"I second that motion," said Captain Rudd.
"And I say no!"
Jacob flourished his bottle. Mr. Timmins's visage, as he confronted Mr. Longsett, became slightly inflamed.
"We don't care what you say. Do you think we're going to sit here, watching you guzzling, as long as ever you please? If you want to give a proper verdict you give one which is according to the evidence--we're not going to let you play the fool with us, Jacob, my boy."
Extending the open palm of his left hand, Mr. Longsett marked time on it with the bottle which he was holding in his right.
"Excuse me, Mr. Foreman, but perhaps I know a bit of law as well as the rest of you, and I say that the law is this, that before a jury can tell the court anything it's got to agree upon what it's going to tell. And what I mean by that is this, that before any one of us--I don't care if it's the foreman, or who it is!--can tell the court that we disagree we've got to agree to disagree--and I don't agree!"
Mr. Moss put a question to the foreman.
"Is that really the case?"
The foreman smiled a wintry smile--and temporised.
"I shouldn't positively like to say."