[Footnote 4: The housemaid's deposition corroborates this part of the evidence.] SECTION VII. [Illustration.] 1.--_Statement of Mr. Henderson._ In the concluding portion of the evidence we have now a double object in view. First, to lay before you the various links by which the circumstances, already detailed, are connected into a single chain; and, secondly, to elucidate the general bearing of the whole upon the particular case of the death of Madame R**, into which it is my more immediate duty to inquire. It was this apparent connection with the entire story which first led me to investigate matters otherwise quite beyond my province, and you will, I have no doubt, after reading the evidence, concur in the propriety of my so doing. It is unfortunate that, in this important part of the case, as previously with regard to the no less important point of the suspicious circumstances attendant on Madame R**'s first illness at Bognor, the evidence of the principal witnesses is open to very grave question. It is not indeed, as then, that the moral character of the individuals themselves rests under any suspicion, for, so far as I have been able to learn, both the servant-of-all-work, and her lover, John Styles, are perfectly respectable people; whilst the young man Aldridge, though certainly a foolish and perhaps rather a dissipated young fellow, has a very fair character from the house of business in which he is now employed. But the evidence of the two former is, as will be seen, greatly diminished in value by the circumstances under which it was obtained, whilst, in the latter, there is so clear a suspicion of _animus_ as cannot but throw still greater doubts upon evidence in itself sufficiently questionable--and rendered yet more so by other circumstances which will hereafter more fully appear. It was this man Aldridge, whose letter, as you will remember, led to the investigation, of which the result is now before you; and his statement hereto annexed, that first gave substance to the suspicions of foul play on the part of the Baron, and, in conjunction with the discovery of the enclosed papers, subsequently induced me to extend my inquiries to the cases of Mr. and Mrs. Anderton. I confess that, notwithstanding the doubt with which his statement is surrounded, I am still inclined to accept it as substantially true, though possibly somewhat coloured by personal feeling against the Baron. The point, however, has seemed to me of sufficient importance to justify the occupying a considerable portion of this present division of the case with such evidence as I have been able to gather respecting the circumstances of his final ejectment, and it will be for you to determine between the story as told himself and that of Baron R**.