“I regret very much that counsel should have persisted in making this formal announcement, after the intimation from the court.  Upon full consultation we thought it would be better that it should not be done.  The circumstances of Judge Terry’s death are notorious, and under these circumstances this court had determined that it would be better to pass this matter in silence, and not to take any action upon it; and that is the order of the court.”

The deceased had been a chief justice of the tribunal which, by its silence, thus emphasized its condemnation of the conduct by which he had placed himself without the pale of its respect.

CHAPTER XVII.

HABEAS CORPUS PROCEEDINGS IN JUSTICE FIELD’S CASE.

On Thursday, August 22d, the hearing of the habeas corpus case of Justice Field commenced in the United States Circuit Court, under orders from the Attorney-General, to whom a report of the whole matter had been telegraphed.  The United States district attorney appeared on behalf of Justice Field.  In addition to him there also appeared as counsel for Justice Field, Hon. Richard T. Mesick, Saml.  M. Wilson, Esq., and W.F.  Herrin, Esq.  The formal return of the writ of habeas corpus had been made by the sheriff of San Joaquin county on the 16th.  To that return Justice Field presented a traverse, which was in the following language, and was signed and sworn to by him: 

“The petitioner, Stephen J. Field, traverses the return of the sheriff of San Joaquin county, State of California, made by him to the writ of habeas corpus by the circuit judge on the ninth circuit, and made returnable before the Circuit Court of said circuit, and avers: 

“That he is a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, allotted to the ninth judicial circuit, and is now and has been for several weeks in California, in attendance upon the Circuit Court of said circuit in the discharge of his judicial duties; and, further, that the said warrant of the justice of the peace, H.V.J.  Swain, in Stockton, California, issued on the 14th day of August, 1889, under which the petitioner is held, was issued by said justice of the peace without reasonable or probable cause, upon the sole affidavit of one Sarah Althea Terry, who did not see the commission of the act which she charges to have been a murder, and who is herself a woman of abandoned character, and utterly unworthy of belief respecting any matter whatever; and, further, that the said warrant was issued in the execution of a conspiracy, as your petitioner is informed, believes, and charges, between the said Sarah Althea Terry and the district attorney, White, and the said justice of the peace, H.V.J.  Swain, and one E.L.  Colnon, of said Stockton, to prevent by force and intimidation your petitioner from discharging the duties of his office hereafter, and to injure him in his