I had a duty to perform, and I performed it." "A duty?
Will you explain to the jury what duty ?" The witness's head rose, then sank.

He, as well as every one else, seemed to be impressed by the solemnity of the moment.

Though the intensity of my own interest would not allow my eyes to wander from his face, I could imagine the strained look in Ella's, as she awaited his words.
They came in another instant, but with less steadiness than he had shown before.

I even thought I could detect a tremor in his muscles, as well as in his voice: "I had rebelled against my sister's wishes; I had grieved and deceived her up to the very night of her foul and unnatural death--and all through _drink_." Here his eye flashed, and for that fleeting moment he looked a man.

"I wished to take an oath--an oath I would remember.