“I remember L’Angelier coming to my office a few weeks before his death and speaking about Miss Smith. I said she was to be married to some gentleman, and when I mentioned the public rumour, he said it was not true, but, if it was, he had documents in his possession that would be sufficient to forbid the banns. I did not see her after that time. I thought that, having been received by Mr. Smith in his house, I was not at liberty to speak to him; but after L’Angelier’s death I thought it was my duty to mention the fact of the correspondence having been carried on between them, in order that he might take steps to exonerate his daughter in case of anything coming out. In the evening of the death of L’Angelier, I called on Mr. Smith and told him that L’Angelier had in his possession a great number of letters from his daughter, and that it was high time to let him know this, that they might not fall into the hands of strangers, numbers of people might go to his lodgings and read them. I went to Mr. Huggins’s office (L’Angelier’s employer). He was not in, but I saw two gentlemen, and told them what I had been told to ask (to get back the letters); but they said that they could not give them up without Mr. Huggins’s consent, and I then asked them to keep the letters sealed up till they were disposed of. I think this was on the Tuesday after L’Angelier’s death. Shortly after I saw Mr. Smith. In consequence of rumours I went to his house and saw Miss Smith in the presence of her mother. I apprised her of the death of L’Angelier. She asked me if it was of my own will that I came to tell her; I told her it was not so, but at the special request of her father. I asked her if she had seen L’Angelier on the Sunday night; she told me that she did not see him. I asked her to put me in a position to contradict the statements which were being made as to her relation with L’Angelier, and asked her again if she did not see him on Sunday evening or Sunday night, and she told me she did not. I observed to her that L’Angelier had come from the Bridge of Allan to Glasgow on a special appointment with her, by a letter written to him. She told me she was not aware that he was at the Bridge of Allan before he came to Glasgow, and that she did not give him an appointment for Sunday evening, as she wrote him on Friday evening giving him an appointment for Saturday: she had expected him on the Saturday, but he did not come, and she had not seen him on Sunday. I put the question to her five or six times in different ways. I told her that my conviction was that she must have seen him on Sunday, that he had come on purpose to Glasgow on a special invitation by her to see her; and I did not think it likely, admitting that he had committed suicide, that he had done so without knowing why she had asked him to come to Glasgow.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“Did you know of this letter yourself?”
Witness.—“I heard there was such a letter. I said to her that the best advice that a friend could give to her under the circumstances was to tell the truth about it, because the case was a very grave one, and would lead to an inquiry on the part of the authorities, and that if she did not say the truth in these circumstances, perhaps it would be ascertained by a servant, or a policeman, or somebody passing the house who had seen L’Angelier, that he had been in the house, and this would cause a strong suspicion as to the motive that had led her to conceal the truth. Miss Smith then got up from her chair and said, ‘I swear to you, Mr. Meau, that I have not seen L’Angelier not on that Sunday only, but not for three weeks or six weeks,’ I am not sure which.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“And the mother was present?”
Witness.—“Yes. I repeated this question five or six times, but her answer was always the same. I asked her with regard to the letter inviting L’Angelier to come and see her, how it was that, being engaged to another gentleman, she could have carried on a clandestine correspondence with a former sweetheart? she said it was to get back her letters.”
The Lord Advocate.—“Did you ask her whether she was in the habit of meeting L’Angelier?”
Witness.—“Yes. I asked her if it was true that L’Angelier was in the habit of having appointments with her in her house; and she told me that he had never entered that house, meaning the Blythswood Square house, as I understood.[119] I asked her how, then, she had her appointments to meet him? She told me that he used to come to a street at the corner of the house (main street), that he had a signal by knocking with his stick, and that she used to talk to him.”
The Lord Advocate.—“Did she speak about her former correspondence with him at all?”
Witness.—“I asked her if it was true she had signed letters in his name, and she said she had done so.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“Do you mean that she added his name to hers?”
Witness.—“I meant whether she signed her letters with L’Angelier’s name, and she said ‘Yes.’ I did not ask her why.”
