had been used, and that, being informed that Butt had paid Adams one hundred dollars to vote for the bill, he questioned Butt about it; that at first Butt denied it, but finally admitted that he had paid Adams money. Still another senator, Holland, testified that after the Senate had adjourned, and when Covington was being tried, he was told that Adams had returned the money, and he asked Butt about it, and Butt admitted that Adams had returned it, but later made a different statement.

Butt and Covington, who testified for him, both denied about all of this incriminating evidence. The testimony need not be set out here, for the question now is whether the evidence introduced by the state was competent and sufficient to sustain the judgment.

Counsel for appellant contends that there was not sufficient evidence of a conspiracy between Covington and the defendant, Butt, to justify the admission of the declarations and acts of Covngton as evidence against the defendant. Before discussing the question, we will say that no declaration by Covington made in the absence of Butt was admitted in evidence. The statement of Covington, made in the presence of Butt, suggesting an organization to control legislation and to make money corruptly, to which Butt assented, is competent, whether there was a conspiracy or not. For that is, in effect, only showing the act of Butt himself. The statement of Covington was admitted as explanatory of this act, and to show to what Butt assented. But, if the evidence be true, it is difficult to believe that no conspiracy existed. When a conspiracy has been shown, then the acts and declarations of one conspirator in furtherance of the common design may be shown as evidence against his associates, and we think the evidence in this case sufficient to show that there was a conspiracy between Covington and Butt and others to pass bill 370 through the Senate by bribery.

In a recent case decided by this court the following extract from Underhill on Criminal Evidence was quoted with approval: "Direct evidence is not essential to prove the conspiracy. It 180 need not be shown that the parties actually came together and agreed in express terms to enter in and pursue a common design. The existence of the assent of minds which is involved in a conspiracy may be, and from the secrecy of the crime usually must be, inferred by the jury from proof of facts and circumstances which, taken to

gether, apparently indicate that they are merely part of some complete whole. If it is proved that two or more persons aimed by their acts toward the accomplishment of the same unlawful object, each doing a part, so that their acts, though apparently independent, were in fact connected and cooperative, indicating a closeness of personal association and a concurrence of sentiment, a conspiracy may be inferred, though no actual meeting among them to concert means is proved." This is a clear and correct statement of the law: Underhill on Criminal Evidence, sec. 491; Chapline v. State, 77 Ark. 444, 95 S. W. 477.

Nor is it material now whether the evidence showing the conspiracy was introduced before or after the acts of the confederate were received in evidence, it being sufficient if on the whole case a conspiracy is shown. Now, a conspiracy is a combination between two or more persons to do something unlawful or to accomplish something lawful by unlawful means: Commonwealth v. Waterman, 122 Mass. 43; 6 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law, p. 832.

The evidence tends to show that early in the session at a meeting in his room, Covington made the suggestion to the defendant, Butt, and a few other senators present that they organize for the purpose of controlling legislation and making money out of it. The defendant Butt did not dissent from this bold proposition to combine for the purpose of extorting bribes, in other words, to go into it as a regular business, but, on the contrary, if the witness told the truth, he showed a ready response to it, and at once began in a practical way to carry out the suggestion by making a memorandum of the names of those senators who, it was believed, could be induced to join the combination. Later in the session we find these two men doing the very thing that was on that occasion proposed by one of them and assented to by the other. We find that one of them received several thousand dollars which he takes under a promise to use for the passage of this capitol bill through the Senate, and shortly 181 after we find the other acting as a distributer of money for the passage of this bill. Now, it is certain that Butt did not pay out his own money in such liberal sums on this bill. If he paid out money, it was furnished by some one financially interested in the passage of the bill. The evidence shows that there were no others thus interested except the firm of Caldwell & Drake. They did pay out a large sum

to bribe senators to vote for this bill. It is therefore morally certain that, if Butt paid out money to bribe Adams on this bill, the money he used came from Caldwell & Drake, either directly or through some agent of theirs. As the evidence shows that this money of Caldwell & Drake was paid te Covington, who was to secure the passage of the bill with the money paid him, it seems probable that Butt was acting under Covington. But, whether that be so or not, they were both engaged in the same undertaking to pass this bill by the corrupt use of money, and were acting for the same principal. Taking the whole evidence together, we think it was amply sufficient to show a conspiracy between them.

