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red ribbon, of what Order I don’t remember. The prosecu-
tor struck me and the others, too, as looking particularly
pale, almost green. His face seemed to have grown suddenly
thinner, perhaps in a single night, for I had seen him look-
ing as usual only two days before. The President began with
asking the court whether all the jury were present.
But I see I can’t go on like this, partly because some
things I did not hear, others I did not notice, and others I
have forgotten, but most of all because, as I have said before,
I have literally no time or space to mention everything that
was said and done. I only know that neither side objected to
very many of the jurymen. I remember the twelve jurymen
— four were petty officials of the town, two were merchants,
and six peasants and artisans of the town. I remember, long
before the trial, questions were continually asked with some
surprise, especially by ladies: ‘Can such a delicate, complex
and psychological case be submitted for decision to petty
officials and even peasants?’ and ‘What can an official, still
more a peasant, understand in such an affair?’ All the four
officials in the jury were, in fact, men of no consequence
and of low rank. Except one who was rather younger, they
were grey-headed men, little known in society, who had
vegetated on a pitiful salary, and who probably had elderly,
unpresentable wives and crowds of children, perhaps even
without shoes and stockings. At most, they spent their lei-
sure over cards and, of course, had never read a single book.
The two merchants looked respectable, but were strangely
silent and stolid. One of them was close-shaven, and was
dressed in European style; the other had a small, grey beard,

111 The Brothers Karamazov