Thorneley. And he prayed the God of light, and truth, and justice to enlighten their minds and guide them to a right conclusion. I have but faintly portrayed the clear, lucid manner in which that able judge summed up the evidence, or the deep feeling expressed in every tone of his voice. Cautious and prudent {93} to a degree as he had been in his language, it yet gleamed out from time to time, like a ray of sunshine, that in his own mind he considered Atherton _not_ guilty. The jury after five minutes' deliberation asked to retire. Do you know what that suspense is,--that hanging on each minute which might bring the issues of life or death? Can you thank what it was to stand there for that hour and a quarter, seventy-five minutes, forty-five hundred seconds, when every minute seemed an hour, and every second a minute; with the dead silence reigning in the court, broken only by casual sounds now and then, that were hushed almost instantly, to so great a pitch had the interest and suspense of the whole crowd collected there risen; your eyes fixed upon that fatal door through which you knew the decision would be borne, with your heart throbbing in dull, heavy thumps against your breast, and your breath almost bushed and dying on your lips? So we stood that evening, the dense November fog stealing into the court, and the gas-lamps flaring garish and yellow in the thick atmosphere, waiting for the verdict. Twice over was a message sent in from the jury-room to the judges, demanding further explanation or elucidation on some point or other. And still we waited. At last the door opened, and they filed back one by one into their box, and took their seats in solemn silence, and were instantly harangued by the clerk of the court, and called upon to declare whether Philip Hugh Atherton was guilty or innocent of wilful murder. Amidst a dead hush, a stillness that was thrilling in its intensity, the foreman stood up and pronounced the verdict, "NOT GUILTY." I saw the prisoner raise his hands for one moment, and then his head drooped on his breast, and he leaned heavily against the railing in front of him. I saw Merrivale rise hastily, and, turning round, lay his hand upon Hugh's shoulder, and his counsel eagerly stretching out their bands towards him in fervent congratulation; and then was heard the Chief-Justice's voice addressing the foreman of the jury: "The peculiarities and complexity of the case make it needful that we should ask upon what grounds you have given in your verdict." Foreman: "We find the prisoner not guilty, my lord, on the ground that it is proved he did not buy the strychnine, and that the evidence of the housekeeper is unreliable evidence. But we think that until the mystery of the murder is cleared up, suspicion must still attach itself to Mr. Atherton."