in a moment, for the prisoners were immediately surrounded, and all further communication cut off between them.
A breathless silence prevailed as the judge gave his charge to the jury. He spoke but briefly of the enormity of the crime—this murder of the aged, the defenceless, and the poor: the general horror which pervaded every one present shewed that amplification was unnecessary. The very brevity had its effect; it was as if the deed were too terrible to be dwelt upon in human hearing. He enlarged more on the folly of guilt, which is so frequently, and was in the present instance so unexpectedly awakened from its blind security, not by the chance of discovery against which it had successfully and yet vainly guarded, but by some little circumstance whose effects had never been feared. He then summed up the various facts which brought the murder home to the gipsy—the vicinity of his encampment—his hurried departure—the purchase of the knife—the clearness with which the child gave his account, and identified the prisoner—the singular carelessness which left the knife behind, as if fated that a discovery should be made—all was conclusive of the real criminal.
The guilt of the female was perhaps less indubitably proved; but when her entire subjection to her husband was taken into consideration—the impossibility of his having committed the murder without her knowledge—the secret speech which, even in