Cross-examined by Mr. Young.—“I went to live at Helensburgh in 1845. M. L’Angelier visited me, and once he came on a Saturday to my lodgings there, and on Sunday we went on the Luss Road. I went up to my room, and L’Angelier not coming in for his dinner, I called for him out of temper. I then found that he was ill, and was vomiting down the staircase. He once complained to me of being bilious. This was a year ago. He complained of once having the cholera. Last year he came to my office and told me he had had a violent attack of cholera, but I don’t know whether that was a year or two years ago. I think it was a journey he was to have made that led him to speak of having had the cholera. I don’t recollect whether he was unwell at that time. I know that when he came to my house he always had a bottle of laudanum in his bag, but I don’t know if he used it. I once heard him speak of arsenic; it must have been in the winter of 1854. It was on a Sunday. I don’t recollect how the conversation arose, but it lasted half an hour. Its purport was how much arsenic a person could take without its injuring him. He maintained that it was possible to do it, by taking small quantities. I don’t know what led to the conversation, and should be afraid to make any statement as to the purpose for which it was to be taken. L’Angelier stated to me he had once been jilted by an English lady, a rich person, and that on account of the deception he was almost mad for a fortnight, and ran about, getting food from a farmer in the country. He was easily excited: when he had any cause of grief he was affected very much.”
By the Lord Justice Clerk.—“After my marriage I had little intercourse with L’Angelier. I thought that he might be led to take some harsh steps with Miss Smith, and as I had some young ladies in my house, I did not think it was proper to have the same intercourse with him as when I was a bachelor.”
The Lord Advocate.—“What do you mean by ‘harsh steps?’”
Witness.—“I was afraid of an elopement. By ‘harsh’ I mean ‘rash.’ This was after L’Angelier had given me his full confidence as to what he would do if her father did not consent to the marriage.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“ Did you understand that Miss Smith had engaged herself to him?”
Witness.—“I understood so from what he said.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“When you used the expression ‘you thought it right to go to Mr. Smith about the letters, in order that he might take steps to vindicate his daughter’s honour, or prevent it from being disparaged,’ did you relate to him her engagement and apparent breach of it? Had you in view that the letters might contain an engagement which she was breaking, or that she had made a clandestine engagement?”
Witness.—“I thought that these letters were love letters, and that it would be much better that they should be in Mr. Smith’s hands than in those of strangers.”
The Lord Advocate.—“ What were L’Angelier’s usual character and habits?”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“Was he a steady fellow?”
Witness.—“My opinion of L’Angelier’s character at the moment of his death was, that he was a most regular young man in his conduct, religious, and in fact most exemplary in all his conduct. The only objection which I heard made to him was that he was vain and a boaster—boasting of grand persons that he knew. For example, when he spoke of Miss Smith, he would say, I shall forbid Madeline to do such a thing, or such another thing—to dance with such a one or such another.”
The Lord Justice Cleric.—“Did he boast of any success with females?”
Witness.—“Never.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“Did he seem jealous of Miss Smith paying attention to others?”
Witness.—“No; of others paying attention to her.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“It was not on account of any levity in his character that you discouraged him visiting you after your marriage?”
Witness.—“No. I thought his society might be fit for a bachelor, but not for a married man.”
The Lord Justice Clerk.—“Do you understand the word ‘levity’?”
Witness.—“Yes; lightness, irregularity. There had been a long cessation of intercourse between us before his death. The photograph (shown him) is a good likeness; he was between 28 and 30 years of age. I think I got accidentally acquainted with him in a house in Glasgow.”
At the close of the case for the prosecution the Lord Advocate proposed to put in certain entries in a pocket book of L’Angelier’s to support the first and second counts of the indictment, which, after argument, was refused by the Court. (See Appendix C., p. 359.)
THE DEFENCE.
In accordance with practice of the Scotch Courts the counsel for the prisoner had the last word; and good use did the Dean of Faculty make of his privilege. The Lord Advocate’s policy had been to depict the character of the prisoner in the vilest colours—as the seducer, rather than the seduced, or, at any rate, for a long period the willing accomplice in all his acts. The Dean dealt not less hardly with the character of L’Angelier.
