unreliability of such testimony. Burrill's work on the same subject
     was also considered.

     He next read a decision of the Supreme Court, which, in effect,
     declares that a verdict of guilty can only be arrived at when there
     is no reasonable hypothesis consistent with the innocence of the
     person charged, even though at the same time the only solution of
     the crime is the theory of the guilt of the defendant. The life and
     liberty of the citizen can not be sacrificed on the ground that
     only by regarding him as guilty can the crime be explained. Mr.
     Forrest then quoted a case showing that where a physical
     possibility existed of the crime being committed by some other
     means than that claimed in the theory of the guilt of the
     defendant, the supposition of his innocence was not to be excluded
     on the ground of its moral impossibility.

[Illustration: W. S. FORREST, LEADING COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE.]

     An adjournment was taken at this point until 10 o'clock Monday
     morning, December 9, when Mr. Forrest resumed his address to the
     jury.

     He began with an apology for his discussion of the question of law
     on Saturday, stating that he thought it was his duty to do so. Then
     he went on to argue that witnesses may lie, but facts can not. He
     took a peculiar line on this point, referring to the tariff
     discussion, and showing that the Republicans claimed that the
     tariff is a benefit to the country, and that the Democrats claimed
     the opposite. "So you see," continued counsel, "much depends upon
     the disposition you have when you start to look at facts." He then
     read from "Taylor on the Law of Evidence," citing a case in which
     Macbeth was quoted to show that the smearing of the daggers was an
     intentional effort to create circumstantial evidence against the
     innocent. The decision also referred to Joseph's coat of many hues
     which was stained by the blood of a kid. All this was done to show
     the unreliability of circumstantial evidence. Then Mr. Forrest
     turned his attention to the case on trial, referring to the fact
     that Klahre had soldered the box that was supposed to contain Dr.
     Cronin's clothes, which, he remarked, according to the theory of
     the prosecution, was to have been shipped to England and received
     by some accomplice in the crime and afterward published to the
     world as containing Dr. Cronin's clothes.

     "You do not claim that I said that?" asked Judge Longenecker.

     "No," replied Mr. Forrest, "but that was your theory and that was
     the theory of the whole world. It was not only the State's
     Attorney's theory, gentlemen; it was not only the theory of the
     press of Chicago; it was the theory of the whole world. The whole
     world has learned the proof. These clothes were never in that box.
     You have since seen that the clothes that these gentlemen assure
     had been sent by Martin Burke to England in that box were never
     shipped over the sea. The box was never intended for an alleged
     accomplice. It was never intended to contain the corpse of Dr.
     Cronin. In spite of all their reasoning and of all the inferences
     that they drew, by chance a workman in a sewer in the town of Lake
     View turned up Dr. Cronin's clothes, which, instead of being in
     England in a tin box, were in a valise buried in a sewer in the
     town of Lake View.

     "In all seriousness I will ask you two questions: suppose the
     cleaning of that sewer had not occurred until after this trial.
     Don't you know that in every speech of these distinguished orators
     they would have urged that Martin Burke was guilty because he sent
     Dr. Cronin's clothes over the sea? If that argument had been made
     to me, and these clothes had not been discovered would not I have
     given it weight? Can not you learn from that fact some lessons? You
     can learn that these gentlemen for the State are no safer guides
     than we are. You can learn that circumstantial evidence can lie and
     mislead, and although the defendant may not be able to disprove
     what they prove, as they say, it does not follow that the
     defendants are guilty."

     DIFFICULT PART OF THE DEFENSE.

     "You see the difficulty that the defense is in when we have to
     prove a negative. How could we prove that the clothes were not over
     the sea if accident had not turned them up in the sewer in Lake
     View? You see the danger of assuming to be true what we can not
     disprove. You see the unreliability of circumstantial evidence. You
     see the difficulty we have in proving a negative. Suppose that one
     of you were on trial, and suppose that the State's Attorney could
     introduce a witness to swear he saw you burning a deed or will, and
     suppose in the middle of the trial the deed should be produced in
     all its entirety, how rejoiced you would be. So rejoiced were we,
     and so rejoiced was the soul of Martin Burke, so gladdened was my
     soul, when the clothes were found in the North Town; call it fate,
     call it blind chance, call it an overruling Providence, call it
     what you will, it did for Martin Burke what his counsel and all the
     witnesses in the world could never have done. Suppose that the
     truth had not been disclosed. Suppose that the clothes had not been
     found; suppose that the argument had been made by these
     gentlemen--and what an argument they would have made in the form of
     a narrative!--describing how the clothes crossed the stormy sea,
     describing the ship containing this guilty secret. They could have
     speculated about what was to be done over there, and how it was to
     be done. Suppose they had done that; suppose that you had believed
     it; suppose you had drawn the conclusion that they urged you to
     draw in their opening, and that they would have urged you to draw
     in their closing. Suppose you had imposed the death penalty on
     Martin Burke; suppose the death penalty had been executed, and then
     the proof should have been discovered that the clothes were in the
     North Town sewer, what justification could you have made to the
     people of the State of Illinois? What justification could you have
     made in your prayers to your God? What justification could you have
     made in the forum of your own consciences to yourselves?

     "Facts do lie. Now, by an agreement between this court and counsel
     for the defendant, I am not to speak of the Camp 20 conspiracy; but
     if that agreement had not been made, may it please your honor, I
     would not have spoken of the Camp 20 conspiracy, because it is
     wholly unnecessary. That has been done ably and exhaustively by the
     distinguished gentleman who represents Mr. Beggs. One thing I want
     to call your attention to and pass it. These gentleman have said,
     'What difference does it make whether that remark of Beggs' that
     the committee reported to him alone was made May 3 or May 10.' Why,
     it makes all the difference in the world to all the defendants
     except Beggs, if you believe it was the appointment of a secret
     committee to kill Dr. Cronin. It makes all the difference in the
     world to them, and the gentleman that asked the question well knew
     it. It was made after May 3, and, therefore, if made, it is
     evidence against nobody but Beggs. If it was made before May 3, it
     would be evidence against everybody on trial, if you believe that
     conspiracy was entered into between them. That is the reason why
     these witnesses were prevailed on to swear that it was made May 3
     instead of May 10. Every one of them, I believe, swore that it was
     May 3, but on cross-examination it turns out that it was May 10.
     O'Connor says that it occurred on a certain night when he was
     appointed on an auditing committee, and the record shows that that
     motion was made on May 10 and that was the only time he was there.
     So you see that somebody had a motive to change that from May 10 to
     May 3; and the motive was to make it evidence against all instead
     of evidence against only one."

     Mr. Forrest went on to say that it was a remarkable thing in this
     case that the State had just one witness to every matter of
     importance. There was just one witness who heard Burke say that
     Cronin was a British spy and ought to be killed. They had just one
     other witness who heard Coughlin say it was rumored that Cronin was
     a spy; then they had just one other witness who heard O'Sullivan
     say, on the 22d of May, that Cronin was a spy, and is it not
     remarkable that there should be just one person who heard those
     gentlemen make such remarks? If they were in the habit of making
     those remarks, is it not highly probable that they made them more
     than once, and that they made them to more than one person, yet why
     was only one produced? It looks as if they were going out into the
     highways and by ways of the world, searching for witnesses, and had
     found only one.

     ATTACKING THE PROSECUTING WITNESSES.

     "Now I shall have something to say with respect to the credibility
     of the witnesses," he continued, "and shall ask you to draw
     inferences you may not be inclined to draw. Probably you will ask
     me why a person should commit perjury in a case where a citizen is
     on trial for his life. It is difficult to answer, because we do not
     know anything of the character of the witnesses or their
     associations, and can not find out what their connection is with
     other parties. There is also this to be remembered, that men have
     whimsical ambition. There are witnesses who desire to be
     distinguished, and who know it is always a great matter to know
     all about some great crime which has been committed. The man is a
     hero for the time being. He is a great man, called upon by
     reporters, written up and petted by the police and other persons. I
     can not tell what the effect of that would be. They may not
     intentionally commit perjury, but at the same time they may be lead
     entirely astray from the facts. Counsel regaled the jury with some
     of his experience in trying other murder cases by way of explaining
     what he meant, and said it is unpopular to testify on behalf of the
     defendant in a case like this. The enemies of my client have their
     claquers placed about the court, whose duty it is to applaud when
     anything comes out favorable to the prosecution.

     "I want to know, if your Honor please, if there is any evidence of
     any claquers having been placed in this court in this case?" curtly
     inquired Mr. Ingham.

     "I certainly do not know of any such evidence," replied Judge
     McConnell, "and the remark is a highly improper one."

     "Claquers were over there in that corner and very frequently
     applauded, and that is where the Clan-na-Gaels were congregated,"
     angrily retorted Mr. Forrest.

     "There are no claquers in this court, and the counsel well knows
     it," said Mr. Ingham, sharply.

     "I can not have you go into that subject or say any more on that
     line, Mr. Forrest," said Judge McConnell.

     "Very well," said Mr. Forrest, and he then turned around to the
     jury and informed them that his client on a previous occasion was
     awarded a new trial by the Supreme Court. Now, I want to call your
     attention to certain evidence. There is a peculiar combination of
     men and circumstances against my clients, Daniel Coughlin and
     Martin Burke. The same remark applies to the other men, but chiefly
     to those two. For example, it is worth $100 a week to Patrick Dinan
     to have it established that his horse took the Doctor away. He told
     you that. He told you that his horse is in the museum, and if that
     fact is not established then he will lose $100 a week. Now, what
     effect do you suppose that will have upon his zeal in giving
     evidence? Again, old man Carlson was in very needy circumstances;
     his boy had not been living with his wife for four years. He had
     been traveling around the country while his wife was living out as
     a servant, and it was obviously to their advantage and pecuniary
     interest that the statement should be established that the murder
     was committed in that cottage. How that might tend to affect his
     testimony and lead him to imagine what never took place, you will
     decide. It is an unfortunate circumstance, and may have made him
     remember things which never occurred, especially as he is an old
     man, and the wall between memory and imagination is nearly broken
     down, owing to old age. Of course this is peculiarly unfortunate to
     my client.

     "Another circumstance. It is proved that the Clan-na-Gael in the
     city of Chicago and throughout the United States is divided into
     two wings. It is proved that a division exists right through the
     country. One wing of this Clan-na-Gael exists in the prisoner's
     bar, the other wing sits in the witness seat. How does the wing
     that sits in the witness seat conduct itself? It involves the
     entire prosecution, and how does it feel toward my client? What do
     they say? They say your wing are robbers, betrayed their comrades
     to the British and sent them to British prisons by telling the
     British government who they were. One of the witnesses, Captain
     Thomas O'Connor, told you that he worked every day through May,
     June, July and August as a detective in this case for not one
     dollar, and you find there are other persons who gave their money
     and collected money to aid the prosecution. We have a split in the
     Clan-na-Gael throughout this entire country, and it is a matter of
     public notoriety and history that 15,000 Clan-na-Gaels were in the
     prosecution. Don't you know it is the same old cover of Irish
     slander? It is the Irish leaders slandering each other, and they
     will slander each other for all eternity. Now what is the effect of
     this? On the one side they say your wing is sending out comrades to
     British prisons, betraying them to the British government, and they
     are prosecuting them, while they say the patriots whom they laud to
     the sky are dynamiters who sent dynamite to England to wreck
     property and lives. Don't you see that stand out plainly and
     distinctly? And not alone has it permeated the prosecution, but if
     you believe what Lyman said about it, one of the dynamiters sits
     right here at the prosecution table. Do you suppose there is much
     difference between the leaders of the two wings? I do not,
     generally speaking. One wing charges the other with betraying their
     comrades and sending them to British prisons. What is the effect of
     it? Every man who has left Ireland for Ireland's good, because the
     English police were after him, and every man who came here from
     Millbank, came here crying, 'Revenge, revenge, revenge.' And yet
     they say they come here and want an American jury to pass upon an
     American case, while the motive behind it all is ancient Irish
     malice, so far as that thing is concerned. What effect has this had
     upon the witnesses? There is not a witness who has been discovered
     in this case since the coroner's jury that is not a suspicious
     witness. Did you notice the peculiarity of the witnesses? I never
     saw such a body of witnesses and you never did. They have eyes like
     the eagle; like the owls they can see better and farther by night
     than by day. Their hearing is as sensitive as that of the deer that
     roams through our northern forests. Their perceptive faculties are
     marvelous. Their recollection is beyond conception. They can
     remember the slightest circumstance. Every one of them, and it is
     an extraordinary thing and quite unnatural, remembers the slightest
     circumstance, and each of them does something more remarkable than
     the defendants about whom they testify. You will remember that it
     is not some public event which occurred and by which they
     recollect, but it is evidence of an occurrence which they
     themselves give, and such evidence and such memories as they have.
     When in the future writers on memory want to give instances of
     prodigious feats of memory they will search the record of the
     Cronin trial and cite the witnesses for the prosecution.

