be extremely judicious and valuable; if, says he, effusion of blood be found between the dura mater and scull, and if a bruise on the scalp corresponds to the part, we may conclude that it has been caused by the blow; but if blood is found between the dura mater and the brain, though we should discover the marks of blows, or even fracture of the scull, still the question may be entertained whether the patient might not have been attacked with apoplexy during the struggle. _How soon is the deceased supposed to have died, after the alleged cause of his dissolution._—This is a very important question, for by learning the length of the interval between the attack and the death, we shall at once be enabled to accept as probable, or reject as impossible, the accounts given by the friends and neighbours. Thus, poisons, in general, require some time for their operation. Apoplexy does not generally destroy life under several hours[7]. CASE III. THE PERSON IS FOUND DEAD, AND THE HISTORY OF HIS DISSOLUTION IS UNKNOWN. The deep obscurity in which this case is necessarily involved, can alone be dissipated by the concentrated light of circumstantial evidence, derived from the inspection of the dead body, in the exact situation and posture in which it was found, and that of the surrounding objects; from the information afforded by competent witnesses, respecting the previous history of the individual in question; and, lastly, from anatomical dissection. In conducting such an inquiry the most trifling incidents connected with the deceased should not pass unheeded, for however unimportant they may at first, individually, appear, we shall often find that in combination they will afford the principal data for the solution of our problem. With how many examples will the history of crime present us where the more minute circumstances have alone furnished the “damning proofs” of guilt? Their apparent insignificance in such cases would seem to exempt them even from the usual precautions of concealment, and more especially from those artful measures by which the designing assassin seeks to cast an impenetrable veil over the more direct evidences of his crime. 1. _Circumstances to be learnt by the Inspection of the Body._ That the inspection of the body could furnish the satisfactory means of discovering the cause of its death, is an opinion which has been very naturally entertained from the earliest ages; although it is easy to perceive that the extent and just value of the indications, which such a practice is capable of affording, could never have been appreciated until the more advanced periods of physiological knowledge.