Select Speeches of Daniel Webster, 1817-1845Webster, Daniel
General
Select Speeches of Daniel Webster, 1817-1845
Webster, Daniel
Speeches, addresses, etc., American
A jury cannot too seriously reflect on this part of the case. There are
many most important allegations of fact, which, if true, could easily
be shown by other witnesses, and yet are not so shown.
How came Mr. Goodridge to set out from Bangor, armed in this formal and
formidable manner? How came he to be so apprehensive of a robbery? The
reason he gives is completely ridiculous. As the foundation of his
alarm, he tells a story of a robbery which he had heard of, but which,
as far as appears, no one else ever heard of; and the story itself is
so perfectly absurd, it is difficult to resist the belief that it was
the product of his imagination at the moment. He seems to have been a
little too confident that an attempt would be made to rob him. The
manner in which he carried his money, as he says, indicated a strong
expectation of this sort. His gold he wrapped in a cambric cloth, put
it into a shot bag, and then into a portmanteau. One parcel of bills,
of a hundred dollars in amount, he put into his pocket-book; another,
of somewhat more than a thousand dollars, he carried next his person,
underneath all his clothes. Having disposed of his money in this way,
and armed himself with two good pistols, he set out from Bangor. The
jury will judge whether this extraordinary care of his money, and this
formal arming of himself to defend it, are not circumstances of a very
suspicious character.
He stated that he did not travel in the night; that he would not so
much expose himself to robbers. He said that, when he came near Alfred,
he did not go into the village, but stopped a few miles short, because
night was coming on, and he would not trust himself and his money out
at night. He represents himself to have observed this rule constantly
and invariably until he got to Exeter. Yet, when the time came for the
robbery, he was found out at night. He left Exeter about sunset,
intending to go to Newburyport, fifteen miles distant, that evening.
When he is asked how this should happen, he says he had no fear of
robbers after he left the District of Maine. He thought himself quite
safe when he arrived at Exeter. Yet he told the jury, that at Exeter he
thought it necessary to load his pistol afresh. He asked for a private
room at the inn. He told the persons in attendance that he wished such
a room for the purpose of changing his clothes. He charged them not to
suffer him to be interrupted. But he now testifies that his object was
not to change his dress, but to put new loading into his pistols. What
sort of a story is this?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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