     "There was that man Pulaski, who testified that he sold Burke a
     shirt. What an idea! That Burke had only one shirt, and that the
     witness did what no other man ever did in his life to a man who
     bought a shirt, asked him to take off his coat to measure him.
     Burke had an abiding place, and why should he go to that store on
     Sunday, the 5th of May, and buy a shirt? If anything of the kind
     ever occurred it was two of those dock loafers who work around the
     bridge, and who look as if they had only one shirt, and when they
     make a change of it they buy a new shirt. Now he says this man came
     in and bought a shirt, and that he told him to step back and try on
     a nice clean shirt, and if it did not fit to put it right back in
     the lot. You know as well as I do that when you go and buy a
     ready-made shirt there is only one question asked you--What is the
     size of your collar? But that is not all. He remembers another man
     who was standing across the street, and that this man went into the
     middle of the street and hailed the other man, and then they had a
     whispered conversation. Now he tells you that he remembers that the
     big man wore a 16-1/2 collar and the little man, who subsequently
     came across the street, wore a 15-1/2 collar. He remembers it
     exactly, and did not testify before the coroner's inquest. And then
     they had a photograph which he identifies, but they never
     introduced it in evidence, and I don't know why, but it looked to
     me as if a 15-1/2 collar would go only half way round that man's
     neck.

     "Now comes Klahre, and he says what never occurred. That on the
     morning of Sunday, May 5th, he read in one of the papers that Dr.
     Cronin was a spy, and had been made away with. As we all know, Mrs.
     Conklin testified that not one word was said about it until 12
     o'clock Sunday, but they had to get it in quick, because Burke was
     out of town on the 8th and 9th. He says that on Monday morning
     Martin Burke came into his place with a box, a tin box, with a rope
     around it. The expressman brought in the box, which weighed about
     fifty pounds, and put it down, and we may rightly call this the box
     trick. Klahre said he was going to cut the rope, when Burke called
     out: 'Hold on; don't you cut that rope.' It would not do for him to
     peep into that box, because he might have seen Dr. Cronin's
     clothes, and then if he had, and it had turned out subsequently
     that the clothes were found in the sewer, it might have been shown
     that he told a fib. But he asked Martin Burke one question, 'What
     do you think of Cronin's disappearance?' He tells you that Burke
     said, 'He is a British spy, and ought to be killed.' So the great
     mystery has been solved. He further says that neither he nor Burke
     said another word in an hour and a half. The first man that came
     there told Klahre just what he wanted to know, and you will
     remember that they asked every man they wanted to impeach, 'Didn't
     you say Cronin was British spy and ought to have been killed?' Now,
     some one made that to order."

     DRIVER SWANSON'S STORY.

     "Now take Swanson. By the way, do you remember that when Captain
     Schuettler, the police officer who spoke to nearly every witness
     since the coroner's inquest, was on the stand, it turned out that
     every time he struck a witness from Clark street to Lake View the
     man was either a German or a Swede? You would not expect a German
     detective to find an American, nor would you expect a German
     detective to find an Irishman. Why I can not tell you, but that is
     a fact. Now, Swanson gave his testimony. Two of my witnesses go to
     a livery stable and get a carriage. The carriage was got to go to
     Fleming's opening on West Van Buren street, and Fleming was a
     cousin of William Coughlin. The carriage comes to William
     Coughlin's saloon, but Coughlin, the very person interested in
     going to the opening, is the very person, according to his
     testimony, who did not go. The Swede remembers every street he
     drove through, every place he stopped, and every cobblestone he
     drove over, and yet they tell you that although it's a large
     establishment their men did not wear a uniform or livery until
     after the 10th of May. The man says he had a tall hat, a cut-away
     coat, his pantaloons did not come up under his vest, and yet he was
     seen driving through the streets at 12 o'clock at night."

     "O'Sullivan watered his garden on that day, too," dryly remarked
     the State's Attorney.

     "Yes, and if it had been your witness he would have told you what
     flower it was he watered, what its color was and just how long it
     had been growing, in every detail," said Mr. Forrest.

     The counsel then went on to give some of his college experience
     where a professor told him the great argument of the truth of the
     gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John was that each one of them
     differed in the circumstantial details of each transaction but all
     agreed in the essentials of every transaction. "That is the
     argument which can not be answered, whereas if they had agreed in
     all the details, the argument would be conspiracy, collusion and
     fraud."

     RIDICULING THE PROSECUTING WITNESSES.

     Counsel then criticised the testimony given by Carberry, whom he
     designated as the impecunious and modest man, and who fixes the
     night of May 4th by his giving a large order to his grocery, and
     then considered what he was pleased to call the remarkable story
     given by Dinan and his wife and Moreland regarding the horse and
     the buggy which it was alleged the Doctor was driven away in. He
     remarked that the horse left the stable at 7:30, not at 7:20, as
     had been testified to, and then proceeded to review Mrs. Conklin's
     identification of the horse and buggy. He ridiculed the testimony
     of the witnesses who were able to say that there was a dim light in
     one room of Mrs. Conklin's house and a bright light in the other,
     and argued that because they all agreed on that point, therefore
     there was something suspicious about that testimony. "She says she
     observed more about that horse, with a mosquito screen behind her
     and an electric light in front of her, than the owner of the horse,
     who has had it for seven years. Why, if you sent a veterinary
     surgeon to look at that horse, he could not, after looking over the
     horse, give you a more exact description of its peculiarities than
     Mrs. Conklin learned through that screen.

     "Now comes the knife transaction. Mr. Flynn appears. Mr. Flynn is a
     remarkable policeman. See if he did not do a more remarkable thing
     than Dan Coughlin did. He is ordered to arrest Coughlin, and he
     takes from his pocket a revolver and two knives--two knives not
     worth 10 cents, both of them. He takes the two knives to his desk
     at the Central Station and locks them up, and then it occurs to him
     that they will not be safe there and he puts them in the Fidelity
     deposit vault, when right beneath him on the floor below is the
     custodian of property taken from prisoners with a vault having a
     combination lock. Did you ever hear of a policeman taking a
     revolver and two old knives worth 10 cents to the Fidelity Bank
     because he was responsible for the property? He never says a word
     about it until last Monday, and he shows them to Conklin. And,
     mirabile dictu!--he says he carried those knives for two years; one
     of them he found on the street: he put one on the mantel, and the
     Doctor carried one of them in his vest and one in his pants. He
     just knew exactly where the Doctor carried these knives. If you
     have two knives you do not trouble yourselves about where you carry
     them; but Conklin knew that the Doctor had one knife in his vest
     and the other in his pants. Don't you see what remarkable feats
     they perform?

     "Now, Neiman is a saloon-keeper, and a party happens to go to his
     place. His attention is called to it three months afterward, and he
     can remember that three people came in to get a glass of wine, and
     he can tell you that one of the men wore a Prince Albert coat. It
     never occurred to anybody that Dan Coughlin and Kunze were in that
     saloon until a week before Neiman testified, and then Dan Coughlin
     was pointed out to him by a detective. Don't you notice the urgency
     there was how to get him to express an opinion? Now, if witnesses
     were urged here, what do you suppose was urged upon them outside?
     Next comes the man Mertes. Owls can see by night, and he says he
     saw these men enter the cottage and then tells you all about it.
     Mrs. Hoertel has a remarkable memory. She is in the habit of going
     out to find her husband who is drunk, and knew certain saloons that
     he frequented. It was no unusual thing for her to find her husband,
     but on this night she knows just what streets she went along and
     just where she turned the corners. She is searching for her
     husband, and she goes to a saloon, does not see him there, but she
     looks at the clock and sees that it was exactly eight o'clock, and
     she will never forget the circumstance that it was exactly eight
     o'clock. She has got to remember that it was eight o'clock or she
     will run afoul of Mertes, and they both remember the same thing.
     She says she saw him enter the cottage; she hears the blows and
     hears the cries of 'God!' and 'Jesus!' and hears the dying moan.
     And yet she never says a word to any body. She is locked out and
     sits on the steps all night, and she goes to her husband's partner,
     with whom she is apparently on good terms, and does not tell her
     story."

     EXPERTS ON THE CAUSE OF DEATH.

     "Now, we go to their experts on the cause of death. How can they
     tell the cause of death? I have heard of men giving extraordinary
     opinions, but their experts can tell you what killed the man, and
     still they can not find any evidence of it. If the public
     prosecutor had put in his indictment 'cause of death unknown,' it
     would not have been necessary for them to say he died from some
     kind of violence, but the jury is prejudiced against these men
     because they said the death is due to that particular thing."

     Mr. Forrest went on to review the testimony of the experts as to
     the hair and blood, and ridiculed the testimony of Professor Tolman
     in regard to his microscopical examinations of what he called
     lanugo. He said, "don't you see the Clan-na-Gaels at work? Let the
     two wings of the Clan-na-Gaels alone and they will make a laughing
     stock of American juries. You and I have got to stand between them.
     Everything that they introduced respecting the hair was introduced
     for the purpose of misleading you. The testimony of Tolman was
     introduced to show by the diameters of hairs that were alike that
     they were Dr. Cronin's hair, so that you should not be mislead. 'A
     little learning is a dangerous thing.' A great scientist can take
     an Irish setter and get two locks of hair from him and examine
     them; the hairs are of the same diameter; can he swear that they
     came from the same dog or no? The hairs of dogs are alike, and
     human hair is as much alike as the hair of horses or of sheep is
     alike. Only think of taking a bit of wool from one sheep and
     comparing it with the wool of another sheep to see if they came
     from the same sheep! We are like the animals in structure: our
     bones are alike, our hearts are alike, our viscera are alike; there
     is no material difference, and it is just as impossible to tell
     whether two locks came from the same human head as it is to tell
     whether wisps of hair came from the same horse's tail."

     CAUSE OF DR. CRONIN'S DEATH.

     At the opening of the afternoon session, Mr. Forrest began the
     discussion of the cause of death. "It is said by the learned
     gentlemen who represent the people, that our defense on that
     question is technical, but I deny it, and I will satisfy you that I
     am right and that it is a substantial defense. They will tell you
     it shows the weakness of our case. Gentlemen, I am engaged in
     defending the lives of these men, and I will avail myself of any
     technicalities and of any and every question in order to perform my
     duty. I will show you that it is not technical, and for this
     reason. They can try us again, they can indict us for causing death
     by hanging, by suffocation, by apoplexy, and also by causes
     unknown, and you are asked to convict under this indictment to
     repair the blunder of the State's Attorney. This is a very simple
     proposition of law. If I charge you with stealing my money I must
     prove you stole my money, and it will not do to show that you stole
     my potatoes; but if you are again indicted for stealing my potatoes
     you can only plead you didn't steal my money. Suppose the body was
     burned after a man was poisoned, would you be able to prove that he
     was poisoned? No, but you would have to charge in your indictment
     that he died from causes unknown. It will not do to simply prove
     that this man, Dr. Cronin, died from violence; that is not the
     question. The indictment charges death from wounds on the head,
     face and body. There is no evidence of any wound on the body, so
     that is excluded, and you are reduced to the supposition of wounds
     on the head and face. It is not a technical defense, as I say,
     because an acquittal on this indictment does not prevent their
     being tried a half a dozen times under different issues. I will now
     refer to the testimony of Dr. Egbert. In his examination, which I
     will read to you, he describes the wounds on the head, but
     distinctly and emphatically says that he can not say whether the
     arteries were cut. The counsel for the State very adroitly put
     their questions as to whether the arteries were involved, and he
     said they were. He meant that the arteries were in that region.
     However, Dr. Egbert testifies that the man did not die from
     hemorrhage. Dr. Perkins next comes on the stand, and tells you that
     the man died of concussion or contusion of the brain. There was no
     evidence of it, because the brain was too decomposed, but he knows
     and is perfectly satisfied that that was the cause of death. Dr.
     Egbert could not, by any possibility, assign the cause of death,
     owing to the decomposition which had taken place, nor could he tell
     whether those wounds were made before or after death. Dr. Perkins
     says the same thing, and Dr. Moyer says the same. If they do not
     know, how do you know? Some of you told me your minds were made up,
     but by the living God you must try us according to the law. The
     burden of proof is on them and they must prove the cause of death,
     and how do you know it? Will you guess at it? Do you propose to
     guess my clients guilty and then hang them?"

