Well may both judge and jury, in the outset of trial, be puzzled to
decide between and do justice to men whose quarrels are made up of
baseness and villainy, and carried on with mutual treachery, fraud,
and violence, and whose witnesses are perhaps of the same character
with themselves. Each party may justly enough accuse the other, though
neither of them are worthy of belief, and deserve even no credit for
the imputations with which they asperse each other’s characters. But
such men need not hope long to deceive the world: a penetrating judge
and an honest jury will, upon sifting the matter, clearly see what kind
of men they have been occupying their attention with, and shew a proper
disgust at the wicked impudence of both plaintiff and defendant.
[Illustration]
[Illustration] [Page 87]