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luteiy untouched —first, the twenty-seven sheep, and second, the skins so plainly marked by the company's brand. My first main proposition is this : That if Lambert did net put the skins there, Meikle was rightfully convicted ; for it will be remembered that Meikle makes no attempt to explain their presence in his smithy by any accident or mistake. He indeed deliberately shuts this door on himself by showing there was no possibility of accident or mistake. He led evidence to show that there were no skins on his fence which might have been taken by accident into the smithy. Young Arthur Meikle at the moment of arrest jumped at that as an explanation —that they were taken from the fence by mistake. But when you come to the trial of Lambert for perjury, when it was no longer asked of Meikle to prove his innocence, he wanted to prove that Lambert had put them in the smithy ; so he shuts out the possibility of their being there by accident or mistake, and brings himself face to face with this proposition —either Lambert put them there or you, Meikle, have been guilty of putting them there, and what their presence there implied. Meikle tells us, in order to make this quite clear, that these skins in the smithy were counted every morning, and that the smithy door was [kept locked; and he led evidence to show that the very morning before the police raid the skins were counted, and not one of the company's skins was found amongst them. Plainly then, even if Lambert were guilty of the offence for which Meikle was convicted, Meikle is not, ipso facto, clear. The onus lies on Meikle to prove that Lambert put the skins there. That onus has not been discharged by Lambert's conviction for perjury, because the statement that he put them there has not been included in the indictment for perjury. Hence the onus lies on him to prove that Lambert put the skins there. We will see whether he has discharged that onus. If not, we must say that he has been rightfully convicted. I need not go far. If the twenty-seven sheep and the skins were evidence on which the jury might convict- —if Lambert was rightfully convicted or doubtfully convicted, Meikle's conviction was most certainly right. On the same evidence the jury might reasonably have convicted Meikle, even if Lambert's conviction was correct, and, secondly, the jury were bound to convict Meikle if Lambert's evidence was correct. Now I want to make it quite clear that it is not at all essential for me to show that Lambert was wrongfully convicted. I believe, and I quite apprehend the responsibility of the statement —I believe I shall establish to your Honours' complete satisfaction that the man Lambert was indeed innocent; but that is not my main purpose. lam not here as an advocate for Lambert—not here to establish Lambert's innocence. lam here merely to establish the proposition that this Commission cannot find that Meikle was wrongfully convicted in 1887 ; and if, incidentally to that purpose, I prove Lambert innocent, then I take it that lam discharging a good service. Well, your Honours, apart from Lambert's evidence, Meikle has to establish his innocence to show how did twenty-seven of the company's sheep get on his land, and, secondly, how did the skins, plainly branded with the company's brand, find their way into his smithy. I admit that twenty-seven sheep found under ordinary circumstances on a neighbour's land and belonging to an adjoining farmer would not probably raise even a suspicion of guilt. But circumstances are easily conceivable in which the finding of sheep on a neighbour's land is almost coercive proof of guilt; and I propose to submit a few references to the evidence to show that the presence of these twenty-seven sheep on Meikle's land and the attempt made to explain it in 1887 amounts to so grave a suspicion as in itself probably to entitle a jury to find him guilty. Now, the circumstances to which I desire to refer I take in order. First it will be shown that the company in the year preceding Meikle's conviction had lost an enormous number of sheep, most of which had been stolen ; that from an area of 600 or 700 acres—l do not remember trie exact acreage —of land adjoining Meikle's, where there was good turnip-feed, and on which 640 sheep were placed or found to be in August, 1887, two months afterwards, in October, 1887, 640 sheep were found to be reduced to 559. It will be shown that mortality had nothing to do with this—that the difference, amounting to one-seventh or one-eighth of the whole flock, must have disappeared owing to the sheepstealing of some man. It was plainly a case of theft, and, whether Meikle was stealing the sheep or not. some one was stealing sheep belonging to the company. Now these sheep, or twenty-seven of them, were found on Meikle's land. I may be asked how is that to be proved, that these twenty-seven sheep came from the company's land. Well, the pastures at that time of year were such that unless sheep had been on turnip land they could not be in the condition in which the twenty-seven sheep were which were found on Meikle's property. They were fat sheep. They could only have at that time of year been so fattened upon turnips; and those sheep, it will be shown, came from the company's turnip land. Now, to do that they must have come not only through good sheep-proof fences, but they must have left abundant turnip feed for bare land, wandered over this poor land to begin with on the company's tussock land, then on to ploughed land through which the crop had not yet sprung, next through another fence of Mr. Meikle's, and on to pasture which I will undertake to prove could not at that time of year have fattened sheep at ali. Now, your Honours, I want to ask the Commission to mark this very significant fact: In the trial in 1887 the case made by the company was that it had rich pasture from which these sheep—if Meikle is correct —must have strayed, and must have strayed on to pastures which could offer no inducement whatever to sheep. A point was made at the first trial that Meikle's pastures were so poor that they could not and would not induce sheep to go there. The point was made that the pastures of the company were so rich that sheep would remain there undoubtedly. And to to show that was plainly a question at issue, we will see how Mr. Duncan, a witness for Meikle, is examined. On page 28 he is giving evidence as to fences. He says, — " I know fences between prisoner and the company. I was asked to examine them by Constable Leece. Examined fence near pre-emptive right; not sheep-proof. Cross-examined : Sheep expert. Sheep might leave turnips for tussock for a stroll; generally come back. Not likely to leave turnips to get at plough." That means ploughed land, of course. There was the case made by the company in 1887 that these sheep left turnip land for ploughed land, which at that time it was not suggested by anybody had a blade of grass or crop upon it. And how was that evidence answered, your Honours ? There is not one