     TESTIMONY OF THE EXPERTS.

     Mr. Forrest read from the testimony of medical men at some length
     to show that they could not assign the cause of death, and asserted
     that the State had compelled its witnesses to stretch their
     consciences and to testify to what were not the facts, because of
     the State's Attorney's blunder in not putting into the indictment
     "cause of death unknown."

     "Are you reading that testimony of Dr. Perkins correctly?" inquired
     Mr. Hynes. "You are putting as an answer and reading to the jury as
     an answer of the Doctor's what in reality was a question of your
     own."

     "Well, possibly I did," responded Mr. Forrest, who went on reading
     testimony. His misquotation of the testimony in that case, however,
     induced the State's Counsel to keep a very sharp eye on the
     evidence he quoted. Mr. Forrest criticised at some length the
     testimony given by Dr. Perkins, and argued that if it would not be
     possible to tell whether the victim died from concussion or
     contusion of the brain without a microscopical examination, it was
     a remarkable thing that no such examination had been made. It was
     evident from the testimony that some one was straining his
     conscience as far as he dared, and it was also in proof that it
     would have been impossible to have told even by a microscopical
     examination of the brain whether death resulted from concussion or
     contusion. However, if it could, they did not do it. Yet the
     attorneys for the State will ask you to say that this matter is
     satisfactorily proved; that you know what the cause of death was,
     no matter whether you do or not, and, notwithstanding all the
     doctors say, it was impossible to say what was the cause of death.
     The State says to you, 'We want these men convicted,' but I say to
     you, 'Do your duty.' The State says to you, 'Violate your oaths and
     convict them now,' and that doctrine is preached by the public
     prosecutor in a community where, above all things, the people
     should be taught respect for the administration of the law. Counsel
     then passed to an examination of the testimony given by Dr. Moore.
     He argued that even Dr. Moore could not assign any cause of death,
     and then made a frantic appeal to the jury, inquiring, 'Are you
     prejudiced against these men?' If the jury wants an excuse, those
     doctors say, we will throw you one. They seem to say we know what
     you think; we know what you want to do and what you are ready to
     do, and all that is needed is for us to throw out a suspicion.

     DR. MOORE'S TESTIMONY RECALLED.

     "Dr. Moore said Dr. Cronin did not die from blood letting, because
     he died before he could have bled to death," remarked Mr. Hynes.
     "It is just as well that you should quote that to the jury."

     "That doesn't matter," roared Mr. Forrest. "Moore says that he
     might have died and possibly would have died from concussion or
     contusion of the brain, but he does not dare say that he did die
     from it. He throws no more light on the cause of death than did the
     others. His evidence was the most extraordinary, and the conclusion
     he arrived at as to why there was contusion of the brain was also
     most extraordinary, and although it must be a very tiresome
     proceeding to you, gentlemen, I am compelled to comment upon it and
     go into it at some length."

     Counsel then read copious extracts from the testimony of Dr. Moore,
     remarking that that doctor reminded him of a celebrated man named
     Bogardus, who had written a book upon the theory that all disease
     could be cured by blood-letting and hot water. "He practiced his
     theory, but by and by his patients began to die, and wherever he
     went the undertaker followed. His friends complained to him and
     said: 'You had better give up your theory.' 'Can't give it up,'
     said the doctor. 'Don't care how many die; I have written a book
     and have a theory, and must sustain it.' So with the indictment of
     the State's Attorney. 'I have written an indictment; it is my
     theory and has got to be sustained, right or wrong, in spite of the
     law and evidence, and you give me a jury which is excited and I
     will get some one to swear to something, and that will be enough.
     My theory must be sustained.' Are you gentleman ready to violate
     your oaths by sustaining it?"

     NO PROOF OF THE CAUSE OF DEATH.

     "We have in evidence that the brain was disintegrated. 'I do not
     find,' said the doctor, 'any indication of brain disease, because
     the brain was too far disintegrated.' He did find concussion and
     contusion of the brain, yet there was no evidence of that. If the
     brain was so far disintegrated that they could not tell one thing,
     how could they tell the other? Of course he could not tell whether
     he died of brain disease, yet he could, although there was no
     evidence, swear that the man died of concussion of the brain. I
     asked him whether he could discover brain diseases by the naked
     eye, and he said no, that it would require microscopical
     examination, and yet he did not make the examination required. Dr.
     Andrews says you can not possibly tell the cause of death from that
     post-mortem examination, and that is the position that all the
     other doctors occupy in the case. I say to you, therefore, that the
     indictment should have read for causing his death in an unknown
     way, and then men would not have had to strain their consciences
     and could have answered the question intelligently. Are we not to
     have conscience in this matter at all? The law should be executed
     in this country as it is in England. There is no place in the world
     where there is so much respect for law as there is there, and there
     is no place in the world where they so uniformly execute the strict
     letter of the law, no matter what the consequence may be. The
     witnesses therefore have disposed of both the internal and external
     evidences, and the doctors have told you they can not possibly tell
     you what the cause of death was. Now, if the doctors say they can
     not, can you? But, says the State's Attorney, you have got to
     sustain my theory. Now, I ask you gentlemen, as twelve law-abiding
     men, twelve men who look me straight in the face--you twelve men
     told me you would try my client according to the law and the
     evidence--if the Court tells you the cause of death must be proved
     beyond reasonable doubt, I ask you how on your consciences you can
     find these prisoners guilty, and even without the testimony of Drs.
     Andrews and Moyer? The God's truth is that no man can tell the
     cause of death. No man can tell how he was killed, whether the
     wounds caused death or whether he died from contusion or concussion
     of the brain. There is nothing in the evidence about blood letting,
     and there is nothing about concussion or contusion of the brain,
     and I ask you to keep to your contracts with the law and with your
     God, and to follow it, no matter where it leads you. You and I
     would risk our lives for the defense of Illinois if she were in
     peril. We are not cowards; we fear neither the hooting of crowds
     nor bullets while we are doing our duty. You care nothing for the
     mob, nor do I, and Illinois now says to you, do your duty on your
     conscience. I demand it of you and you can not give me less. Now,
     everything that was put in the notes was put in the hypothetical
     question which we submitted to our medical men, and Drs. Moyer,
     Andrews and Curtis tell you distinctly that it is impossible, from
     the description of the wounds and the notes taken at the
     post-mortem, to tell what the man died of. They corroborate the
     other witnesses that the cause of death was uncertain. How much
     evidence do you want? There is not only a reasonable doubt, but we
     have proved beyond possibility of doubt that you can not tell the
     cause of death. Now, gentlemen, your duties are important, and you
     will be required to carry them out.

     "You will remember that early in the case the State's Attorney said
     dates are important, and they are of vital importance. Dr. Moore
     closed the evidence as to the cause of death on October 26th, and
     he and the other physicians all swear that you can not tell whether
     the wounds were ante or post mortem. Now what do they do? Instead
     of going to Dr. Fenger or other prominent medical men and asking
     their opinion, what do they do? They know that if they ask the
     opinion of eminent medical men they might be told that the boys had
     made a mistake, and, therefore, they say we represent the people of
     the State of Illinois; we represent the right wing of the
     Clan-na-Gael and we will show you a trick. You remember that on
     October 31st they discovered this witness, Mrs. Hoertel, who
     testified that the wounds were committed before death. They could
     not get any one to swear that the doctors were right, but they had
     got their theory that it took place in the Carlson cottage; they
     have got their men from Millbank prison, they have the Clan-na-Gael
     back of them and they say 'We will show you something.' Now, you
     see why we proved that we did not get that name of Mrs. Hoertel
     before the 31st of October. Mr. Clan-na-Gael, you may be cunning,
     but you are tracked into your den at last. I told you to look out
     for the Clan-na-Gael. Don't you see how important it was? I can not
     tell you whether those wounds were inflicted before or after death;
     the doctors can not tell you. The State well knows that it can not
     get any such evidence from any doctors, and therefore they say we
     will show you that he was murdered. On October 26th they sent out
     their German spies, or I will apologize for that and say
     detectives. Schuettler goes out, and Hoefig goes out, and a lot of
     others, and they look into the highways, byways and hedges of the
     city, and finally they find a woman who can swear that she saw the
     Doctor enter the cottage, heard the blows inflicted, heard him cry,
     'Oh, God,' 'Oh, Jesus,' and then heard the dying moans. I believe
     you can talk about this murder being awful, you can say that we did
     not denounce the Doctor's murder, but that has been done
     sufficiently all over the world, and the whole world has fixed the
     responsibility for it on the head of my client, but I will tell you
     right here in your court-house, in the name of the law and justice,
     they would commit a legal murder to sustain a theory and a blunder.
     The whole thing was made necessary by the original blunder. Dates
     are of importance.

     "Now, gentlemen, that is all I have got to say about the cause of
     death. Did I not tell you that those witnesses were remarkable
     witnesses? They turned up just at a good time, and the State's
     Attorney calls it providence. It seems to me that some men can
     appeal to God by day and rely upon the devil by night as easily and
     as unceremoniously as Mansfield can act the double part in 'Dr.
     Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.'"

     "Let us talk common sense. You and I are citizens of Illinois. We
     are responsible for the good name and honor of Illinois or her
     shame. We know our families are here, and we are ready to stand up
     for her and give our lives for her if necessary. We intend to
     uphold the law, but you can not uphold the law by any such
     testimony as has been introduced in this case. You laugh at my
     catch-basin, some of you; I did not know what they wished these
     catch-basins might be, and you don't know. They never examined into
     that, and yet it is highly probable that from the condition that
     body was in, from its position, with the head being down and the
     feet up, and from the evidence of the men who told you that when
     they attempted to pull the body up it slipped back, it is
     physically possible that those very wounds on the scalp might have
     been made while pulling the body out. If there had been a tin
     oyster can or anything like that at the bottom of the catch-basin
     when the body slipped back, it would have made just such wounds,
     and in that case, or even if they were made by the bricks and hard
     mortar, the skull would not have been scratched, and the skull was
     not scratched."

     Mr. Forrest then undertook to trace the course of the wagon from
     the cottage to where the trunk was found, and said the men must
     have gone over ten miles instead of going about two and a half
     miles, in order that the wagon must be brought to the Carlson
     cottage. Unless that could have been established in some way, one
     link in the chain of evidence would be gone. The State said they
     wanted to get on paved streets, yet as a matter of fact they went
     on unpaved streets. After spending some considerable time in going
     over the route alleged to have been taken by the wagon with the
     trunk, Mr. Forrest had the trunk brought in and proceeded to point
     out to the jury the defects in regard to the State's evidence in
     regard to that trunk. He alleged that all the blood stains could be
     made with a half a pint of blood judiciously distributed; that the
     marks on the lock showed that it had been pried off from the
     outside, and urged upon the jury that it would have been impossible
     for the three men to have kicked open the trunk from the rear in
     order to dump the body into the catch-basin without bending the
     hasp in front. The key, he insisted, was found by a trunk-maker,
     and that the whole thing was a fabrication by men who had been
     employed to get up a plausible story.

     THINKS THE EVIDENCE WAS MANUFACTURED.

     "And bear in mind, gentleman, that the men who had control of the
     lock, the Lake View men, were in the house--were in the Carlson
     cottage before Lorch. Schuettler enters the house, examines it and
     leaves it; Wing enters there, 'examines' it and leaves it, and then
     they send Lorch there, and they tell him to look about the cottage.
     Gentlemen, mark you, they tell him to look, and there right in the
     middle of the cottage, under some kind of furniture, they find a
     key. Now he tries to correct himself; he sees it is a most
     important matter; he tries to correct himself as to dates. Now
     then, gentlemen, there was a pot of paint in the house, and the
     paint is daubed on two or three inches thick. There is the paint; a
     whole pot of it right in the house. The pot of paint in the house
     of course accounts for the daubing on the floor; that is why it was
     put there.

