THE DEFENCE.

(_Seventh Day Continued._)

Mr. Serjeant SHEE then rose to open the defence. He said: In rising to

perform the task which it now becomes my duty to discharge, I feel,

gentlemen of the jury, an almost overwhelming sense of responsibility.

Once only has it before fallen to my lot to defend a fellow-creature

charged with a capital offence. You can well understand that to take a

leading part in a trial of this kind is sufficient to disturb the

calmest temper, and try the clearest judgment, even if the effort only

last for one day. But how much more trying is it to stand for six long

days under the shade, as it were, of the scaffold, conscious that the

least error in judgment may consign my client to an ignominious death

and public indignation! It is useless for me to conceal that which all

your endeavours to keep your minds free from prejudice cannot wholly

efface from your recollection. You perfectly well know that for six long

months, under the sanction and upon the authority of science, an opinion

has almost universally prevailed that the blood of John Parsons Cook has

risen from the ground to bear witness against the prisoner; you know

that a conviction of the guilt of the prisoner has impressed itself upon

the whole population, and that by the whole population has been raised,

in a delirium of horror and indignation, the cry of blood for blood. You

cannot have entered upon the discharge of your duty--which, as I have

well observed, you have most conscientiously endeavoured to

perform--without, to a great extent, sharing in that conviction. Before

you knew that you would have to sit in that box to pass judgment between

the prisoner and the Crown, you might with perfect propriety, after

reading the evidence taken before the coroner’s jury, have formed an

opinion with regard to the guilt or innocence of the prisoner. The very

circumstances under which we meet in this place are of a character to

excite in me mingled feelings of encouragement and alarm. Those whose

duty it is to watch over the safety of the Queen’s subjects felt so much

apprehension lest the course of justice should be disturbed by the

popular prejudice which had been excited against the prisoner--they were

so much alarmed that an unjust verdict might, in the midst of that

prejudice, be passed against him, that an extraordinary measure of

precaution was taken, not only by Her Majesty’s Government, but also by

the Legislature. An act of Parliament, which originated in that branch

of the Legislature to which the noble and learned lord who presides here

belongs, and was sanctioned by him, was passed to prevent the

possibility of an injustice being done through an adherence to the

ordinary forms of law in the case of William Palmer. The Crown, also,

under the advice of its responsible Ministers, resolved that this

prosecution should not be left in private hands, but that its own law

officer, my learned friend the Attorney-General, should take upon

himself the responsibility of conducting it. And my learned friend, when

that duty was intrusted to him, did what I must say will for ever

redound to his honour--he resolved that, in a case in which so much

prejudice had been excited, all the evidence which it was intended to

press against the prisoner should, as soon as he received it, be

communicated to the prisoner’s counsel.

I must therefore tell my unhappy client that everything which the

constituted authorities of the land--everything which the Legislature

and the Law Officers of the Crown could do to secure a fair and

impartial trial has been done, and if that unhappily an injustice should

on either side be committed, the whole responsibility will rest upon my

Lords and upon the jury. A most able man was selected by the prisoner as

his counsel not many weeks ago, but, unfortunately, was prevented by

illness from discharging that office. I have endeavoured, to the best of

my ability, to supply his place; but I cannot deny that I labour under a

deep feeling of responsibility, although the national effort, so to

speak, which has been made to insure a fair trial is a great cause of

encouragement to me. I am moved by the task that is before me, but I am

not dismayed. I have this further cause for not being altogether

overcome in discussing the mass of evidence which has been laid before

you. When the papers in the case came into my hands, I had formed no

opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the prisoner. My mind was

perfectly free to form what I trust will prove to be a right judgment

upon the case, and--I say it in all sincerity--having read these papers,

I commenced his defence with an entire conviction of his innocence. I

believe that truer words were never pronounced than the words he uttered

when he said “Not Guilty” to this charge, and if I fail in establishing

his innocence to your satisfaction, I shall have very great misgivings

that my failure is attributable only to my own inability to do justice

to his case, and not to any weakness in the case itself. I will prove to

you the sincerity with which I declare my conviction of the prisoner’s

innocence by meeting the case for the prosecution foot to foot, and

grappling with every difficulty which has been suggested by my learned

friend. You will see that I shall avoid no point which has been raised.

I will deal fairly with you, and I know that I shall have your patient

attention to an address which must, I fear, unavoidably be a long one,

but in which no observation will be introduced which does not

necessarily and properly belong to the case.

The proposition which my learned friend undertakes to establish entirely

by circumstantial evidence, may be shortly stated. It is, that the

prisoner, having in the second week in November made up his mind that it

was his interest to get rid of John Parsons Cook, deliberately prepared

his body for the reception of a deadly poison by the slower poison of

antimony, and that he afterwards despatched him by the deadly poison of

strychnine. Now, no jury will convict a man of the crime thus charged

unless it be made clear, in the first place, that he had some motive for

its commission,--some strong reason for desiring the death of the

deceased; in the second place, that the symptoms before death, and the

appearances of the body after death, are consistent with the theory that

he died by poison: and, in the third place, that they are inconsistent

with the theory that death proceeded from natural causes. Under these

three heads I shall discuss the large mass of evidence which has been

laid before you; and I must, by adhering to that order, exhaust the

whole subject, and leave myself no chance of evading any difficulty

without immediate detection. Before, however, I proceed to grapple in

these close quarters with the case for the Crown, allow me to restore to

its proper place in the discussion, a fact which, although it was by no

means concealed by my learned friend in that address by which he at once

seized upon your judgments, appeared to me to be thrown too much into

the shade--the fact, I mean, that strychnine was not found in the body

of the unfortunate deceased. If he died of the poison of strychnine--if

he died within a few hours, or within a quarter of an hour or twenty

minutes of the administration of a strong dose--if the _post-mortem_

examination took place within six days of the death, there is not the

least reason to suppose that between the time of the injection of the

poison and the paroxysms of death, there was any dilution of it, or any

ejection of it by vomiting. Never, therefore, unless chemical analysis

is altogether a failure in the detection of strychnine, were

circumstances more favourable for its discovery. But, beyond all

question, strychnine was not found. Whatever we may think of the

judgment and experience of Dr. Taylor, we have no reason to doubt that

he is a very skilful chemist; we have no reason to believe--in fact, we

know to the contrary--that he and Dr. Rees did not do all that the

science of chemical analysis could enable men to do to detect the

poison. They had a distinct intimation from the executor and near

relative of the deceased, that he, for some cause or another, had reason

to suspect that poison had been administered. They undertook an analysis

of the stomach (which, without now going into details upon that point,

was not on the whole in an unfavourable condition) with a firm

expectation that if it was there it would be found, and without any

doubt as to the efficiency of their tests. Then, in December, they

say,--

“We do not find strychnine, prussic acid, or any trace of opium.

From the contents having been drained away” (not drained out of the

jar, you know) “it is now impossible to say whether any strychnine

had or had not been given just before death, but it is quite

possible for tartar emetic to destroy life if given in repeated

doses; and, so far as we can at present form an opinion, in the

absence of any natural cause of death, the deceased may have died

from the effects of antimony in this or some other form.”

