Resurrection

After the last words of the prisoners had been heard, the form in

which the questions were to be put to the jury was settled, which

also took some time. At last the questions were formulated, and

the president began the summing up.

Before putting the case to the jury, he spoke to them for some

time in a pleasant, homely manner, explaining that burglary was

burglary and theft was theft, and that stealing from a place

which was under lock and key was stealing from a place under lock

and key. While he was explaining this, he looked several times at

Nekhludoff as if wishing to impress upon him these important

facts, in hopes that, having understood it, Nekhludoff would make

his fellow-jurymen also understand it. When he considered that

the jury were sufficiently imbued with these facts, he proceeded

to enunciate another truth--namely, that a murder is an action

which has the death of a human being as its consequence, and that

poisoning could therefore also be termed murder. When, according

to his opinion, this truth had also been received by the jury, he

went on to explain that if theft and murder had been committed at

the same time, the combination of the crimes was theft with

murder.

Although he was himself anxious to finish as soon as possible,

although he knew that his Swiss friend would be waiting for him,

he had grown so used to his occupation that, having begun to

speak, he could not stop himself, and therefore he went on to

impress on the jury with much detail that if they found the

prisoners guilty, they would have the right to give a verdict of

guilty; and if they found them not guilty, to give a verdict of

not guilty; and if they found them guilty of one of the crimes

and not of the other, they might give a verdict of guilty on the

one count and of not guilty on the other. Then he explained that

though this right was given them they should use it with reason.

He was going to add that if they gave an affirmative answer to

any question that was put to them they would thereby affirm

everything included in the question, so that if they did not wish

to affirm the whole of the question they should mention the part

of the question they wished to be excepted. But, glancing at the

clock, and seeing it was already five minutes to three, he

resolved to trust to their being intelligent enough to understand

this without further comment.

"The facts of this case are the following," began the president,

and repeated all that had already been said several times by the

advocates, the public prosecutor and the witnesses.

The president spoke, and the members on each side of him listened

with deeply-attentive expressions, but looked from time to time

at the clock, for they considered the speech too long though very

good--i.e., such as it ought to be. The public prosecutor, the

lawyers, and, in fact, everyone in the court, shared the same

impression. The president finished the summing up. Then he found

it necessary to tell the jury what they all knew, or might have

found out by reading it up--i.e., how they were to consider the

case, count the votes, in case of a tie to acquit the prisoners,

and so on.