     "Then we have the trunk question; the key must be lost in order to
     account for the breaking open of the trunk. But, gentlemen, that
     trunk might easily have been broken open by simply throwing it down
     on the sidewalk, without any force at all, and it would have broken
     open of itself without being kicked open at all. But, gentlemen,
     for finding the key which fits the lock on the trunk, that,
     gentlemen, may account for the fact that the top of the trunk was
     broken off. Mr. Foster alluded to the confused way in which Officer
     Lorch fixes his dates as to the finding of the key, and to the fact
     that while Lorch could tell what he was doing on half a dozen days
     on both sides of May 25th, he could not tell what he was doing on
     May 25th. Now, as regards the paint upon this key. Just take a look
     at it, examine both sides of it, and you will see from the even
     edges of the paint that it was held by one end and the other dipped
     in. This side is rubbed off a little, you see, but it is evident it
     was dipped in. Dipped in, gentlemen. Well, did the police do it? I
     don't know, you don't know. But there is one circumstance that can
     not fail to strike you forcibly, namely, that the lid was
     evidently broken off from behind while the hasp and lock remain
     intact. This is evidence which in itself contradicts the theory of
     the State that the top of the trunk was torn off in order to get
     the body out of it. Gentlemen, this is an attempt to counterfeit
     the truth, but it is hard to counterfeit truth. God Almighty has so
     made it that it is hard to counterfeit it. You can not sink the
     truth. You can not cover it up. It is like a buoy in the water. It
     may be sunk under the surf ace for a short time, but when you come
     to stir the water by cross-examination, it will surely come to the
     surface again. It is hard to counterfeit the truth."

     PERHAPS THE POLICE KILLED CRONIN.

     "If Dr. Cronin was killed in there, in that cottage, and his body
     placed in the trunk, and if his murderers afterward painted that
     floor, they must have found that key there. They must have known
     that the key was lost; they must have been desirous of finding it,
     and if they had painted that floor, and the key was lying there,
     they must have found it. They would have looked pretty carefully
     for it and yet, lo and behold! there, right in the middle of the
     floor, it is found by Officer Lorch. But remember Schuettler had
     been there, Wing had been there, the whole Carlson family had been
     there, from the 21st to the 24th of May, three whole days before
     Lorch found it. Do you think that the Carlson family went around
     there and never touched any thing? I don't know; I hardly think you
     do. Now, right in the middle of the floor, under a washstand or
     some other piece of furniture, the key was found, and of all the
     men in the world to find it who should it be but an officer who had
     been a trunkmaker who found it. Lorch, whose business is
     trunkmaking, was the man who found it. He had worked in a trunk
     factory, and when he found the key, as he says, he worked for some
     time in order to get it to fit. Of course a carpenter might have
     found it, a molder might have found it, a stone mason might have
     found it; but of all the suspicious circumstances in the world, the
     most suspicious in connection with the finding of this key was the
     fact that it was found by a trunkmaker."

     DID NOT TRACE THE WAGON.

     Mr. Forrest alluded to the fact that nobody from the State had
     attempted to trace the wagon from the cottage, and insinuated that
     the reason that they had left this phase of the case alone was
     because the route of the wagon described by the witnesses for the
     State did not correspond with any rational idea of what the route
     would be of persons driving from the cottage to the place where the
     body was finally disposed of. Mr. Forrest alluded to the testimony
     of the expressman Mortensen, and referred sneeringly to his
     remarkable memory by which he was enabled to remember every article
     of furniture he hauled to the Carlson cottage from the Clark street
     flat, although there was nothing in the particular incident to
     distinguish it from others of its kind. Mortensen had been in the
     custody of the police, ever since the coroner's inquest, until he
     took the witness stand. He did not identify the trunk as the one he
     hauled, but said it was one just like it. He pretended to identify
     the other articles of furniture. It was plain he was drilled on
     this point, and, great God! if they drilled the witnesses on minor
     points, how did they know but they drilled them on more important
     things! He drew attention to the fact that neither of the Carlsons
     had said a word about seeing a trunk in the Carlson cottage at the
     coroner's inquest, but this was before the Clan-na-Gael had taken
     charge of this case, for when the trial came on, old Carlson was
     ready to swear that he had gone out expressly one night in April or
     March to see the trunk, and he peeped in through the window for
     that purpose, and then he sees the trunk and nothing else. This
     testimony came just before the mimic from Millbank prison came upon
     the stand and gave an exhibition of his powers of mimicry in a case
     in which a man was on trial for his life. "Well, did the judge in
     the English court say you were a dangerous man?" Mr. Clancy was
     asked, and he says, "Oh, yes, but it was only because I was a
     Fenian. That's all; and they tried to arrest me for being a Fenian,
     and I drew out my revolver and I deliberately tried to murder them
     (two policemen)." "That's nothing, gentlemen of the jury; this
     makes him a hero; this is one of the patriots who have been
     betrayed and sent behind British prison bars; this man who tried to
     murder two English policemen in the execution of their duty is one
     of the patriots of Irish patriots. So says your public prosecutor.
     Well, but the judge said he was a dangerous man, and he served out
     his fourteen years in Millbank prison. And now he comes here,
     having become a great mimic, a wonderful actor, and coolly and
     deliberately tries to mimic the life of poor Pat O'Sullivan away."

     At this point, on the suggestion of Mr. Forrest, a recess was
     taken.

     Before the jury retired, Juror Culver expressed a desire to take
     the map of Lake View introduced in evidence along with him. Mr.
     Forrest said he could have it, but Bailiff Santa interfered and
     said it could not be done without the sanction of the Court. Mr.
     Forrest turned to the judge and said as neither the State nor the
     defense had any objection to the jury having the map he thought it
     might be allowed. Judge McConnell said the jury could have the map
     but not at this particular time.

     Mr. Forrest resumed his argument on the following day, Tuesday,
     speaking for five hours. He dwelt at length on the dry subject of
     blood corpuscles, and insisted that Drs. Belfield, Tolman and
     Haines had been mistaken in their testimony. The failure of the
     State to put in evidence the letter sent to the Carlsons from
     Hammond, Ind., informing them that the cottage was no longer needed
     by the murderous tenants, was due, so counsel argued, to the fact
     that it was afraid the defense would prove it was not in Martin
     Burke's handwriting. He argued at length, with the apparent purpose
     of convincing the jury, that it was a huge conspiracy planned to
     strangle his clients; that the witnesses for the State were hired
     perjurers, and that the lawyers were the tools of a body of men who
     were seeking to control an organization for political purposes, and
     concluded his third day's talk by telling with dramatic effect a
     story about the fate of a pleasure-seeker who innocently, in
     exploring the base of a huge cliff in Scotland, ran upon the cave
     of a band of smugglers. The man peered into the cave. The smugglers
     detected him, and believing he was a spy captured him and sentenced
     him to death. They tumbled him over the brow of the cliff, and his
     body was dashed to pieces on the jagged rocks below. A rope was
     used in the execution, and on this fact the lawyer laid especial
     stress, but just as he was rounding up his brightest and most
     luminous period, Judge Longenecker brought him to a dead halt by
     asking, in a matter-of-fact tone, what the authorities did to the
     man who cut the rope.

     The appeal for the prisoners was closed on the following day
     (Wednesday, Dec. 11th,) when Mr. Forrest again spoke for five
     hours. He went over, in detail, the evidence relating to Dinan's
     horse, ridiculing the testimony of Mrs. Conklin and dwelling on the
     conversation between Coughlin and Dinan, to show that the former
     had given the correct version of it, and that therefore there was a
     presumption in favor of his innocence. There was no evidence that
     Coughlin had any motive for desiring Cronin's death, and the main
     testimony against him was that of thieves and keepers of
     disreputable resorts; nor was there any proof that Burke was
     connected with the crime. Concluding the most lengthy speech of the
     trial, Mr. Forrest said:

     FORREST'S PERORATION.

     "Now, Gentlemen of the Jury," continued Mr. Forrest, "I want you to
     find Daniel Coughlin and Martin Burke not guilty. Why? Because
     there is not established in this case a conspiracy in which it is
     alleged these men participated. In other words, to save my strength
     and not to exhaust your patience, there is nothing proved in this
     case beyond reasonable doubt that will connect them or either of
     them with the killing of Dr. Cronin. It is not necessary for me to
     repeat that. Now, then, I ask you to acquit them and when I ask you
     to acquit them, I ask you simply to do your duty--nothing more.
     Nothing has been left undone against them that could have been
     done. The State has had several able lawyers, and they have
     insulted every witness called for the defense. Every man called for
     the defense has been called a murderer or a sympathizer with
     murder. Everything has been done to insult and break down witnesses
     for the defense. Everything that intimidation in the court-room and
     out of it could do has been done in behalf of the State; everything
     that insinuation could do, has been done on the part of the State.
     The Court has given them the widest range of cross-examination, so
     there can't be any fault found in that respect. All the evidence
     which they offered was admitted by the court. We have the State's
     Attorney's forces, and the entire police force of Chicago. They
     have talked about the police force betraying them. I saw no
     evidence of it. Everything that one wing of the Clan-na-Gael could
     do has been done. In addition to the State's Attorney, they have
     had other distinguished orators--two of the greatest criminal
     lawyers of modern times, Luther Laflin Mills and George Ingham,
     whose business, like mine, is the pleading of criminal law; Mr.
     Hynes, a great lawyer, a great cross-examiner, one of the most
     brilliant orators of the Chicago bar, a man whom one of the largest
     corporations in Chicago relies upon to wring verdicts from juries
     in most desperate cases. He, too, has done all that he could on
     behalf of the State. Everything that could be done has been done to
     prove this charge, so that, gentlemen of the jury, you can say to
     your neighbors, you can say to your social worlds, you can say to
     your own consciences that no fault is to be found with the State;
     everything has been done that could be done, but there was a
     reasonable doubt as to the guilt of those men, and I found them not
     guilty for that reason. Remember, the State's Attorney has solemnly
     told you that the world has confidence in you, that he has
     confidence in you, that the Judge has confidence in you, and that
     whatever verdict you render will satisfy him, will satisfy the
     community, will satisfy the world, because the community has
     implicit and unlimited confidence in your honor and intelligence.
     This, gentlemen, I say on behalf of Martin Burke and Daniel
     Coughlin, in confiding their cases to your hands. No peroration
     have I, but simply one word will I give. The word I give is
     'duty'--duty to Illinois, duty to your God, duty to yourselves. 'To
     thine own self be true, and it must follow as the day the night
     thou canst not then be false to any man.'"

LONGENECKER'S CLOSING.

     "If the Court please and Gentlemen of the Jury, I regret to
     announce that Mr. Mills is sick and not able to close this case.
     While I know you, gentlemen of the jury, are disappointed, while I
     am profoundly disappointed, yet no one is more disappointed than
     Mr. Mills himself. No one regrets it any more than the gentleman
     who was to address you himself. I left him yesterday evening at 7
     o'clock, and it was determined there and then by his physician that
     it would not be safe for him to attempt to close this case.

     "When I was struggling along here in the city of Chicago years ago,
     trying to earn an honest living in my profession, Mr. Mills called
     me into his office and said: 'Longenecker, I would like to have you
     as one of my assistants in the State's Attorney's office.' I said:
     'Very well, I will be very glad to come into your office.' And when
     this case arose, and I felt the great responsibility that rested
     upon me as State's Attorney, I thought I would be doing the people
     a good service in requesting Mr. Mills to close the argument in
     this case. And at my earnest solicitation he agreed to do so. But
     it has been willed otherwise, and he is not here to address you.

     "Now, I promise you, gentlemen, that I shall not talk to you long.
     I make that promise to you now. I know how tired you are, having
     been locked up so long away from your families, and it would be
     unreasonable, even if I could, to attempt to make a long speech in
     reference to this case. And if I do not cover all the points made
     in the case, if I do not go into details, I think you will all give
     me indulgence, for I do not want to impose upon your good nature
     and upon you as jurors any longer.

     "We are not in this case for the first time after the opening with
     the theory of the defense. In most all murder cases, in most all
     important trials, when the State, or the people represented by the
     State's Attorney, gives an outline of the prosecution's side, the
     defendants' attorney arises and gives to the jury their defense. If
     not at the opening, then after the evidence is closed for the
     prosecution; then they arise and tell us how they are going to
     meet this evidence. That was not done. So that it remained until
     the last. When counsel for the defendants arose to address you in a
     three days' argument, for the first time, you, as jurymen, and we,
     as representatives of the people, were notified of the theory of
     the defense; that is, that there was a great conspiracy on the part
     of the people; that there was a conspiracy to hang innocent men; a
     conspiracy to murder under the guise of the law, and the gentleman
     was so earnest in that statement that he carried it all through his
     argument to the jury. He argued that proposition with the same
     force that he did anything else that he talked about in the case.
     Now gentlemen, if that is your notion of this case, if you believe
     there is a conspiracy to murder Martin Burke, and those other men
     on trial, then you ought to acquit, and you ought to recommend to
     His Honor that the counsel representing the people of this great
     State should be indicted and tried for murder. If I, as a
     representative of the people, am guilty of coaching evidence
     against Martin Burke and those other men on trial, I ought not to
     have a trial, but ought to be taken by the citizens of your State
     and hanged without court or jury. Do you believe, gentlemen, that
     there is a conspiracy here to convict innocent men? Do you believe
     that these men sitting by my side have crowded me out of my office
     and concocted a conspiracy against innocent men, and called in a
     jury of twelve men to assist them? You do not believe that they are
     guilty of it. If they were guilty of if, do you suppose that they
     could do it without my knowing it? If they did it without my
     knowing it or finding it out, then I am unworthy of the position,
     and should be prosecuted for criminal negligence and convicted.
     Why, the gentleman tells you that it is done by the other branch of
     the Clan-na-Gaels, and they are backing the prosecution; that as
     soon as it gets out of the hands of the Coroner they bring up
     witness after witness to swear falsehoods before you, and he states
     it in that way.

