“My Lord, and Gentlemen of the Jury:—The charge made against my client by the learned counsel for the crown,—imposing as it seems, and sustained as it is by competent witnesses,—is really so unsubstantial, as to be easily overthrown, by reference to a single fact,—as it is no doubt _already_ invalided in the estimation of your lordship, of the jury, and of all within the sound of my voice, by the simple _recollection_ of that fact;—to wit: that the statute laws of France as well as those of England, regard a minor of fourteen years of age as an _infant_ in the law, and incapable of contracting marriage without the knowledge and consent of his or her parents or guardians. Therefore, the quasi marriage ceremony celebrated between the man Victoire L’Orient and the infant Estelle Morelle, in the Catholic chapel of St. Etienne, Paris, on the thirteenth day of November, eighteen hundred and —— _was_, and _is_, completely invalid and of none effect, and could therefore form no obstacle to the nuptials solemnized between Estelle Morelle and the Lord Viscount Montressor at the parish church of Hyde on the first of May ultimo. This fact is so well understood by all here present, that I need not dwell upon the point any longer than to remind your lordship and the jury that this _is, of itself_, all sufficient for the _legal_ acquittal of my client. “But, my lord and gentlemen, I wish to be understood as standing here, _not only_ in the character of an advocate of a client,—whom I consider as having been presented and indicted upon untenable grounds, and whom I feel assured stands already fully acquitted before you, _but also_ as the champion of a deeply-injured and most unhappy, though most estimable lady, whose high moral and intellectual excellencies can only be equaled in degree by her cruel wrongs and great sufferings,—a lady whose hand and fortune, while yet she was an infant, became the objects of a foul conspiracy, and whose fair name is now the target of the sharpest arrows of calumny. My lord and gentlemen, the proved invalidity of that first quasi marriage suffices to clear my client before the _court_. It is, therefore, to acquit her before the _tribunal of public opinion_, that I stand here and proceed to make a statement of facts, every one which I pledge myself to establish by witnesses of unquestionable probity.”