The history of jurisprudence embodies among its dusty archives many a tale of love, of sorrow, of blighted affection, of bitter, remorseless persecution, of long-cherished vengeance, which needs not the pen of a Warren or Dickens to invest it with every attribute of startling interest which can mark the wildest narrative of fiction.

In the year 1835, there came into the county of Lapeer a German, from the province of Wurtemberg, by the name of Ulrich, bringing with him a young and attractive wife, to whom he had been some years married. This lady, when a girl, had been a belle in her little neighborhood, in Wurtemberg, and had been sought in marriage by more than one anxious suitor, and among them was one Daum, by whom she was courted, and to whom she had extended such encouragement as led him to fix his affections upon her with all the fervor of the German heart. Daum was a man of unusual strength of mind, of stern and impressive demeanor, of great depth of feeling, but, as the sequel will show, of the most implacable disposition when his animosities had been aroused. He loved the girl with that intensity natural to men so constituted, and having few or no affinities with others, owing to his reserved and morose disposition, he commenced by lavishing his hours of leisure, and the earnings of his industry upon her alone. Unlike her lover in all respects, the girl was attractive, fond of society, and unstable in her affections; and when the wedding day came, to which Daum had long and impatiently looked forward, as the consummation of his bliss, after the wedding guests had met, she told him that she loved him not, and never could be his. Daum sold his estate, and removed at once from the scene of discomfiture to a distant province.

Time passed on, and the lady was again wooed and won by a light-hearted and comely youth, her former suitor's superior in personal appearance, but his inferior in wealth and intellect. His courtship was now followed by marriage, the news of which reached the self-banished Daum, roused every latent feeling of rage and jealousy of which his strong heart was capable, and he turned to the scene of his former happiness, instigated by his sole desire—for revenge! He skulked about the neighborhood, lying hid during the day time for the most part, but watching every opportunity to way-lay and destroy his rival. At length they met is a wild, narrow mountain pass; a deadly and fierce struggle took place, at the termination of which Ulrich was left upon the ground slain, as his assassin supposed. Daum fled, and Ulrich recovered and returned to his wife, pale, bleeding, and faint. The officers of justice sought for Daum in vain; he had fled to England, where he spent the next six years of his life.

The circumstances had passed away from the public mind, and the parties most interested had ceased to think of them, or to feel any apprehension at Daum's return. Five years passed on, and the married couple, with their children, joined a party who were emigrating to America, and settled in the county of Lapeer. There they resided in quiet comfort and happiness for three years. The wild farm had begun to assume the appearance of cultivation—the log-house to be encircled with creepers and flowering shrubs—the white haired children played around the door—the old German hound lay watchfully at the gate, and the truant sweetheart, now a comely matron, sang at her wheel the sweet songs of her Faderland. All was peace in this sequestered home, when, at the close of a bright day in August, 1838, a knock was heard at the door, which was answered by the woman, who, upon opening it, met face to face with her old suitor. The recognition was mutual—not a word was said between them, but while the heart of one of them sunk within her from very fear, that of the other was roused to a frenzy, which made itself manifest in a wild gleam of long pent-up vengeance.

The husband was absent, having gone upon a distant hunting excursion in pursuit of deer, and all that night, with doors and windows barred, a sleepless, tearful, trembling watcher, awaited his return. He came not, and his step never again crossed that threshold.

Precisely one year from the time of the occurrence just narrated, Mr. Thorn, an old resident of Lapeer county, walking upon a balmy Sunday morning upon the borders of one of those beautiful little lakes which lie embosomed upon the flowery openings of that country, found upon the beach, just within the water's edge, a human skull. At a loss to account for its appearance there, he followed up the steep bold bank which overhangs the lake, and upon its verge, found the body to which the skull belonged. A jury was summoned to the spot, and the remains were at once identified by the half-frantic widow, whose wounds were opened afresh by the discovery which shut out forever the last ray of hope which had lingered in her breast for a long, sad year.

The cause and manner of the death of the murdered man were obvious by an examination of the skeleton—a rifle ball piercing through the vertebral column from behind, had passed out through the breast bone. The murdered man had never known who or what had took his life. He lay as he fell, upon his face, with his undischarged rifle resting by his side, and upon his bleaching skeleton the hunting pouch, belt, knife and powder horn, which he had brought with him from his old country home. Autumn deepened into winter, winter had brightened into spring, spring had blossomed into summer, yet there he lay, within three miles of his home, unnoticed and undiscovered.

Upon the discovery of the body, Daum was arrested, and his trial was very long and arduous, in consequence of the necessity of taking all the evidence through interpreters, was had before the Hon. Chales W. Whipple, at the Circuit Court for the county of Lapeer, in March, 1840. The principal counsel engaged in the cause were Hon. Peter Morey, then Attorney General, Hon. A. H. Hanscom, Hon. T. J. Drake, Hon. E. H. Thompson, and George W. Winser, Esq.

During the twelve days occupied by the trial, the prisoner Daum remained impassive and unmoved throughout, except when, upon permission being granted by the Court, the bones of the murdered man, which had been wired together and placed under a covered table, were suddenly drawn out at the very feet of the prisoner, when a deathly paleness overspread his face, and a strong and involuntary shudder passed through his frame.

The evidence, as may be gathered from the foregoing sketch, was entirely circumstantial, there being no direct testimony whereby to connect the prisoner with the death of Ulrich, and the jury found themselves unwilling to convict; and giving the unhappy prisoner the benefit of the slight doubt by which the occurrence was surrounded, brought in, after a lengthy consultation, a verdict of NOT GUILTY.