But they afterwards attended the inquest, and having heard the evidence

of Mills, of Mr. Jones, of Lutterworth, and of Roberts (who spoke to the

purchase of strychnine on the morning of the death), they came to the

conclusion that the pills administered to Cook on the Monday and the

Tuesday night contained strychnine. Dr. Taylor came to that conclusion,

notwithstanding his written opinion that Cook might have been poisoned

by antimony, and notwithstanding the fact that no trace of strychnine

was found in the body. I call your attention now to this circumstance in

order to claim for it its proper place in the discussion. The gentlemen

who have come to the conclusion that strychnine may have been in the

body, although it was not found, have arrived at that conclusion from

experiments of a very partial kind indeed; they contend that when

strychnine has once done its fatal work and become absorbed into the

system it ceases to be the thing it was when taken into the system; it

becomes decomposed, its elements are separated from each other, and

therefore are no longer capable of responding to the tests which would

certainly detect its presence if undecomposed. That is their case. They

account for its not being found, and for their belief that it destroyed

Cook, by that hypothesis. Now, it is only an hypothesis. No authority

for it can be drawn from experiments, and it is supported by the opinion

of no eminent toxicologists but themselves. It is only fair to them, and

to Dr. Taylor in particular, to say that Dr. Taylor does propound that

theory in his book. It is, however, only a theory of his own; he does

not support it by the authority of any distinguished toxicologist, and

when we recollect that his knowledge of the matter--good, humane

man!--consists in having poisoned five rabbits twenty-five years ago,

and five others since this question was raised, it cannot have much

weight. But I will call before you a number of gentlemen of high

eminence in their profession as analytical chemists, who will state

their utter renunciation of that theory. I will call Dr. Nunneley, a

fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons and a professor of chemistry,

who attended the case at Leeds, which has been described to you, and

Dr. Williams, professor of _materia medica_ at the Royal College of

Surgeons in Ireland, for eighteen years surgeon to the City of Dublin

Hospital. Dr. Letheby, one of the ablest and most distinguished men of

science in this great city, professor of chemistry and toxicology in the

Medical College of the London Hospital, and medical officer of the City

of London, will tell you that he rejects the theory as a heresy unworthy

the belief of scientific men. Dr. Nicholas Parker, of the College of

Physicians of London, and professor of medicine, Dr. Robinson, of the

College of Physicians, and Mr. Rogers, professor of chemistry, concur

with Dr. Letheby.

Lastly, I will call Mr. William Herapath, of Bristol, probably the most

eminent chemical analyst in this country, who also utterly rejects the

theory. All of those gentlemen contend that if not only half a grain of

strychnine, but even 1-50th part or less has once entered into the human

frame, it can and must be discovered by the tests known to chymists.

They will tell you this, not as the result of a few experiments, for

ever regretted, upon five rabbits, but from a large experience as to the

operation of the poison upon the inferior animals, created, as you know,

for the benefit of mankind, and many of them from their experience as to

its effects upon the human system. I will satisfy you from their

evidence, that if you admit the correctness of the tests which were

used, the only safe conclusion at which you can arrive is that

strychnine not having been found in the body, it could never have been

there. They all agree, too, that no degree of putrefaction or

fermentation in the human system could so decompose strychnine that it

should no longer possess those qualities which cause it, in its

undecomposed state to respond to chemical tests. I will now apply myself

to a question which in my judgment is of equal, if not greater,

importance--the question whether, in the second week of November, 1855,

the prisoner had a motive for the commission of this murder--a strong

reason for desiring that Cook should die. I never will believe that

unless it were made clear that it was his interest to destroy Cook, you

would come to the conclusion that he had committed such a crime. It

seems to me abundantly clear upon the evidence that not only was it not

the interest of Palmer that Cook should die, but that the death of Cook

was the very worst calamity that could befall him, and that he could not

possibly be ignorant that it would be followed by his own ruin. That it

was followed by his immediate ruin we know. We know that at the time

when it is said he commenced to plot Cook’s death he was in a condition

of the greatest embarrassment--an embarrassment which in its extreme

intensity had come upon him but recently--an embarrassment, too, in some

degree mitigated by the circumstance that the acceptances he is said to

have forged were those of his mother--a lady of large fortune living in

the town. My learned friend’s hypothesis is, that not until he was in a

state of the greatest embarrassment did he wish to destroy Cook. My

learned friend stated to you “That, being in desperate circumstances,

with ruin, disgrace, and punishment staring him in the face, which could

only be averted by means of money, he took advantage of his intimacy

with Cook, when Cook had become the winner of a considerable sum, to

destroy him, in order to obtain possession of his money.” Let us test

this theory. Let us relieve our minds for a moment from the anxiety we

must always feel when the life of a fellow-creature is at stake, and,

looking at it as a mere matter of business, let us ask ourselves whether

in the second week of November Palmer had any motive to commit this

crime.

When a long correspondence is read to a jury, who are without the same

means of testing its importance as the judge or the counsel, they

frequently do not attach that weight to it which it deserves. But I

watched the correspondence which was read to you yesterday with an

anxiety which no words can express, because I firmly believed that in it

the innocence of the prisoner lay concealed; that it proved not only

that the prisoner had no motive to kill Cook, but that Cook’s death was

ruin to him. Allow me to call your attention to the relation in which

these men stood to each other. They had been intimate as racing friends

for two or three years; they had had many transactions together; they

were jointly interested in at least one racehorse, Pyrrhine; they

generally stayed at the same hotels; they were seen together upon almost

all the race courses in the kingdom; they were known to be connected in

adventures upon the same horses at the same races; and although, Cook

being dead, the mouth of the prisoner being sealed, and transactions of

this kind not being recorded in regular books, it is impossible to give

you positive evidence as to their relations to one another, it is

abundantly clear that they were very closely connected. In August, 1855,

money was wanted either by Cook or Palmer, and Palmer applied to Pratt

for it. He seems to have wanted £200, to make up a larger sum, having

already £190 in Pratt’s hands; and he offered as security for the

advance his friend Mr. Cook, whom he described as a gentleman of

respectability and substance. We do not know the exact state of Cook’s

affairs at that time. Such a fortune as he had might have been thrown

down in a week with the life he was leading; but a young man who is

reckless as to the mode in which he employs his money and has only

£13,000 may for a year or two pass before the world for a man of

considerable means. It is not every one who will go to Doctors’ Commons

to ascertain the precise amount of the property he has inherited. Mr.

Cook, of Lutterworth, kept his racehorses, lived expensively, was known

to have inherited a fortune, and was altogether a person whose

friendship was of considerable importance to a man like Palmer.

Recollect that I am not now defending Palmer against the crime of

forgery, nor am I defending him against the imputation of reckless

improvidence in obtaining money at an enormous discount. But as early

as May, 1855, Palmer and Cook were thus circumstanced. What was their

position in November?

The evidence of PRATT, and the correspondence which he proved, can leave

no doubt on our minds upon that subject. Among a mass of bills,

amounting altogether to £11,500, there were two, of £2,000 each, due the

last week in October, two others, amounting to £1,500, having become due

some time before, but being held over from month to month upon payment

by Palmer, who was liable for them, of what was called interest at the

rate of 60 per cent. These three sums--£2,000, £2,000, and £1,500--were

the embarrassments which were pressing upon him in the second week in

November, and, be it observed, they were pressed upon him by a man who,

although he would, doubtless, have been glad to get his principal, would

also, upon anything like security, have been very well pleased to

continue to receive interest. How can capital, if well secured, be

better employed than in returning 40 or 60 per cent.? In this state of

things Palmer, in answer to an urgent demand for money, came up to town

on the 27th of October. Pratt then insisted that if Palmer could not pay

one of the £2,000 bills which had just become due he should pay

instalments, in addition to the enormous interest charged upon it, and

it was agreed that £250 should be paid down, £250 upon the 31st of

October, and a further sum of £300 as soon afterwards as possible,

making a total payment on account of that bill of £800, to “quiet” Pratt

or his client, and to induce him to let the bill stand over. On the

ninth of November the £300 was paid, and then a letter was written, to

which I beg your particular attention. On the thirteenth of November,

the day that Polestar won the race, Pratt wrote to Palmer that the case

(“Palmer v. the Prince of Wales Insurance Company”) had been laid before

Sir F. Kelly, that in the opinion of several secretaries of insurance

offices the company had not a leg to stand upon, and that the mere fact

of the enormous premium would go a great way to get a verdict. The

letter concluded--“I count most positively on seeing you on Saturday.

Do, for both our sakes, try and make up the amount to £1,000, for

without it I shall be unable to renew the £1,500 due on the ninth.”