[Illustration: LUTHER LAFLIN MILLS, ONE OF COUNSEL FOR PROSECUTION.]

     "Every Clan-na-Gael witness that we have called to the stand
     belonged to the triangle, part of the Clan-na-Gael organization,
     Camp 96, from which Dr. Cronin left (I put it in that way). The
     learned counsel for an hour talked about his organizing an
     opposition camp, calling it 96, the same as old 96; Columbus Club
     instead of Columbia Club. The whole of that camp stood by the
     triangle; the very men who came here to testify from the camp were
     in sympathy with the triangle and believed that they were right
     until within the last year or so. We go right into their own camp,
     among their own friends, and we get the truth from men who believed
     that Dr. Cronin was not right in making the charges against the
     triangle, and yet it was fully believed that it was the other
     faction. It is true that P. McGarry did belong to an opposing camp,
     but Thomas O'Connor, John F. O'Connor, Henry Owen O'Connor, John
     Collins--the whole of them, were members of Camp 20, that we
     produced here as witnesses. Are they in a conspiracy with the other
     associates, the members of the same camp as John F. Beggs, Daniel
     Coughlin and Martin Burke? Why, they come as brothers from the same
     camp so that won't do to charge it in that way. Now, gentlemen, the
     only reason of that is to show you how far men will go in trying to
     mislead a jury.

     "Do you believe that I could have it in my heart to put a witness
     on the stand that I did not believe, to swear the life away of
     these men. If you do, recommend to His Honor that I be prosecuted
     for the crime. Gentlemen, I would rather have my arms torn from my
     body than to be guilty of such a crime as that.'

     Mr. Forrest--"We believe that."

     Judge Longenecker--"Yes, you must believe it. And yet one of your
     lawyers wants you to believe that I was so ignorant, that I was so
     unworthy of my position, that I was so incompetent as to sit here
     like a mummy and let these men conspire to have a jury hang
     innocent men.

     "Gentlemen, you don't believe that. You don't believe that that
     great big-hearted Irishman sitting there (Mr. Hynes), whose heart
     has always gone out for poor humanity, would be guilty of it. Mr.
     Foster says that he has known Mr. Ingham, and he knows him to be a
     truthful man, a man that is worthy of belief, and for that reason
     he says Ingham said nothing against Beggs, because he was such a
     straight, truthful man. In that regard that gentleman, that legal
     light of the bar, charged me with dishonesty, charged that
     big-hearted Irishman with dishonesty.

     "Gentlemen, I may be a little disconnected in my argument before
     you and if I am, you will pardon me. But I wish to notice Foster's
     argument for his client. If there is nothing against John F. Beggs,
     I can not see why he said so much. It was understood, I may say,
     that Mr. Ingham was not to talk about Camp 20 at all. That is the
     truth of the matter. He was not to discuss that proposition. I had
     gone over it, as you recollect, I thought I had tired you out by
     talking of Camp 20. Mr. Hynes was to take up that, and he did, and
     went over the same ground as I had, and I still have to repeat
     myself because of this assumed sincerity on the part of Mr. Foster.

     "Why this learned counsel should talk a day and a half if there is
     nothing against his client, I do not know. Do you wonder at it? Why
     is it that a man, whose services are so valuable, who never had
     anything but an important case, should talk a day and a half in a
     case where there is no evidence against his client, and out of the
     day and a half never talk about his client's case, except for about
     fifteen minutes, is more than I can understand. Was it because he
     was trimmed for a speech? Was it because he had to read the Irish
     history that he had copied into his manuscript? Was it because
     Foster had to advertise at the expense of his client? or was it
     because he thought there was something against his client? You know
     how he spread like the waters of the Platte river; you can look at
     it and you can say what a mighty river. It is all spread out. It is
     true it is all spread out, but there is no depth to it.

     "We do not take issue with him on the smoke-stacks of Ireland. We
     do take issue with him in reference to Mr. Hynes, and we have given
     you our statement in regard to that. We do take issue with him in
     regard to everything except in regard to the ability on our side. I
     admit that we have ability here on this side helping me. Why should
     not the people of the State of Illinois have ability as well as the
     defendants? He said I had five assistants, and yet these three
     lawyers had to be called in to help me in this case. Has that
     anything to do with the case at issue? Since you began this trial
     three Grand Juries have been impaneled and discharged. Two other
     courts have been constantly in session. Over 300 cases have been
     disposed of--I am making a guess of that, averaging it for the
     actual three months. Three hundred cases have been disposed of; and
     three Grand Juries have been impaneled and discharged since this
     case began. Habeas corpuses have been heard; men have been sent to
     the penitentiary and others to the bridewell and some to the jail.
     And yet he would have you understand that I had five assistants
     doing nothing. Now, that is not fair, is it? That is not doing his
     client any good; that is not in the case. Suppose it was so, what
     has that got to do with the guilt or innocence of Beggs? No matter
     whether I had five, six, or a dozen assistants, the question is,
     What are the facts? Lawyers or no lawyers, that is what you have to
     deal with.

     "Mr. Foster argued for an hour about how the Presbyterians had got
     away with Swing, and how the Methodists had disposed of Dr. Thomas,
     and how the Episcopals had disposed of Dr. Cheney. Didn't he talk a
     long time about that? What for? Why did he devote his time to
     talking about that? But suppose that the hot-headed Presbyterians
     had said, we do not believe that this man ought to be permitted to
     live? Suppose that they had ordered a committee of investigation, a
     secret committee to investigate Dr. Swing? Suppose that they had
     entered into that arrangement, not intending to murder him, but
     suppose they did, and suppose you can find no other people on earth
     that had a feeling against Dr. Swing but these men who said he was
     unworthy to live, and that men said he ought to be killed, and
     these men had themselves invited him out? Why, the Presbyterians
     would hang for killing him, for carrying out that conspiracy.
     Sometimes these conspiracies are brought about by things that ought
     not to affect the mind of any man. Now, our theory has been in this
     case that there was a conspiracy, whether it originated at the time
     of the appointment of the committee, or after its appointment, our
     theory is that there was a conspiracy to murder Dr. Cronin because
     they believed he was a spy, and that the men who followed that up
     had another object in having him murdered, namely, to prevent him
     from going before the honest Irishmen and showing them how they had
     been robbed of their funds. That has been our theory. The proof
     justifies us in making this statement. Did you ever think since
     this trial--have you heard of anybody having any feeling against
     Dr. Cronin? You have heard of his belonging to this organization
     and that. You have heard of his singing in public; you have heard
     of his being here and there, a man liked. Has there been any
     evidence of any other person on earth that would be likely to kill
     Dr. Cronin? None at all. Where do you go, where do you get the
     starting point in this great conspiracy? Where do you find it? You
     find it in Camp 20, in Turner Hall? Now, we do not charge that the
     entire camp was in it. We do not charge that the membership knew of
     the conspiracy, but we do charge that it started there among these
     parties.

     "Foster treats the Beggs-Spellman correspondence as if Beggs was
     publishing to the world that he was going to commit murder. Not so.
     Our theory is, and it is the correct one, that these letters were
     written for the purpose of covering up that which they expected
     this committee to do. That is our theory. That is why they were
     written. That is why Mr. Beggs said to me when he was brought face
     to face with the record that a committee had been appointed, but
     does he explain? You can see that it is a blind. You can see why he
     flushed these letters in the face of the people; because it was the
     work of the conspirators to begin in this line. Nothing had yet
     been prepared for the disposition of Cronin. Nothing had been
     arranged, but they must make a sort of an investigation in this
     way. Talk about reading between the lines? The Lord knows there is
     enough in the lines without reading between the lines.

     "Recollect that the letter in which he says: 'I hope no trouble
     will result,' is one of the links. Let us get it just right, 'I
     hope no trouble will result.' On the 18th the flat is rented. And
     on the 20th they finish laying the carpet. Now jump on to the 22d,
     the next meeting of Camp 20, where these minutes are approved, and
     what do you find? On the 22d of February in the line of his
     letters, in the line that he hopes that no trouble will result,
     what does he do? Pat McGarry read his speech, in which he said that
     the man who gave Le Caron his credentials to go into the convention
     was a greater scoundrel than ever Le Caron could pretend to be."

     Mr. Donahoe--"You will concede that every Irishman knew who it was
     that gave Le Caron his credentials?"

     Mr. Longenecker--"I do not know whether they did or not. I presume
     they did. Beggs said that they had members who were coming in and
     violating the hospitality of that camp. That would have to be
     stopped. It was not right. He said that they came in there talking
     about Alexander Sullivan, and it was cowardly to talk of a man
     behind his back. Why did they not say so to his face? He said
     Alexander Sullivan had strong friends in that camp, and he slapped
     his breast and says, 'I am one of them.'

     "Now, gentlemen, that alone does not amount to so much. Beggs'
     letters alone would not amount to so much. The speech alone--story
     I mean--the fact of what happened in Camp 20 alone; but when you
     take into consideration the manner in which he speaks of the letter
     to Spelman--the speeches he makes and the letter on the 22d, when
     you bring them all in together, then it does become strong. Now,
     gentlemen, I am not going to bother you about reading. I am anxious
     that you should not be misled in reference to Beggs. Because, if
     Foster is correct--and I know he is--then, if Beggs is guilty, he
     is awful guilty. A man who is educated, a man who has practiced
     law, a man who ought to be ready to see that the law is executed, a
     man who is educated in a profession of this character, is held
     accountable for his acts in a higher degree than is the man who
     does not know the law. And for less acts he is more responsible. If
     this man set the machinery in motion--and his counsel says he is
     not a dupe--if he set this terrible conspiracy in motion, then he
     becomes the worst of the men on trial. And he is just the character
     who would do just the little which would have more effect than if
     he stood by in the shoes of Martin Burke or Dan Coughlin. He stands
     at the head of the conspiracy. He stood there helping to forge the
     first link in this great conspiracy; and I am anxious, gentlemen,
     that you do not be misled in reference to John F. Beggs. John F.
     Beggs made his record on this chain of evidence the same as Martin
     Burke made his record.

     "Well, but Mr. Foster says that Beggs is acquainted with Harrison.
     He introduced this fact that this second constable introduced him
     to Bailey Dawson and Mr. Babcock, and that he only introduced him
     for the purpose of what? Of showing his associations. Is that the
     reason why he introduced this speech that Beggs had made to
     President Harrison? Does that show the associations of every man
     who has shaken the President's hand? Does it give him character?
     Does it throw open the record? Is it an open book of his character
     to go and shake the hand of President Harrison? If that is so,
     President Harrison had better stand and shake the hands of men who
     are all over this country, and give them characters. If that is
     opening up the book of a man, if that gives him a reputation and a
     standing when he is charged for cruel murder, why then Mr. Harrison
     ought to shake hands with a good many fellows in Chicago. That is
     not it. He didn't know what might come. Providence had been causing
     the sewer to give up the silent witness. Providence had been giving
     up the German woman that heard the last words of the dying man. He
     don't know what Providence might do before the case ended, so an
     alibi must be proven for Beggs, and when he finds out that he does
     not establish an alibi, then he wants you to understand that he was
     practicing a fraud on you, and simply introduced it for the purpose
     of showing his associations.

     "Of course, take a circumstance alone, and it may be weak. But when
     it stands in relation to another circumstance in the line of the
     object, then it becomes strengthened. And Mr. Forrest will not find
     me disputing his propositions of law. Right here let me say that
     the Court will give you the law; but do not forget that you are to
     try this case on the facts under the law. He may give you fifty
     instructions that the law is so and so, and that if the facts are
     so and so, apply them under that law and that is so and so. He will
     tell you that if from all the circumstances in the case, you have
     no reasonable doubt as to the guilt, then you must convict; but,
     that if you have a reasonable doubt, then you must acquit. It is
     you after all who become the judges of the case. Do not forget the
     evidence in the case. The Court does not intend to instruct the
     evidence out of your mind in giving you a long chain of
     instructions which it is his duty under the law to give. He does
     not intend that you shall forget the evidence that is applicable
     under that law. For instance, he might give you an instruction, and
     it is possible he will, that before you can find the men guilty,
     you must believe beyond a reasonable doubt that Dr. Cronin, if
     killed, was killed in the manner and form as charged in the
     indictment, and that the cause of death was as charged in the
     indictment.

