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290 TRIAL OF JOHN W. WEBSTER.
which will account for every day I spent during that, week; for every
day and every hour I was absent from home. Every day, from the
Friday of the disappearance to the following Friday, I never was absent
.from my home after nine o'clock at night; and, as to being seen by Mr.
Sanderson getting out of the omnibus alone in Harvard Square, it is
altogether a mistake. I was at home every night.
I placed some evidence in the hands of my counsel about where I was
at different times on Friday, which they have not used. In regard to
where I dined that day, I would say that I left the College about three
o'clock that afternoon to come up town. I had had no dinner; but, as
I walked up towards the omnibus-office, I came to the place at the corner
of Hanover street, called Concert Hall, of Brigham's, where I had occa-
sionally been before to get a bite, and I stopped in there and got a mut-
ton-chop. I waited there some time, then went to Mr. Kidder's, and
afterwards took the omnibus, home.
But accident put it into my power to show that I had been at one
place on Wednesday evening, of which I notified my counsel. Having
occasion to make a little present to a young lady, I went to Munroe's
book-store, and bought a copy of Humboldt's new work, Cosmos. I took
the book with me, and, as I was going by, stopped in again at Brigham's
to get a cup of tea, and thence went to Mr. Cunningham's. I came off
in a hurry, and left the parcel and a note behind me. On my arrival, I
found that I had forgotten my book. My counsel afterwards sent to
found that I had forgotten my book. My counsel afterwards sent to Brig-
ham's, and found the book and note in the place where I had left them;
and the people there recollected the circumstance, so that I was able to
fix that it was Wednesday evening, and where I was that evening; but
unfortunately they could not remember the fact of my being there on
the other occasion. But, as it has been with me in various other respects,
my counsel have not thought proper to mention this circumstance. And
so I might mention a great many other matters. But I will not detain
the Court by detailing them. [The prisoner here sat down; but imme-
diately rose again and added,-]
Will the Court allow me to say one thing more? I have felt more
distressed by the production of these various anonymous letters, than,
I had almost said by anything else that has occurred during the trial.
And I call my God to witness,-and if it should be the last word that I
should ever be allowed to speak,-positively declare I never wrote those
letters. Since they were introduced into the case, one of my counsel has
received a letter from this very "Civis," in which the writer says that he
wrote the one signed with that name.* A notice has already been inserted
in the newspapers, I believe, calling upon him to come forth; but he has
not yet shown himself. If he is present here in the court-room, and has
a spark of humanity in his breast, I call upon him to come forward and
declare himself! [This last sentence was spoken with great emphasis,
the prisoner at the same time elevating his voice and looking round the
crowded court-room and up to the gallery, with an excited and oratorical
air.]
When the prisoner ha!'d concluded his address, which occupied about
fifteen minutes, the Chief Justice, after a consultation among the mem-
bers of the Court, arose, and with a voice greatly disturbed by emotion,
and a countenance indicative of sorrow and distress, delivered the follow-
ing charge to the jury:-
Gentlemen of the Jury,-It is with 'the deepest sense of the responsi-
bilities which devolve upon this Court, and upon myself as their repre-
sentative that I rise to address you upon the most important and inter-
esting subject to which the attention of a jury can ever be called. But
the case has been so long under consideration, it has now been brought
to such a crisis, the whole of the evidence and the arguments of counsel
*This IFCfer will be found in the Appendix.
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