A difficult legal question arose, after Tawell’s death, with reference to his Australian land, which the Crown re-granted to his widow and family, after its forfeiture by his conviction; whether this re-grant should prevail over the claims of a previous purchaser, a retired auctioneer, who had houses on it, who alleged that he had purchased it for a _bonâ fide_ consideration, under a sufficient power of attorney, executed before Tawell’s conviction. “The affixing the seal of the colony to this grant by Sir W. Denison, created a serious difference between that governor and his chief minister, Mr. Cowper. The seal was affixed pursuant to the instructions of the Secretary of the Colonies, who only acted in the matter in accordance with the opinion of the Attorney and Solicitor-General of England. A part of the sworn duty of a colonial governor is to obey the instructions of the Secretary of State for the Colonies.”[19] The governor, therefore, sent his private secretary for the great seal of the colony and himself executed the new deed. On this being done the owners of the property found the ground cut from under their feet, and it never came before the law courts, but it is believed that some compromise was effected with the family of Tawell, and so the matter ended. TRIAL OF GEORGE BALL FOR POISONING HIS MOTHER WITH PRUSSIC ACID. _July, 1860_, HOME CIRCUIT, LEWES, _before_ COLERIDGE, CHIEF JUSTICE _of Common Pleas_. BARROW, _for the Prosecution_. SERJEANT BALLANTINE _for the Defence_. This case, really of misadventure, is reported, briefly, as showing the carelessness with which dangerous medicines may, no doubt most unintentionally, be administered even by professional men, the culpable ignorance in some of those chemists who deal in such deadly preparations. The accused, a medical man, but not in regular practice, had for some time attended his mother, a very ailing old lady, and been in the habit of giving her small doses of prussic acid, as a remedy for violent attacks of vomiting to which she was subject. On the 11th of July in consequence, he purchased of a Mr. Moswell, a chemist in Lewes, a drachm of Scheele’s prussic acid, equal to 60 “minims,” and gave her a dose of 4 “minims.” The result was favourable, and the old lady went for a walk. On her return, however, she again complained, and the accused administered another dose of prussic acid, evidently from its effects, a deadly quantity, as she hardly got to her bedroom before she became insensible, and died almost instantaneously. The accused believed he had given her only seven drops, the proper quantity to be given. That he gave her seven drops was not doubted, but that the size of drops differ under circumstances as much as the strength of Scheele’s preparation of the acid, will be seen from the following evidence. _Mr. Scrate_, a surgeon at Lewes (who was sent for by the accused, found the lady dead and the accused apparently in a very distressed state of mind), said:—