Pratt had threatened to issue a writ against Palmer’s mother. Palmer had

almost gone upon his knees to beg him not to do so, and this letter

really meant, “Unless you give me £200 more and make up £1,000, a writ

shall be served upon your mother.” That letter is written on the

thirteenth of November. Palmer gets it at Rugeley, whither he had gone

from the racecourse on the day that Polestar won. What does he do? He

instantly returns to Shrewsbury, gets there on Wednesday, sees Cook.

They say he doses him. We will see how probable that is presently. Cook

goes to bed in a state I will not describe, gets up next morning much

more sensible than he went to bed, goes upon the racecourse, returns

with Palmer to Rugeley on the Thursday, goes to bed, gets up next

morning still uncomfortable, but able to go and dine with Palmer on that

day (Friday). On that day, the sixteenth of November, Palmer writes to

Pratt--

“I am obliged to come to Tattersall’s on Monday to the settling, so

that I shall not call and see you before Monday, but a friend of

mine will call and leave you £200 to-morrow, and I will give you

the remainder on Monday.”

The person who ordinarily settled Cook’s accounts was a person named

Fisher, a wine-merchant in Shoe-lane, who was called first in this case;

and on that very day (the day on which Cook dined with Palmer), Cook

writes to him:--

“It is of great importance, both to Mr. Palmer and myself, that a

sum of £500 should be paid to a Mr. Pratt, of 5, Queen-street,

May-fair, to-morrow, without fail. £300 has been sent up to-night,

and, if you will be kind enough to pay the other £200 to-morrow, on

the receipt of this, you will greatly oblige me, and I will give it

to you on Monday at Tattersall’s.”

There is a postscript, which I will read, but upon which I will at

present make no observation--“I am much better.” What is the fair

inference from these letters? I submit that the inference is, that at

that date Cook was making himself very useful to Palmer. Pratt was

pressing for an additional sum of £200. Palmer communicated his

difficulty to Cook, who at once wrote to his agent to pay the £200. More

than this,--the £300 referred to in the letter as having been paid

“to-night” [The Attorney-General.--“The other day”] means one of these

things--it either means the £300 which had been sent up on the 9th of

November (and if it did, then Cook knew all about it--probably had an

interest in Palmer’s transactions with Pratt); or it was a false

representation, put forward merely for the purpose of putting a good

face upon the matter to Fisher; or it means that on that day £300 had

somehow or other come to their hands, and had been by Cook made

applicable to the convenience of Palmer. Whichever way you take it it

proves to demonstration that Palmer and Cook were playing into each

other’s hands with respect to that heavy encumbrance upon Palmer, and

that Palmer could rely upon Cook as his fast friend in any such

difficulties. Although, when we take the sum total of £11,500, his

difficulties sound large, yet the difficulty of the day was nothing like

that, because, in the reckless spendthrift way in which they were

living, putting on bills from month to month, and paying an enormous

interest per annum, the actual outlay upon the day of putting on was not

considerable. I submit that this letter shows that on the day on which

it is said that Palmer was poisoning Cook, the 16th of November, Cook

was acting towards him in a most friendly manner, was acquainted with

his circumstances, and willing to relieve his embarrassments, and

actually did devote a portion of his earnings to Palmer’s purposes. I

will, however, make this plainer. Part of the case of my learned friend

is that Palmer, leaving Cook ill in bed at Rugeley, ran up to town on

the Monday, and intending to despatch Cook that night, obtained

possession of his Shrewsbury winnings by telling Herring, who was not

Cook’s usual agent, that he was authorized by Cook to settle his

Shrewsbury transactions at Tattersall’s. On the Monday, as on the

Tuesday, Cook, though generally indisposed, was during the greater part

of the day quite well. He got up and saw his trainer and two jockeys.

The theory of the case for the prosecution is that he was quite well,

because Palmer was not there to dose him. You will see how grossly and

contemptibly absurd that is presently. Being well on Monday and Tuesday,

do not you think that, had not Cook known that Palmer did not intend to

go to his regular agent, Fisher, he would have been very much surprised

that he on Tuesday morning received no letter from that gentleman,

informing him of the settlement of his transactions? And could Palmer,

as a man of business, have relied upon an absence of such surprise and

alarm on the part of Cook?

We have the evidence of Fisher, that he, at Cook’s request, contained in

the letter of the 17th November, advanced the £200, which he would, had

he settled Cook’s affairs, have been entitled to deduct from the money

he would have received at Tattersall’s on the Monday. He did not settle

those affairs, and the money has never been paid. That explains the

whole transaction. Cook and Palmer understood each other perfectly well.

It was the interest of both of them that Palmer should be relieved from

the pressure of Pratt. Accordingly, Cook said, “This settlement shall

not go through Fisher’s hands. We have got him to pay the £200 to Pratt,

but it shall not be repaid to him on Monday. I will let Palmer go to

London and settle the whole thing through Herring.” That was done, and

accordingly Fisher has never been paid. There is a letter to which I

will particularly call your attention. It is one sent by Palmer to Pratt

on the 19th November, 1855:--“You will place the £50 which I have just

paid you and the £450 you will receive by Mr. Herring--together

£500--and the £200 you received on Saturday” [That is the £200 which

Fisher paid to Pratt at the express request of Cook,] “towards payment

of my mother’s acceptance for £2,000 due on the 25th of October, making

paid to this day the sum of £1,300.” Taking that letter with the one

which Cook wrote to Fisher on Friday, the 16th, can you doubt that on

that day Cook was a most convenient friend to Palmer, who could not by

possibility do without him? It does not end there. Cook died at 1

o’clock on the morning of Wednesday the 21st of November. If we want to

know what influence that death had upon Palmer, we must take it from the

letters. On the 22d of November--and I am sure you will make some

allowance for a day having elapsed from the death of Cook--Palmer writes

to Pratt, “Ever since I saw you I have been fully engaged with Cook and

not able to leave home.” Unless he murdered Cook, that is the truest

sentence that ever was penned. He watched the bedside of his friend. He

was with him night and day. He attended him as a brother. He called his

friends around him. He did all that the most affectionate solicitude

could do for a friend, unless he was plotting his death.

“Ever since I saw you I have been fully engaged with Cook, and not

able to leave home. I am sorry to say, after all, he died this day.

So you had better write to Saunders; but, mind you, I must have

Polestar, if it can be so arranged; and, should any one call upon

you to know what money or moneys Cook ever had from you, don’t

answer the question till I have seen you.”

“I will send you the £75 to-morrow, and as soon as I have been to

Manchester you shall hear about other moneys. I sat up two full

nights with Cook, and am very much tired out.”

And did he not? Was it not true? It may not be true that he sat up the

whole of the nights, but he was ready to be called if Cook should be

ill. Elizabeth Mills says, that after the first serious paroxysm on the

Monday night she left Palmer in the arm-chair, sleeping by the side of

the man whom the prosecution say he had attempted to murder. No;

murderers do not sleep by their victims. What was Pratt’s answer to

Palmer’s letter? I will read it, that you may see what quick ruin Cook’s

death brought upon Palmer. That answer, dated November 22, is as

follows:--

“I have your note, and am greatly disappointed at the non-receipt

of the money as promised, and at the vague assurances as to any

money. I can understand, ’tis true, that your being detained by the

illness of your friend has been the cause of not sending up the

larger amount, but the smaller sum you ought to have sent. If

anything unpleasant occurs you must thank yourself.”

“The death of Mr. Cook will now compel you to look about as to the

payment of the bill for £500, on the 2d December.”

“I have written to Saunders, informing him of my claim, and

requesting to know by return what claim he has for keep and

training. I send down copy of bill of sale to Crubble to see it

enforced.”

