"We might make a recommendation to that effect," suggested Captain Rudd. "Excuse me," interposed Mr. Moss, "but I doubt if I could agree to our doing that. I'm afraid that Master Bailey deserves some punishment. This is not the first time he has done this sort of thing. He was dismissed from his last two places for dishonesty." Again the foreman shook his head. "That didn't come out in the evidence. You know, gentlemen, what we have to do is to dismiss from our minds any knowledge of the parties which we may have outside the case, and confine our attention to the sworn testimony." Mr. Moss smiled, declining to be pooh-poohed. "That's all very well in theory, Mr. Grice, but in practice it won't do. Nichols, with his fish-cart, has done a daily round in this country of some twenty miles or so for the last twelve or fourteen years. I doubt if there is a person in this room who has not some knowledge of him. As for Bailey, his mother lives within a hundred yards of my house; I have known him ever since he was born. I am acquainted, too, with his last two employers, and with the circumstances under which he left them." "I know nothing of either of the parties," said Captain Rudd. "You are a new-comer. I doubt, as I say, if any other person present can say the same." If any other person could, he didn't. There was a pause--broken by the foreman. "Let us understand our position. Eight of us say guilty--Mr. Tyler goes with the majority; two of us have not yet made up our minds; and Mr. Longsett is the only one who says not guilty. May I inquire, Mr. Longsett, on what grounds you favour an acquittal?" "You've no right to ask me anything of the kind. This is not the first jury I've served on. Although you're foreman, you're only like the rest of us. What you've got to do is to ask me if I say guilty or not guilty. I say not guilty. "I believe, Mr. Longsett," insinuated Mr. Moss, "that Bailey is a relation of yours?" "That's no business of yours." "Then are we to understand, Mr. Longsett"--the foreman spoke with almost ominous suavity--"that you have arrived at a point at which you are impervious to argument?" "I say not guilty." "Even though it may be demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that the prisoner is guilty?" "It's no good talking to me, Mr. Grice. I say not guilty." The foreman, stretching out his hands in front of him, looked round the table with an air which was eloquent with deprecation. Old Parkes banged his fist upon the board. "And I say guilty, and I hope they'll give him seven years--the thieving varmint!" "Arrived at a state of sudden conviction--eh, George?" This was Mr. Timmins, who was middle-aged and jaunty. "Some people are easily convinced," growled Mr. Longsett. "You're not one of that sort, are you, Jacob?" This again was Mr. Timmins. "You won't convince me."