Year: 1871

confronted Win MT. OuOOQlE On LQ6
question of time, and forced to answer, she
absolutely contradicted him on the testI-
mony of the clock on her own mantle
piece. In substance, her evidence was
simply this. She had looked at her clock
when Mr.. Dubourg entered the room,
thinking it rather late hour for a visitor
to call on her The clock regulated by
! the maker only the day before) pointed to
twenty-five minutes to nine. Practical
experiment showed that the time required
to walk tie distance, at rapid pace, from
the stile to the lady's house, was just FIVE
minutes Here, then, was statement of
the farm bailiff (himself respectable wit
ness) corroborated by another witness of
excellent position and character. TIE
clock, on being examined next, was found


to be right The evidence of the clock
maker proved that he kept the key, and
that there had been no necessity to set the
| clock and wind 1t up again, since he had
| performed both those acts the day preced-
ing Mr.. Dubourgs visit. The accuracy
of the clock thus vouched for, the conclu-
sion of the evidence was irresistible. Mr..
| Dubourg stood convicted of having been
in the field at the time when the murder


was committed; of having by his OWN ad-
mission, had quarrel with the murdered





assault and a threat on his side and, last
ly, as having attempted to set up an abb
! by false statement of the question of
time. There was no alternative but to
commit him to take his trial at the Assizes,
/ charged with the murder of the builder in
| PaTdon's Piece. a.r--2


The trial occupied two days.


No new facts of Importance were dis
covered in the interval The evidence
| followed the course which it had taken at


the preliminary examination, with this


difference only-thati it was most carefully
sifted Mr. Dnbourg had the double ad-
vantage of securing the services of the
| leading barrister in the circ1it, and of
moving the irrepressible sympathIes of the
jury, shocked at his position, and eager
| for proof of his innocence. By the end of
| the first day the evidence had told against
| him with such irresistible force that his


own counsel despaired of the result.


When the prisoner took his place in the


dock on the second day there was but one
conviction IN the minds of the people in
court everybody said, ''the clock will
! hang him"


1t was nearly two in the afternoon, and
! the proceedings were on the point of being
adjourned for half an hour when the al
1 q
paper to the counsel for the defense


: The counsel lose, showing signs of agi-
| tation, which aroused the curiosity of the
audience. He demanded the immediate


hearing of a new witness, whose evidence


in the prisoners favor he declared to be


too important to be delayed for single


moment After a short colloquy between
| the Judge and the barristers on either side,
4 the Court decided to continue the sitting
The witness appearing in the box, prov
| ed to be young woman IN delicate health.
| On the evening when the prisoner had
| paid his visit to the lady, she WINS in that
| lady's, service as housemaid The day af-
ter she had been permitted lby previous
arrangement with her mistress1 to take a
weeks holiday, and to go on visit to her
| husbands in the west OF Cornwall While
there she had fallen i'll, and had not Leen


strong enough since to return to her en-
ployment Having given this preliminary
account of herself, the housemaid then
narrated the following extraordinary par
ticulars in relation to her mistress clock


On the morning of the day when Mr..
| Dubourg had called at the house she had


been cleaning the nantle-piece. She had
rubbed the part of 1t which was under the
clock with her duster, had accidentally
struck the pendulum, and stopped it.
| Having once before done this, she had
been severely reproved. Fearing that a
repetition Of the offense, only the day after
the clock had been regulated by the maker,
might lead perhaps to the withdrawal of
her leave of absence, she had determined
to put matters right again, If possible, by
| herself


After poking under the clock in the
dark, and failing to set the pendulum
going again properly in that way, she next
attempted to lift the clock and give it a
shake. 1t was set in a marble case, with
a bronze figure on the top, and il was so
| heavy that she was obliged to hunt for
| something which she could use as lever


The thing proved to be not easy to find on
| the spur of the moment Having at last
laid her hand on what she wanted, she
contrived so to lift the clock a few inches
and drop it again on the mantle-piece as
to set it going once more.


The next necessity was, OF course, to
move the hands on. Here again she was
met by an obstacle There was difficulty
in opening the glass case which protected


the dial. After useless searching for some
instrument to help her, she got from the
footnlan (without telling him what she


wanted 1t for) small chlsel. Wish this
| CdS6"hlLEE
scratching the brass frame Of it, and set
the hands oi the clock by guess. She was
| furried at the time, fearing that her mis-
tress would discover her. Later in the
day she found that she had overestimated


the interval of time that had passed while
she was attempting to put the clock right.
She had, in fact. set it exactly a quarter
| of an hour foo fast


No safe opportunity of secretly putting
/ the clock right again had occurred until
the last thing at night. She had then
moved the hands back to the right time.


AT the hour Of the evening when Mr.. Du-
| bourg had called on her mistress she posi-
tively swore that the clock was a quarter
of an hour too fast. 1t had pointed, as
| her mistress had declared, to twenty-f five
minutes to nine-the right time then be-


ing as Mr.. Dubourg had asserted, twenty


minutes past eight.


| Questioned as to why she had refrained
1 from giving this extraordinary evidence
at the inquiry before the magistrate, she
declared that in distant Cornish village
| 10 which she had gone the next day, and


in which her illness had detained her from


that time, nobody had heard Of the IN
quiry or the trial. Sne would not have
| been then present to state the vitally i'm
/
| Just sworn if the prisoners twin brother


had not found her out on the previous day,


had not questioned her if she knew any


thing about the clock. and had Clearing


what she had to telD insisted on her tax


ing the journey with him to the Court


the next morning.


This evidence virtually decided the trial.
There was great burst of relief in the


crowded assembly when the woman's state


ment had come to an end.


She was closely cross-examined, as a


matter of course Her character was in


quired into; corroborative evidence (rela-
| ting to the chisel and the scratches on the


frame) was sought for, and was obtained


The end of it was that, at late hour on


the second evening, the jury acquitted the


prisoner witheut leaving the box. 1t was
not too much Co say that his life had been


saved by his brother. HIS brother alone


had persisted, from frat to last, in obsti-
nateiy disbeheving the iciock-for no bet


ter reason than that the clock was the


witness which asserted the prisoners guilt.
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