a public officer-a Deputy Sheriff-in ignorance of the law by which his own rights and duties are defined? Did he not know his duty? Most unquestionably he did. The gentleman on the other side has portrayed him as a highly intelligent and faithful public officer. Where is the evidence of his faithfulness? The only evidence you have of it, is here, on the face of this very indictment. And is a Deputy Sheriff entitled to this encouragement, when he goes to the back end of a stable, armed with a process for the delivery to him of property, and allows himself to be talked to until the property is out of his reach? Even in that view you cannot excuse him. If that be a proper discharge of duty, he is entitled to all the credit of it. But I say, gentlemen, that you cannot be deceived by this mere pretence--this shallow trick,-that you will not permit your judgments to be carried away by the suggestion that Carlin did not know anything about this arrangement. If Carlin did not assent to it, there were legal means within his reach which he might have put into operation, but which he did not resort to. If he had, Mr. John Collins would have been obliged to give up the property. Now, gentlemen, it is pretended here that this horse did not belong to Mr. Jones, but that it belonged to Mr. Collins. The gentleman has complained very much of Mr. Jones' lack of gallantry, and asserted that the horse is the property of Mr. Collins, or his wife. But where is the evidence of that, except the testimony of Mr. Collins himself? Mr. Jones was able to respond in ten times the value of the horse, when he made this undertaking after the action for replevin had been brought. That, I should think, was security enough to Mr. Collins, that if the horse was his he would get him, after the question of ownership had been tried and decided. But why has he not gone on and tried this action of replevin? It was brought upwards of a year ago; and yet, neither John Collins nor Mrs. Collins has dared to present to a jury of their country the issue whether they were the owners of that property

or not.

MR. STOUGHTON.-I must protest against the counsel's going outside the case. There is no proof of that in this case.

MR. WHITING.-There is proof before the jury that such a suit was commenced, and that is the end of it. If it was not a mere pretence that the property belonged to Mrs. Collins, why not go on with their suit properly and manfully? Mr. Jones is able to respond in ten times the value of the horse, if the property belongs to Mrs. Collins. Then why not go on with the suit?

MR. STOUGHTON.-I do not think that, for the purpose of convicting a man, it is perfectly fair to make statements outside of the evidence.

THE RECORDER.-There is no evidence that that suit has not been tried and a verdict rendered.

MR. WHITING.-I say that it is a crying sin of the day, that gentlemen are permitted to go outside of the true issue, and comment on matters not in the case. The gentlemen on the other side pressed into their summing up matters which were not in the evidence; but the moment the tables are turned on them, they raise objections.

Now, all the evidence we have upon this subject is, that such a suit was commenced; and we have no evidence of any single step that has been taken by Collins since, for the purpose of obtaining legal possession of the horse, which we never should have got, but for the influence of this complaint, or indictment. If there is no evidence that that suit was tried, or was abandoned, there is no evidence that Mrs. Collins ever owned the horse; and yet an argument was presented to you upon that. Is there any evidence that Mrs. Collins ever called upon Mr. Jones, or said to Mr. Jones, or to anybody else, that that horse was her's? No; there is no evidence of that kind. If there was a controversy between Mr. Jones and Collins, Mr. Jones was a man of equal standing with Mr. John Coljins, although he may be the son of Mr. E. K. Collins, as the gentleman thought proper to prove in his direct examination of Mr. Collins. Mr. Jones was a gentleman who had always paid his debts, and was ready to pay them. Mr. Jones was a gentleman who had never violated his neighbors' rights by undertaking to take illegally,

or by process of law, his neighbor's property from him. But Mr. Collins is to be protected by the Sheriff, and a Deputy Sheriff, and by counsel who come into court to protect that Deputy Sheriff, under indictment for outrageous conduct. It was an outrage, and a violent outrage, on the rights of Mr. Jones. I think, gentlemen, that it is an outrage that you will not permit to go unpunished; and that although a great variety of matter has been dragged into the case, you will come back to the plain and simple question presented for your consideration. If you come to the conclusion that Carlin possessed himself of this property by means of his process, even in the manner described by Mr. Collins, and afterwards permitted Collins to take the property away, and made no legal or effectual efforts to prevent it, then you will say that he delivered the property to the plaintiff in violation of this statute, and leave him to the tender mercies of the Court. If you should do that, hereafter your houses will not be invaded by Deputy Sheriffs, and your property wrongfully taken away. Remember that what is Mr. Jones' case to-day, may be yours to-morrow. A Deputy Sheriff may walk into your house and take some of your property. If you were to resist him, you would be severely punished for resisting an officer. He may hand your property over to the plaintiff, who, like Mr. John Collins, may run away with it, so that you can never get it.

