"Samuel Palmour, how do you vote?" that chairman would say.
Samuel Palmour, or whoever it was, would hist himself to his feet, and he would say something like this:
"Death."
He wouldn't say it joyous. He wouldn't say it mad. He would be pale when he said it, mebby—and mebby trembling. But he would say it like it was a duty he had to do, that couldn't be got out of. That there trial had lasted so long they wasn't hot blood left in nobody jest then—only cold blood, and determination and duty and principle.
"Buck Hightower," says the chairman, "how do you vote?"
"Death," says Buck; "death for the man. But say, can't we jest LICK the kid and turn him loose?"
And so it went, up one side the room and down the other. Grimes had showed 'em all their duty. Not but what they had intended to do it before Grimes spoke. But he had put it in such a way they seen it was something with even MORE principle to it than they had thought it was before.
"Billy Harden," says the chairman, "how do you vote?" Billy was the last of the bunch. And most had voted fur death. Billy, he opened his mouth and he squared himself away to orate some. But jest as he done so, the door opened and Old Daddy Withers stepped in. He had been gone so long I had plumb forgot him. Right behind him was a tall, spare feller, with black eyes and straight iron-gray hair.
"I vote," says Billy Harden, beginning of his speech, "I vote for death. The reason upon which I base—"
But Doctor Kirby riz up and interrupted him.