The Portland daily press., 1872-02-24
The English Attorney General In the
TichbOrne Case.

Correspondence of the Cincinnati Gazette.l
The attorney general commenced his OPEN
ing for the defence in the Tichborne case on
the 18th, aud is still on his legs.
Sir John Coleridge is one of the most
charming speakers in England. Indeed,
there are not six speakers in England who
can approach him in the fine art of being
charming in public address. He has none
of the English hesitation and ah-ah-ing
which set you almost distracted as you sit in
the galleries of either house of parliament
listening to the debates. He is uncommonly
smooth, oily and connected. His voice is not
unlike that of Wendell Phillips, of whom you
cannot but be reminded as you listen to the mel
lihuous stream of the attorney-generars elo-
| quence. His gestures are not absolutely
| graceful. Some of them are absolutely awk-
ward. But there are not three men in Great
Britain who can make a graceful gesture,
| while there are not three men in Italy who
cannot.
! The attorney general has also first rate
bodily presence and plenty of what the
dramatic critics call aplomb. He is thor
| oughly selfpossessed His tall, erect, we'll
proportioned figure is kept as steady as a ship
in tranquil sea- His face is unobstructed
by whiskers, and his head is equally desti-
| tute of hair; so that his wig rather be-
comes him, which is more than be said of
many of his fellow barristers. These wigs,
as a general rule, are simply disgusting.
They are short haired, frizzly and frowsy, un-
clean and unkempt.
The bland elocution and countenance of
Sir John seems out of keeping with the acrid
| things he feels obliged to say. No man can
make more purely elegant and fastidously
| gentlemanly speech than he. Iheard hisspeech
| in the house, when he sot under the gang
way, and introduced his bill for the abolition
nf nm ifu faaf VIC mn nf hn ,nok
delightful pieces of oratorical music that l ever
| heard.
| Now the same pleasant voice sends the ar
rows ofinvective into that far from diminu-
tive target the claimant. The nasty, stuffy
little court room, at Westminster was pack
ed tight with perspiring ladies and gentlemen,
dukes and judges, old men and maidens in
refreshing state of unventilation.
| Sir John rises with an effective air of self
confidence. He glances serenely around up
| on his compact and expectant audience.
With exquisite precision of words and delber-
alton of elocntion he proceeds to say, after a
few preliminary remarks, thai his object will
be to show that the noble mother of his in
| FAINT client is not to be cast down from her
dignity, and to see her child bereft of his in
hertance by the cunning and audacious
schemes Of slight pause) conspirator, "a
| (another pause), forger (another pausel, an
imposter Ia longer pause, and villainl
These epithets were uttered with leisurely
| frigidity, and made decided sensation, which
| quickly burst into applause, mostly confined
to the box full of witnesses for the defense.
The lord chief justice leaned forward and
| said such demonstrations could not be allow
ed. The attorney general, with the utmost
sang Jroid, resumed in a tone of apology, say
ing his words were the strongest he could
think of, but they should be followed by
stronger ones, if such could be found in the
language. He would proceed to lay before
them hundreds of indisputable facts, each con-
vcting the plaintiff OF fraud, ne, CRIME
| fgreat deliberation) on scale OF depth and
wickedness hitherto unexampled, as far as he
knew, in the annals of their law courts.
| As to the character of the claimant, of
course the jury lad formed very decided
and very low opinion. But that by itself is
not conclusive. Of course, a man may be
low, unmitigated blackguard, and yet retain
his personal identity. But where the point
! of identity is to be made out chiefly by the
evidence of the plaintiff himaelf, then if you
cannot believe him upon any other subject,
how can you believe him upon himself?
He gives brief narrative of the career of
| the claimant, and says ifhe sounds ironical, 1t
must be remembered that such facts are in
themselves irony complete. The plalntiif's
history as given by himself, especially his his
tory of the shipwreck, is held up to ridieule
IN the most SuperclllOus Ihaiinoi, SOn0 VI tho
plaintiffs letters are read, spelling and all, and
the fB. of b. X, in one of them is translated
" Baronet ofthe British Kingdom" amid roars
of laughter
Sir John proceeds tccompare the slight, un-
der-sized, delicate, chivalrous, honorable, cul-
tivated Sir Roger with this enormous mass of
flesh, this rascal who was tried for horse-steal-
ing, this common Australian thief for eight or
nine years, this low ruffian-h;s French gone,
mothers name gone, education gone feeling
gone, all gone. The letters of the real Sir
Roger were those of low blackguard-black-
guard in expression, blackguard in tone.