if I mistake not, by a former
marriage, upon the perils and distress of her unhappy situation.«
    »If, indeed, you are able to instruct that point, Mr. Fairbrother,« said the
presiding Judge -
    »If I am indeed able to instruct that point, my Lord,« resumed Mr.
Fairbrother, »I trust not only to serve my client, but to relieve your Lordships
from that which I know you feel the most painful duty of your high office; and
to give all who now hear me the exquisite pleasure of beholding a creature so
young, so ingenuous, and so beautiful, as she that is now at the bar of your
Lordships' Court, dismissed from thence in safety and in honour.«
    This address seemed to affect many of the audience, and was followed by a
slight murmur of applause. Deans, as he heard his daughter's beauty and innocent
appearance appealed to, was involuntarily about to turn his eyes towards her;
but, recollecting himself, he bent them again on the ground with stubborn
resolution.
    »Will not my learned brother, on the other side of the bar,« continued the
advocate, after a short pause, »share in this general joy, since, I know, while
he discharges his duty in bringing an accused person here, no one rejoices more
in their being freely and honourably sent hence? My learned brother shakes his
head doubtfully, and lays his hand on the panel's declaration. I understand him
perfectly - he would insinuate that the facts now stated to your Lordships are
inconsistent with the confession of Euphemia Deans herself. I need not remind
your Lordships, that her present defence is no whit to be narrowed within the
bounds of her former confession; and that it is not by any account which she may
formerly have given of herself, but by what is now to be proved for or against
her, that she must ultimately stand or fall. I am not under the necessity of
accounting for her choosing to drop out of her declaration the circumstances of
her confession to her sister. She might not be aware of its importance; she
might be afraid of implicating her sister; she might even have forgotten the
circumstance entirely, in the terror and distress of mind incidental to the
arrest of so young a creature on a charge so heinous. Any of these reasons are
sufficient to account for her having suppressed the truth in this instance, at
whatever risk to herself; and I incline most to her erroneous fear of
criminating her sister, because I observe she has had a similar tenderness
towards her lover