“We find him,” he said, “according to the confession of all those who observed him narrowly, vain, conceited, pretentious, with a great opinion of his own personal attractions, and a very silly expectation of admiration from the other sex. That he was successful to a certain extent in conciliating such admiration may be the fact; but, at all events, his own prevailing ideas seem to have been that he was calculated to be very successful in paying attention to ladies, and that he was likely to push his fortune by such means. Accordingly, once and again we find him engaged in attempts to get married to women of some station at least in society. We heard of one disappointment which he met with in England, and another we heard a great deal of connected with a lady in Fife; and the manner in which he bore his disappointments on those two occasions is perhaps the best indication and light we have to the true character of the man. He was not a person of strong health, and it is extremely probable that this, among other things, had a depressing effect on his spirits, rendering him changeable and uncertain—now uplifted, as one of the witnesses said, and now most deeply depressed—of a mercurial temperament, as another described it, very variable and never to be depended upon. Such was the individual with whom the prisoner unfortunately became acquainted. The progress of their acquaintance is soon told. My learned friend the Lord Advocate said the correspondence must have been improper, because it was clandestine: yet the letters of the young lady at that first period breathe nothing but gentleness and propriety. The correspondence in the commencement shows that if L’Angelier had in his mind originally to corrupt and seduce the prisoner, he entered upon the attempt with considerable ingenuity and skill; for the very first letter of the series which we have contains a passage in which she says, ‘I am trying to break myself of all my bad habits: it is you I have to thank for this, which I do sincerely from my heart.’ He had been suggesting to her improvement in conduct or something else. He had thus been insinuating himself into her company. She had yielded, no doubt, too easily to the pleasures of this new acquaintance, but pleasures apparently of a most innocent kind at this period. Yet it seems to have occurred to her mind at a very early period that it was impossible to maintain this correspondence with propriety or her own welfare; for so early as April 1855 she wrote him—‘I think you will agree with me in what I intend proposing, that for the present this correspondence had better stop. I know your good feeling will not take this wrong. It was meant quite the reverse. By continuing it, harm may arise, by discontinuing, nothing can be said.’ And from then to September it did cease.”
Unfortunately the correspondence was renewed, discovered, and stopped by her father until April, 1856, when it is re-opened by a letter, of the 30th of that month, from Helensburgh, in which she writes:—“P(papa) has not been in town a night for some time; but the first night he is off I shall see you. We shall spend an hour of bliss. There shall be no risk: only C. H. (Haggart) shall know.” This letter was followed by that of the 3rd of May, inviting him on Tuesday, the 6th, to come to the garden gate, and adding, “Beloved of my soul, a fond embrace, a dear kiss till we meet! We shall have more than one, love, dearest.” Signed, “From thy ever devoted and loving wife, thine for ever, Mini.”
“Alas,” said the Dean, “the next scene is the most painful of all. In the spring of 1856, the corrupting influence of the seducer was successful, and the prisoner fell. This is recorded in a letter bearing the post-mark of the 7th of May, which you have heard read. And how corrupting that influence must have been, how vile the acts that he resorted to for accomplishing his nefarious purpose, can never be proved so well as by looking at the altered tone and language of the unhappy prisoner’s letters. She had lost not her virtue merely, but, as the Lord Advocate said, her sense of decency. Think you that without temptation, without evil teachings, a poor girl falls into such depths of degradation? No. Influence from without—most corrupting influence—can alone account for such a fact. And yet through the midst of this frightful correspondence, there breathes a spirit of devoted affection towards the man that had destroyed her—that strikes me as most remarkable.”
Then, after alluding to the precautions with which she sought to surround her interviews with L’Angelier at the Blythswood Square house; to the evident proofs that an elopement was projected, and to the strong probability that no interview took place without Haggart’s connivance, and that, therefore, the interviews at this time must be limited to the two spoken of by that witness, he urged that up to the month of February, 1857, he was entitled to say, “without a shadow of evidence to the contrary, that they were not in the habit of coming into personal contact.”
“We now,” continued the Dean, “come to a very important stage of the case. On the 28th of February Mr. Minnoch proposes, and if I understand the theory of my learned friend’s case aright, from that day the whole character of the girl’s mind and her feelings changed, and she set herself to prepare for the perpetration of what he has called one of the most foul, cool, deliberate murders that ever was committed. I will not say that such a thing is impossible, but I will venture to say it is very highly improbable. He will be a bold man to fathom the depths of human depravity, but this at least experience teaches us, that perfection even in depravity, is not rapidly attained, and it is not by such short and easy stages as the prosecutor has been able to trace in the career of Madeline Smith, that a gentle loving girl passes all at once into the savage grandeur of a Medea, or the appalling wickedness of a Borgia. Such a thing is not possible. There is a certain progress in guilt, and it is quite out of all human experience that, from the tone of the letters, there should be a sudden transition—I will not say from affection for a particular object—but to the strange desire for removing, by any means, the obstruction to her wishes and purposes that the prosecutor imputes to the prisoner. Think, in your own minds, how foul and unnatural a murder it is—the murder of one who, within a very short space, was the object of her love—an unworthy object—an unholy object; but yet while it lasted—and its endurance was not very brief—it was a deep, unselfish, absorbing, devoted passion. And the object of that passion she now conceived the purpose of murdering. Such is the theory that you are desired to believe. Now before you will believe it, will you not ask for demonstration? Will you be content with conjecture? Will you be content with suspicion, however pregnant, or will you be so unreasonable as to put it to me in this form, that the man having died of poison, the theory of the prosecution is the most probable? Oh, gentlemen, is that the manner in which a jury should treat such a case? Is that the kind of proof on which they should convict on a capital offence?”
