_Whether any, and what marks, punctures, contusions, echymoses, dislocations, or other injuries, are to be observed about the face, neck, chest, or any other parts of the body; and how far their appearance and character demonstrate the nature of the operation, or instrument by which they were inflicted?_—Upon the discovery of a dead body, it becomes one of the first objects to ascertain the nature, extent, and direction of any wounds, or marks of violence, that may be observed. Whether they be merely superficial, or extend beyond the local injury and penetrate the cavities, will be a matter of subsequent investigation by dissection. The examination of deep wounds, in the first instance, is comparatively unimportant, for they are not liable to obliteration by incipient putrefaction; whereas marks and bruises, unless they be carefully inspected before the body undergoes this change, will not be easily distinguished from spontaneous discolouration. This precaution is highly important in those cases in which we suspect the person to have been strangled; when we shall generally discover a circular mark about the neck produced by extravasated blood, or, if the act has been committed by the hand, irregular patches corresponding in some places with the fingers and nails of the assailant; traces of violence will be frequently also discoverable on the chest which will answer to the impression of the knees. Upon examining the body of _Sir John Dinely Goodere_, who was murdered on board the _Ruby_ ship of war in 1741, the surgeon’s mate stated that he found the marks of nails and fingers on his neck; this testimony was satisfactorily fortified by another witness, who declared that on looking into the cabin, he had seen a hand on the neck of the deceased. An accomplice also confessed that after having strangled him with their hands, they drew a rope tight about his neck.[13] A very satisfactory instance of the same kind occurred to the author of the present work, during his residence in the county of Cornwall; and he feels no inconsiderable satisfaction in reflecting upon the train of circumstances, through which he was enabled, by his evidence at the assizes of the county for 1814, to secure the conviction of the murderer. The evidence was wholly circumstantial, and the relation of it is well calculated to illustrate the great importance of the particular line of investigation, which it is the object of the present chapter to elucidate. For these reasons he is induced to compile from his notes the following brief sketch of the case. A Cornish peasant, engaged in attending upon the light-house on the western coast, was found dead in a field near the public road leading from Penzance to the “Land’s end,” on Sunday, December the 12th, 1813; he was lying in a dry ditch, with his stick at a little distance from him; one of his shoes was down at the heel, and both were smeared with mud; his pockets were empty. The body