It was probable that, even among the jury, there was one or more who, if he had not absolutely set poison for his neighbour's cats, for destroying his young chickens or scratching up his flower beds, had threatened to do so, and would not have regarded it as a very serious crime had he done so.
Therefore he contended that the jury should put this trumpery affair altogether out of their minds; on the double ground that, in the first place, the prisoner at the bar did not poison the dog; and that, had he done so, it would have had nothing whatever to do with the present affair.
"Why, gentlemen," he said, "it is an insult to your understanding to ask you to credit that this young fellow--whose character, which I shall presently prove to you, by unimpeachable evidence, is of the highest kind--has, for four years, cherished such malice against his employer, for dismissing him mistakenly, that he has become the consort of thieves and burglars, has stained his hands in crime, and rendered himself liable to transportation, for the purpose merely of spiting that gentleman.

Such a contention would be absolutely absurd.

I must beg you to dismiss it altogether from your mind, and approach it from a different standpoint, altogether.
Divested of this extraneous business, the matter is a most simple one.
"The prisoner left his mother's cottage, at seven o'clock in the evening, to go over for an hour or two to his friend Mr.
Shrewsbury, the schoolmaster of Tipping.

He took with him a few tools, as he had promised to put some shelves in his friend's house.

On the way he heard some talking down a lane, which he knew led to only a field.