ALL was hushed as the first words of the famous orator rang out.

The eyes of the audience were fastened upon him. He began very

simply and directly, with an air of conviction, but not the

slightest trace of conceit. He made no attempt at eloquence, at

pathos, or emotional phrases. He was like a man speaking in a circle

of intimate and sympathetic friends. His voice was a fine one,

sonorous and sympathetic, and there was something genuine and simple

in the very sound of it. But everyone realised at once that the

speaker might suddenly rise to genuine pathos and "pierce the heart

with untold power." His language was perhaps more irregular than

Ippolit Kirillovitch's, but he spoke without long phrases, and indeed,

with more precision. One thing did not please the ladies: he kept

bending forward, especially at the beginning of his speech, not

exactly bowing, but as though he were about to dart at his

listeners, bending his long spine in half, as though there were a

spring in the middle that enabled him to bend almost at right angles.

    At the beginning of his speech he spoke rather disconnectedly,

without system, one may say, dealing with facts separately, though, at

the end, these facts formed a whole. His speech might be divided

into two parts, the first consisting of criticism in refutation of the

charge, sometimes malicious and sarcastic. But in the second half he

suddenly changed his tone, and even his manner, and at once rose to

pathos. The audience seemed on the lookout for it, and quivered with

enthusiasm.

    He went straight to the point, and began by saying that although

he practised in Petersburg, he had more than once visited provincial

towns to defend prisoners, of whose innocence he had a conviction or

at least a preconceived idea. "That is what has happened to me in

the present case," he explained. "From the very first accounts in

the newspapers I was struck by something which strongly prepossessed

me in the prisoner's favour. What interested me most was a fact

which often occurs in legal practice, but rarely, I think, in such

an extreme and peculiar form as in the present case. I ought to

formulate that peculiarity only at the end of my speech, but I will do

so at the very beginning, for it is my weakness to go to work

directly, not keeping my effects in reserve and economising my

material. That may be imprudent on my part, but at least it's sincere.

What I have in my mind is this: there is an overwhelming chain of

evidence against the prisoner, and at the same time not one fact

that will stand criticism, if it is examined separately. As I followed

the case more closely in the papers my idea was more and more

confirmed, and I suddenly received from the prisoner's relatives a

request to undertake his defence. I at once hurried here, and here I

became completely convinced. It was to break down this terrible

chain of facts, and to show that each piece of evidence taken

separately was unproved and fantastic, that I undertook the case."

    So Fetyukovitch began.

    "Gentlemen of the jury," he suddenly protested, "I am new to

this district. I have no preconceived ideas. The prisoner, a man of

turbulent and unbridled temper, has not insulted me. But he has

insulted perhaps hundreds of persons in this town, and so prejudiced

many people against him beforehand. Of course I recognise that the

moral sentiment of local society is justly excited against him. The

prisoner is of turbulent and violent temper. Yet he was received in

society here; he was even welcome in the family of my talented friend,

the prosecutor."

    (N.B. At these words there were two or three laughs in the

audience, quickly suppressed, but noticed by all. All of us knew

that the prosecutor received Mitya against his will, solely because he

had somehow interested his wife- a lady of the highest virtue and

moral worth, but fanciful, capricious, and fond of opposing her

husband, especially in trifles. Mitya's visits, however, had not

been frequent.)

    "Nevertheless I venture to suggest," Fetyukovitch continued, "that

in spite of his independent mind and just character, my opponent may

have formed a mistaken prejudice against my unfortunate client. Oh,

that is so natural; the unfortunate man has only too well deserved

such prejudice. Outraged morality, and still more outraged taste, is

often relentless. We have, in the talented prosecutor's speech,

heard a stern analysis of the prisoner's character and conduct, and

his severe critical attitude to the case was evident. And, what's

more, he went into psychological subtleties into which he could not

have entered, if he had the least conscious and malicious prejudice

against the prisoner. But there are things which are even worse,

even more fatal in such cases, than the most malicious and consciously

unfair attitude. It is worse if we are carried away by the artistic

instinct, by the desire to create, so to speak, a romance,

especially if God has endowed us with psychological insight. Before

I started on my way here, I was warned in Petersburg, and was myself

aware, that I should find here a talented opponent whose psychological

insight and subtlety had gained him peculiar renown in legal circles

of recent years. But profound as psychology is, it's a knife that cuts

both ways." (Laughter among the public.) "You will, of course, forgive

me my comparison; I can't boast of eloquence. But I will take as an

example any point in the prosecutor's speech.

