MR. O'CROWLEY
The saints protect us! What a vile fabrication!
MRS. FENNELL
Ah, you old hypocrite, 'tis about time that you were
found out.
MR. O'CROWLEY
Place that woman under arrest for contempt of court.
(_Mrs. Fennell is placed in the dock_) Now, Mrs. Fennell,
anything that you will say will be used in evidence
against you, so I warn you to hold your tongue and
keep quiet.
MRS. FENNELL
I'll try and keep quiet, your Worship.
MR. O'CROWLEY
Gentlemen, I regret to state that a mistake has occurred
somewhere, and there's nothing more plentiful
than mistakes. They commenced long ago in the
Garden of Eden, and they are as inevitable as the day
and night, as inevitable, I might say, as America itself.
Yes, some one has blundered, as Napoleon said
when he woke up and found himself a prisoner on St.
Helena. Mr. Fennell, alas! has erred, but to err is
human, and to forgive is divine. We are reasonable
people, and we must treat this matter in a reasonable
manner. The prisoner has stated that he purchased
poteen at my premises, but what reliance can we
place on the word of a man who is addicted to drinking
poteen? None whatever. We have only the prisoner's
word that the poteen was purchased at my
establishment, but the probability is that he was only
suffering from its ill effects when he imagined that I
was the one who supplied it.
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