The Dean, then, took up seriatim the three charges, examining the evidence on each in detail, making on each the criticisms, already reported in the previous summary of the evidence, showing how the first charge had failed even in the opinion of the prosecutor: how doubtful, to say the least, it was that the interview on which the second charge was based had taken place, and the weakness of many of the proofs on which the charge of murder was rested. Passing, then, to the suggestion of suicide, he continued—
“I might stop here, for nothing could be more fallacious than the suggestion of the Lord Advocate, that it was necessary to explain how this man came by his death. His lordship will tell you that a defendant has no further duty than to repel the charge and stand on the defensive, and maintain that the case for the prosecution is not proved. No man probably can tell at the present moment—I believe no man on earth can tell—how L’Angelier met his death. Nor am I under the slightest obligation even to suggest to you a possible manner in which that death may have been compassed without the intervention of the prisoner. Yet it is but fair, when we are dealing with so many matters of conjecture and suspicion, that we should, for a moment, consider whether that supposition on which the charge is founded is preferable in itself, in respect to its higher probabilities, to other suppositions which may be fairly made. The character of this man, his origin, his early history, the nature of his conversation, the numerous occasions on which he spoke of suicide, naturally suggest that as one mode by which he may have departed this life. Understand me, I am not undertaking to prove that he died by his own hand—but I think there is more to be said for suicide than for the prisoner’s guilt. But I entreat you to remember that that is no necessary part of my defence. But of course I should be using you very ill—should be doing less than my duty to the prisoner—if I had not brought before you the whole of that evidence which suggests the extreme probability of that man dying by his own hand at one time or other. From the very first time at which we see him, even as a lad, in the year 1843, he talks in a manner to impress people with the notion that he had no moral principle to guide him. He speaks over and over again of suicide at Edinburgh, Dundee, and elsewhere—ay, the prisoners letters shew that he had made the same threat to her[120]—that he would put himself out of existence. And is it half as violent a supposition as the supposition of this foul murder, that upon this evening—the 22nd of March—a fit of that kind of madness which he himself described, came over him, when he met with disappointment—finding, it may be, that he could not procure access to an interview which he desired—assuming that he came to Glasgow for that purpose—assuming even that he mistook the evening of the meeting, and expected to see her on the Sunday—can anything be more probable than that, in the excited state in which he then was, he should have committed the rash act which put an end to his existence.”[121]
Again, in answer to the motive imputed by the prosecution; re-reading the letter of the 10th of February, in which on her bended knees Miss Smith besought him, “as he hoped for mercy at the judgment, not to inform on her—not to expose her;” asked him “to pardon her if he could; to pray for her as the most wretched, guilty, miserable creature on the earth;” told him “she could stand anything but her father’s hot temper;” when she wrote, “Emile, you will not cause my death. If he is to get your letters, I cannot see him any more; and my poor mother, I will never kiss her. It would be a shame to them all. Emile, will you not spare me? Hate me, despise me, but do not expose me.” The Dean said—
“Is that the language of deceit? Is that the mind of a murderess, or can any one affect that frame of mind? Can you for one moment listen to the suggestion that that letter covers a piece of deceit? No, no. The finest actress could not have written that to him, unless she had felt it; and is that the condition in which a woman goes about to compass the death of him whom she has loved? Is that the frame of mind?