“Your Honor,” he said, “I am a judge myself, occupyin' in my home state a position very similar to the one which you fill here, and whilst I realize, none better, that this ain't all accordin' to the rules of evidence as laid down in the books, yet when I git to thinkin' about them old soldierin' times I find I am inclined to sort of reminiscence round a little. And I trust your Honor will pardon me if I should seem to ramble slightly?” His tone was more than apologetic and more than confidential. It was winning. The judge upon the bench was a veteran himself. He looked toward the prosecutor. “Has the state's attorney any objection to this line of testimony?” he asked, smiling a little. Certainly Gilliam had no fear that this honest-appearing old man's wanderings could damage a case already as good as won. He smiled back indulgently and waved his arm with a gesture that was compounded of equal parts of toleration and patience, with a top-dressing of contempt. “I fail,” said Gilliam, “to see wherein the military history and achievements of this worthy gentleman can possibly affect the issue of the homicide of Abner J. Rankin. But,” he added magnanimously, “if the defense chooses to encumber the record with matters so trifling and irrelevant I surely will make no objection now or hereafter.” “The witness may proceed,” said the judge. “Well, really, Your Honor, I didn't have so very much to say,” confessed Judge Priest, “and I didn't expect there'd be any to-do made over it. What I was trying to git at was that cornin' down here to testify in this case sort of brought back them old days to my mind. As I git along more in years--” he was looking toward the jurors now--“I find that I live more and more in the past.” As though he had put a question to them several of the jurors gravely inclined their heads. The busy cud of Juror No. 12 moved just a trifle slower in its travels from the right side of the jaw to the left and back again. “Yes, suh,” he said musingly, “I got up early this mornin' at the tavern where I'm stoppin' and took a walk through your thrivin' little city.” This was rambling with a vengeance, thought the puzzled Durham. “I walked down here to a bridge over a little creek and back again. It reminded me mightily of that other time when I passed through this town--in '64--just about this season of the year--and it was hot early today just as it was that other time--and the dew was thick on the grass, the same as 'twas then.” He halted a moment. “Of course your town didn't look the same this mornin' as it did that other mornin'. It seemed like to me there are twicet as many houses here now as there used to be--it's got to be quite a little city.” Mr. Lukins, the grocer, nodded silent approval of this utterance, Mr. Lukins having but newly completed and moved into a two-story brick store building with a tin cornice and an outside staircase.