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The trial of Oscar Wilde on charges of indecency was resumed to-day at the Old Bailey, before Mr. Justice Wills. In view cf the possibility of the case being concluded to-day, the public gallery was again packed with a crowd of spectators eager to witness the final scene. The Solicitor-General and Mr. C. F. Gill were early in court, and the prisoner, who arrived shortly after 10 o'clock, stood in the well of the court, and had a long consultation with Mr. Travers Humphreys. He looked extremely unwell, and his whole appearance and demeanour betokened the keenest anxiety. Shortly before half-past ten Sir Edward Clarke, Q.C., entered the court and joined the conversation. The prisoner afterwards proceeded to the foot of the jury-box, and talked for some time with the Rev. Stewart Headlam and with Lord Douglas of Hawick. As soon as his lordship had taken his seat the prisoner resumed his seat in the dock.

The Solicitor-General again raised the question of the withdrawal of the case as regarded the witness Shelley. He pointed out that in 1894 Mr. Justice Collins laid it down that there was no law by which a case could be withdrawn from the jury on the ground that the evidence of an accomplice was uncorroborated.

His Lordship said he preferred to adhere to the course which he had taken, as the result of very deliberate consideration. One stroner reason he had for doing so was that it was contrary to the practice of the law for a judge to allow the uncorroborated evidence of an accomplice to go to a jury. He did not see any use in that if the jury were to have the liberty of deliberately disregarding that direction. When an opportunity arose he should be glad to have the question settled authoritatively.

Sir Edward Clarke then rose to address the jury on behalf of the prisoner. He said he had to deal with what remained of this case, but he should not detain them long now, and he did not think it would be needful for him to address them at any great length hereafter. The case before them was now very limited, and the witnesses upon whom they were asked to rely were few in number. He was painfully conscious of the manner -he had almost said the unjustifiable manner -in which the case had been conducted on the part of the Crown. He should call Mr. Wilde into the witness-box again to state for the third time in that court that there was no truth whatever in these accusations which were made against him, and to face for the third time, and now with a new assailant, the cross-examination which might be administered to him with regard to these accusations. As counsel for the defence, he (Sir Edward) might do something to sustain the traditions of public prosecutions, and induce his learned friend to remember -which he feared for a moment yesterday he seemed to forget -that he was there not to try and get a verdict of guilty by any means he could, but to lay before the jury for their consideration and judgment the facts upon which they were asked to give a very serious determination. The jury must give their decision, not on suspicion and innuendo, but upon the evidence of facts. Broken as Mr. Wilde was with the anxiety of these suceessive trials, he might well be spared the indignity of again going into the witness-box. But he would go into the witness-box, because otherwise he (counsel) knew what the Solicitor-General would say, and he (Sir Edward) would have no opportunity of reply. He contended Mr. Wilde's conduct throughout had been that of an innocent man. He had courted every inquiry and had surrendered to meet these charges, confident in the hope that as examination and examination went on these accusations would break down, as they had been breaking down these five weeks, and that at last he would get his vindication from the judgment of the jury upon the facts of the evidence before them. In conclusion, he submitted that on the evidence the jury could only return a verdict of not guilty. He then called Mr. Wilde.

The prisoner then entered the witness-box, and was allowed to be seated while giving his evidence. He said this was the third time he had gone into the witness-box. He described the nature of his acquaintance with the Queensberry family, and Lord Alfred Douglas. stated that after Lord Queensberry left a card with an offensive inscription he at once instituted proceedings. In the course of his evidence in the Queensberry libel case he was asked certain questions with regard to Parker and Wood, in answer to which he made certain statements.

Sir E. Clarke: Were all those statements absolutely true? -Entirely.

Have you any qualification or alteration to make in regard to these statements? -No, I have no observations to make.

Is there-any truth whatever in the accusations made; against you in this indictment? -None whatever.

Cross-examined by the Solicitor-General, witness said he first made the acquaintance of Lord Alfred Douglas in 1893, and when Lord Queensberry objected to the intimacy between Lord Alfred Douglas and himself, he was quite ready to cease the acquaintance. Lord Alfred, however, desired the acquaintance to be continued. Lord Alfred Douglas was now in Paris, where he went at witness's desire. Witness had been in communication with him.

Do you frequently correspond with Lord Alfred Douglas? -Yes.

Are the two letters that have been read samples of the style in which you addressed him? -I do not think I should say they were samples. The letter written from Torquay was a prose poem in answer to his poem.

"My own boy" -is that the way in which you usually addressed him? -I do not say usually, but often. He was much younger than I was.