So that the first effect of Cook’s death was, in the opinion of Pratt,

who knew all about it, to saddle Palmer with the sum of £500. Now I will

undertake to satisfy you that the transactions out of which that bill

for £500 arose were transactions for Cook’s benefit, and in which Palmer

lent his name to accommodate Cook, upon whose death he became primarily

and alone responsible for the bill. Let me state the view which my

learned friend (the Attorney-General) takes of that transaction,

because I intend to meet his case foot by foot, and I shall, I hope

convince him that, if he had had the option, he would never have taken

up this case--the Crown would never have appeared in it. The universal

feeling in the country was, however, such as to render it impossible

that the case should not be tried, after the verdict of wilful murder

had been obtained upon the evidence of Dr. Taylor; and the Crown felt

that it would be neglecting its solemn duty to protect every one of the

Queen’s subjects, if it did not take care that a man against whom there

was so much prejudice--a man leading the life which Palmer has led,

disgraced, as it is said, by forgeries to a large amount, and a gambler

by profession--should have a fair trial. There was no way of securing

that, as my learned friend at once saw, no possibility of the prisoner’s

being saved, except by giving to the counsel who defended him all the

information which my learned friend himself possessed. The view which my

learned friend takes of the £500 transaction, the theory on which he

thinks it probable that Palmer plotted the death of Cook, is this:--

“Pratt still declining to advance the money, Palmer proposed an

assignment by Cook of two race horses, one called Polestar, which

won the Shrewsbury Races, and another called Sirius. That

assignment was afterwards executed by Cook in favour of Pratt, and

Cook, therefore, was clearly entitled to the money which was raised

upon that security, which realised £375 in cash, and a wine warrant

for £65. Palmer contrived, however, that the money and the wine

warrant should be sent to him, and not to Cook. Mr. Pratt sent down

his check to Palmer in the country on a stamp, as the act of

parliament required, and he availed himself of the opportunity now

afforded by law of striking out the word ‘bearer’ and writing

‘order,’ the effect of which was to necessitate the endorsement of

Cook on the back of the cheque. It was not intended by Palmer that

those proceeds should fall into Cook’s hands, and accordingly he

forged the name of John Parsons Cook on the back of that cheque.

Cook never received the money, and you will see that, within ten

days from that period when he came to his end, the bill in respect

of that transaction, which was at three months, would have fallen

due, when it must have become apparent that Palmer received the

money, and that, in order to obtain it, he had forged the

endorsement of Cook.”

That is the view which the prosecution take of the case, and I think I

shall be able to satisfy you that it cannot possibly be the correct one.

We know from Pratt exactly what took place. Palmer wrote to him

saying,--

“I have undertaken to get the enclosed bill cashed for Mr. Cook.

You had the £200 bill of his. He is a very good and responsible

man. Will you do it? I will put my name to the bill.”

So that it was represented to Pratt as a transaction for the

accommodation of Cook. Pratt’s answer to that is:--

“If Mr. Cook chooses to give me security, I have no objection; but

he must execute a bill of sale on his two horses, Polestar and

Sirius; more, he must execute a power of attorney, and his

signature to both must be witnessed by some solicitor in the

country, so that I may be quite sure that it is a really valid

security. If Cook will do that I will give him £375 in money, and a

wine warrant for £65; which, charging £10 for expenses, and £50 for

discount, will make £500.”

There can be no doubt that Cook attached great value to Sirius and

Polestar, which mare was, probably, then booked for the engagements in

which she won so much money at Shrewsbury; and it is to the last degree

improbable that he would have executed this bill of sale, with a power

of attorney to enable the mortgagee or assignee to enforce it at once

effectually, and yet have received no money. Would he, if such had been

the case, have remained quiet to the day of his death, and never have

written to Pratt to say that although he had sent him the required

documents he had never received the money? Cook was as much in want of

money as Palmer was, and would he thus have thrown away his money? Is it

credible that if Palmer had misappropriated the cheque he could for

three months have kept Cook in ignorance of the transaction? Is it not

probable that Cook’s name was written on the cheque with his full

knowledge and consent? It is not suggested that there was any attempt to

imitate his handwriting. Is it not more probable that Cook, who, I will

prove to you from the letter, wanted ready money, and who would probably

be put to inconvenience by receiving only a cheque, which he would not

get cashed for a day or two, took the ready money--£315, which Pratt

sent at the same time to Palmer--and that Palmer took the cheque? On the

6th of September Palmer wrote to Pratt:--

“I received the cheque for the £100, and will thank you to let me

have the £315 by return of post, if possible; if not, send it me

(certain) by Monday night’s post to the Post-office, Doncaster. I

now return you Cook’s papers signed &c., and he wants the money on

Saturday, if he can have it; but I have not promised it for

Saturday. I told him he should have it on Tuesday morning at

Doncaster; so please enclose it with mine, in cash, in a registered

letter, and he must pay for it being registered. Do not let it be

later than Monday night’s post to Doncaster.”

So that Palmer asked that it should be sent like his own, Cook,

according to the letter, wanting it in cash. Pratt replied to Palmer,

acknowledging the receipt of the documents, and promising that he would

send him his money to Doncaster on the Monday, and would endeavour to

let Cook have his at the same time. On the 9th of September Palmer wrote

to Pratt:--

“You must send me, for Mr. Cook, by Monday night’s post (to the

Post-office, Doncaster,) £385 instead of £375, and the wine

warrant, so that I can hand it to him with the £375, and that will

be allowing you £50 for the discount, &c. I shall then get £10, and

I expect I shall have to take the wine, and give him the money; but

I shall not do so if you do not send £385, and be good enough to

enclose my £315 with it, in cash, in a registered letter, and

direct it to me to the Post-office, Doncaster.”

In these letters there is an intimation that Cook wanted the money on

the Saturday. He was inconvenienced by only getting a cheque upon

London, which he could not immediately change; and, therefore, Palmer

gave him the money and took the cheque. It is remarkable that, when we

look to the banking account of Palmer at Rugeley, we find that the £375

is paid in by somebody to his account, but that the £315 is not paid in

to his account at all. The bill was accepted for Cook’s accommodation,

Cook gave security for it, and he never, during the three months which

elapsed before his death, complained to Pratt that he had not received

the money for it. I submit that the fair version of the transaction is

that which is given in a letter from Palmer--that Palmer let Cook have

the cash, and himself took the cheque, having Cook’s authority to put

his name at the back of it. How else can you account for the silence of

Cook, and for the fact that the £375 is paid into the Rugeley Bank, but

there is no trace of the £315? This being so, the result of Cook’s death

was to make Palmer liable for the £500 bill, on the back of which he had

put his name. Therefore, I submit to you, that on the second motive

suggested by my learned friend (the Attorney-General), the case has

entirely failed. In addition to this, however, we find from these

letters the difficulties which the death of Cook brought upon Palmer. We

find the disappointment of Pratt that he could send no more money, the

bill for £500, the danger of losing Polestar, which Palmer very much

wanted to have, and which Pratt would, unless paid the £500, bring to

the hammer in order to realise his security; and we find that inquiries

were at once apprehended from Cook’s friends as to the moneys which

Pratt had paid to Cook, and the probable value which the latter had

received for the endorsements and acceptances which he had given. There

is another, although not so strong a reason, why it is improbable that

Palmer should have desired the death of Cook. Mr. Weatherby has told us

to day that, although it frequently happens that the moneys won at a

race are sent up by the clerk of the course in a week after the race,

yet that does not always happen. On Tuesday, November the 20th, on the

night of which day he died, Cook, who was then perfectly sensible,

perfectly comfortable and happy, and enjoying the society of his friend

Mr. Jones, gave to Palmer a cheque for £350 upon Weatherby’s. If Palmer

killed Cook, and it happened that Fraill had not sent up the money so as

to be there by Wednesday morning, Weatherby’s would not pay the cheque,

nor would they have cashed it if they had received information that Cook

had died during the night. It actually happened that the cheque when

presented was not paid, because Fraill did not send up the money. Was it

probable that Palmer, having got from Cook a cheque for £380, would have

run the risk of losing his money by destroying him the same night?

