Mr. SERJEANT SHEE--It was in the newspapers, he said.
Mr. ATTORNEY-GENERAL--He did not venture to say that the newspaper statement in any way differed from the fact which he admitted in this Court. I have seen that gentleman not merely contenting himself with coming forward, when called upon for the purposes of justice, to state that which he knew as a matter of science or of experiment, but I have seen him mixing himself up as a thoroughgoing partisan in this case, advising my learned friend, suggesting question upon question, and that in behalf of a man whom he has again and again asserted he believed to be a poisoner by strychnia. I do not say that alters the fact; but I do say that it induces one to look at the credit of those witnesses with a very great amount of suspicion. I reverence a man who, from a sense of justice and a love of truth--from those high considerations which form the noblest elements in the character of man--comes forward in favour of a man against whom the world may run in a torrent of prejudice and aversion, and who stands and states what he believes to be the truth; but I abhor the traffic in testimony to which I regret to say men of science sometimes permit themselves to condescend. I ask you therefore to look at the statements of those witnesses with dispassionate consideration before you attach implicit credit to them. But let me assume that all they say is true, that it is the fact that they in their experiments have succeeded in discovering strychnia when mixed with other impurities, and contaminated, no matter by what cause--they say that no extent of putrefaction, no amount of decomposition, will alter the character of that vegetable matter, so that it may not be detected if it is in the human stomach. Be it so. But then must it always be found in every case where death has ensued? Professor Taylor says no; and he says it would be a most dangerous and mischievous proposition to assert that that must necessarily be so--that it would enable many a guilty man to escape who, by administering the smallest quantity whereby life can be affected and destroyed, might by that means prevent the possibility of the detection of the poison in the stomach of the individual. All the witnesses seem to agree in this, or, at all events, the great bulk of them agree in this, that the poison acts after it has been absorbed into the system; taken up by the absorbents of the stomach, it is carried into the blood; passing by means of the circulation through the tissues, it is deposited there; at some stage or other of its progress it affects the nervous system; and as soon as the nerves affecting the muscles of motion become influenced by its baneful power, then come on those muscular spasms and convulsions of which we have heard so much. If the minimum dose be given, and that operates by absorption, it is perfectly clear--and must be clear--that the whole must be taken up by absorbents and pass into the blood, and that none therefore will be found in the stomach. Nay, a further proposition is also clear. If it is necessary that it should be first passed by means of the circulation into the solid tissues of the body, before it acts upon the nervous system, it will cease to be found in the blood. Again, a portion of it, if in excess, will be eliminated in the kidneys, and pass off in watery excretion. You do not know, therefore, in what part of the human body to put your hand upon it. But this is undoubtedly the fact, if there has been an excess over the quantity necessary to destroy the life of a particular individual, then, as soon as the absorbents have taken up the necessary quantity, the nervous system will at once be affected and life destroyed; you will find the excess in the stomach, if you adopt the proper means of seeking for it. Now, what did these gentlemen do? They gave never less than a grain--often as much as two grains; and yet we now know that a quarter of a grain is enough to destroy a small animal like a rabbit, and that no man could venture to hope for life who took half a grain or three-quarters of a grain of it. Therefore in the cases of their experiments, and experiments made, allow me to say, for the purpose of this case, after those parties had been retained--I use the word “retained,” for it is the appropriate word; no parties can be more thoroughgoing partisans than scientific men who have once taken up a case--after they have been retained for this case, and desire that their experiments should have a certain result, they take good care to have doses large enough to leave a small portion in the stomach. But be this as it may, I have only now to deal with the experiments of Professor Taylor and Dr.