From your knowledge of the actual state of much of the population in the worst part of the metropolis, derived from your experience in the several local offices you have held, and especially your experience as a superintendent registrar, do you believe that the inspection of the body to verify the fact of death, and, as far as inspection and inquiry on the spot may do so, to determine the cause of death, would be important securities not merely for the truth of the registration, but valuable securities for life itself?—Most certainly I do. Had there been such an inspection and verification prior to the year 1831, the horrible system of destroying human beings for the purpose of selling their bodies could not have been carried on to the extent to which I know it existed at that period. Being then the vestry clerk of St. Paul, Covent Garden, the officers of which were bound over to prosecute Bishop, Williams, and May, for the murder of the Italian boy, the duty of conducting the prosecution entirely devolved upon me. In the course of my inquiries, I elicited beyond all doubt that the practice of burking, as it was then called, had prevailed to a considerable extent in the metropolis. Would inspection, do you conceive, and proper inquiry as to the cause of death, have prevented such murders?—Most effectually so, I conceive. I may mention that they took out the teeth of the younger subjects, and sold them to the dentists. The Italian boy, it would have been seen, had no teeth; the teeth had been punched out in such a manner as to have been remarkable. Though the motives to such dreadful practices are removed under the securities for the public safety imposed in connexion with the Anatomy Act, yet in cases of other attempts against life, do you consider that the requiring a certificate of the fact of death, verified on inspection before burial, would interpose useful practical obstacles for the prevention of murder, and the protection of life?—Most assuredly. Mr. Partridge, the surgeon of King’s College, at whose instance the murderers were taken into custody, in the cases referred to, expresses a similar opinion as to the importance of the proposed verification of the fact and cause of death by a proper officer.