found--that a packet containing arsenic had lain on a certain morning, in a certain apartment--that the prisoner had been seen to come from that apartment alone, in the afternoon; that it was not an apartment usually inhabited or visited by the prisoner--that there was evidence the prisoner was aware the packet of arsenic lay there--that the said packet was missed the next morning, from the said apartment--that the said packet was subsequently found in a locked escritoire of the prisoner's, to which he alone had access--that a torn piece of paper, visibly a portion of the outer cover of the said packet of arsenic, had been seen, by a witness whose respectability and credibility were beyond a doubt, fall from within the breast of the waistcoat of the prisoner--that the prisoner had resisted the opening of the body--that Dr. Harman's opinion the deceased had died by the effects of poison, would not have amounted to evidence, had the body not been opened--and finally that the defence rested entirely on the unsubstantiated assertions of the prisoner himself. As probable motives could not become subjects of proof, though much had been said of them on the trial, he would say nothing of them here: they were all calculated to awaken feelings for, or against the prisoner; and once more, he entreated the jury to dismiss every thing but evidence from their minds, and give their verdict accordingly. He then told them distinctly what verdict it was their duty to their country to give, if they considered these facts proved, and what verdict was due to humanity, and the prisoner, if they still felt a doubt. From the circumstance we have already mentioned, of candles being placed on the desk of the judge only, the twilight-like sort of obscurity which, by the time his lordship approached the conclusion of his charge, had stolen over the rest of the court-house, added much to the solemn effect of this most anxious part of the proceedings. The forms of the jurymen, but dimly discerned, leaning over with painful eagerness, to catch, as it were, the very thoughts of the judge; their eyes glancing in the distant light, as they removed them, from time to time, from his countenance, to look round on each other; and when he ceased speaking, the pause that followed--and then--the verdict, which issuing as it now did, from the gloom in which the whole group was wrapped, sounded more awfully, more like the condensed, irrecoverable decision of the _judicial twelve_, than when, in the broad light of day, the foreman, though in his official capacity in fact the voice of all, still looks the individual. The single word pronounced was--Guilty!!! As though the whole assembly had hitherto held their breath, a sort of universal gasp was distinctly heard; and during the moment, the judge was preparing to pronounce the awful sentence of the law, a movement was observable in the part of the gallery where Lady Arden, though not visible, was known to be. CHAPTER XI.