     "Well, now, that means you are to decide whether he was killed as
     charged in the indictment, not as testified by any particular
     doctor on the stand. Why, this counsel undertakes to tell me what
     my duty is as State's Attorney. This man, who says there was a
     great conspiracy here; that Ingham and Hynes and Scanlan and the
     Clan-na-Gael got up a conspiracy here to murder innocent men, and
     I, W. S. Forrest, have discovered it. This man argues this point,
     that it was not the cause of death, with the same force and
     strength that he does any other point in the case, and yet he knows
     in his soul there is nothing in it. Why, he tells you that I made a
     blunder in that indictment. Why, gentlemen, if that indictment had
     charged that this man was killed and that the cause was unknown,
     with all these wounds on his head, with all this blood in the trunk
     and in the cottage, wouldn't you have a right to take that into
     consideration, the blood in the cottage and on the sidewalk and in
     the trunk, and the condition of him when he was found? If I had
     drawn such an indictment, he would have a reason to say that. I
     don't know what effect their argument has had upon you, whether you
     think you know more about drawing an indictment than I do, or Judge
     Baker, who has drawn them for years and years, and hence I am going
     to read to you just what the doctors say on that proposition.

     "But recollect that that can be proven the same as any other
     circumstance. But before going into that, gentlemen, I like to talk
     when I come to a fact and not leave it for some other time. Mr.
     Culver, you buy a wad, you buy a pistol, and you buy a bullet. Now
     Culver may intend to have that pistol to shoot somebody. It was
     known that you were going to shoot him. Then you are just as guilty
     for buying the wad, and you the bullet, and you the powder, as he
     is for doing the shooting, fully so. Now, Martin Burke held the
     pistol, wad, bullet and all. He hired the cottage, he moved the
     furniture, he was present when it was ordered. But if he only did
     all that, just as I say, it must be a criminal intention. Suppose
     you said you didn't buy that powder at all, had nothing to do with
     it. Well, we find out that when you bought the powder that you said
     you were going to give it to Culver, and Culver was going to shoot
     Longenecker for talking so long about this case. That would nail
     you. The same way as the other. Now, of course, just to say that
     these innocent acts alone of themselves are not criminal, but what
     may seem to be innocent may be guilty circumstances. That is the
     point I want to make on that. Same with Martensen. Here is evidence
     from Martensen, who moved the furniture. Why Martensen tells us, 'I
     was hired to haul this furniture; that is my business.' He went and
     hauled it, and said he was the man who hauled it there. Nothing out
     of the way for him to haul that furniture. That circumstance of
     itself is innocent, while under certain circumstances it might be
     guilty."

     The State's Attorney then took up the cause-of-death phase of the
     case. He had not, he said, intended to say much about it, as the
     Judge, according to law, would tell the jurors that they must
     determine the cause. But the statement made by Attorney Forrest to
     the effect that if the jurors returned a verdict of acquittal on
     the present indictment, the State could try the prisoners again on
     an indictment stating that the cause of death was unknown,
     compelled him to refer to it. The statement made by Attorney
     Forrest was, the speaker cried, absolutely untrue. No law would
     permit the suspects to be tried again. Moreover, the indictment was
     strictly in accord with the testimony given by the medical
     witnesses who had on the stand sworn that death was caused by
     violence from blows inflicted on the head.

     The theory that because the Doctor might have, under certain
     circumstances, died from a stroke of apoplexy, was no reason why he
     had died of apoplexy.

     "If he died of apoplexy," cried the State's Attorney, "why were his
     shirt and pantaloons cut to get them off him? Why was he stripped,
     his body put in one sewer and his clothes in another? The
     physicians, some of them, admitted that such wounds as found on the
     Doctor's head might not cause death. Well, a bullet in the bowels
     of a man might not kill him, but if a man with a bullet wound there
     was found dead, it would be judged by any man of sense that the man
     died from the effects of the bullet wound."

     The assault upon the testimony of the State by Attorney Forrest
     came in for extended argument. "It showed how weak is the testimony
     of the defense," he exclaimed, "it shows how weak it is when this
     three-day lawyer spends nearly the whole of that time on our
     evidence and but fifteen minutes on his own. Forrest did quote a
     little Scripture, so did the devil. Forrest talked about Matthew,
     Mark, Luke and John, about whom his Sunday-school teacher taught
     him. He said that they disagreed; and because they disagreed, he
     tried to argue, that Mrs. Conklin and the young ladies who
     corroborated her, must have lied because they agreed. The only
     thing that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John have to do with this case
     is that they all point to Calvary, and, gentlemen, the evidence in
     this case points to Calvary [Cronin was buried at Calvary]. It was
     easy for him to deny the truth of our testimony, and especially
     that of Mrs. Hoertel, but he didn't attack Mrs. Hoertel's
     character. Why? Because they knew it was spotless."

     "Now, the gentleman says there are other witnesses, and among them
     Dinan, has an interest in the museum, and all that. Why, Dinan made
     the statement he made here before the coroner's inquest. The same
     statement he made here, he made in the presence of Dan Coughlin,
     and yet this learned lawyer, who spent three days talking about
     witnesses and not fifteen minutes over his own defense, tells you
     Dinan swears in this case because he has an interest in keeping the
     gray horse in the museum. Then, gentlemen, you remember his
     attitude toward Mrs. Conklin, whose evidence was straight forward,
     who gave her testimony before the coroner, and who made her
     statement the very day after Dr. Cronin disappeared. What has he
     said but that he would have you believe she was sitting there
     committing willful and deliberate perjury; this woman who felt that
     Dr. Cronin was gone; who felt he was dead, who charged O'Sullivan
     with being in the conspiracy before she could induce the officers
     of the law to believe anything was wrong. He would have you
     believe, as he said, that she lied while upon the stand, and yet
     you noticed how she gave her evidence. The same tactics were
     pursued with Conklin and all the other witnesses. It was asserted
     that all of it came out after the coroner's inquest. Why look at
     it. He talked about the horse and well knows that she described
     and that she mentioned about his knees when before the coroner. Her
     identification of that horse was like your identification would be
     of a man who might come into your house to-night and you might see
     him under a gas jet. If you saw him in the street in daylight the
     next day you might not know him, but if you ever saw him under a
     gas jet under the same circumstances you would immediately say,
     'There he is.' His stooping position, his eyes, and a dozen other
     things would strike your memory and make you certain of your
     identification.

     "So with Mrs. Conklin. When she saw the horse in the same position
     it was on the evening Dr. Cronin was driven to his death, she
     immediately said, 'that is the horse.' Why, because she saw the
     unquiet appearance of the horse and the movement of its legs, and
     she at once said 'that is the horse.' But it was not necessary for
     her to be so positive in the identification of the horse. She said
     it was a white horse and a top buggy without side curtains from the
     very start, and the moment she saw Dinan's horse and buggy she
     identified it. Then he tells you that Mertes was fixed by us to see
     Coughlin driven up to that cottage, and he tells you that without
     Mertes we could not have proved that Coughlin was ever there. He
     also tells you that without Mrs. Hoertel and Mertes we could not
     prove that Cronin was murdered. Well, to a certain extent the great
     lawyer is right, for without any evidence we could not prove the
     crime. Now, take Coughlin's conduct in regard to that white horse.
     Or, before we reach that I would call your attention to the fact
     that it was known that Dr. Cronin had been driven away from the
     Conklin residence in a buggy drawn by a white horse, for on the
     Monday morning, long before it was known that Dr. Cronin was
     murdered, before any one had charged that there was anything wrong
     with him except Mrs. Conklin, word was sent out from the police
     force to see who had a white horse and buggy out on Saturday night,
     and yet this lawyer would have you, as an honest jury, believe that
     we were trying to have Mertes swear that he saw Coughlin drive
     there with a bald-faced brown horse for the purpose of swearing his
     life away. It is absurd to talk such stuff as that. Yet he would
     have you believe it. Mertes never mentioned the matter until after
     the body was found; until after the cottage was discovered and it
     was advertised as to what horse had driven Cronin away.

     "But here is a significant fact to which I wish to direct your
     attention. Why should Dan Coughlin, on the Monday morning, before
     any one had charged that Dr. Cronin was murdered, when Captain
     Schaack said he would turn up all right, when he was not uneasy,
     when he told Mrs. Conklin to wait until night, when the world and
     every one almost had accepted the statement that the trunk had
     contained the body of a woman, on account of the statement made by
     a certain man, why should Dan Coughlin be so anxious about the
     horse his friend had driven? No one had told him that any one drove
     a white horse, and why should he say to Dinan, 'Don't mention it,
     because Cronin and I were not friends?' Gentlemen, at that time
     Coughlin knew that Dr. Cronin was murdered, and he knew that the
     white horse and buggy had carried him to his death. Think of the
     matter, and remember that it was on the Monday morning before any
     one had charged that anything had happened to Dr. Cronin that he
     was so anxious to have the matter concealed. Why was he induced to
     believe that that horse had taken Dr. Cronin to his death? No one
     had charged that he had anything to do with it; no one believed the
     poor woman, and why should Coughlin be so ready to believe it when
     Captain Schaack did not believe it, when the chief of police did
     not believe it, when the public prosecutor did not believe it, and
     when the community were led to believe that Dr. Cronin was alive? I
     ask you again, why should Dan Coughlin, on the 6th of the month,
     the second day after the murder, and before anything had been
     discovered, tell Dinan to keep still.

     "This man, Forrest, tells you that because we have only one witness
     to a fact, therefore, it is put up and is a lie. He goes on to tell
     you about Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and that is about all he
     knows about the Bible. He says Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are not
     agreed, and he quotes that to show that Mrs. Conklin and the two
     Miss McNearneys when they gave a description of the man who called
     for Dr. Cronin lied, because, as he says, they agreed in their
     description. The trouble with him is they didn't tell the story all
     alike, but the material part of it they did tell alike. All that
     leads up to the identification of the man who drove Cronin, the
     central figure, they do agree upon, and that is true. The same way
     with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. While they give it in different
     language, do not they all point to Calvary, and so it is with this
     evidence of the Misses McNearney and Mrs. Conklin, and the evidence
     also of Dinan; it is the evidence of witnesses who tell the truth
     and it all points you to Calvary. I do not intend to dwell upon all
     that Forrest has talked to you about. He has talked about the
     evidence of that wagon, and seems to think a good deal more of
     sound than he does of sight. He regards sound as being far better
     than sight, hence I think he will appreciate my speech on this
     account.

     "He says that wagon was driven from away across the railroad
     crossing onto Fullerton avenue. No one saw it cross the railroad
     track, and Officer Steib says, the first he saw of it it was east
     of Ashland avenue. He also says that before he saw it he heard it
     rumbling over the railroad track, but he does not know whether it
     was this wagon he heard rumbling or some other. But there is not
     enough in it for us to stop long to consider whether it crossed the
     railroad track or not. The fact is the same. They did not see it
     until it was east of Ashland avenue, and then they saw it coming
     back on Ashland avenue. There is no reason why they could not drive
     around the block if they wanted to, but we do not know what course
     they took, yet we do know they could have taken that course very
     easily, and if they had taken a direct course they would have been
     tracked from the cottage to the place of their destination.

     "Forest then says to you: 'It is strange, isn't it, that they drove
     right down toward the city, where they could be seen by the police
     force?' It does not seem that the police force hurt them any. They
     were seen by half a dozen officers and not stopped, and the man who
     drove the wagon did not seem afraid of police officers, but on the
     contrary seemed to know just what police officer to strike. They
     got along to Fullerton avenue, and they knew that it was just the
     very thing to do to drive along a street where they would not be
     suspected. Suppose they had driven along Ashland avenue straight to
     where they went to dispose of the body, they would have been
     unquestionably tracked. But we are not here to argue why they did
     or did not do certain things. Those men who murdered Dr. Cronin and
     thrust his body into the sewer, can probably tell you far better
     than I can. There is reason for acquitting the men if you believe
     them guilty, simply because we can not tell exactly the way they
     drove around or in what direction. The fact is they were seen on
     Fullerton avenue, going east, about half-past 11 o'clock. At 12
     o'clock they were seen going north on Clark street, and at 1
     o'clock they were at Evanston avenue and Edgewater, and one man sat
     on the wagon, facing backward.

