That she had done this, the public read in the journals of the day, and the simple announcement cast a softening light upon her character.
The court room was crowded at an early hour, before the arrival of judges, lawyers and prisoner.

There is no enjoyment so keen to certain minds as that of looking upon the slow torture of a human being on trial for life, except it be an execution; there is no display of human ingenuity, wit and power so fascinating as that made by trained lawyers in the trial of an important case, nowhere else is exhibited such subtlety, acumen, address, eloquence.
All the conditions of intense excitement meet in a murder trial.

The awful issue at stake gives significance to the lightest word or look.
How the quick eyes of the spectators rove from the stolid jury to the keen lawyers, the impassive judge, the anxious prisoner.

Nothing is lost of the sharp wrangle of the counsel on points of law, the measured decision's of the bench; the duels between the attorneys and the witnesses.

The crowd sways with the rise and fall of the shifting, testimony, in sympathetic interest, and hangs upon the dicta of the judge in breathless silence.