There were men dressed in the garb of homespun butter-nut, a cloth made on the hand-looms of the day. Some were yet wearing their old army uniforms, the well-known sky-blue trousers, navy-blue blouse, with brass buttons with the American eagle upon them, the blue overcoat with the long or short cape,—a distinction between an ex-cavalryman and ex-infantryman. Others were there togged out in the then up-to-date store clothes and "biled" shirt. The horses were tied to wagons in front of the school-house, on the open prairie and to trees in the rear. Camp-fires were burning in different places, on each side and behind the house. These men were walking arsenals. Nearly all were each carrying two six-shooters, and among them were rifles of many different patterns. One man could be seen with a long-barreled Hawkins rifle, while his neighbor carried an army Enfield, one a Springfield, and one man an old brass-band American musket. Some had the Gallagher, some the Spencer, and some carried Sharp's carbine. Not a man was there through idle curiosity, but either to kill the Odens or see fair play. It was learned afterward that the twenty men who had come up from Gokey's had held a council just before they came to the school-house and decided that, in killing the Odens on that trip, they might have to kill others and at the same time sacrifice some of their own lives. They decided not to use one bit of testimony they had for the State. Simply let the whole thing go by default and bide their time. So the trial came off—or rather, the hearing. Bill Oden, the first witness after young Powell had given his forced-by-threat testimony, stated to the jury that it was very unfortunate that he had killed the young man; that he only intended to disable him so that he could do no harm; had struck with the handspike a harder lick than he had intended. Tom Oden said that Parker had murder in him when he came to the cabin; that he tried to reason with him, to no purpose; that had his brother not struck him with the spike before he shot the second time,—he claimed Parker had shot at his brother once; but Powell afterward stated that was false; that he, Parker, might have killed all of them. And all this time not a protest; while on the other hand, the Odens had made out a clean case of self-defense. The jury brought in, from under the boughs of an oak tree out in the wood, a verdict, "Guilty of an excusable homicide." Thus closed one of the greatest farces of a trial, in jurisprudence. A few days after the Odens returned home they were literally bullet-riddled by a determined party of men, some thirty in number, starting from Chetopa and augmenting until Gokey's trading-post was reached.