law would not have allowed him more than six, had it been his own. It was suspected that all was not right about the Treasurer's office, and Cornell very cunningly managed to be appointed and sworn to go and examine into the condition of the funds in the Treasury; and he reported to the tax payers of Butler county, under oath, that the money was all in the safe, when the truth was, he had stolen it out long before, and there was no money in the safe.

What do we see here in this man who would get up indignation meetings to hang men in this free country? Here are the characteristics of highway robbery, grand larceny, perjury and the confidence game, all combined. For the stealing of the money of the county, Cornell has been indicted, and may go to the penitentiary. In addition to the above misdemeanors, this man Cornell has put his property out of his hands, and now, many honest citizens appeal in vain for their dues.

In connection with this man's history, the following little story may be of interest to the reader:

Cornell is familiarly known in Hamilton, as the "Yellow Dog." This title was given to him on account of the following:

Being "housed" on Ludlow street one night, he imagined he heard the front gate open, and he became panic-stricken. Flight is the recourse of the timid and craven, and of course he fled. Boots in hand, and

bare headed, he sped past the shrubbery with that recklessness that is blind to all surroundings, and flowerpots and shrubbery were swept away with a vim and a din that brought many a neighbor to their windows, who beheld, with much amusement, a ghost-like form in Battle Alley, endeavoring to disentangle itself from the debris of what was, but a moment before, a grape-arbor, and the nucleus of a pretty garden, but was now the surroundings of a more central and animated figure. Some jeered, some whistled and cat-called, but one, relishing the joke, sardonically declared that it was Muncies' yellow dog scared white. And to this day Bill Muncies' dog shares honors with John B. Cornell, for the poor dog had such a penchant for being around in other peoples' yards, and disturbing neighbors at unseasonable hours, that the wit of the simile could never be turned aside, or forgotten.

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CHAPTER XLIV

HISTORY OF J. V. SPELLMAN.

OR was Spellman dissimilar in the perversity of

his character to that of the person we have just reviewed. Indeed, the well worn adage that "birds of a feather flock together," is so applicable here, that we do not wonder that they were hand and glove together.

Spellman lives at Port Union, Butler county, and is related to the woman who lives in Ludlow street, mentioned in the previous chapter as on familiar terms with Cornell, and was ever ready to assist in any undertaking; hence it comes that he was secretary of the Port Union indignation meeting. He had, however, managed to live in his neighbourhood without attracting public attention to a great degree, until he insulted a lady who was unfortunate enough to be living on his farm.* That this was not a mere lapse of virtue, but the promptings of a most vicious nature, must occur to any who remember how he went to one of his neighbors, a Mr. Osborn, to get his little girl to go and do his house-work,

*For particulars see Lewis Pictory, who lives near by.

while his wife went on a visit to her daughter, in Hamilton. The little girl having been left unprotected with this man, he attacked her, and attempted to outrage her person. The poor child went home crying, and told her parents of Spellman's hellish act. The father not wishing to take his girl into court, compromised the matter for a sum of money with the saintly gentleman of morality and justice. Yet this man esteems himself a fit person to instigate indignation meetings against one already acquitted of crime. But if indignation meetings are at all tolerable, they should be applied in just such infamous cases as this, where from peculiarities of the law, no prosecution can ensue, though the whole community are iusulted, and virtually outraged by these crimes against society.

Thus have we truly written of a few of the leading spirits in the movement to drive Thomas McGehean from Butler county. And it may be added here, that much more might be truly written concerning them. What cared these men for the death of Tom Myers? Not more than they did for a yellow dog; and the release of Garver, after his perjuring himself in his testimony against McGehean, illustrates this. Malice was the prime cause of their work, and having failed to secure McGehean's conviction, and being thus deprived of the blood of their victim, nothing was left for

them to do to satiate their hellish disposition for revenge, but to arouse the fears of law-abiding persons, and to obtain this well meant support, in furtherance of their covert designs. They denounce the attorneys, who, according to their calling, have engaged to defend their client and who, in that act, have pledged themselves to use all the means in their power to acquit him, because they fulfilled that pledge, and labored faithfully and earnestly to the bitter end for the acquittal of Thomas McGehean of the charge

· preferred against him; and one of them, Thomas Millikin, more particularly did they denounce, an honored and respected attorney, grown old and gray in the service of his fellow-citizens. Not even the slanderous tongue of envy or malice had ever said aught against his character. Him they denounced, and declared that those who had respected him for his uprightness for many long years, should respect him no more, and that those who had confidence in his honesty, and trusted in his ability for many years, should confide in his honesty, and trust his ability no longer, and that the church, of which he had been a devout and faithful member, should rid itself of his presence. This, and more, did these men do; not in the interest of religion; not in the interest of morality; not in the interest of justice, of law and order, did they do these things; but to satisfy their own malice, to forward their own ends, and to blind the populace to