On the ease being resumed on Saturday, the 30th of January, Mr. Wilkinson turned to the evidence ing the prisoner herself on the charge of poisoning her husband. The law did not require that any motive should be proved where evidence of the commission of criminal act was circumstantial any where it was direct. The first ling for attention was the writing to Dickinson calling forth the answers now in evidence, Either her alleged fear of her husband was true, or it was false. The latter was the alternative established; but it did not follow that because she denounced her husband the accused was prepared to explanation of the false sentations had been forthcoming, but y there was strong motive behind, not jed t" them, They might supply an interpretation, perhaps, from the scraps of wherein accused wrote Edith—tom—Dickinson," or from the envelope th " Walter Lilith Halowell Dickinson."
Why should Mary Jacob have written them, or others that were in? He asked the Jury moreover to believe that these severe put into Miss Jacob's box later than they were said to have been found. That a merciful conclusion, and that was the The accused was writing hor as the wife of another than her has hand: that indicated the intention of a change that could only be brought about by the death of that husband. "He did not press this, but it was right he should call attention' to it. The telegram to Mr. Dickinson came under the same explain: tion; if his recollection of it was correct, the statement was untrue. Absence of motive was neither proof of innocence nor guilt, but the episode of the mysterious stranger threw light on the motive, or absence of it, in the prisoner. The only conclusion possible on her evidence in that respect was that it was false. The nonexistence of Annie Luke was as well established as it. was possible to establish a negative, and on that conclusion the prisoner had a design in doing what she did, or was capable of actions without atoll, The former did not neces-convey that she contemplated then all that subsequently occurred; she was entitled to the benefit of any doubt; she did not mention the visitor in her first examination at the inquest, she probably thought of her only when she found suspicion directed against herself. What it conveyed to the Coroner was very clear from his summing up; there was no other object, that person had admitted causing the murder. The different handwritings in the series showed it to be an afterthought, the first introduction of Annie was not in contemplation of the deceased's death. The matter Iroaght much distress to the husband's mind: the prisoner and no other person knew of Annie Luke or of her name. On the 2nd of November Mrs. Carew knew of Mary Jacob's visit to the waste-paper duskot, on the 4th she produced a pasted letter,' on the 5th she identified it as one she had received some days before from her husband; when she received the fragments she said she did not recognise it. It was his duty to present von small indications that there was on the part of the accused an expectation of the death of the deceased. On the lith of October there was the entry in her diary, after mention of Dr. Wheeler ordering deceased medicine, "not that it will do him much good I'm thinking." Tt was ambi-guans, but it must be considered. Un the 13th, "He (deceased) made me feel very much disgusted." On the 15th she found. her husband at home in bed, "I wonder how long it will last." Two interpretations were possible, the Jury had to elect which it should be. He also called attention to the abstraction in that Court of une of the exhibits as showing the character of the accused. The Jury would place upon it the proper construction, but it afforded an indication of character and had a bearing upon the accused's action in regard to other phases of the case. Another incident was her letter to Sir Ernest tow under circumstances that must be ken into account; she had got off successfully in that case and no charge was laid till later. This made the assumption all the stronger that she was conscious such a charge might be Inid. He had now to allude to more serious matters. The explanation of purchase of arsenic by the prisoner particularly demanded earnest consideration. 'The first purchase (13th Oct.) was satisfactorily explained; the particular point was that it should' have isted sixteen days, or say twelve, yet on the 17th it was sent down to be refilled. There was no explanation of how the half-ounce it contained had been used, but there was one suggestion—the accused produced a bottle said to have contained Dr. Baelz's prescription, made up at Schedel's and said: "I wish you to hand that bottle in, because, having smelt it, I believe it'to contain arsenic." This was an instance of knowledge brought home to the prisoner by herself. She could detect the smell of arsenic, yet how did the arsenic get there The explanation of this would probably lead them to account for the deceased's death. "Every explanation by the prisoner that did not stand examination must tell against her, and he submitted there was no reasonable explanation of arsenic being in the bottle except that the prisoner. put it. there. The chemist did not, and there was no suggestion that deceased would do so. The accused had a knowledge of it and she might have put the arsenic in that bottle because she knew her husband was taking that medicine to relieve his pain. That" would account for the Fowler's solution missing from the bottle which accused was herself using and wi she must otherwise have missed. The second half-ounce bottle was accounted for by the bottle being accidentally broken, although no arsenic was found in the scrapings from the fender. In face of that evidence the deduction should be conclusive. On the 20th a bottle of Fow-Ier's solution was purchased, and the circumstances went to prove that what accused said with regard to. deceased's craving for arsenic and the finding of a nearly empty bottle that same evening were untrue. Ne toleration of the arsenic would account for the use of that ounce bottle; the deceased could not if he had been getting arsenic in these quantities from any other hands be craving for it to such an extent as to threaten to send some one else if his wife did not get it for him. The conclusion he asked them to draw was that Mrs. Carew obtained the arsenic at Maruya's that morning; had any other person taken the solution to the house and thad been used by the prisoner the deceased would never have made the statement she said he made on the 21st.
