Major Billcord had the services of a distinguished lawyer from Plattsburgh and of another from Elizabethtown to defend himself and the six ruffians. They almost made a "celebrated case" of it. They got the trial into the county court, and the six ruffians were sentenced to ten days confinement in the county prison, and the major himself to thirty days. The assault and the conspiracy were too outrageous, in the opinion of the justice, to be punished with a simple fine. The workingmen and the farmers had got hold of the case and talked a great deal about it. Against the advice of the eminent legal gentlemen he employed, Paul Bristol was prosecuted for the first assault upon Walker Billcord, and this brought in the testimony of Lily and her mother, which the lawyers wanted to keep out. This evidence completed the history of the case by filling in the beginning of the trouble. Paul was fully justified and acquitted, and the people praised him for his defence of his sister. Fathers and mothers were interested, for they looked to the law for the protection of their children. Every effort was made to save the magnate from the disgrace of being confined in a common prison, but public sentiment would have been indignant, and he had to serve out his time. The farmers and mechanics were inclined to go as far the wrong way in one direction as the major and his friends were in the other. The magnate was a "soulless capitalist," a "bloated bondholder," and he suffered, especially among the mill hands, for this senseless reason. But the judge was even-handed between the two parties, and the major learned a lesson which was worth half his fortune to him--that before the law he was no more than the equal of the poor man. Four of the six ruffians were taken from the institute by their parents, who had sent them there to be fitted for college, and they were sure that their sons had been led away by the influence of Major Billcord, and by the lack of proper discipline in the school. Three others were removed for the same reason. The loss of these pupils was a severe blow to Colonel Buckmill, who had condemned the conduct of the major from the first. Though other students were soon obtained to take their places, and even to increase the number of pupils in the school, the colonel realized that he was not managing the institution on the right principle. The magnate had lost much of his influence in the vicinity, and the principal found that he could afford to be independent of him, for it would pay better.