Mr. Tippit treated the inquiry with great contempt.  “Does the gentleman,” he asked, in turn, “claim for Mr. Davenport a superhuman degree of piety?  Would he have us understand that Mr. Davenport is not a sinful man, and is the expression made use of by Mr. Holden more than tantamount to that?  I do not think the words worthy of notice,” he said, “nor am I disposed to waste time on them.”  Mr. Tippit concluded by saying, that if a man, in the honest expression of his opinions about a book, was to be dealt with criminally, free speech, free action, the noble inheritance of our ancestors, were gone, and the liberties of the country no more.  Collecting himself for a last effort, he represented the Goddess of Liberty, like Niobe, all tears, weeping over the fate of her children, should the iniquity, contemplated by Ketchum, be consummated.

The impression made by the lawyer’s speech was favorable, as was evident from the looks of the audience, and the approving hum that filled the room, and prepossessed as they were in favor of Holden, they would undoubtedly have acquitted him, but, alas! they were not the tribunal to decide his fate.  We have already dilated on the proceedings of the little court of pied poudre, beyond our original intention, and for that reason shall endeavor, without designing, “with malice prepense,” to slight the eloquence of Ketchum, to compress his remarks into as small a compass as possible.  He has since risen to the dignity of a County Court Judge, and, therefore, needs no celebrity, which a work so unpretending as the present, can confer.

Mr. Ketchum then began by saying, that to be sure his experience in courts was not very great, but he had some, and, so far as it went, he never knew a case plainer than the one on trial.  The gentleman (bowing to Tippit), with all his ingenuity, and he was not going to deny him his due, which was greater than his knowledge of the law, had been unable to affect his own mind, or, as he believed, the mind of his honor, or of any one present.  He felt, therefore, that the task before him, though an unpleasant one, was lightened by the inability of his brother Tippit to make out even a plausible defence.  Peeling this, he should, if he consulted only his own inclinations, be disposed to leave the case where it was, without comment, but he supposed it was expected he should say something, and in the discharge of his duty, he would comply with the expectation.  As for the character of the prisoner, he had nothing to say about it.  He would neither admit that it was good, nor claim that it was bad; whatever it might be, it had nothing to do with the case.  The question was, what was done at the meeting?  All the witnesses agreed that the prisoner interrupted the proceedings.  True, they disagreed in respect to the exact words, but take the testimony of any, and sufficient was made out to support the prosecution.  Here he dwelt upon a criticism of the words, coming to conclusions