But let me call your attention to another portion of the case. You remember that it was stated by one of the witnesses, that Carlin said the horse was out of the county. Mr. John Collins swears that he took him or sent him out of the county, but never told any one. How, then, did Carlin know it? He could not have known it, unless Collins and he had understood this thing perfectly well; and they meant to take the horse out of the county, and keep it there until we compelled them to bring it back.

I say then, gentlemen, that unless you hold these parties to a strict responsibility in the performance of their duties, there is an end to anything like regularity; there is an end to the preservation of our property and our rights. Mr. Jones, on this occasion, does

not car one single straw what the result may be. It will be enough for him that he has presented to a jury the facts in this case; that they have been called upon to dispose of it, and have disposed of it in their own way. But he did want to know—and he may be unwise in this, for every man is unwise who goes to law if it can be avoided. I never knew a man to gain by it, and I never knew a man with pure motives who was not abused for attempting to enforce his rights. He did want to know whether acts such as these can be perpetrated by public officers with impunity; and it will be for you to decide that question. It strikes me, gentlemen, that the evidence in this case is so clear and plain, that "the wayfaring man, though a fool," could not help coming to the conclusion, that the defendant intended to give Mr. Collins possession of this horse. If you come to that conclusion, you will find him guilty of the offence with which he is charged. If, on the other hand, you are perfectly satisfied that he had nothing to do with it; that he never did take the property under writ of replevin, and that his statements to Mr. Jones were all false, then perhaps, upon the testimony of Mr. Collins, (as much of it as you think proper to believe,) you will be bound to render a verdict in his favor.

Mr. CLINTON then handed to his honor a paper, containing certain legal propositions, which he requested his honor to charge the jury.

The RECORDER then charged the jury as follows:-Gentlemen of the Jury,-The defendant, Thomas Carlin, is indicted for a misdemeanor, under this section of the statute :

"Where any duty is, or shall be, enjoined by law upon any public officer, or upon any person holding any public trust or employment, every willful neglect to perform such duty, where no special provision shall have been made for the punishment of such delinquency, shall be a misdemeanor, punishable as herein pro vided."

The statute makes it the duty of the Sheriff, or of the Deputy

Sheriff and for the purposes of this statute, I charge you that the Deputy Sheriff is a public officer within the meaning of the statute -upon the issuing of a process in the nature of replevin, such as was the process in this case, and upon the taking of the property, to retain that property for the space of three days before delivering it to the plaintiff, under the process under which the property is taken. The object of that you will readily perceive. It is for the purpose of guarding the rights of the parties who claim to be the owners of the property. The possession of property is, to a certain extent, ownership. There are many kinds of property which, if taken upon this process, and disposed of at their intrinsic value, might be very trivial; and yet to the person from whom that property was taken, it might be a matter of very great moment. Such, for instance, are articles that derive their value from the source whence they come, and which attaches to some things a value far greater than the amount for which they might be purchased. Gifts from friends, and family pictures, are property of that nature; and therefore it is, that this statute, which authorizes a public officer to go upon your premises and take your property, throws additional safeguards around the property and rights of the party from whom it is taken, permitting him at any time within three days after that property is taken, to execute a bond to the Sheriff; and upon the receipt of that bond, it then becomes the duty of the Sheriff to deliver over to the defendant in the cause the property which has been taken by virtue of that process.

This is the

You will at once, gentlemen, see the importance of a statute of that kind, and the necessity of its being strictly enforced. It is a matter in which we are all interested. It relates not only to this isolated case, but to all other cases of a similar nature. first case under that statute that I have known to be presented to the consideration of a jury; and although the amount involved is small, yet, at the same time, the principle is one of very grave moment, and demands the serious consideration of the jury.

Now, you are to be the judges as to the evidence; and questions