The old days were, therefore, done, he went on.  Henceforth we must observe the Law.  We were here now with the intention of observing that Law.  Should we therefore fear it?  Should we dread the decision of this distinguished servant of the Law?  By no means.  To show that the Law was no dragon, no demon, he would now, in the very face of that Law, proceed to clear this innocent man of that cloud of doubt and suspicion which for a brief moment the social body had cast upon him.  He would show to the gentlemen of this jury and to this honorable court that there had been no violation of the Law through any act of this honest, open-faced, intelligent young gentleman, long known among them as an upright and fair-dealing man.  The Law, just and exact, would now protect this prisoner.  The Law was no matter of haphazard.  The prosecution must show that some specific article of the Law had been violated.

“Now,” continued Dan Anderson, casting an eye about him as calmly as could have done any old trial lawyer examining the condition of his jury, “what are the charges made by the Territory?  The prosecution specifies no section or paragraph of the statutes of this Territory holding it unlawful to shoot any dangerous wild beast at large in this community.  But we do not admit that this prisoner shot anything, or shot at anything whatever.  We shall prove that at the time mentioned he was engaged in a simple, harmless, and useful pastime, a pastime laudable of itself, since it tends to make the participant therein a better and more useful citizen.  There is no Territorial law forbidding any act which he is here charged with committing.  Neither has the body social in this thriving community placed upon its records any local law, any indication that a man may not, without let or hindrance, do any act such as those charged vaguely against this good young man, who has only availed himself of his right under the Constitution to bear arms, to assemble in public, and to engage in the pursuit of happiness.”

The prosecution, he said, had introduced reference to a certain pig, alleging that it was slain by the act of the prisoner.  He would not admit that there had been any pig, since no corpus delicti was shown; but in any event this was no civil suit now in progress.  We were not here to assess value upon a supposititious pig, injured in a supposititious manner, and not represented here of counsel.  No law had been violated.  Why, then, his client had been thus ruthlessly dragged into court, to his great personal chagrin, his loss of time, his mental suffering, the attorney for defence could not say.  It was injustice of a monstrous sort!  Prosecution might well feel relieved if no retaliatory action were later taken against them for false imprisonment.  This innocent young man must at once be discharged from custody.

When Dan Anderson sat down there was not a man in the jury who was not bathed in perspiration.  Abstruse thought was hard at work.  Blackman, J. P., perspiring no less than any member of the jury, drew himself up, but he was troubled.