At one side was a magpie nest of small, shining articles—silver spoons and thimbles, gold beads and pewter cups, some pipes and a snuffer. Brave among them was a knife in a "Long Hunter's" sheath—Doby's knife.
How the boy did gloat over that knife!
But he had to let it lie and go to take his place on a log with the other witnesses.
"'Tis far and away the best thing there," thought he as the clerk of the court picked up the leather sheath, took out the curious stone knife, examined it with interest, tried its edge, and then began to sharpen a goose-quill pen-point with it. "I'll keep an eye on it," the nervous owner decided.
A bailiff drummed on the log with a stone until Doby had to shake his ears as though he had been in swimming. This stone gavel called the court to order. A curious crowd of country people, of townspeople, and of delegates gathered under the elm.
Jonathan Jennings, president of the constitutional convention, afterward first Governor of Indiana, and a member of Congress, acting as local or associate judge, sat upon the bench, which in this case was a sturdy, literal bench, it having been borrowed from under the tubs in a neighbor's wash-house.
William Hendricks, afterward third Governor of Indiana and later Senator from Indiana, who was secretary of the convention, became clerk of this local court, by appointment, pro tem.
Both of these empire-builders gave to the case of Doby's old knife the same formal attention that the cause of justice should always command even in the smallest courts.
Jonathan Jennings was young, not much over thirty, and as rosy and blond as Doby himself. His manner was grave and kind as he said: "The court is ready to try the case of the State of Indiana versus Jerry Cobbler. Is the State ready?"
Answer: "It is."