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CHAPTER XXX.
FOR THE DEFENSE.
When Mr. Balais rose again it was to speak for the defense, and he
addressed the jury amidst an unbroken silence. So rapt, indeed, was the
attention of his audience that the smack of a carter's whip, as he went
by in the street below, was resented by many a frown as an impertinent
intrusion; and even the quarters of the church clock were listened to
with impatience, lest its iron tongue should drown a single sentence.
This latter interruption did not, however, often take place, for Mr.
Balais was as brief in speech as he was energetic in action. He began by
at once allowing the main facts which the prosecution had proved--that
the notes had been taken from Trevethick's box, and found in the
prisoner's possession, who had been detected in the very act of
endeavoring to change them for notes of another banking company. But
what he maintained was, that this exchange was not, as Mr. Smoothbore
had suggested, effected for the purpose of realizing the money, but
simply of throwing dust in the prosecutor's eyes. He had changed the
notes only with the intention of returning his own money to Trevethick
under another form. Even so young a man, and one so thoroughly ignorant
of the ways of the world and of business matters as was his client, must
surely have been aware, if using the money for himself had been his
object, that it could be traced in notes of the Mining Company as easily
as in notes of the Bank of England; nay, by this very proceeding of his,
he had even given them a _double_ chance of being traced.
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