It is suggested that he obtained this cheque fraudulently, and then,

lest Cook should detect the fraud, destroyed him. That was not likely to

answer his purpose. He might be certain that directly the breath was out

of Cook’s body, Jones would go to Mr. Stevens; that Stevens and

Bradford, Cook’s brother-in-law, would go down to Rugeley; that the

death being sudden there would most likely be a _post-mortem_

examination; and that, instead of settling for the £500 bill and the

£350 cheque with Cook, he would have to settle with hard men of

business, men who cared nothing for him, who would probably look upon

him as a “leg” upon the turf, and would regard neither his feelings nor

his interests, but would let him go to ruin any way he might, not

stirring a finger to save him. Is it probable that a shrewd intelligent

man of business would make such a choice as that. More than this, we

know that at that very time Herring held one bill for £500, and three

for £200 each, to which there were the names of both Palmer and Cook,

and for all of which, either in the whole or in part, Cook must, unless

he rushed to his own ruin, provide. If Palmer put Cook to death, he

immediately became solely liable, not only for these bills, but for

that, as security, for which the bill of sale was executed on Sirius and

Polestar, which would not be so easily renewed as those for the large

sums on which the enormous usury was paid. That bill would very likely

soon find its way to his mother, and that it should do so would not suit

Palmer, for his mother is a respectable and serious person, who,

although she loved her son, did not like and gave no encouragement to

his gambling; nor did that excellent and most honourable man who stands

by him--his brother, who was estranged from him for a length of time,

until this calamity came upon him, simply because he disapproved the

gambling by which he lived. Cook being dead, there was, therefore, no

one to save Palmer from ruin, for in all this voluminous evidence there

is not the smallest trace that there was any one else in the world who

would lend Palmer his name or would assist him to obtain money. If it

be, as it is stated, a fact that he forged the name of his mother, is

not that conclusive evidence that he had no other resource but the

goodnature--the easiness, perhaps the folly of Cook? Is it then credible

that under such circumstances he would have desired to bring upon

himself not merely the creditors and executors of Cook, but their

solicitors--men who, in the discharge of their duty to their clients,

can have no sympathy for any one, and with whom no arrangement is

possible? I have, therefore, I hope, shown you that Palmer had an

interest in the life of Cook. But, more than that, was it safe for him

that Cook should die? Palmer was a man who had a shrewd knowledge of the

world and a knowledge of his profession, and, among other things, of

chemistry. My learned friends have put in a book which was found in his

house, and among other notes one in which there is this, “Strychnia

kills by causing tetanic fixing of the respiratory muscles.” In the same

book there are many other notes.

Lord CAMPBELL: The Attorney-General stated that he did not place much

reliance upon that note.

Mr. Serjeant SHEE: My learned friend did not press this note, but he

thought it was evidence which ought to be before you (the jury). I use

it to satisfy you that Palmer had studied his profession sufficiently to

know, and knew perfectly well, that if strychnine were administered it

would in all probability kill the victim in horrible convulsions, in a

very short time, and in a way so striking as to be the talk of a small

neighbourhood like Rugeley for a month or more--time enough to alarm

everybody and provoke inquiry into the circumstances of the death, which

must certainly, in all probability, end in the detection of guilt. If

that is so, was he at that time so circumstanced as to render it safe

for him to run the risk of such suspicions? His brother, Walter Palmer,

had died in the month of August; and, unless his mother forgave him, or

recognized the acceptance, his only hope of extraction from his

difficulties lay in getting from the Prince of Wales office the money

due to him as assignee of the policy on his brother’s life. That his

chance of getting that money was good is shown by the fact that he

refused the offer of the office to return the premium, and that it was

upon it that Pratt had obtained the discounts, and had resolved, under

the direction of Palmer, to put it in suit. It was really the only

unpledged property which he had, and how he was situated with regard to

it appears from the letters and from the evidence. The Insurance

company, annoyed at being called upon to pay so large a sum, were

determined to do all they could to resist it. They accordingly sent

Inspector Field and his man to Stafford to make inquiries. They could

not do this without talking, and this had been going on for some time.

[To show that this had been the case the learned Serjeant read the

deposition of the witness Deane, who was examined yesterday.] So that

just before the death of Cook, Palmer knew himself to be the subject of

what he appeared from his actions to consider a most unfounded and

unwarrantable suspicion. He put the policy into the hands of an attorney

to enforce payment of the sum due upon it. The office met the claim by

insinuations and inquiries which were of a nature to destroy his

character and to bring upon his head the suspicion of a murder. The

pressure by Pratt upon Palmer to meet the £2,000 bills did not commence

until the office disputed the payment of that policy. All went as smooth

as possible as long as Pratt held what he believed to be a good

security, but when they began to dispute that, Pratt writes to Palmer

and tells him that the state of things is changed. After saying that

nothing can be done towards compelling the office to pay until the 24th,

he says in his letter of the 2d of October:--

“This, you will observe, quite alters arrangements, and I therefore

must request that you make preparations for meeting the two bills

due at the end of this month.... In any event, bear in mind that

you must be prepared to cover your mother’s acceptances for the

£4,000, due at the end of the month.”

There was the pinch. The office would not pay, and bills for £4,000 were

coming due. If anything occurred to increase the suspicions of the

office--which was very very unwilling to pay--all chance of the £13,000

was lost. That £13,000 is sure to be paid unless that man (pointing to

the prisoner) is convicted of murder. As sure as he is saved, and saved

I believe he will be, that £13,000 will be paid. There is no defence--no

pretence of a defence. The premium taken was an enormous one, and that

£13,000 is good for him and will pay all his creditors. This

correspondence of which my learned friend must have taken a view

different from any which I can take, but which I am sure he would have

put in, whatever had been his view of it--this correspondence saves the

prisoner if there is common sense in man. Here is another letter from

Pratt to Palmer, dated October the sixth:--

“I have your note, acknowledging receipt by your mother of the

£2,000 acceptance, due on the 2nd October. Why not let her

acknowledge it herself? You must really not fail to come up at

once, if it be for the purpose of arranging for the payment of the

two bills at the end of the month. Remember I can make no terms for

their renewal, and they must be paid. I will of course hold the

policy for so much as it is worth, but in the present position of

the affair, no one except your mother, who is liable upon the

bills, can look upon it as a security. [That was because Simpson

and Field were down there making inquiries.] Do not neglect

attending to this, for under a recent act bills of exchange are now

recovered in a few days. You know and can appreciate my conduct in

avoiding all trouble and annoyance to your mother; but to that

there is a limit. I cannot by any representation be a party to

inducing any body to believe that security exists where there is

doubt upon the point. P. S. I cast no doubt upon the capability of

the office to pay, but in the nature of things, with so large an

amount in question, it is not to be surprised at, if, they think

they have grounds of objection, they should temporize by delay.”

Does not this show that on the sixth of October suspicions were hanging

over Palmer’s head, which would come down with irresistible momentum and

crush him if there were a suspicion of another violent and sudden death?

Do you think that a man who had written in his manual what were the

effects of strychnine would risk such a scene as that poison would

develope in the presence of the dearest and best friend of Cook--a man

whom he could not influence--and a medical man, who loved Cook so well

as to sleep in the same room with him, that he might be ready to attend

him in case he needed assistance? Is that common sense? Are you going to

enforce such a theory as that which Dr. A. Taylor propounded as to the

effects which strychnine produces upon rabbits? Impossible--perfectly

impossible! I will prove the position in which Palmer stood still more

clearly. On the 10th of October Pratt, in a letter addressed to him,

says:--

“I may add that I hear they (the insurance company) have been

making inquiries in every direction.” To be sure, they had. Field

the detective officer had been at Stafford, where he could make

inquiries as well as at Rugeley.

“But on what they ground their dissatisfaction is as yet a mystery.

In any event no step can be taken to compel payment until after the

4th of December.”