—shame for past sins, burning shame, dread of exposure, grief at the injury she had done her parents? Is that the frame of mind that would lead a woman—not to advance another step on the road to destruction, but to plunge at once into the depths of human wickedness? The thing is preposterous, and yet it is because of her despair, as my learned friend called it, exhibited in that and similar letters, that he says she had a motive to destroy this man. What does that mean? It may mean, in a certain improper sense of the term, that it would have been of advantage to her that he should cease to live. That is not a motive in any proper sense of the term. If some advantage resulting from the death of another be a motive to the commission of murder, a man’s eldest son must always have a motive to murder him that he may succeed to his estate; and I suppose the youngest officer in any regiment of Her Majesty’s army has a motive to murder all the officers in his regiment—the younger he is, and the further he has to ascend the scale, the more murders he has a motive to commit. Away with such nonsense! A motive to commit a crime must be something a great deal more than the mere fact that the result of that crime might be advantageous to the person committing it. You must see the motive in action—you must see it influencing the conduct—before you can deal with it as a motive; for this, and this only, is it a motive in the proper sense of the term—that is to say, it is moving to the perpetration of the deed. But let me ask you what possible motive there could be, even in the most improper and illegitimate sense of the term—I mean what possible advantage could she expect from L’Angelier’s death so long as the letters remained? Without the return of her letters she gained nothing. Her object, her greatest desire, that for which she was yearning with her whole soul, was to prevent the exposure of her shame. But the death of L’Angelier, with those letters in his possession, instead of insuring that object, would have been perfectly certain to lead to the immediate exposure of everything that passed between them. Shall I be told that she did not foresee that? I think my learned friend had been giving the prisoner credit for too much talent in the course of his observations on her conduct. But I should conceive her to be infinitely stupid if she could not foresee that the death of L’Angelier, with those documents in his possession, was the true and best means of frustrating the then great object of her life. Shall I be told that the motive might be revenge? Listen to the letter, Tell me if it is possible that in the same breast with these sentiments, there should link one feeling of revenge! No; the condition of mind in which the poor girl was throughout the months of February and March, is entirely inconsistent with any of the hypotheses that have been made on the other side—utterly incredible and wholly irreconcileable with the perpetration of such a crime as is here laid to her charge.”[122]
Passing on, then, to the incident of her sudden flight from her home, when she heard of L’Angelier’s death, the Dean repudiated the notion that she was absconding from justice. She had left Glasgow early in the morning, and at half-past three in the afternoon was found on board a steamer going from Greenock to Helensburgh. Any one going by rail could easily have overtaken her.
“If her flight means anything,” he said, “it means flying from what she could not bear—the wrath of her father, and the averted countenance of her mother. But she came back again without the slightest hesitation, and upon the Monday morning there occurred a scene as remarkable in the history of criminal jurisprudence as anything I ever heard of, by which that broken spirit was altogether changed. The moment she was met by a charge of being implicated in causing the death of L’Angelier, she at once assumed the courage of a heroine. She was bowed down, and she had fled, while the true charge of her unchastity and shame was all that was brought against her; but she stood erect and proudly conscious of her innocence when she was met with this astounding charge of murder. You heard the account that M. de Meau gave of that interview with her in her father’s house on the Monday. That was a most striking statement, and given with a truthfulness obviously that could not be surpassed. What was the import of that conversation? He advised her, as a friend, if L’Angelier was with her on that Sunday night, for God’s sake not to deny it. And why? Because, he said, it is certain to be proved. A servant, a policeman, a casual passenger, is certain to know the fact, and if you falsely deny it, what a fact that will be against you. What was the answer? In answer to five or six suggestions of M. de Meau, she said at length that she would swear that she had not seen him for three weeks. If she did not see him on the Sunday that was true.”
On the purchases of arsenic, the Dean called the attention of the jury to the improbability of her having purchased it at the time when she was urging L’Angelier not to go to the Bridge of Allan whilst she was there with her family, and to her throwing it away on the 17th of March, and then buying more on the 18th;—“throwing it away, it was said, when just coming within reach of her victim, and then buying more, with circumstances of openness and publicity inconsistent with the hypothesis of any legitimate object? Why expose herself to the necessity of a repeated purchase, when she had got enough to poison twenty or a hundred men.”