"Your sonnet is quite lovely. It is a marvel that those red rose-leaf lips of yours, &c." Now I ask you this, Mr. Wilde. Do you consider that was a decent way of addressing a youth? -lt is like a sonnet of Shakespeare. It was a fantastic, extravagant way of writing to a young man.

Was it decent? -Of course it was decent. It is a beautiful way for an artist to write to a young man who has culture, charm, and distinction. Decency does not come into the question.

Do you understand the meaning of the word, sir? -Yes.

Then I ask you whether you consider it a decent mode of addressing a young man? -I can only give you the same answer. It was a literary mode of writing to another -intended to be a prose poem.

Do you consider it to be decent phraseology? -Oh, yes.

In regard to other portions of the letter, witness said he referred in it to Hyacinthus, who was madly loved in Greek days. The letter was signed, "Always with undying love, yours -Oscar." Witness waa devoted to Lord Alfred Douglas, and had a refined and intellectual love for him. The other letter was not a prose poem. It was written after there had been a quarrel about something. The letter contained the following: -"Your letter was delightful red and yellow wine to me, but I am sad and out of sorts. You must not make scenes with me. They kill me. They wreck the loveliness of life. I cannot listen to your curved lips saying hideous things to me. Do not do it, you break my heart." The letter continued -"You are the divine thing I want -the thing of grace and genius, but I do not know how to do it. Shall I come to Salisbury."

Witness said an artist in literature, a man of letters, always looks for literary expression, and that leads one to certain expressions. Lord Alfred Douglas had stayed with him three times at the Savoy Hotel. Their rooms adjoined. After the committal of the Marquess of Queensbery, witness and Lord Alfred Douglas left the country together.

You two alone? -Yes.

Witness further admitted that he had visited Taylor at Little College Street, and had met a number of young men there. He could not remember their names. He had never met Parker there. Did Taylor strike you as being a pleasant companion? -Yes; I thought him very bright.

Pleasant? -Yes.

Did you know what his occupation was? -I understood he had none.

Had any of those persons you met any occupation? -I did not ask them.

When you heard that Parker had stayed with Taylor did that alter your opinion of Taylor? -I do not think I am called upon to express an opinion. If Parker was poor and shared his room it would be a charity.

Had any of these young men at Taylor's any intellectual attraction? -No, it was my vanity and love of admiration. I liked to be praised and made much of, and was gratified.

What! -with the admiration of these boys? -At the admiration.

What possible gratification was it to you who, we are told, was a successful literary man to obtain the praise of these boys, whose very names you cannot remember? -Praise from anybody is always delightful. Praise from other literary people is usually tainted with criticism. (Laughter.) It pleased me very much to be made much of.

Witness added that it did not occur to him that he could exercise any influence over these young men. He had no preference for one of the Parkers rather than the other. He called Charles Parker "Charlie," and told him to call him "Oscar." He did not remember ever taking a young man to the Savoy Hotel and dining with him alone at night. He did not dine there alone with Parker.

The Solicitor General next proceeded to cross-examine witness as to his relations with a man named Scarfe. Sir E. Clarke objected on the ground that it was not relevant. The Solicitor-General said he had a right to treat the witness as any other witness for the purpose of discrediting him. His Lordship overruled the objection, but said if the bounds of fair play were overstepped the consequence would recoil on those who overstepped it.

Witness said that Scaife had visited him at 10, St. James's Street, and had lived with him alone in a private room at an hotel. Witness also said he met a boy named Conway on the beach at Worthing and took him to Brighton for six weeks. He had also met a man named Harrington. With regard to Alfred Wood, he met him at the Cafe Royal. He had been asked to give Wood assistance.

Why did you not give it him? -I did.

Why prolong the interview? -If you mean taking him to supper, I wished to be kind to him.

Did you take him to dinner alone in a private room? -Yes.

Witness added that he afterwards met Wood again at the Café Royal. He was asked to interest himself in Wood. It was after that second meeting that he learned Wood was known to Taylor. He was afterwards told that Wood was minded to extort money from him on account of some letters which witness had written to Lord Alfred Douglas having come into possessiou. Witness afterwards met Wood and the latter gave him the letters.

What did you give him? -Ultimately I gave him £15.

What for? -Because he wished to go to America.

Do you mean to state that your payment of that money had no relation to the delivery of those letters? -None whatever.

You paid your money and you got the letters? -Yes.

Where are the letters? -I tore them up.

You had gone to buy? -No, to bargain.

To bargain for what? -Those letters.