But, even if we concede that no conspiracy was shown, a majority of us think that this evidence was competent on another ground. For, while you cannot show separate and isolated crimes or facts having no bearing on the crime under investigation, you can always show all the circumstances. connected with the particular crime, even if in doing so you have to bring to light other offenses. You can go back to the time when the intention to commit the crime under investigation was first formed and trace it through all the intervening circumstances to the consummation of the criminal act, and thus lay before the jury the whole transaction. This is necessary in order that they may correctly judge the motives and conduct of the defendant under investigation. "If," says the author of a recent work, "several crimes are so intermixed or blended with one another or connected so that they form an indivisible criminal transaction, and a complete account of any of them cannot be given without showing the other, any or all of them are admissible against a defendant on trial for any offense which is itself a detail of the whole criminal scheme": Underhill on Criminal Evidence, sec. 88.

You might as well expect that one should be able to judge correctly the merits of a play, and of the motives and conduct of 182 the actors as displayed therein, by witnessing only the last scene of the last act, as to expect, where the crime under investigation is part of a connected scheme, that the jury should be able to determine the motives of the defendant and judge correctly of his guilt or innocence without any knowledge of the origin of the crime or the circumstances and motives that led up to it. The law does not blindfold courts and juries in that way, and it is always compe

tent to show the beginning as well as the end of the criminal transaction.

Now, as before stated, the evidence tends to show that this crime had its beginning early in the legislative session. The rising curtain discloses defendant and certain other senators, guardians of the state, assembled in the room of Covington, president of the Senate, gravely discussing, notthe good of the state, but how to take over the business of Cox and Cook, two noted lobbyists, control legislation, and make money out of the passage of bills. This was the beginning. Later, when the bill appropriating eight hundred thousand dollars of the state's money was introduced in the Senate, in which bill Caldwell & Drake, contractors of large means and rather lax ideas about the proper use of money, were greatly interested, an opportunity was presented to put into practice the plan agreed to by Covington and defendant at the beginning of the session.

They did not, however, put Cox and Cook out of business, but acted with them. Cook says that Caldwell put up over twelve thousand dollars to pass this bill. Of this Cook gave Covington seven thousand dollars, but two thousand five hundred dollars went for another purpose, leaving about four thousand five hundred dollars to be used in the passage of the bill through the Senate, with the promise of more if it became a law. Cook does not state what he did with the remainder, but he no doubt retained a liberal percentage. Cox appears only in the misty background, but he no doubt got his percentage also. So that the amount paid to Covington probably represents the bulk of that expended on the legislature. With this sum Covington was to pass the bill through the Senate. The evidence does not directly show to whom Covington distributed this money, or how much of it be retained himself, but it shows that very soon after it was placed in his hands the defendant appeared as the distributer of money to secure the passage of this bill.

183 As the testimony of Hinkle shows that Covington knew that Butt was ready and willing to engage in a venture of that kind, it, as before stated, seems highly probable that, if Butt paid out any money to secure the passage of this bill, he secured it from Covington. These transactions, from the time the money was paid over by Caldwell to Cook until a portion of it was paid to Adams by the defendant, were all part of the same scheme to pass this bill by buying the

votes of senators. The evidence that money was paid by Caldwell to Cook and by Cook to Covington for the passage of this bill is competent, because it tends to show where Butt procured the money which he paid to Adams and explains the motives that lay behind this act of Butt. He had no personal interest in the passage of the bill, and there was no reason why he should squander money in that way. If it could not be shown where this money probably came from, the testimony of Adams that Butt paid him money to vote for the bill would seem unreasonable. But the whole thing is cleared when you trace the crime back to its source and view the whole transaction. You then see that Butt was not acting for himself alone, but that behind him was a party interested and willing to pay out large sums of money on this bill. Caldwell did not deal directly with these corrupt legislators, but his desire to make money out of the expenditure for which this bill provided was the moving force that led to this crime, and it was competent to show that he paid money and to trace this money through the different agents into whose hands it came in order to show the whole of the criminal transaction and to explain the motives of the different actors therein. A part of the route that the money took is shown by circumstances only. But, assuming that the witnesses spoke the truth, these circumstances are quite convincing, and to repeat again makes it seem very probable that the money used by Butt came through Covington, and that the whole of this evidence relates to the same criminal scheme. But whether he received it from Covington or not, the evidence tends strongly to show that the act of Butt was only a detail in a larger scheme carried out by Cox, Cook, Covington and others, and the whole can be shown. think there can be no doubt of its competency: Melton v. State, 43 Ark. 367.

The objection to the testimony of McNemer, a witness who 184 testified for the state in rebuttal as to the character of this defendant, on the ground that it was not confined to a time anterior to the commencement of the prosecution, is based entirely on the form of the question propounded to this witness and his answers thereto. In these the present tense is used, but his testimony shows clearly that he refers to a time previous to the prosecution. No special objection Am. St. Rep., Vol. 118-4