The Burch divorce case
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A Scene in Court. The correspondent of the Chicago Journal thus gives an interesting scene in the Burch divorce case:
‘
When the court came into session, the little court-room was crowded to suffocation.
Mr. Stuart (charged with seducing
Mrs. B.) made his appearance before the call of the jury, and carelessly took a chair near
Mrs. Burch's customary place, with his back to the stairs.
The fact soon became known that he was present, and he was at once the centre of all eyes.
In a few moments
Mrs. Burch, accompanied, as usual, by her mother,
Mrs. Turner, and
Mr. Corning, came into the court-room.
Every eye in the audience was fastened upon the pair.
Even the counsel and the jury fixed their attention upon these two, the alleged paramour and the alleged victim.
Every eye was riveted upon their faces, as if to read there some lesson, to discover there some index which should disclose the truth more clearly than oral witnesses or written deposition; some agitation of the frame, some blanching of the cheek, some slight shudder which should betray the secret of guilt.
’
Mr. Stuart arose from his seat and politely made way for the party to pass, and as
Mrs. Burch passed him amid a trying stillness, she gracefully bowed to him. He acknowledged the favor as easily as if he were paying the morning compliment, and
Mrs. Burch passed to her seat with as little confusion and embarrassment as though she had saluted a casual acquaintance upon the promenade, and was not addressing a man in a court-room amid curious eyes, where she stood the alleged victim of his seductive wiles.
There was nothing to be read in those faces, save a mutual politeness which you would expect in those not charged with crime, and the twain passed on, the one to her seat, the other to the witness's stand.
