Gloucester County Democrat., 1908-02-27

| MS lawyer had diminished, 1t was no.
| ticed, in very respectable quarters" :"
The Information impaired by Mike
| Sheehan to the politicians at Mr.. Far
bach's had been slowly seeping through
| the various social strata of the town,
and, though at first incredulously re-
| jected, it began to find acceptance,
Upper Main street cooling appreciably
in its acceptance of the Tocsin as the
law and the prophets. There were
even a few who dared to wonder in
their hearts If there had not been a
mistake about Joe Louden, and, al
though Mrs Flitcroft weakened not,
the relatives of Squire Buckalew and
of Peter Bradbury began to hold up
their heads a little after having made
home horrible for those gentlemen and
reproached them with their conversion
as the last word of senile shame. In
addition, the coloneps grandson and
Mr. Bradbury's grandson had both
| mystifyingly lent countenance to Joe,
consorting with him openly, the former
for his own purposes, the latter be-
cause he had cunningly discovered that
| it was a way to Miss Tabor's regard,
which since her gentle rejection Of him
he had grown to believe, good youth,
might be the pleasantest thing that
could ever come to him. In short. the
| question had begun to thrive, Was 1t
possible that Eskew Arp had not been
Insane after all?
| The best Of those who gathered om-
inously about the courthouse and its
purlieus were the young farmers and
| field hands, artisans and clerks, one Of
the latter being pimply faced young
man Qately from the doctors hands,,
who limped and would limp for the
rest of his life, he who, Of all men,
held the memory of Eskew Arp in
least respect and was burningly de-
sirous to revenge himself upon the liv-
ing.
The worst were Of that mystifying,
embryonic, semi-rowdy type, the Amer
ican voyou, in the production of which
Canaan and her sister towns every
where over the country are prolific
the young man. youth, boy perhaps,
creature of nameless age, whose
clothes are like those of brakeman
out of work, but who is not brake
man in or out of work; wearing the
black soft hat tilted forward to shelter
-as counter does the contempt of a
clerk-that expression which the face
does not dare wear quite in the open,
asserting the possession Of supreme ca
pacity in wit, strength, dexterity and
amours; the dirty handkerchief under
the collar, the short black coat, al
ways double breasted; the eyelids
sooty, one cheek always bulged, the
forehead speckled, the lips cracked,
horrible teeth and the affectation of
possessing secret information upon all
matters of the universe, above all, the
instinct of finding the shortest way to
any scene of official interest to the
policeman, fireman or ambulance sur
geon-a singular being, not profession
ally criminal, tough histrionically
rather than really, full of Its own
argot of brag, hysterical when crossed,
timid through great ignorance and
therefore dangerous. 1t furnishes not
the leaders, but the mass of mobs, and
it springs up at times of crisis from
heaven knows where. You might have
driven through all the streets, of Ca
naan week before the trial and have
seen four or five such fellows, but
from the day of its beginning the
square was full of them, dingy shuttle
cocks batted up into view by the Toe
sin.
They kept the air whirring with their
noise. The news of that sitting which
had caused the squire, Flitcroft and
Peter Bradbury to risk the courts dis
pleasure was greeted outside with loud
and vehement disfavor, and when, at
noon, the jurymen were marshaled
out to cross the yard to the National
House for dinner large crowd fol-
lowed and surrounded them until they
reached the doors of the hotel. Don't
let Lawyer Louden bamboozle your
Hang himr' "Tar and feathers fer
ye eff We don't hang himw These were
the mildest threats, and Joe Louden,
watching from an upper window of
the courthouse, observed with a trou-
bled eye how certain Of the jury shrank
from the pressure of the throng, how
the cheeks of others showed sudden
pallor. Sometimes "public sentiment"
has done evil things to those who have
not shared it. and Joe knew how rare
thing is a jury which dares to stand
square against town like Canaan
aroused.
The end Of that afternoons session
saw another point marked for the de-
fense. Joe had put the defendant on
the stand. and the little man had prov
ed an excellent witness. During his
life he had been many things-many
things disreputable; high standards
were not brightly illumined for him in
u. n.