It is plain that suspicions were then rife, or that attempts were made

to excite suspicions against him with regard to the death of Walter

Palmer. On the 18th of October Pratt enclosed to Palmer a letter from

the solicitor of the company, stating that the directors had determined

upon declining to pay the amount claimed; but that, although the facts

disclosed in the course of their inquiries would have warranted their

retention of the premiums which had been paid, they were prepared to

refund them to any one who might be shown to be legally entitled to

them. Palmer determined that the money should be paid; and a case was

laid before Sir Fitzroy Kelly. If anything happened to Cook by foul play

he had no more chance of receiving this £13,000 than of obtaining

£130,000. From all this I infer, not only that Palmer had no interest in

Cook’s death, but that he had a direct pecuniary interest in his living.

I think it is impossible that I should be so much mistaken as that a

considerable portion of what I have advanced should not be worthy of

your attention, and I therefore submit to you, to the Court, and to my

learned friend, that the case as to this supposed motive for the crime

has failed. We now proceed to the facts of the case, and in considering

them it will be necessary to group them without entire reference to

dates. I will first inquire whether the symptoms with which Cook was

attacked and the appearances presented by his body after death were

consistent with the theory of his having died by strychnia poison, and

inconsistent with that of his having died from some other natural cause.

It is under this head that I shall discuss, I hope not unduly, the

medical evidence in this case, and present to you such observations as

occur to me on the witnesses who have been called to support the view

which the Crown takes of the effect of that medical testimony. Cook died

at one o’clock in the morning of Wednesday, November 21, in the presence

of Jones. It was no sooner light than Jones posted to town and saw his

stepfather, Mr. Stevens. Mr. Stevens went down to Rugeley and was

introduced to Palmer. Palmer went with him to the Talbot Arms, and

uncovered the corpse--a bold thing to do if he had murdered him. The

body was so little emaciated or affected by disease that Stevens

wondered he could be dead; but he observed some little rigidity about

the muscles. Stevens’s suspicions were roused; he asked Palmer to

dinner, questioned him about the betting-book, got angry that it was not

produced, dissembled with Palmer, cross-examined him, went up to town,

met him at Euston-square, again at Wolverton, at Rugby, and at Rugeley.

At last he gave him to understand that he suspected him and intended to

probe the whole matter to the bottom. He resolved to have a

_post-mortem_ examination, and that examination took place.

The appearances presented by the body after death were such as might

have been anticipated by those who were acquainted with his course of

life, his general health, his pursuits, and, not to say anything hard of

him, his vices, and the drinking, racing company which he kept. His

father had died at thirty years of age, his mother about the same age, a

few years after her second marriage; his sister was dead; and he himself

was affected with a pulmonary disorder. Cook had been suffering for a

long time from a sore throat, and bore about him all the signs and

indications of having led a licentious life. Indeed, he appears to have

been about as dissipated a young man as can be well imagined. I do not

mean to say that he was utterly depraved, or that he was lost to all

sense of honour and propriety; but it does not admit of doubt that his

manner of living was wild, riotous, and extravagant. His complaints

indicated his excesses, and he was avowedly addicted to pursuits the

reverse of commendable. When his body was opened there was evidence of a

soreness of the tongue. I do not go to the length of saying that there

was anything to lead to the inference that there was an actual sore at

the time of death, but there were follicles and symptoms, if not of a

recent, certainly of a not very remote ulcer. The inside of the mouth

had been ulcerated, and the skin taken off on both sides. There is

abundant evidence to show that Cook was himself of opinion that these

symptoms were syphilitic. He could scarcely be persuaded to obey the

instructions of Dr. Savage, the respectable and very competent physician

whom he consulted, and, though it is admitted that he was not “fool

enough to go to quack doctors,” it is very certain that he was weak

enough to follow the counsels of every medical man who would venture to

give him advice when coincided with his own opinion that mercury was the

best thing for his complaint. The spots which are the fatal

characteristics of his dreadful malady had already made their appearance

on his body, and he was haunted by the apprehension that some day, as he

was running about the race-course, his face would be suddenly covered

over with copper blotches, which would leave no doubt on the minds of

those who saw them as to the true nature of his disease. Many a man

similarly affected has retrieved his position, redeemed his character

and become a virtuous member of society.

Far be it from me, then, to say one word that would press with undue

severity on the memory of the dead; but no false delicacy shall deter me

from the discharge of my duty, and I make these remarks not in an unkind

or censorious spirit, but for the sake of truth, and because the state

of Cook’s health is a most important element in this inquiry. It is

certain that it was his own opinion that he was suffering from virulent

syphilis, and in this opinion the medical men who originally attended

him did not hesitate to concur. That he did not correct his habits is

evident from the fact, that within a recent period of his death he had

again become diseased. When his body was opened on the second

examination, there were found between the delicate membrane which the

spinal marrow covers, and is called the arachnoid, and embedded to some

extent in the next covering, not so delicate, termed the _dogma mater_,

granules about one inch in extent; and I will satisfy you, upon the

evidence of witnesses whose authority will not be questioned, that if

the body had been opened in the dead-house of any hospital in this

metropolis, those granules would have been regarded as symptoms

affording conclusive explanation of the cause of death. Such, then, was

the condition of Cook’s health--a condition but partially and

imperfectly revealed by the first _post-mortem_ examination. That

examination was not conducted with the same minuteness and precision

that circumstances rendered necessary on a subsequent occasion, and the

syphilitic disease was neither ascertained nor suspected. The stomach

was taken out, and you have heard the suggestion, which, were it not

that the Court has ruled it to be of no significance, I should have been

prepared to disprove that Palmer attempted to interfere with the

operation by shoving against the medical man engaged in it. The

inference sought to be deduced was, that some of the stomach escaped

from the jar: but we have the evidence of Dr. Devonshire himself that

such was not the fact. None of it did escape, and it was sent up in its

entirety to London, there to be analysed by Dr. Taylor and Dr. Rees.

Those gentlemen examined it with the knowledge that, owing to the report

of Palmer having purchased a fatal drug from Mr. Roberts on the day of

the death, there was a suspicion of foul play. Mr. Stevens talked of the

fact to Dr. Taylor; and, with the consciousness of it on his mind, that

gentleman wrote a letter, attributing the death to antimony. [Dr. Taylor

intimated dissent.]

Well, if the letter is not to be so understood, it is at all events

susceptible of this interpretation--that the death may have been caused

by antimony. Dr. Taylor attends the coroner’s inquest, which, in all

probability, is held in consequence of his own letter. He hears the

evidence of Jones, Roberts, and Mills, and it is but natural to presume

that these are the witnesses whose testimony has the greatest influence

on his opinion. He forms his judgment on the evidence of chambermaids,

waitresses, and housekeepers, and contrary to the opinion of the medical

man who attended Cook in his last illness (for be it remembered he had

no encouragement from Mr. Jones, the surgeon, of Lutterworth, a man of

age and character to form a sound decision on the case); he comes boldly

and at once to the conclusion that his original notion about antimony

having been the cause of death was a mistake, and then he has the

incredible imprudence--an imprudence which has necessitated this trial,

or at all events rendered it necessary that it should take place in this

form and place--to declare upon his oath to the coroner’s jury that he

believes that the pills given to Cook on Monday and Tuesday contained

strychnine, and that Cook was consequently poisoned. That evidence of

his is carried on the wings of the press into every house in the United

Kingdom. It becomes known throughout the length and breadth of the land

that Dr. Taylor, a man who has devoted his life to science, a man of the

highest personal character, and who stands well with his medical

friends, has declared--not as a conjectural opinion, mark you, nor as a

reserved opinion delivered in a private room to a few men whose

discretion might be relied on--but, that in the public room of a public

inn, in a little village, where everything that occurs is known, he has

declared upon his solemn oath that it is his belief that Cook died

because pills containing strychnine were administered to him on the

nights of Monday and Tuesday. He had himself failed to discover the

faintest traces of strychnine, yet, at the coroner’s inquest he had the

hardihood to declare his conviction that the pills contained strychnine,

and that Cook died of them. His evidence is neither consistent with

itself nor with the opinion of Mr. Jones. He takes upon him to pronounce

positively, in the face of the world, that Cook’s disease was nothing

else than tetanus, and tetanus, too, of the kind that can be produced by

poison only, and that poison strychnine.

