He felt himself in the position of a puppy, when itsmaster, taking it by the scruff of its neck, rubs its nose in themess it has made. He tried to consider it all as acoincidence, which would pass without infringing his manner oflife. Still he would not give in to the feelings of repentance whichbegan to arise within him. When, accordingto his opinion, this truth had also been received by the jury, hewent on to explain that if theft and murder had been committed atthe same time, the combination of the crimes was theft withmurder. When he considered thatthe jury were sufficiently imbued with these facts, he proceededto enunciate another truthnamely, that a murder is an actionwhich has the death of a human being as its consequence, and thatpoisoning could therefore also be termed murder. While he was explaining this, he looked several times atNekhludoff as if wishing to impress upon him these importantfacts, in hopes that, having understood it, Nekhludoff would makehis fellowjurymen also understand it. What a strange coincidence that after ten years, during which Inever saw her, this case should have come up today when I am onthe jury, and that it is in the prisoners' dock that I see heragain And how will it end? Oh, dear, if they would only get onquicker."īefore putting the case to the jury, he spoke to them for sometime in a pleasant, homely manner, explaining that burglary wasburglary and theft was theft, and that stealing from a placewhich was under lock and key was stealing from a place under lockand key. It was so pleasant tohear the impressive tones of his own voice, and therefore hefound it necessary to say a few words more about the importanceof the rights given to the jury, how carefully they should usethe rights and how they ought not to abuse them, about theirbeing on their oath, that they were the conscience of society,that the secrecy of the debatingroom should be consideredsacred, etc. Then he foundit necessary to tell the jury what they all knew, or might havefound out by reading it upi.e., how they were to consider thecase, count the votes, in case of a tie to acquit the prisoners,and so on.Įverything seemed to have been told but no, the president couldnot forego his right of speaking as yet. The public prosecutor, thelawyers, and, in fact, everyone in the court, shared the sameimpression. The president spoke, and the members on each side of him listenedwith deeplyattentive expressions, but looked from time to timeat the clock, for they considered the speech too long though verygoodi.e., such as it ought to be. At last the questions were formulated, andthe president began the summing up. Told she might do so by the president,she only lifted her eyes to him, cast a look round the room likea hunted animal, and, dropping her head, began to cry, sobbingaloud.Īfter the last words of the prisoners had been heard, the form inwhich the questions were to be put to the jury was settled, whichalso took some time. Simeon Kartinkin only repeated several times: "It isyour business, but I am innocent it's unjust." Maslova saidnothing in her defence. and seeing it was already five minutes to three, heresolved to trust to their being intelligent enough to understandthis without further comment.Įuphemia Botchkova repeated once more that she knew nothing aboutit and had taken part in nothing, and firmly laid the whole blameon Maslova. He was going to add that if they gave an affirmative answer toany question that was put to them they would thereby affirmeverything included in the question, so that if they did not wishto affirm the whole of the question they should mention the partof the question they wished to be excepted. The facts of this case are the following," began the president,and repeated all that had already been said several times by theadvocates, the public prosecutor and the witnesses.
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