cution is not calculated, however, to give people abroad a very high opinion of the impartiality of criminal proceedings in California. By a general law, Terry's case should have been tried by our court of sessions; but Terry did not like our court of sessions; and so, not being able to dispute the authority of that court to try him, he asks the legislature to pass a law taking all such cases out of courts of sessions. This the legislature did; in order to prevent a man charged with a crime from being tried before a court he does not like, courts of sessions all over the state are declared incompetent to try duellists. That was the first step. The case then came before Judge Hager of a district court. There Terry made a new demand: he asked now to select his own place of being tried, and his own judge. All this has been granted. The case is sent to Marin ; and J. H. Hardy, it is plain to see, will be the judge. How the trial will terminate is not hard to divine. A Marin jury acquitted the duellist, Johnson, who also killed his man; and it would be strange if they do less for Terry."
Plate sin with gold
And the strong lance of justice hnrtless breaks ;
Clothe it in rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it.
Hardy, a personal friend of Terry's, and a most chivalrous and fire-eating judge of the law-and-order stamp, came down from Mokelumne Hill for the express purpose of presiding temporarily at the seventh district court held at Marin county, in order to free his friend. What had these men to fear from the law when they could so play upon it that it would sing any tune that best pleased them ? And now hear the conclusion of the whole matter. The day is fixed for trial, the hour has arrived; the witnesses from San Francisco who should have been present are becalmed upon the bay ; the court waits, and drinks, and smokes, and swears a little; then the prosecuting attorney moves a nolle 'prosequi, and the trial of the Honorable David S. Terry, late judge of the supreme court of California,
