He had no mother. He was an orphan. An orphan! Did the Court realize what it meant? No, he dared not ask them to picture to themselves all that was implied in that bitter word. An orphan. Nobody to instil those early lessons of piety ... to grow up wild, neglected, despised.... It was impossible for a man to avoid going astray in such terribly unnatural conditions. Everybody else had parents to counsel and direct them; he alone was bereft of this blessing. It was cruel, it was illogical, to apply the same standard to him as to those fortunate other ones. Let the Court call to mind the names of those who had deviated from the narrow path of duty; did they not all belong to this unhappy class? It might safely be inferred that they had no mothers! Such person were to be pitied and helped, rather than condemned for what was the fault not of their natures but of their anomalous situation in life. To rescue a motherless young soul from the brink of perdition was the noblest task of a Christian. And this was still, thank Heaven, a Christian country, despite the ever-swelling invasion of that irreligious foreign element which threatened to break up the old faith in God. The Madonna was still worshipped; together with the Saints. Their precious relics and other holy amulets still proved their efficacy in the hour of danger. Amulets--ah, that reminded him. To kill a man with a view to possessing yourself of his substance was an unpardonable crime. Now what had this boy done? Let them take the so-called robbery first. Well, no robbery had been committed, in spite of the notorious fact that this Protestant, this foreigner was known to be loaded with money. His client had fought down the temptation, the almost irresistible temptation, of appropriating the gold. Let them remember that! The minutest investigation failed to reveal anything save a single coin which he had attached to a string and hung about his neck. Motives, not deeds! What were his motives for this strange act? An unconscious application of the homoeopathic principle. He had taken it as a safeguard, an amulet, in the childish belief that it might protect him on future occasions against insults such as those he had undergone. Then, while the audience were still puzzling what the last words meant, he suddenly indulged in one of those abrupt transitions for which he was famous, and burst out: