For the Right

by Karl Emil Franzos

But Taras evidently did not take in this hint any more than he had understood the preceding words. One thought only had laid hold of him, and he reeled like a stricken man. "Lost!" he groaned hoarsely, the ominous syllable being taken up more shrilly by the peasants, who pressed closer still.

The clerk, meanwhile, had produced the documents of which he was the bearer, the one being a writ of the court, the other a letter of Dr. Starkowski's. "There!" he cried, thrusting them under Taras's nose.

Taras was striving to regain his composure. "We are usable to read writing," he said, gasping. "You must tell us what the lawyers have got to say. To whom have they adjudged the field?"

But Mr. Stupka did not feel it prudent to answer this question right out. He broke the official seal, putting on a look of the greatest importance. "With pleasure, good people," he said condescendingly, "with pleasure! I'll read it to you, and translate it presently into plain language. The legal style, you know ..."

But Taras interrupted him. "To whom?" he repeated, more emphatically.

"Well, I should say," stammered the luckless clerk, "I should say ... to the lord of the manor, so to speak."

"It is a lie," shrieked Taras; "it cannot be!" But the peasantry veering round, cried scornfully: "Did we not tell you that going to law is a folly? You have done it now!"

Utterly beside himself with the passion of his disappointment, the judge clenched his fists and set his teeth in the face of the mocking crowd, but the two elders laid their hands on him gently. "Do not give way," begged the faithful Simeon, "try and bear the blow; let us hear the verdict first, and then we will consider what next can be done."

The clerk spread out the document. "In the name of the Emperor!" he began, translating the somewhat lengthy preamble. The villagers loyally had pulled off their caps; Taras only thought not of baring his head. Simeon endeavoured to remind him, but the judge shook him off. The honest man looked at him doubtfully, and receded a step. The others did not notice it, too intent upon the verdict.

It was a long piece of legal rhetoric, substantiating every statement with a flourish of evidential reasoning, in the German language, which in those days was the medium for judicial transactions throughout that conglomerate of Babel-tongued countries going by the name of Austria. It was no easy undertaking to translate the strangely intricate periods of official verbosity into the simple vernacular of the listeners; but Mr. Stupka, being as clever as he was small, contrived to make himself understood. The verdict amounted to a dismissal of the case, because the plaintiffs could not bring forward sufficient proof to uphold their claim. The description of the field in the title deeds, it said, was in favour of the party in present possession, and if a number of witnesses upon their oath had given contrary evidence, their testimony was invalidated by counter-evidence upon oath likewise. It was not the court's business in civil cases to start an inquiry whether false witness possibly had been tendered; it was rather the duty of the court to decide which evidence weighed heavier in the scale, and the balance had inclined in favour of manorial rights. It seemed strange, also, that the village judge, as had been reported, should have opposed the exhortation of the witnesses by means of the pope....