After an explanation of Hayashi's (Ma-mya's assistant) failure to identify Mrs. Carew, counsel proceeded to notice other parts of the evidence bearing on this same jint and the purchase of another ounce-lo of Fowler's solution that passed into the prisoner's keeping with the bedpan. The order was admitted not to be in deceased's handwriting and was said to be very like accused's. On the Wednesday it was undeniable that Mrs. Carew received another one-ounce bottle from Miss Jacob. If they found that death was due to arsenic, they would be asked to say that death was sufficiently caused by Fowler's solution. The accused's explanations of these facts were inconsistent; she said at first he had been taking arsenic in small quantities for some months, and later that she was in the habit of giving him doses of arsenic every day in their early married life and that afterwards he took it, without measuring it, as a pickane-up. When her husband pressed her for arsenic on the 20th of Oct., it never occurred to her to go to the bottle "always kept on the sideboard." it was to an empty bottle in the medicine cupboard that she referred. He now passed to the most serious point of all. If the deceased was in the habit of taking Fowler's solution it must have been procured from_somewhere, and the accused would have known where. They had only negative evidence that arsenic was not supplied to her by any other foreign chemist than Schedel, and that the only other Fowler's solution was for the dog. These were negative points, but he submitted that the absence of evidence as to where deceased obtained this arsenic was not explicable; if he took it in such large quantity it could be supported by evidence, and the absence of evidence showed the fact did not exist. The quantity alleged by the accused was beyond the power of an_ ordinary European stomach to take, and counsel for the defence suggested that she had only estimated it. The fact could have been in her knowledge, and its absence was a serious thing for them to consider.
Thave now, gentlemen, said the learned counsel, laid before you the arguments that
of the Crown, and I will conclude by say-it was nly duty to put before you on behalf ing to you, in words that I will borrow and adopt:—Pay no regard to anything but to the internal voice of your own consciences, and to that sense of duty which you owe to God and man on this occasion, seeking no reward except the comforting assurance that when you look back to the proceedings of this day you will feel that have Aischanged to the utmost of your ability and to the best of your power the duty which it was yours to perform. If on a review of this whole case, comparing the evidence on the one side and on the other, and weighing it in the even scales of justice, you can come to the conclusion of innocence, or can even entertain that fair and reasonable amount of doubt of which the accused is entitled to the benefit, in God's name acquit her; but if, on the other hand, all the facts and all' the evidence lead your minds, with satisfaction to yourselves, to the conclusion of her guilt, then—but then only—I ask for a verdict of guilty" at your hands. For the protection of the good, for the repression of the wicked, I ask for that verdict by which alone—as it seems to me—the safety of society can be secured, and the demands, the imperious demands, of public justice can be satisfied.
The Judge—I shall sum up to you on Monday morning, and I shall hope to complete my summing-up soon after lund is is a convenient opportunity of than ing you, fentenen, for the unwearied attention that you have given throughout this protracted trial. Measured in hours (some seventy, I believe) the time it has occupied is not so very long—not by any means too long considering the enormous gravity of the issue—but you have been necessarily detained from your homes and duties and pleasures for a great number of days. The Crown and the prisoner alike! have been indeed fortunate in hating you for a jury, and, to the Counsel engaged, your patience and consideration have been
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.