jouvlns. Then, says the correspondent
She described how In two hours they
brought him back dead. In the evening
she asked those about her how the trouble
came about, and they told her that the
Prince said Victor had given him q blow.
:" | went to his body she said az looked
at his gloves, and when | saw them un-
broken, unstained and clean, and tightly
fitting, buttoned as l had seen them in the
morning, I knew the Prince had lied p
AS she said this, she pointed her finger at
the Prince, and looked him in the face,
but he made no sign,
In a moment this little feminine out
burst reminded me Of an instance which
an old Nevada Judge Of the early times
gave me as being what he ~sparklingly
called "the most right up and snappy
ebullition Of womanly spunk" that had
ever fallen under his notice.
az was sitting here" said the Judge
ain this old pulpit, holding court, and W.
were trying a big, wicked. locking Span
ish desperate for killing the husband Of
bright, pretty Mexican woman. II was
lazy summer day, and an awful long one
and the witnesses were tedious. None o
, us took any interest In the trial, exoep
that nervous, uneasy devil Of q Mexican
' woman-because you know how they Low
b and how they hate, and this one ha,
loved her husband with all her NIGH
4 and now she had boiled II all down int
hate, and stood there splitting it at tina
D Spaniard with her eyes; and | tell yo'
! she would stir me up, too, with a little q
her summer lightning occasionally. Wei
, I had my coat of and heels up, lolling an,
u sweating, and smoking n Of those cal
bsge cigars the San Francisco peopl
$ used to think were good enough for u
8 in those times; and the lawyers the
all hdu tiCll Nputt Vu uuu MtI
4 smoking and whiting, and the wit
: nesses the same, and so wal the prisoner
Well, the fact is, there warn't an,
I interest In q murder trial then, becaus
the prisoner was always brought in no
guilty, the jury expecting them to do a
much for them some time and, although
! the evidence was straight and suuar
r against this Spaniard, we knew we coul
: not convict him without seeming to b
rather high.handed and sort of retiectin
7 on every gentleman in the community
for there wern'tany carriages and liverie
: then, and so the only style there we
! to keep your private graveyard. Bu
/ that woman seemed to have her heart s,
on hanging that Spaniard, and you
ought to have seen how she would glal
on him a minute, and then look UP at N
In her pleading. way, and then turn, an
for the next five minutes search the Jury
II aces-and by and by drop her face Ia h,
hands for Just a little while, as If she w
a most ready to give up; but out she
o come again directly and be as live a,
d anxious as ever. But when the Jury a
nonnced the verdict, not,guilty, and [ To
| the prisoner he was acquitted and free
nc go, that woman rose up till she appear
10 be as tall and grand as a seventy 70
4 gun ship, and says she;
w "Ju1ge, do / understand you to
~ That this man is not guilty, that murder
- my husband without any cause, before
~ eyes and my little children's, and that
,rs has been done to him that ever Justice
~, the law could dof"
SO The same,'n
~ And then what do you reckon
aid' Why she turned on that smirk
spanish fool like a wildcat, and out v
'bst . navy and shot him dead in 0
I'd l sTh., -.
admit" ~
~ "Wssn't it though" said the Judge,
lei. mirinsly. II wouldn't have missedil
anything. adjourned court right on
spot, and We patton our coats, and \
my out and took up . collection for her
look her cubs, and sent them over tho m
oil taina 70 their friends. All, she ",
spirited wenchr