proved,” says the writer, “that Cook died from strychnia, there is no difficulty in connecting Palmer with the administration of it. But if that fact is not proved, then the other circumstances do not lead to the irresistible inference of his guilt.” For the sake of all parties concerned in the case, for the sake of society at large, and, above all, for the sake of justice, let that point be set at rest; and let that be done in this manner--Mr. Herapath says he can detect strychnia wherever present. Then let there be a certain number of animals killed, some by strychnia and some by other means; let their interiors be taken out and put in jars, each separately and numbered, and verified with all the necessary formalities, Mr. Herapath being kept in the dark as to which was the poisoned jar and which was not; and if he then can distinguish between those which contained strychnia and those that did not, let the Home Secretary have the moral courage to step in and avert the disgraceful and horrible-to-contemplate possibility of having one day, in token of his acknowledged innocence, to wave a flag over the grave of William Palmer, to which he has been consigned upon insufficient evidence, despite of the revelations of science, and because (to use the words of Dr. Taylor), “society demands a victim.” My lord, I have been told by lawyers that all presumptive evidence of crime should be admitted cautiously, for the law holds that it is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer. And there is a famous case which so strongly illustrates this noble principle of the law that I may remind your lordship of it here. The mother and reputed father of a bastard child were observed to take it to the margin of the dock in Liverpool, and, after stripping it, to throw it into the dock. The body of the infant was not afterwards seen, but, as the tide of the sea flowed and reflowed into and out of the dock, the learned judge who tried the father and mother for the murder of their child, observed that it was possible the tide might have carried out the living infant, and the prisoners were acquitted. The case is mentioned by Garrow, one of the ablest and purest judges that ever adorned the bench; and it has been brought before me as illustrative of the wise and merciful caution which the judges of the past were used to exercise before they persuaded juries to condemn men who might possibly be innocent. How your lordship would have decided this trial had it taken place before you, and had the public Press, under the influence of insurance societies, hounded on the many to a cry for blood, I can easily anticipate; but that the great judge who ruled for mercy adjudicated according to the well-known principles of the Constitution is what I am assured by every man who has made the English law his study, and who is too pure to be influenced by a shout of “Crucify him! crucify him!” will admit without the slightest shadow of a doubt. Take,