Where several persons fire at one and the same time, it is practically impossible to say which one is responsible for the shot which actually causes death in the person fired upon. This ignorance has often helped to soothe the soldier of sensitive conscience when, with others, he has had to obey the order to fire on a spy or other person liable to death under martial law. This indirectly suggests one of the most curious possibilities of legal inadequacy. What is the position of a soldier ordered by his officer to fire on a mob? Metaphorically, he is between the devil and the deep sea. If he fires on the mob, he may be called upon to account for his act to a civil tribunal, and thus be found guilty of murder and hanged. While, on the other hand, if he does not fire upon the mob, when so ordered by his officer, he may be tried by court martial and shot! To turn from murder to suicide and attempted suicide, much suggests itself as anomalous and even absurd in the laws and customs of England in this connection. There is an element of farce in the arrest, detention and prosecution of some wretched man or woman who has unsuccessfully endeavoured to escape from life.[30] Suicide attracts numberless persons, excited by neurotic impulses. Sometimes a woman, _enceinte_ and deserted by her lover, throws herself into a canal or into the river. A man guilty of misappropriation, on the verge of having his misdeed discovered, takes poison, shoots himself or tries to jump in front of a railway train. If the poison comes up, if the shot is inaccurate, or if there is a pit of salvation between the railway metals, the would-be suicide may find himself before a magistrate the next morning, with a burly policeman as his accuser. A well-meant anomaly. When it has run its course, the accused may be proceeded against by the person who has suffered through his act of misappropriation. There are women who in moments of pique or unreasoning rage, do away with themselves, largely because they cannot conveniently vent it upon the cause of their discomfiture. Among women-servants of inferior type, there is a tendency to commit suicide because of some faithless lover, or other cause. These misguided creatures generally first write a pathetic letter, disjointedly stating their grievances, with the full confidence that it will be published in the newspapers of the Sunday following the inquest. This strange vanity throws a pitiful ray on the phases of the ignorant mind. Of course, suicides are not confined to the lower or intermediate classes, but they are more generally found among persons whose lot is not alleviated by fortune or gentle birth.