Even the formal indictment drawn up against him, of which a copy had been sent him, could not repress his hopes. He knew that in such a document everything concerning him and his offence was naturally represented in the darkest colors, so as to leave the judge-advocate sufficient grounds on which to bring the proceedings against him to the point of actual trial. The document read: “Proceedings have been opened against Sergeant Ferdinand Julius Schmitz, on motion to that effect, because of an offence against Paragraph 94 of the Military Criminal Code. “Although the defendant maintains that he has been on particularly friendly terms with Vice-Sergeant-Major Roth, that would in no way justify him in disobeying an order issued while in the performance of duty. On the contrary, his refusal to obey two peremptory and emphatic orders, given in the presence of the stable guard, and therefore before men assembled, was a most glaring instance of insubordination. “The excuse of defendant, that he was in an excited condition by reason of indulgence in alcoholic liquors, in nowise exculpates him. The circumstance that his offence has been committed while intoxicated during the performance of his duty, is rather an additional reason for increasing the measure of his punishment. “Defendant will be tried by court-martial.” That sounded indeed very dangerous, just as if he were a criminal of the deepest dye,--he, who for nine years had conducted himself blamelessly. He was almost tempted to laugh at this accusation, which seemed to him so strongly tinctured with prejudice. On October 20th, at noon precisely, the trial began. The judges had come to town from the seat of the command of the army corps. With faces severe and forbidding, they sat at a long table,--a major, a captain, a first lieutenant, a judge-advocate to conduct the proceedings according to the statutes, and a second one to conduct the prosecution. After Schmitz had given an intelligent account of the facts, Roth was called as witness. He represented the affair in the most glaring colors, denied all friendship with the defendant, and likewise denied in the strongest language that he also had been intoxicated, as Schmitz had stated. By hook or crook he had gained over as witnesses for his sober condition on that evening the invalid afflicted with lung trouble, and likewise the Pole. The latter, because of the semi-idiotic state of his mind, and because of his insufficient knowledge of German, he had instructed to simply nod his head to all the questions asked him. As luck would have it, it so happened that the questions put to this witness were of a kind to which his mute nods were the answers most unfavorable to the defendant. The wonder was, however, that the court made no objection to such testimony. Finally the “Vice” swore, with a voice shaken by no tremor, to the truth of his deposition.