“Oh, what awful lies!” cried the wife. “It’s a wonder you don’t fall dead!”
“You were not there,” the Clerk remarked quietly. “Now, Oby, what is your defence? Have you got any witnesses?”
“No; I ain’t got no witnesses. All as I did, I know I walked up the hedge to look for mushrooms. I saw one of them things”—meaning the wires on the table—“and I just stooped down to see what it was, ’cos I didn’t know. I never seed one afore; and I was just going to pick it up and look at it” (the magistrates glance at each other, and cannot suppress a smile at this profound innocence), “when this fellow jumped out and frightened me. I never seed no rabbit.”
“Why, you put the rabbit in your pocket,” interrupts the first witness.
“Never mind,” said the Clerk to the witness; “let him go on.”
“That’s all as I got to say,” continues the defendant. “I never seed no such things afore; and if he hadn’t come I should have put it down again.”
“But you were trespassing,” said the Clerk.
“I didn’t know it. There wasn’t no notice-board.”
“Now, Oby,” cried the head keeper, “you know you’ve been along that lane this ten years.”
“That will do” (from the chairman); “is there any more evidence?”