     "Another point. Some one during the trial, and I think I took that
     position myself, during the time Forrest was arguing the question
     of the trunk, said they kicked it open. Now, it does not matter
     whether they kicked it open or not. Men who could open a sewer
     could pry that lock open as well as any one else. He wants you to
     understand that the officer pried it off, but you will remember
     that those two honest Germans testified that they found the lid
     separate from the trunk, and that they gathered it up and put it
     with the trunk. Now, it does not matter whether the lock was broken
     open or whether the trunk was kicked open. The fact is it was
     locked; that the trunk was in the wagon and the key was gone. Is it
     for us to say whether they pried open that trunk or kicked it open
     from the rear? Our theory is that they kicked it open, and that
     when they found it would not open wide enough they pulled the lock
     off. We don't know how it was done. His clients can tell you better
     perhaps than we can if they had anything to do with it, which we
     insist they had under the evidence."

     "I take an exception to that remark of Judge Longenecker's," said
     Mr. Forrest.

     "Oh, yes," replied the State's Attorney, "take your exception.
     Forrest also said that the key was found by a trunk-maker, because
     he found on the stand a man, Officer Lorch, who had worked once as
     a trunk-maker. Do you believe what Officer Lorch said as to where
     he found that key, or do you believe that he went and fitted a key
     to the trunk, then put some paint on it, put it where it was under
     the washstand, and then came into this court and swore to a lie? If
     you want to believe Forrest's statement against that of the
     officer, believe it. But we say that after they had got the trunk
     into the wagon they found that the trunk was locked and the key
     gone, but it does not matter. We could theorize as to how that key
     was missing on the floor, but it is not necessary. It is in
     evidence that that key was found in the cottage, and it is in
     evidence that the trunk was locked and had not a key upon it when
     they went to take out the body. Yet this learned lawyer would have
     you believe this is a conspiracy on the part of the people, and he
     says it began after the coroner's inquest. That is his statement. A
     conspiracy to convict innocent men! Now, look at it. I suppose he
     would have you believe, and he might just as well go on to charge,
     that the body of Dr. Cronin was put there by the conspirators on
     the part of the State, and that the trunk was put where it was by
     the same conspirators on May 5th, also that the clothes were put in
     the sewer in a sachel just like the one these men bought at
     Revell's, and not only that, but that Martin Burke knew he was
     going to be brought into that conspiracy when he went to Winnipeg.
     He would also have you believe that Martin Burke knew after the
     coroner's inquest and before his name was mentioned that there
     would be a great conspiracy, and that they would try to implicate
     him, and therefore he would go to Winnipeg. I merely mention those
     matters, gentlemen, because you will have observed that Mr. Forrest
     argued them with the same force that he argued every circumstance
     connected with this case, and you can appreciate the sincerity of
     his argument. Is it to intimidate the people's representatives, so
     that they would not dare go further in this hellish conspiracy? Is
     it for that purpose, or what does he mean by it? If it means that
     he thinks he can intimidate the representatives of the people in
     this case, he has struck the wrong blow, because it is our duty to
     present these matters as we get them, and we shall use our weak
     endeavors to do our duty.

     "Mr. Forrest spoke as earnestly about that and was as much in
     earnest as he was when he spoke to you of the identification of
     Burke. He read to you an authority of a case which occurred about
     three hundred and fifty years ago, where the identification was
     contested. According to his reasoning, a man might go into your
     house, shoot your wife before your eyes, and then if you can
     identify him the moment you see him you are not to be believed. He
     argues that before you can be believed you must put him in a line
     of a hundred men, let them walk through a room one by one, and then
     pick him out. That he argues in the face of undisputed evidence
     that you saw him kill your wife, yet he would have you believe that
     you could not rely upon any such evidence as that for
     identification. The man who could be mistaken in Martin Burke's
     face, surely must be blind. It is a case of undisputed
     identification. The case Forrest refers to, is where it has been
     contested; where three or four witnesses swear that is the man and
     others swear that it is not the man; where witnesses swear that it
     is the horse and others swear that it is not the horse; where some
     witnesses swear that it is so and other witnesses swear that it is
     not so, but who ever heard of any man, any lawyer, any man, indeed,
     in his senses undertaking to talk with sincerity and urge upon
     twelve honest men that where five witnesses come forward and swear
     to the face of Martin Burke, that he is the man, and are not to be
     believed. Who ever heard of a second-class lawyer, or even a police
     court shyster, claiming that that identification was not perfect?
     Five undisputed witnesses, old man Carlson, Mother Carlson, Charles
     Carlson, Mrs. Charles Carlson, and Mortensen, five witnesses swear
     that that is the man who rented the cottage, yet that same learned
     lawyer is undertaking to mislead you into the belief that that
     identification is not to be relied upon. It is absurd.

     "Well, if he will argue that Martin Burke is not the man who was
     there on the 4th of May, if he will argue under this evidence that
     Martin Burke did not rent that cottage, if he will argue that he
     did not move that furniture there, if he will argue that Martin
     Burke was not seen on the premises there, and tell me that he is in
     earnest, and you believe his argument, tell me when and where you
     would convict a man of crime, if the lawyer takes the position he
     did in this case. But he says the old man Carlson could not tell it
     was the 4th of May. How do you know? When that old man got on the
     stand, Forrest was yelling at the top of his voice, 'How do you
     know, how do you know?' while the old man yelled at the top of his
     voice, 'Because I know.' Yet he would have you believe he said 'How
     do you know?' in such a meek and mild tone that he could not hurt
     anyone's feelings. He is not sincere when he says that the State's
     Attorney and Mr. Hynes and Mr. Ingham are engaged in a conspiracy,
     and when he abuses the witnesses on the stand and charges them with
     perjury and lying, he knows in his heart that it is not true. He
     has made insinuations against that big-hearted Irishman sitting
     there, Mr. Hynes, of bullying witnesses, which he knows is untrue.
     There is not a man who practices before the bar of Chicago who is
     more lenient with the witness than is Mr. Hynes, and there is not a
     man at the bar who will get more out of him than will Mr. Hynes.
     You, gentlemen, heard his cross-examination of the defendants'
     experts, and his examination of the witnesses who came to the
     stand, and I will leave it to you to decide, and not to Forrest, if
     he abused the witnesses on the stand. For three days this learned
     counsel for the defense stood before you twelve gentlemen and had
     no stock in trade; not a word to say in their defense beyond
     abusing and scandalizing the men who are trying this case, and who
     are seeing that the people of this great State are not
     misrepresented. He stood here and maliciously abused Mr. Hynes,
     whose only effort and desire has been that the guilty men, if they
     are guilty, shall be punished, and it is my duty as an officer of
     the State, to explain this matter to you and to hurl back the
     insinuations at the man who made them.

     "He told you further that I had made a blunder, but he did not tell
     you how many blunders he had made. He told you I had made a blunder
     with the same force that he tells you that Mertes lied when he
     testified that he saw Coughlin at the Carlson cottage, and when he
     tells you that, his clients have not been proved guilty,
     notwithstanding all our witnesses' lies. Suppose what he says about
     Mertes and his knowing it was May 4th is proved, what difference
     does it make whether it was on the night of May 4th or not. But he
     does put this man Kunze and Dan Coughlin together at the Carlson
     cottage. He puts Coughlin in the cottage and Kunze driving him
     there, and he and his associates gave you good evidence of their
     sincerity when they went to the cottage or house where this poor
     man lives, who can talk but very little of the English language,
     and told him that the Court had sent them to find out what he knew.
     Yet when he comes here and gives his evidence on the witness stand
     they tell him he lied, but they carefully abstained from saying
     what they did when they went to see him. You will remember how they
     examined him and put words into his mouth that he did not
     understand, and then tried to impeach him, but I think you,
     gentlemen, will admit that it is proved beyond question that
     Coughlin went to the cottage; that he had a key to it in his
     pocket; that he was perfectly at home there, and that Kunze drove
     him there.

     "Then he says old man Carlson did not see Burke there on the night
     of the 4th. He could not tell you why the old man did not see him,
     although the old man said distinctly that he did; but this we do
     know, that the next morning he and his wife were out in front of
     the cottage and they saw something on the steps which they say
     looked like preserves, and he said to his wife that he supposed
     they had been moving in the night before. You will remember that
     Burke had said to old Carlson that it was about time to move in.
     Yes; move in. It was a bad day for Burke when he moved in, and it
     was a bad day for Dr. Cronin when he moved in."

     "The witness said it was about time to fix up," said Mr. Forrest.

     "Yes. I think he did. It was a pretty bad time to fix up," retorted
     the State's Attorney. "Fix up is a better word, and a nice fix they
     made of it. Old man Carlson tells you that the next morning he
     thought they had moved in. Forrest says you must not believe old
     Carlson, because he is an old man, and that the story about the
     wagon tracks he did not tell before the coroner. That is very true,
     but he says here that there was a wagon track, and it certainly was
     not necessary for the old man to commit perjury in order to prove
     that there was a wagon track. A great many thing's have happened
     which were not testified to before the coroner's inquest, but
     Forrest says that none of them are true. He first complains and
     abuses us when getting a jury because there was so much known of
     the case and so much published, and yet, because we did not publish
     the whole thing to the world and before the coroner, he abuses us
     before the petit jury. You can not please him, and the only way to
     please him is to give him evidence sufficient to acquit his
     clients.

     "Mr. Forrest brought the trunk in here and exhibited it to you and
     I have a right to say a few words about that. I also desire to say
     a few words about the clothes and the necktie, which was cut
     through at the neck. They cut his pantaloons off, they cut his
     clothes off and did not take the time to take them off."

     "I want to enter an objection to the jury's inspecting the
     clothes," hastily remarked Mr. Forrest, jumping to his feet.

     "I don't care about the clothes," replied the State's Attorney.
     "You exhibited the trunk, and I am going to speak of that, although
     they are all in evidence. At the same time I desire to call your
     especial attention to the necktie, which was not unfastened in the
     front but cut from behind. They had the man on his face, and when
     they stripped his body of the clothing they cut his necktie. Now, I
     want to show you this bloody trunk. They never turned up the bottom
     of this trunk to show you what is there. There is some of the blood
     which ran through the trunk. Do you see this blood in the trunk?
     You do not believe that the man in that trunk died from apoplexy do
     you? You do not believe that he died from poison, do you? You do
     not believe he died a natural death. Where was the trunk found? It
     was found within three-quarters of a mile south of where the body
     was found in a catch-basin, and right by its side, within three or
     four blocks, were found the clothes of Cronin in the sewer.
     Remember that the wagon was seen half a mile north of where the
     body was found with this trunk in it, which was then thought to be
     a carpenter's chest, and it was seen coming this way empty three
     blocks east of where the body was found.

     "I want to call your attention to this matter because it is
     important. You will remember that Mr. Ingham mentioned the fact in
     his statement that when seen they were north of Bryn Mawyr avenue,
     looking for the Lake Shore drive in the sand, whereas, if they had
     honestly been looking for the Lake Shore drive, they would have
     found it south. Now then, put these three things together. You know
     where the body was found and the clothes were found, and between
     those two points this trunk was found with blood fresh in it that
     could be stirred by those honest Germans the next morning, with
     cotton batting saturated with blood, and if you put those things
     together, you will have reason to believe that it was the same
     trunk that came from the Carlson cottage. Why? Because the trunk in
     the Carlson cottage was just such a trunk, and it had been moved,
     and in the valise was found Cronin's clothes, and that valise was
     moved from 117 Clark street and was found in the sewer. I am going
     to make up a chain of evidence in this case, although I am not
     going all over those outside circumstances, because every
     circumstance which is proved in the case is not necessary for a
     conviction; mark that. If you get instructions from the court that
     there is a necessary circumstance lacking, and if you have a
     reasonable doubt on that material circumstance, and if there can be
     no conviction without that circumstance in the case, then you can
     not convict. But every circumstance in the case that is proved is
     not a material or necessary circumstance. If such circumstances as
     are necessary to lead your minds to believe the guilt of the
     accused beyond a reasonable doubt are clearly proved, that is all
     that is necessary for you to be satisfied upon. You need all these
     little outside circumstances, because they corroborate and make
     stronger each link in the chain of evidence. You want to remember
     that every point which leads in the direction of a correct
     conclusion to your minds should be very clear to you. As to whether
     they affect the material circumstances is another matter.

