“Yet a difference should no doubt be made between cases like these, where the unhappy person commits a deed for which he has a natural horror, and against which he struggles, and those in which the criminal, so to speak, has a natural relish for his crime, delights, and persists in it. Take the case of Gilles Garnier, which occupied the attention of all France in the reign of Louis the Thirteenth. ‘This man-wolf,’ (_loup-garou_,) says Bodin, ‘carried away a girl from ten to twelve years of age, killed her with his hands and teeth, and eat the flesh from her thighs and arms. Some time afterwards he strangled a boy ten years old, and eat his flesh. Still later he killed another boy, from twelve to thirteen, with the intention of eating him, but was prevented.’ He was arrested, convicted, and burnt alive. There was here no insanity; the horrid deeds were all avowed with the minutest circumstances, the intention was express, and the crime was repeated and persisted in. I cannot regard this monster as innocent, for I cannot discover that he resisted or struggled against the diabolical impulse. “Take the case of Leger, a recent case, related by Dr. Cazeauvielh, from the monster’s own confessions. He lived in a cave, and had an unnatural craving to feed on human flesh. One day he perceived a little girl, ran to her, passed a handkerchief around her body, threw her upon his back, plunged into the woods and hastened to his cave, where he killed and buried her. Arrested three days after, he immediately told his name, where he lived, and said that having received a blow on his head, he had left his country and his family. In his prison he related how he had lived in caverns in the rocks. ‘Wretch,’ said the physician to him,‘you have eaten the heart of this little girl. Confess the truth.’ He then answered in trembling, ‘Yes, I did so, but not all at once.’ After that he sought no longer to conceal his crimes, and with great coolness and indifference related a long series of horrible deeds which he had committed. He revealed them, even to the minutest particulars; he produced the proofs, and pointed out to the court the place of the crime, and the manner in which it had been consummated. The judge had no need to question him, for he himself disclosed all of his own accord. On the trial, his features wore a mild and placid aspect. He seemed quite unconcerned and insensible, except his face assumed an air of gayety and satisfaction during the reading of the indictment. After about half an hour’s deliberation, the court rejected the plea of insanity, and declared him guilty of homicide, with premeditation and lying in wait. He heard his sentence with the same placid indifference, and was executed a few days after. This seems to me to prove that the middle ages were not more severe than we are to-day.”