Such was Dr. Taylor’s testimony; and on such testimony the coroner’s

jury returned their verdict. But, merciful heaven! in what position are

we placed for the safety of our own lives and those of our families, if,

on evidence such as this, men are to be put on their trial for foul

murder as often as a sudden death occurs in any household! If science is

to be allowed to come and dogmatise in our courts--and not science that

is successful in its operations or exact in its nature, but science that

is baffled by its own tests, and bears upon its forehead the motto, “A

little learning is a dangerous thing”--if, I say, science such as this

is to be suffered to dogmatise in our courts, and to utter judgments

which its own processes fail to vindicate, life is no longer secure, and

there is thrown upon judges and jurymen a weight of responsibility too

grievous for human nature to endure. If Dr. Taylor had detected the

poison by his own tests, he, with his long experience in toxicological

studies, would have been an excellent witness for the Crown; but he has

not found the poison, and not having seen the patient, and knowing

nothing of his death-bed symptoms beyond what he gathered from the

evidence of an ignorant servant girl, and of Mr. Jones, whose testimony

does not show that he agrees with him in opinion, Dr. Taylor thinks

himself justified in declaring upon his oath in a public court that the

pills contained strychnine, and that Cook was poisoned. If verdicts are

to be moulded on testimony such as this, what medical practitioner is

safe? On what ground does Dr. Taylor vindicate his opinion? He does not

appear to have ever seen one solitary case of strychnine in the human

subject, yet, with the full knowledge that the consequences of his

assertion might be disastrous to the prisoner at the bar, he has the

audacity to assert that the pills, which for anything he knows to the

contrary were the same that Dr. Bamford prepared, contained strychnine,

and that Cook was poisoned by it. I have quoted the sentiment, “a little

learning is a dangerous thing,” and assuredly to no science is that

maxim so applicable as to the medical. Of all God’s works there is no

other which so eloquently attests our entire dependence on Him, and our

own nothingness, as that mortal coil in which we live, and breathe, and

have our being. We are struck with amazement as we contemplate it. We

feel, we see, we hear; yet the instant we attempt to give a reason for

these sensations our path is crossed by the mystery of creation, and all

we know is that God created man--that he is our Omnipotent Maker and we

the work of His hands. Yet we fancy that we can penetrate all mysteries,

and there are no bounds to our arrogance. There has been much talk in

this inquiry of the two kinds of tetanus--idiopathic and traumatic. Dr.

Todd, urged by the Court to explain the former, described it as

“constitutional.” Perhaps “self-generating” would have done as well, but

let that pass. But how is our knowledge advanced by translating

“idiopathic” as constitutional? It is easy to give an English

translation of that Greek compound, but the thing is to explain what the

translation means. What is the meaning of the phrase “constitutional

tetanus?”

Lord CAMPBELL: Tetanus not occasioned by external injury.

Mr. Serjeant SHEE: Just so, my lord, or in other words, tetanus not

referable to any known cause. But, in truth, idiopathic means in a

general sense “unaccountable.” Not that constitutional tetanus is always

and invariably so, but that cases of tetanus do continually occur of

which you can only suspect the cause, and attribute it by hypothesis to

a “cold,” or some other vague accident. In such cases you say that the

disease is idiopathic, and not traumatic. The Crown will have it that

Cook’s was the tetanus of poison, but it is almost an assumption to say

that it was tetanus at all. That he died of convulsions, or immediately

after them, is certain, and that they were convulsions similar to those

from which he suffered on the preceding night, is beyond all doubt. But

what pretence is there for positively asserting that they were tetanus

at all? The evidence of Mr. Jones, fairly interpreted, cannot be

construed otherwise than as intimating an impression that they were

convulsions which partook of the tetanic character. That might be, and

yet the malady might not be tetanus. It is bad reasoning--most defective

logic--to argue without positive proof of the fact that the disease was

tetanus, and no other tetanus in the world than that produced by poison.

Following in the trail dragged for them by the toxicologists, the Crown

have thought proper to impute the death of this man to the poison of

strychnine. It is for them to prove the fact. We contest it; but it by

no means follows that we should be bound to explain the death on other

grounds. If we can satisfy you that this man was assailed by any one of

the numerous kinds of convulsions to which humanity is liable, and that

he was asphyxiated or deprived of life when writhing in some sudden

spasm or paroxysm, we shall have done all that can in fairness be

demanded of us, unless, indeed, the Crown shall be prepared to prove

that Cook’s symptoms were irreconcilable with any other doctrine than

that of death by strychnine. This they have not done and cannot do. I

propose to call your attention to the statements of the witnesses Mills

and Jones, with respect to the symptoms which they observed in Cook on

the evenings of Monday and Tuesday; and having done so, I will submit to

your candid judgment whether those symptoms may not be more naturally

accounted for by attributing them to convulsions which are not tetanic

at all, and most assuredly not tetanic in the distinctive character of

strychnine, but which may rather be classed under those ordinary

convulsions by means of which it constantly pleases Providence to strike

men down without leaving upon their bodies the faintest indications from

which the cause of death may be inferred. You have it upon the authority

of medical men of the highest distinction, that it sometimes occurs that

men in the prime of life and in the full vigour of health, are smitten

to death by convulsions that leave no trace upon the body of the

sufferer. The statements Mills and Jones are such as to render it

entirely unnecessary to resort to the hypothesis of any kind of tetanus,

much less to that of strychnine, in accounting for the death of Cook.

Regard being had to the delicate state of his health, and to the

continually recurring derangement of his constitution, it is far safer

to conclude that he died of ordinary convulsions than of any description

of tetanus, whether traumatic, idiopathic, or that produced by poison.

Nor must we omit to inquire into the state of his mind. He went to

Shrewsbury races in the imminent peril of returning from thence a ruined

man. His father-in-law, Mr. Stevens, assured Palmer that there would not

be four thousand shillings for those who had claims on his estate. From

the necessity he was under of raising money at an enormous discount, we

may easily infer that he was in desperate difficulties; and that, unless

some sudden success on the turf should retrieve his fortunes, his case

was hopeless. His health shattered, his mind distracted, he had long

been cherishing the hope that “Polestar” would win, and so put him in

possession of a sum, amounting in stakes and winnings, to something like

a thousand guineas. The mare, it is true, was hardly his own, she had

been mortgaged, and if she should lose, she would become the property of

another person.

Picture to yourself what must have been the condition, mental and

bodily, of that young man when he rose from his bed on the morning of

the races. It is scarcely possible that as he went down to breakfast

this thought must not have crossed his mind, “My fate is trembling in

the balance: this is the crisis of my destiny; unless my horse shall win

and give me one chance more of recovering myself, to-night I am a

beggar.” With these feelings he repairs to the race-course. Another race

is run before Polestar is brought out. His impatience is extreme. He

looks on in a state of agonising excitement. Will the minutes never fly?

At last arrives the decisive moment. The time has come for his race. The

flag is dropped; the horses start; his mare wins easily, and he, her

master, has won a thousand guineas! For three minutes he is not able to

speak, so intense is his emotion. Slowly he recovers his utterance, and

then how rapturous is his joy! He is saved, he is saved! Another chance

to retrieve his position, one chance more to recover his character! As

yet, at all events, he will not be a disgrace to his family and his

friends. Conceive him to be, with all his faults an honourable young

man, and you may easily imagine what his ecstacy must have been. He

loves the memory of his dead mother--he still reverences the name of his

father--he is jealous of his sister’s honour, and it may be that he

cherishes silently in his heart the thought of some other being dearer

still than all, to whom the story of his ruin would bring bitter

anguish. But he is not ruined; he will meet his engagements like an

honourable man. There is now no danger of his being an outcast, an

adventurer, a black-leg. He will live to redeem his position, and to

give joy to those who love him. With such thoughts in his heart, he

returns to his inn in a state of indescribable elation, and with a

revulsion from despair that must have convulsed--though not in the sense

of illness--every fibre of his frame. His first idea is to entertain his

friends, and he does so. The evidence does not prove that he drank to

excess, but he gave a champagne dinner, and we all know that is a

luxurious entertainment, at which there is no stint and not much

self-respect. That evening he did not spend in the society of Palmer;

indeed, it is not clear in whose company he spent it. But we find him on

the evening of Wednesday at the “Unicorn,” with Saunders, his trainer,

and a lady. On Thursday he walks upon the course, and Herring

remonstrates with him for doing so, as the day is damp and misty, and

the ground wet. That night he is seized with illness, and he continues

ailing until his death at Rugeley.

