The writer is unwilling in any way to enter between the now long and forever separated disputants or to go behind the rendering of the court. The defendant is dead, and only requires for justice’s sake the assertion that he believed himself to have been wronged, and that he acted on that belief with the unforgivingness belonging to him. The plaintiff has suffered fearfully enough for any imprudence or error, was believed by her intimate and most honored friends to be innocent, was vindicated by a jury after a most searching trial, and is now living in modest and blameless retirement. She has a right to the benefit of her acquittal, and shall be left unassailed to that unseen Tribunal which alone is as just and merciful as it is infallible.
The verdict of the jury was hailed with acclamations by one party, with amazement and derision by the other. Rumors and charges of perjury, fraud, and corruption were rife, and many a character suffered badly, while the end left the contestants pretty much where the beginning found them, with the exception of the bad passion, costs, and anguish that lay between. They had been hoisted into a public pillory in the face of the whole country, subjected to all kinds of odious remarks, the very sanctities of their being defiled and profaned by the miscellaneous gawking and commenting of the prurient crowd. Besides all this long strain on his feelings and huge drain on his purse, Forrest had the angry grief of seeing large numbers of his most cherished friends fall away from him to the side of his antagonist, never to be spoken to again. And then he had the mortification of defeat amidst the cheers and jeers of his foes, who combined to honor the victorious lawyer to whom at every step he owed his repulses with a brilliant banquet and a service of plate, including a massive silver pitcher bearing the inscription, “From God the conquering champion cometh!” He was just the kind of man to feel these things most keenly. No wonder the unsuccessful warfare and its shameful close stung his pride, envenomed his resentment, darkened his life, and left on him rather a permanent wound than a scar. But, sure of the rightfulness of his cause, his self-respect and his faith in ultimate justice for the iniquity he felt had been done him enabled him to bear up with defiant fortitude. And he was far from being unsustained without, numerous as were the familiar associates who deserted him. Whenever he appeared in public the same enthusiastic multitudes as of old greeted him with an even wilder admiration. Many a voice and pen were lifted to defend and applaud him, while many attacked him. The tributes in the newspapers more than equalled the denunciations. Two examples in verse will show the estimate of him and his cause formed by close acquaintances:
TO EDWIN FORREST.
Thou noble and unflinching one,
Who stoodst the test so firm and true;
Doubt not, though clouds may hide the sun,
The eye of truth shall pierce them through.
Heed not the sneer and heartless mirth
Of those whose black hearts cannot know
The sterling honesty and worth