Stevenson Robert Louis. Kidnapped

Webster’s Thesaurus Edition for PSAT, SAT, GRE, LSAT, GMAT, and AP English Test Preparation.While my husband and Mr. Henley were engaged in writing plays in
Bournemouth they made a number of titles, hoping to use them in the future.
Dramatic composition was not what my husband preferred, but the torrent of
Mr. Henley’s enthusiasm swept him off his feet. However, after several plays
had been finished, and his health seriously impaired by his endeavours to keep
up with Mr. Henley, play writing was abandoned forever, and my husband
returned to his legitimate vocation. Having added one of the titles, The Hanging
Judge, to the list of projected plays, now thrown aside, and emboldened by my
husband’s offer to give me any help needed, I concluded to try and write it
myself.
As I wanted a trial scene in the Old Bailey, I chose the period of 1700 for my
purpose; but being shamefully ignorant of my subject, and my husband
confessing to little more knowledge than I possessed, a London bookseller was
commissioned to send us everything he could procure bearing on Old Bailey
trials. A great package came in response to our order, and very soon we were
both absorbed, not so much in the trials as in following the brilliant career of a
Mr. Garrow, who appeared as counsel in many of the cases. We sent for more
books, and yet more, still intent on Mr. Garrow, whose subtle cross-examination
of witnesses and masterly, if sometimes startling, methods of arriving at the
truth seemed more thrilling to us than any novel.