If he guesses wrong, the lawyer "excepts" and the case may be reversed on appeal.

This is not a test of the defendant's guilt or innocence, but a test of the abstract learning and quickness of the presiding judge.
It is generally believed that appellate courts are prone to reverse criminal cases on purely technical grounds.

Whether this belief be well founded or ill, its wide acceptance as fact is fertile in bringing the law into disrepute.* Justice to be effective must be not only sure but swift.

An "iron hand" cannot always compensate for a "leaden heel".
*Cf.

"Criminal Law Reform," G.W.Alger, "The Outlook," June, 1907.