     "I want you to remember that Burke went to Winnipeg. Forrest says
     that he never attempted to deceive the officers there or to go
     under an assumed name, but Officer McKinnon tells you that he first
     said his name was Cooper, and when the chief of police told him any
     statement he made would be used in evidence against him, then, for
     the first time, he said his name was Burke. Again, when Patrick
     O'Sullivan was requested to come to the police station and he saw a
     lot of men standing back of the Carlson cottage, he wanted to know
     what those men were doing in that cottage, clearly showing that he
     knew what had transpired in the cottage. Another thing I want you
     to remember is what Beggs said after the murder, when he said to
     Maurice Morris and another person in the presence of Ward, who did
     not take the stand, 'Cronin is all right; we know what we are
     talking about and you do not; you are not in the inner circle.'
     Whoever said it was the organization or a part of the Clan-na-Gael
     which formed that inner circle? We did not, but that inner circle
     was made up of members of the order, men who knew what was going
     on. Foster says Beggs' remark was advertising the murder, but it
     was not. It means that he and other members who were interested in
     the murder of Dr. Cronin were an inner circle; that he knew where
     Cronin could be found, and that he believed his remains would keep
     there undiscovered until they could not be identified. You have
     another link, then, in the chain of evidence, and you have to take
     every circumstance in the case that leads you up to the chain, and
     strengthens each link in the chain that was forged by Beggs. Then
     he answers: 'Why didn't you call Tom Murphy?' We had him before the
     grand jury, and we examined his books, but the idea of calling Tom
     Murphy himself when his partner sits here and has sat here from the
     beginning of the trial as a lawyer for the defendant! As to the
     money in the camp, Tom Murphy did not have enough money in the
     funds of the organization to square his own account, let alone
     spending money for killing Cronin. We did not claim that he did. We
     do not claim that the camp paid the expenses, but we have the right
     to take Tom Murphy before the grand jury and investigate the camp
     in order to discover who were the conspirators.

     "Now, gentlemen, I do not propose to dwell upon their defense at
     all. They have no defense. When we started in this case we groped
     in the valley and you groped in the valley. When you looked for the
     evidence you found it. If you are looking for an excuse to acquit
     those defendants, you may acquit them either on the ground that we
     have not stated the cause of death, or you can acquit them on the
     ground that you do not believe the evidence. But you are not going
     to do that; you are too honorable men to do so. The people of the
     State of Illinois have rights as well as these defendants. I would
     not ask you to convict the men unless you feel that the evidence
     justified you in doing so, but their defense, what is it? It is
     shorter than the defendants can cover themselves by lying upon it,
     and, as a covering, it is narrower than they can wrap themselves
     in. There is no defense. Since we were groping in the valley we
     have piled up a mountain of evidence, until you have the mountain
     peaks, which stand out so clearly, that all of you can not fail to
     see them, and there stands the evidence, irresistible,
     unimpeachable and indisputable. Gentlemen, let us see what we have
     got.

     "Let us start in on this chain. Go into Camp 20 and see what there
     is there. You find that there was a committee appointed; you find
     that charges were made about spies; you find there was a circle of
     brothers banded together. Take in the 22d of February; take in the
     speech of Beggs; take in the letters of Spelman. There you have got
     a link. You start out from Camp 20 with that link. You go over to
     117 South Clark Street; you go to Revell; you take the buying of
     the trunk and the buying of the valise and the buying of the
     furniture; the putting of it into 117 Clark street, and Kunze is in
     there as a man to throw the public off as to the cause of the
     occupancy. There you have a second link. The trunk, the valise, the
     strap and the furniture form a second link. Put that on and follow
     it up. These two links are undisputed and undenied. There is no
     dispute as to that second link; you find Martin Burke taking the
     furniture and putting the trunk and valise into that cottage. There
     is a third link undisputed; no question about it, unless you want
     to disbelieve the five witnesses as to the identification of Martin
     Burke. You go on and you find Patrick O'Sullivan contracting with
     Cronin, that is the fourth link. There are four links established
     by evidence and undisputed leading up to the murder of Dr. Cronin.
     You come to Dan Coughlin; he has the horse and buggy; that is the
     fifth link. These five links are as solid as the rocks--as solid as
     iron; five undisputed links in the chain. You find, further, on
     Evanston road, the trunk, the body and the clothes. That is another
     link. There are six links that lead from Camp 20 to the grave of
     Dr. Cronin. We have the first link made by the Clan-na-Gael
     brotherhood in Camp 20; to that add Beggs' letters and his
     statements about the inner circle; to that add that that committee
     was to report to him alone; to that add everything that Beggs did
     and said; it is all hanging on that link. We find Burke renting the
     cottage and saying that his sister is going to keep house with him;
     we find him disappear; we find him in Winnipeg. That is another
     link. Then there is the P. O'Sullivan link; you find his printed
     card was presented to Dr. Cronin, and the man who presents it says,
     'O'Sullivan wants you to go to his ice house.' That is an
     undisputed circumstance. All these circumstances are leading you up
     to the murder of Dr. Cronin. Take Dan Coughlin's statement to
     Dinan; take his statement that Smith, from Hancock, Michigan, is
     the man who drove the rig, the very man that Burke went to see at
     Hancock, Michigan, and who says John Ryan is his friend.

     "Look at it! There never was such a chain of circumstances. The
     chain itself is strong, and yet all those circumstances, those
     little links, are as strong--so strong that they can not be broken.
     And yet this lawyer will stand up here for three days and say there
     is not evidence enough to convict! Now, another thing that goes to
     add to P. O'Sullivan's link and to show that he was not honest in
     that contract is the testimony of this man A. J. Ford. He testifies
     that he made a speech in Camp 20, in which he said that there were
     men fraternizing with the deputies up in the Washington Literary
     Society in Lake View, and he gave this man O'Sullivan as his
     authority. There is another circumstance. Why then did O'Sullivan,
     if he believed that Cronin was organizing a lodge there--if he
     believed that that literary society was taking in men opposed to
     the Irish cause--why did he think Cronin was a friend of his, and
     why did he go and make a contract with Dr. Cronin? Now, gentlemen,
     I have laid down these links; you take it in Camp 20, follow it to
     117 Clark street, to the cottage, to Dan Coughlin's horse and
     buggy, to the trunk, the body and the clothes. You come back to
     Camp 20 and it falls at the feet of John F. Beggs. His lawyer says
     that John F. Beggs is the dupe of no man. No, gentlemen; but John
     F. Beggs is just as guilty, if he was in this conspiracy, as Martin
     Burke, every bit. The learned counsel told you a story here, and it
     was very apt. He told you that men who had been defrauding the
     government and doing crooked work took a man who was on their track
     and put him over the brink of a precipice and swung him back and
     forth, and he says one of them climbed up and cut the rope, and an
     innocent man, innocently charged, dropped on the rocks below and
     was cut to pieces. The men who stood by and laughed while this was
     being done were just as guilty as the man who cut the rope. John F.
     Beggs, if he was in this conspiracy, is just as guilty as the men
     who dealt the blows, every bit. Now, in such a case as that, where
     an innocent man was swung out over the rocks--where these men who
     were criminals themselves, swung a man over a cliff down to
     death--what would you do if you were on a jury to try such men?

     "Gentlemen, I am through; I promised you I would hurry up. I do not
     believe that if I were to talk from now till next June I would
     change your opinion one way or another. If you are settled to turn
     these men loose, you will do it; if you believe this evidence is
     not sufficient to convict them, why of course you will acquit them.
     But I want to call your attention to your responsibility.
     Gentlemen, this is a serious matter; it has got down to business. I
     have been sitting here for weeks, and indisputed evidence that must
     lead your minds to the conclusion that Dr. Cronin was murdered,
     evidence that must lead to the conclusion that it was done by a
     conspiracy; evidence that must convince your minds that it was a
     cold-blooded murder, that it was planned in secret, that it was
     done with the coolness of those men who swung the man over the
     cliff--you must have come to the conclusion that if there ever was
     a murder case in which the extreme penalty of the law was demanded
     at your hands by a verdict of that kind, this is one. Remember that
     you are not here to acquit guilty men; you are not here to convict
     innocent men. Remember that we are here insisting that this
     evidence is so overwhelming that you, as honest men, under your
     oaths, can not resist this volume of proof, and that it ought to
     convince you beyond a reasonable doubt that all five of these men
     are guilty of this crime."

CHAPTER XXIV.

ALL THE TESTIMONY BEFORE THE JURY--JUDGE M'CONNELL'S LUCID CHARGE--THE
  JURY RETIRES--A PERIOD OF ANXIETY--POPULAR EXCITEMENT AT ITS
  HEIGHT--DEMEANOR OF THE PRISONERS--SUSPENSE AT LAST ENDED--THE VERDICT.

Breathless silence prevailed as the State's Attorney concluded his
argument. Attention was now directed to Judge McConnell. Every eye in
the court-room, including that of the prisoners, was directed toward the
bench. Spreading before him a bulky roll of foolscap, his Honor, after
requesting the close attention of the jurors, commenced to read the
final instructions. These were couched as follows:

     "The jury are judges of the law as well as of the facts in this
     case, and if they can say upon their oaths that they know the law
     better than the Court itself, they have the right to do so; but,
     before assuming so solemn a responsibility, they should be sure
     that they are not acting from caprice or prejudice, that they are
     not controlled by their will or wishes, but from a deep and
     confident conviction that the Court is wrong and they are right.
     Before saying this upon their oaths, it is their duty to reflect
     whether, from their study and experience, they are better qualified
     to judge of the law than the Court. If under all circumstances they
     are prepared to say that the Court is wrong in its exposition of
     the law, the statute has given them that right.

     "In the language of the statute, murder is the unlawful killing of
     a human being, in the peace of the people, with malice
     aforethought, either expressed or implied. The unlawful killing may
     be perpetrated by poisoning, striking, starving, drowning,
     stabbing, shooting, or by any other of the various forms or means
     by which human nature may be overcome and death thereby occasioned.
     Express malice is that deliberate intention unlawfully to take away
     the life of a fellow-creature, which is manifested by external
     circumstances capable of proof. Malice shall be implied when no
     considerable provocation appears, or when all the circumstances of
     the killing show an abandoned and malignant heart.

     "Whoever is guilty of murder, shall suffer the punishment of death
     or imprisonment in the penitentiary for his natural life, or for a
     term of not less than fourteen years. If the accused, or any of
     them, are found guilty by the jury, the jury shall fix the
     punishment by their verdict.

     "An accessory is he who stands by and aids, abets, or assists, or
     who, not being present, aiding, abetting, or assisting, hath
     advised, encouraged, aided, or abetted the perpetration of the
     crime. He who thus aids, abets, assists, advises, or encourages,
     shall be considered as principal and punished accordingly. Every
     such accessory, when a crime is committed within or without this
     State by his aid or procurement in this State, may be indicted and
     convicted at the same time as the principal, or before or after his
     conviction, and whether the principal is convicted or amenable to
     justice or not, and punished as principal.

     "The manner or cause of death, which is alleged in the indictment,
     is an essential element of the charge against the defendants, and
     the law requires the prosecution to establish that averment to your
     satisfaction, beyond reasonable doubt, as it is laid in the
     indictment, before a conviction of the defendants, or either of
     them, can lawfully be had. But whether or not the manner or cause
     of death was as laid in the indictment may be established by
     circumstantial evidence, just as any other fact essential to
     conviction may be.

     "The indictment against the defendants is no evidence of their
     guilt, but is merely a formal charge for the purpose of putting
     them upon trial. You ought to commence the investigation of this
     case with a presumption that the defendants, and each of them are
     innocent of the crime of which they are accused, and you should act
     upon this presumption throughout your consideration of the
     evidence. Unless this presumption of innocence shall have been
     overcome by proof of guilt so strong, credible, and conclusive as
     to convince your minds, beyond every reasonable doubt, that the
     defendants are guilty, and unless the evidence is of such a nature
     as to exclude every reasonable doubt of guilt, then you ought to
     acquit the defendants.

     "But this rule of law, which clothes every person accused of crime
     with the presumption of innocence, and imposes on the State the
     burden of establishing his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, is not
     intended to aid any one who is in fact guilty of the crime to
     escape, but is a humane provision of law, intended, so far as human
     agencies can, to guard against the danger of any innocent person
     being unjustly punished.

     "Circumstantial evidence in criminal cases is the proof of such
     facts and circumstances connected with or surrounding the
     commission of the crime charged as tends to show the guilt or
     innocence of the party charged, and if these facts and
     circumstances are sufficient to satisfy the jury of the guilt of
     the defendants beyond a reasonable doubt, then such evidence is