And you took money for this purpose? -Yes.

You paid the money? -Yes.

And you got the letters? -Yes.

When did you destroy the letters? -I tore them up two or three days afterwards.

Witness added that on the next day he gave Wood a lunch at the Florence and an additional sum of £5. Wood afterwards went to America.

Now, I come to the Savoy Hotel. Were you visited at that hotel by many young men? -The majority of my friends are young.

You heard what the masseur said. Is that untrue? -Entirely.

You contradict his testimony wholly? -Wholly.

May I take it your testimony is the same as regards the evidence of the chambermaid? - Yes.

This concluded the cross-examination, and the Court adjourned for lunch.

(Continued on Page 4.)

On the Court resuming the prisoner, who had entered the dock, was again called into the witness-box. He was re-examined by Sir E. Clarke. Sir E. Clarke then addressed the jury on behalf of the defence. The trial was again adjourned.

The trial of Oscar Wilde and Alfred Taylor was resumed to-day at the Old Bailey—before Mr. Justice Charles and a jury—the Crown case having closed at the hour of adjournment yesterday. There was again a large attendance of the general public, but the court was scarcely so crowded as heretofore. Pending the arrival of the judge, Taylor was brought into the dock for a consultation with his counsel, Mr. Grain. When Mr. Justice Charles took his seat Mr. Gill, on behalf of the Crown, withdrew the counts for conspiracy.

Sir Edward Clarke said that had he known these counts would be withdrawn he should have asked that the prisoners be tried separately, and he now asked for a verdict of not guilty, so far as the allegations related to conspiracy.

Mr. Gill observed that he had adopted this course to avoid any difficulty in the way of the prisoners giving evidence.

His Lordship, in acceding to Mr. Gill's application, said he could not consent to the adoption of the course suggested by the learned counsel for the defence.

Sir Edward Clarke replied that he did not wish to appear tenacious, and he would at a later stage of the case ask for a verdict of not guilty upon those particular counts.

Sir Edward at once began his address for the defence of Wilde. Having at the outset given, on his client's behalf, an absolute denial to the charges brought against him, the learned counsel animadverted on the conduct of a large section of the press, which, he alleged, was such as to prejudice his client and imperil the interests of justice. He accused the Crown counsel of having yesterday read the cross-examination of Wilde in the action brought against Lord Queensberry for the sole purpose of inducing the jury to believe that the man who wrote "Dorian Grey" was likely to commit indecency, but, as Coleridge said, a man should be regarded as superior to his books. There was no single page in "Dorian Grey" where the statement was made of any person being guilty of abominable sin. From "Dorian Grey" Sir Edward passed on to comment on the Chameleon, many of the passages in which, from Wilde's pen, he described as merely smart phrases. In that magazine his client saw the story of "The Priest and the Acolyte," a production which was a disgrace to the man who wrote it, to the editor who accepted it, and to everybody concerned with it, and Mr. Wilde became so indignant that he wrote to the conductor of the magazine declining to be longer associated with it. The literary controversy had nothing whatever to do with the questions before the jury. The controversy as to the morality of Shakespeare's sonnets was likely to last as long as the question of who wrote the letters of Junius, or as to the character of certain sonnets of Michael Angelo to one of his friends. He therefore asked the jury altogether to discard what had been urged against the prisoner in relation to "Dorian Grey" and the Chameleon. Coming to Wilde's association with the Queensberry family, he observed that prisoner was still a friend of Lady Queensberry, who divorced her husband.

Mr. Gill: I protest against any attack upon Lord Queensberry, who is not now represented. It is altogether irrelevant to say here that Lord Queensberry was divorced.

Sir Edward Clarke said that to hear his learned friend rebuking irrelevance was rather amusing. (Laughter.) In the case of Wilde v. Queensberry he (Sir Edward) and the learned counsel acting with him for Wilde took the responsibility of accepting a verdict of not guilty. It was perfectly clear that the jury then sitting would not have found Lord Queensberry guilty of a criminal offence For the course then adopted he (Sir Edward) was responsible, and he was here again to meet on his client's behalf a case which could not be properly tried at the former trial, but which could now be determined upon a proper issue. If Mr. Oscar Wilde had been guilty of the charges against him, would he have provoked investigation as he did, bringing an action for libel? It was said there was a species of insanity which caused men to commit unnatural crime, but what would they think of a man who, if he had been guilty of such offences, insisted upon bringing them before the world? He was confident that the evidence of his client would be a complete answer to the allegations against him.

Oscar Wilde was then called from the dock and sworn. He answered the questions of Sir E. Clarke in subdued tones.