Arrived at Rugeley, it is but natural to suppose that a reaction of

feeling may have set in. Then the dark side of the picture may have

presented itself to his imagination. The chilling thought may have come

upon him that his winnings were already forestalled, and would scarcely

suffice to save him from destruction. It is when suffering from a

weakened body, and an irritated and excited mind, he is attacked with a

sickness which clings to his system, leaves him without any rest,

incapacitates him from taking food, distracts his nerves, and places him

in imminent danger of falling a victim to any sudden attack of

convulsions to which he may have a predisposition. He relished no

society so much as that of Palmer, whose residence was immediately

opposite the Talbot Arms Inn, where he was lying on his sick bed. For

two nights he had been taking opiate pills, prescribed by Dr. Bamford.

On Sunday night, at twelve o’clock, he started as from a dream in a

state of the utmost excitement and alarm. He admitted afterwards that

for two minutes he was mad, but he could not ascribe it to anything

unless to his having been awakened by a squabble in the street. But do

no such things happen to people of sound constitutions and regular

habits? Do no such people awaken in agony and delirium because there is

a noise under their windows? No, these are the afflictions of the

dissipated and the anxious, whose bodies are shattered, and whose minds

are distracted. Next day, Monday, he was pretty well, but not so well as

to mount his horse, or to take a walk in the fields. He could converse

with his trainer and jockey, but he took no substantial food, and drank

not a drop of brandy-and-water. You will bear in mind that Palmer was

not with him that day. In the middle of the night he was seized with an

attack similar in character to that of the night preceding, but

manifestly much milder, for he retained his consciousness throughout

it, and was not mad for a moment. The evidence of Elizabeth Mills is

conclusive on the point. [The learned Serjeant read some passages from

the deposition of the witness in question.] At three o’clock on the

following day (Tuesday) Mr. Jones, the surgeon, of Lutterworth, arrived,

and spent a considerable time--probably from three to seven o’clock--in

his company. They had abundant opportunity for conversing

confidentially, and they were likely to have done so, for they were very

intimate, and Jones appears to have been on more familiar terms with

Cook than was any other person, not even excepting Mr. Stevens. Nothing

occurred, in the entire and unbounded confidence which must have existed

between Mr. Cook and Mr. Jones, to raise any suspicions in the mind of

Mr. Jones; and at the consultation which took place between seven and

eight o’clock on Tuesday evening, between Jones, Palmer, and Bamford, as

to what the medicine for that evening should be, the fit of the Monday

night was not mentioned. That is a remarkable fact. The Crown may say

that it is remarkable, inasmuch as Palmer knew it, and said not a word

about it; but I think that it shows that the fit was so little serious

in the opinion of Cook that he did not think it worth mentioning to his

intimate friend Jones. If Cook had not given to Elizabeth Mills a rather

exaggerated description of what had occurred, would he not have said to

Mr. Jones, when he came from Lutterworth to see him, “You can’t judge of

my condition from my appearance now, for I was in a state of perfect

madness over night, and in fact, I thought that I was going to die?”

Evidently he would have said something of that sort, and if he had, Mr.

Jones would have mentioned it at the consultation.

My inference, then, is that the first statement which was made by

Elizabeth Mills was the correct statement of what occurred. Palmer, in

the presence of Jones, administered two pills to Mr. Cook, which it is

supposed poisoned him--which contained a substance which sometimes does

its deadly work in a quarter of an hour--which has done it in less, and

which rarely exceeds half an hour; and we are asked to believe that, in

spite of Cook’s objecting in the presence of his friend to take the

pills, Palmer positively forced them down his throat at the imminent

peril of the man falling down in a few minutes in convulsions evidently

tetanic. As in the course of the examination of Mr. Jones the word

“tetanus” was used, it is right that I should say a word upon that

subject. The word “tetanus” is not in his deposition; but I tell you

what is in it, and it is one of the most remarkable features in this

case, because it shows how people, when they get a theory into their

heads, will fag that theory,--how they will stretch it to the very

utmost, and make it fit into the exact place in which they wish to put

it. We have it now in the evidence of Dr. Taylor that at the inquest he

sat next to Mr. Deane, the attorney’s clerk, and suggested the questions

which it was necessary in his judgment to put in order to elicit the

truth as to the symptoms of Mr. Cook’s disease. Now, fancy Dr. Taylor,

who had had a letter telling him that there was a suspicion of

strychnine, and who had all but made up his mind at that time to state

positively upon oath his opinion that the pills given on Monday and

Tuesday nights contained strychnine; fancy----

THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL.--I am sorry that my learned friend should be

misled upon a matter of fact; but I am told that Dr. Taylor was not

present when Mr. Jones was examined.

Mr. SHEE continued: Then the observation which I was about to make does

not apply; and all I can say is, that Mr. Jones had probably in his

mind’s eye, when he gave that evidence, a recollection of what he had

seen on the Tuesday night. He could not have seen very accurately,

however, for he said that there was only one candle in the room, and

that he had not light enough to see the patient’s face, and that he

could not tell whether there was much change in the countenance of the

deceased--a very important fact, when the doctors all say that Cook’s

disease cannot have been traumatic tetanus, because there is always a

peculiar expression of the countenance in those cases, which was not

observable in Cook. However, Mr. Jones, who is a competent professional

man, gave his evidence, and it is quite clear that the notion of tetanus

must have entered into his mind, because I find in the depositions that

the coroner’s clerk first put down “tetinus;” and the probability, I

think, is that that disease did occur to Mr. Jones at the time, and that

he used the word, because the clerk never could have invented it. Then

“tetinus” is struck out; then the word “convulsions” is written, and

also struck out; and, as the sentence stands, it is, “There were strong

symptoms of violent convulsions.” What is the fair inference from that?

Why, that the man who saw Cook in the paroxysm did not think himself

justified in saying that it was a tetanic convulsion at all, though it

was very like tetanus. Now, I will just call your attention to the

features of general convulsions, as described in cross-examination by

the medical witnesses, in order to show that the convulsions of which

Cook died were not tetanic, properly speaking, but were of that strong

and irregular kind which cannot be classed under the head of tetanus,

either traumatic or idiopathic, but under the head of general

convulsions. I propose upon this part of the case to read an extract

from the work of Dr. Copland, which will enable you to judge whether

Cook’s complaint bears a greater resemblance to general convulsions than

to traumatic tetanus or strychnine tetanus. Before doing so, however, I

would observe that the only persons who can be supposed to know anything

of tetanus not traumatic are physicians, and that not one of that most

honourable class of men (who see the attacks of patients in their beds,

and not in the hospital), has been called by the Crown, with the

exception of Dr. Todd, who is a most respectable man, and who gave his

evidence in such a way as to command the respect of everyone; but even

his practice appears to be not so much that of a physician as of a

surgeon. I am instructed that I shall be able to show, by the most

eminent men in the profession, that the description which I am about to

read from Dr. Copland’s book, the _Dictionary of Practical Medicine_, is

the true description of general convulsions. In that book I find the

following, under the head of “Convulsions:”--

“Definition.--Violent and involuntary contractions of a part or of

the whole of the body, sometimes with rigidity and tension (tonic

convulsions), but more frequently with tumultuous agitations,

consisting of alternating shocks (clonic convulsions), that come on

suddenly, either in recurring or in distant paroxysms, and after

irregular and uncertain intervals.”