hardly any blood was effused into the cavity of the chest. Coupling these circumstances with the trifling hemorrhage during life, and the fact that she had much vomiting, and some convulsions immediately before death, Pyl satisfied himself that she had not died of the wound: and accordingly the signs of corrosion in the mouth and throat, and of irritation in the stomach, with the subsequent discovery of the remains of some nitric acid in a glass in her room, proved that she had died of poison.[84] _Causes of the disappearance of poison from the body._—Chemical evidence is not always attainable in cases of poisoning. Various causes may remove the poison beyond reach. Hence although poison be not detected in the body,—the experimenter being supposed skilful and the poison of a kind which is easily discovered,—still it must not be concluded from that fact alone that poison has not been the cause of death. For that which was taken into the stomach may have been all discharged by vomiting and purging, or may have been all absorbed, or decomposed; and that which has been absorbed into the system may have been all discharged by the excretions. 1. It may have been discharged by vomiting and purging. Thus on the trial of George Thom for poisoning the Mitchells, held at Aberdeen at the Autumn Circuit of 1821, it was clearly proved, that the deceased had died of poisoning by arsenic; yet by a careful analysis none could be detected in the stomach or its contents; for the man lived seven days, and during all that time laboured under frequent vomiting.[85] In a remarkable case related by Dr. Roget, arsenic could not be found in the matter vomited twenty-four hours after it had been swallowed;[86] in another related by Professor Wagner of Berlin, that of an infant who died in twelve hours under incessant vomiting after receiving a small quantity of arsenic, none could be detected in the stomach;[87] in another which I have described in a paper on arsenic, although the person lived only five hours, the whole arsenic which could be detected in the tissues and contents of the stomach did not exceed a fifteenth part of a grain;[88] in an American Journal there is a striking case of a grocer, who died eight hours after swallowing an ounce of arsenic, and in whose body none could be found chemically,—at a period however antecedent to the late improvements in analysis;[89] and in a case communicated to me not long ago by Mr. Hewson of Lincoln, where arsenic was given in solution, and death ensued in five hours, none of the poison could be detected either in the contents or tissues of the stomach by a careful analysis conducted according to the most modern principles.