Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1898-01-14


barism, and the sooner we get rid of the
jury in this country the better for it. "
He tipped his chair back against the
pine boards and drew clouds enough
out of his bricr wood to obscure the
most lucid argument
1t was party of four, made up of
hydraulic engineer, captain in the
navy on furlough, graduate of Har-
ward going to study law i'll the fall,
and an uncle of the young man, Judge
Chambers one of the justices of the 81
perior court of Connecticut. The jl., SO
was the patriarch of the uum 1t. the
owner of the camp and caught more
fish than all of the rest of the men to-
gether.
He took off his glasses, and as he
wiped them he scrutinized his nephew
with fond contempt.
The hydraulic engineer spoke quick
ly and Systematically, like the pumping
of one of his own motors.
Il myself think the juryman is the
most outraged free man | know Of
While the criminal is receiving bou-
quets from silly women and feeding
like a gamecock the poor juryman is
deprived of wholesome air, of decent
food, of exercise and always of sleep UNI
til a verdict is agreed upon | would
like to know what sort of verdict a man
is going to give whose whole routine
of life is changed and who is coerCed
by the lack of food or sleep.
1--WE don't think of putting the Off
Of ,o1 n,.l
i'll irons until they bring in a verdict,
the captain observed with the uncon-
scious intonation of superiority into
which the seaman always falls when i'll
presence of the landlubber.
The judge took his cigar out of his
mouth, and the rest turned to him with
Difference. The young man started to
say irreverently, "Oh, you're preju
diced" but for once held his peace.
The judge was not a talker, but when
he opened his mouth his friends respect
ed his well digested experience, if not
his arbitrary opinion.
1.-The jury system, he said judicial
ly, sis an abominatiOn as praCticed in
England and in most of our states. We
i'll Connecticut passed an act of legisla
ture so that the juryman serves as the
other officers of the court and goes from
the jury room to his home as | do my
self. To put juryman like school
boy, on honor is to get the best results
l have known Of but one case where IA
jury penned up assisted justice more
than it would have done had it been
free. But in this case justice was served
in "a blind, haphaZard way at Il terrible
cost. 1t happened i'll my own circuit 20
let me sect was % years ago, and
a similar case might not happen again
i'll the century"
Rain had now set in 1t was chilly
on that May evening, and the fire and
the tale to come tempted the company
to draw their chairs III a closer circle
around the chimney, for leaf from the
judges ponderous volume of experiences
that covered 30 years of fighting at the
bar and ruling on the bench was sure to
need no further illustration to hold at
tention than his own genuine elocution.
The tale is paraphrased little into
continuity by one of its auditors and
will not be given precisely i'll the frag
mentary and conversational form Of its
original narrator
Broadfelds is one of the most pictur
esque one of the oldest and one of the
loveliest villages i'll Connecticut. 1t CON
sists of two streets, each about mile
long, intersecting each other ut right
angles A double row of elms planted
III King Charles time guards each ave
nue.. The town reminds one of old Had
ley, famous for its stately streets, its
colonial homes and undisturbed peace.
On the goth of May, 1872, Broad
fields awoke out of an insensibility that
had lasted for over 200 years. What pol
itics, crops, war, marriage, debt or in
heritance could not accomplish had now
come to pass
At 8 O'Clock at night, or perhaps a
little later, Mrs. Burns, the wife of the
richest, the most Grabbed and the most
feared man in this ancient community,
electrified her next door neighbors by a
cry of "Murderl' Then Broadtields,
lethargic as stone hitching post, awoke
to new and awful responsibilities.
The people of the town We're all in
their beds, and Mrs. Burns would have
been had she not stepped out to the
barn, 100 yards or so back of the house,
to look for her husband. He had taken
his lantern and had gone out there
alone about an hour before to do some
simple chores, and his wife actuated
possibly by some subtle influence like
that with which detected crime is able
to draw crowd out of the bowels of
the earth, felt anxious about him for
the first time in her life. When she
found Mr.. Burns dead in his own blood,
she ran to the front gate and uttered
into the blackness of the unlighted
streets her memorable cry,
1t took Broadfields no little time tC
awake to the consciousness of crime
of such high degree, but at last GROUP
of leading citizens stood about the wild
ow in the anxious light of their sway
ing lanterns. These good people were
as much perplexed about what to do al
= white cat with litter of black crows
1t finally occurred to the minister thai
Deacon Luke Bassett, who had forgot
ten the fact himself, was town consta'
BILE, and that, as the sole representative
of the law, it was his duty to see Il
Mrs. Burns story were true, and if SC
to apprehend the murderer
By this time there was throng of al
least seven persons, and these the dea-
con authoritatiyely ordered into the