    "The prisoner, running away in the garden in the dark, climbed

over the fence, was seized by the servant, and knocked him down with a

brass pestle. Then he jumped back into the garden and spent five

minutes over the man, trying to discover whether he had killed him

or not. And the prosecutor refuses to believe the prisoner's statement

that he ran to old Grigory out of pity. 'No,' he says, 'such

sensibility is impossible at such a moment, that's unnatural; he ran

to find out whether the only witness of his crime was dead or alive,

and so showed that he had committed the murder, since he would not

have run back for any other reason.'

    "Here you have psychology; but let us take the same method and

apply it to the case the other way round, and our result will be no

less probable. The murderer, we are told, leapt down to find out, as a

precaution, whether the witness was alive or not, yet he had left in

his murdered father's study, as the prosecutor himself argues, an

amazing piece of evidence in the shape of a torn envelope, with an

inscription that there had been three thousand roubles in it. 'If he

had carried that envelope away with him, no one in the world would

have known of that envelope and of the notes in it, and that the money

had been stolen by the prisoner.' Those are the prosecutor's own

words. So on one side you see a complete absence of precaution, a

man who has lost his head and run away in a fright, leaving that

clue on the floor, and two minutes later, when he has killed another

man, we are entitled to assume the most heartless and calculating

foresight in him. But even admitting this was so, it is

psychological subtlety, I suppose, that discerns that under certain

circumstances I become as bloodthirsty and keen-sighted as a Caucasian

eagle, while at the next I am as timid and blind as a mole. But if I

am so bloodthirsty and cruelly calculating that when I kill a man I

only run back to find out whether he is alive to witness against me,

why should I spend five minutes looking after my victim at the risk of

encountering other witnesses? Why soak my handkerchief, wiping the

blood off his head so that it may be evidence against me later? If

he were so cold-hearted and calculating, why not hit the servant on

the head again and again with the same pestle so as to kill him

outright and relieve himself of all anxiety about the witness?

    "Again, though he ran to see whether the witness was alive, he

left another witness on the path, that brass pestle which he had taken

from the two women, and which they could always recognise afterwards

as theirs, and prove that he had taken it from them. And it is not

as though he had forgotten it on the path, dropped it through

carelessness or haste, no, he had flung away his weapon, for it was

found fifteen paces from where Grigory lay. Why did he do so? just

because he was grieved at having killed a man, an old servant; and

he flung away the pestle with a curse, as a murderous weapon. That's

how it must have been, what other reason could he have had for

throwing it so far? And if he was capable of feeling grief and pity at

having killed a man, it shows that he was innocent of his father's

murder. Had he murdered him, he would never have run to another victim

out of pity; then he would have felt differently; his thoughts would

have been centred on self-preservation. He would have had none to

spare for pity, that is beyond doubt. On the contrary, he would have

broken his skull instead of spending five minutes looking after him.

There was room for pity and good-feeling just because his conscience

had been clear till then. Here we have a different psychology. I

have purposely resorted to this method, gentlemen of the jury, to show

that you can prove anything by it. It all depends on who makes use

of it. Psychology lures even most serious people into romancing, and

quite unconsciously. I am speaking of the abuse of psychology,

gentlemen."

    Sounds of approval and laughter, at the expense of the prosecutor,

were again audible in the court. I will not repeat the speech in

detail; I will only quote some passages from it, some leading points.