consideration, and that, although it was not proved beyond a doubt that death was the result of mortal agency, yet if they arrived at the conclusion that the prisoner had a strong motive for destroying the deceased, and had possession of an instrument by which to effect that purpose, there was a _prima facie_ case made out which would lead them to the next question, namely, was the state of the body, or was it not, consistent with the fact of a violent death? There is no infuriated and Press-prejudiced populace regarding the prisoner as a great criminal, and thirsting after her blood. No! The judge says to the jury you cannot, according to the law of the land, whatever your suspicions in this case may be, find a verdict of guilty; there is no proof of a murder having been committed, and the prisoner must be acquitted on that charge. That may be a vicious law, but it is the law, and had no more right to be violated in the case of William Palmer than in that of any other individual. If it be, the whole proceedings of the trial are a mockery and a delusion--a disgraceful pandering to out-of-door prejudices and a lasting disgrace to this country.” This is the language of a man who writes as an unprejudiced observer, and, I am told, with a deep knowledge of the law. If it be, as he says, that this is the law in cases of this nature, with what face can my brother be executed when precisely the very reverse was done by your lordship in his case, and, when forgetting or despising all the precedents of mercy with which our jurisprudence abounds, you took only the sanguinary view of the evidence, and enforced everything against the prisoner by argument, by gesture, and by look.