The learned counsel first took him through his academical career at Dubin and Oxford, and passed from this to his career as a dramatist and playwright.

Sir Edward: In cross-examination in the Wilde v. Queensberry case you denied all the charges against you. Was the evidence then given by you absolutely and entirely true evidence?—Witness: Entirely true evidence.

Sir Edward: Is there any truth in any one of the allegations of indecency which have been brought against you in this case?—Witness: There is no truth whatever in any one of the allegations.

Mr. Gill began his cross-examination much on the lines adopted by Mr. Carson in the former trial. The learned counsel quoted from a sonnet of Lord Alfred Douglas, in which occurred the line, "I am that love, that dare not speak its name." What was the nature of the love represented in that poem?

Wilde now gave with marked deliberation and emphasis the following answer: It is a love which is not understood in this century. It is the love of David for Jonathan—such love as Plato described in his philosophy—the beginning of wisdom. It is a deep spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect, and has dictated the greatest works of art. It is in this century much misunderstood. It is an intellectual affection between an older and a younger man. The elder man has had knowledge of the world, the younger has the joy, the hope, the glamour of life. It is something which this age does not understand. It mocks at it, and it sometimes puts one in the pillory for it. (Cheers in the gallery.)

His Lordship: I shall have the court cleared if there is again the slightest manifestation of feeling.

Mr. Gill took the witness through the evidence of the staff from the Savoy Hotel and the masseur, Mr. Bigge. He denied there was a word of truth in it.

Wilde also gave the same general denials to the evidence of Charles Parker and Shelley. The latter, he said, used to write him morbid, religious letters. The witness Atkins had also given a wrong account of the circumstances under which they met. It was true Atkins and Schwabe went with him to Paris, but the account given of what took place there was untrue. It was grotesque and monstrous. Taylor's rooms in Little College Street, near the Houses of Parliament, were Bohemian. Taylor burnt pastilles there. He (Wilde) went there to smoke, chat, and amuse himself. Actors came there. Taylor was an accomplished pianist. Mayor was a pleasant, agreeable young man, and was his guest at the Albemarle Hotel in an ordinary way. Taylor was a young man of private means. He took the boy Alphonso Conway, whom he met at Worthing, a trip to Brighton. Conway slept in a room off his, divided by baize doors.

Did you feel the affection you have described for these youths?—Oh, certainly not.

Further cross-examined: He knew that men dressed in women's clothes went to certain rooms in Fitzroy Street, and that Taylor was once arrested there. He (Wilde) knowing the men sometimes dressed as women on the stage, could not imagine what the police were at Fitzroy Street for.

Mr. Gill: And you saw no reason why the police should keep observations on Taylor's rooms in Little College Street?—Witness: I saw none.

Sir Edward Clarke elicited in cross-examination that Atkins desired to go on the music-hall stage. He communicated that wish to Wilde, and obtained an engagement, the defendant purchasing for him his first song. The Allen letters he did not regard as of any importance.

Sir Edward: They were not prose poems?—Witness (smiling): Oh, no. They contained some slighting allusions to other people which I should have been sorry to see published. I know nothing of the Chameleon except that I was told it was to be a literary and artistic magazine.

Wilde returned to the dock. The prisoner Alfred Taylor was then called and examined by Mr. Grain. He said his age was 33, and his father formerly conducted a wholesale business which had now been turned into a limited liability company. He was educated at Marlborough, and was for some time in the militia, intending to pass on to the army, but after one training he resigned his commission. In 1883 he came into possession of £45,000, and had since lived a life of pleasure about town. The statements of Charles Parker alleged against witness were absolutely untrue.

Cross-examined by Mr. Gill: He never went through a sham form of marriage with a man named Charles Mason. He had never accosted men at the Empire and at the Alhambra. He denied the statements of the brothers Parker as to what took place at his rooms.

Mr. Gill next questioned Taylor as to the incidents of the police raid in Fitzroy Street.

You were one of the men arrested?—I was.

And you had with you Charles Parker?—Yes.

How was Parker getting his living?—I understood he was receiving money from his father.

You and Parker were discharged. Some were fined and some were bound over?—Yes.

Questioned as to the appointments of his apartments at Little College Street, Taylor said he had a censer there in which he burnt pastilles.

Re-examined: The garment taken from the rooms by the police was an Oriental costume which had come from Constantinople, and had been obtained by him for a fancy dress ball at Covent Garden.

On the conclusion of Taylor's examination, the Court adjourned for luncheon.