“But,” continued the Dean, “the possession of this arsenic is said to be unaccounted for, as far as the prisoner is concerned. It might be so; it may be so; and yet that would not make out the case for the prosecution. She says she used it as a cosmetic. This might be startling at first sight to many of us here, but after the evidence you have heard it will not amaze you. At school her story, which has so far been borne out by evidence, shows that she read of the Styrian peasants using it for strengthening their wind, improving their complexions. No doubt they used it internally, and not externally as she did, but in the imperfect state of her knowledge that was a fact of no significance. L’Angelier, too, was well aware of the same fact. He stated to more than one witness—and if he stated falsely, it is only one of a multitude of lies proved against him—that he used it himself. It is not surprising if L’Angelier knew of this custom that he should have communicated it to the prisoner, and that she should have used it externally, for an internal use is apparently a greater danger, which may have suggested to her to try it externally, and there is no reason to suppose, that if used as she used it, it would produce any injurious effects. No doubt we have medical men coming here and shaking their heads and looking wise, and saying that such a use of arsenic would be a dangerous procedure. That is not the question. The question is whether the prisoner could use it without injurious effects, and that she could do so is proved by the experiments of Dr. Laurie and Dr. Maclagan. The publication in Chambers’s, Blackwood’s Magazine, and Johnston’s “Chemistry of Common Life,” of information on the uses of arsenic, had reached not the prisoner alone, but a multitude of other ladies, and had incited them to the same kind of experiments. The two druggists—Robertson and Guthrie—spoke to the fact of ladies having come to their shops seeking arsenic for such purposes on the suggestion of these publications. It cannot, therefore, be surprising to you to learn that when the prisoner bought this arsenic, she intended to use it, and did actually, afterwards, use it for this purpose.”[123]
Then, citing the behaviour of Eliza Fenning, in the well-known disputed, and even now disputed case, as a parallel instance of such behaviour as the prisoner showed when taxed with the charge of murder:[124] repudiating the doctrine that juries have nothing to do with the consequences of their verdict, and that all questions of evidence must be weighed in the same scale, whether the crime be capital, or a mere case of pocket picking, and appealing to the jury not to raise their rash and imprudent hands to tear away the veil Providence has been pleased to place over this mystery, the Dean closed his most effective speech.
THE JUDGE’S CHARGE.
The most material comments of the Lord Justice Clerk have been already so fully quoted as notes to the several portions of the evidence, or to the points made by the counsel for the defence, that it will now suffice to give his concluding summary of the case.
“The first charge is that she administered arsenic on the 19th or 20th of February. Probably you may come to the conclusion, on the evidence of Miss Perry and others, that he did see her on that occasion; but she was not proved to have had arsenic or any other poison in her possession; and what I attach very great importance to is, that there is no medical testimony, by analysis of the matter vomited, that that illness did proceed from the administration of arsenic. If the doctor had examined the vomit and proved that there was arsenic there, I am afraid the case would have been very strong against her as having given him coffee or something before his illness on that occasion. But it is not proved that that illness arose from the administration of poison. Arsenic she had not, and there is no proof of her having possessed anything deleterious. Therefore I have no hesitation in telling you that charge has failed.
“The second charge stands in a somewhat different position in regard to the evidence, although in one respect it is similar to the first, for it is not proved that the illness arose from the administration of arsenic or any other poisonous substance. But then the way in which you can connect the prisoner with a meeting on that occasion is much stronger. Still if you should think you can acquit her of the first charge, and that there is too much doubt to prove the second proven, then you will observe how much this weakens the case that has been raised by the prosecution on the motives for revenge, on the change in the tone of the letters, and the desire to allure him again to her embraces and fascinations, which could not be accounted for except on the supposition of some such murderous design. In that view undoubtedly the foundation of the case is very much shaken, and will not lead you to suppose that the purpose of murder was cherished on the 22nd.
“Then as to the charge for murder, the question for you to consider is a simple one. No matter how the prisoner is surrounded with grave suspicions, and with many circumstances that seem to militate against the notion of innocence upon any theory that has been propounded, still are you prepared to say that the interview of the 22nd March has been proved against her? She had arsenic before the illness of 22nd February, and I think you will consider the excuse of using arsenic as a cosmetic of the same stamp as those which she stated to the druggists. She bought arsenic again on the 6th of March, and it certainly is a very odd thing that she should buy more arsenic when she came back on the 18th. Because unless you are to take the account to be sure, that she used it as a cosmetic, she has it before the 22nd, and that is a dreadful fact if you are quite satisfied that she did not get it and use it for the purpose of washing her hands and face. It may create the greatest reluctance in your mind to take any other view of the matter than that she was guilty of administering it somehow, though the place where may not be made out, or the precise time of the interview. But on the other hand you must keep in view, that arsenic could only be administered by her if an interview took place with L’Angelier, and that interview, though it may be the result of an inference that may satisfy you morally that it did take place, still rests upon an inference alone, and that inference is to be the ground, and must be the ground, on which a verdict of guilty is to rest. You will see, therefore, the necessity of great caution and jealousy in dealing with any inference which you may draw from this. Probably none of you may think for a moment that he did go out that night, and that without seeing her, and without knowing what she wanted to see him about, if they met, he may have swallowed 200 grains of arsenic on the street, and may have carried it about. On the other hand, if he did not commit suicide, keep in view that that will not of itself establish that the prisoner administered the arsenic. The matter may have remained most mysterious—wholly unexplained. You may not be able to account for it on any other supposition, but still that supposition or inference may not be a ground on which you can safely and satisfactorily rest your verdict against the prisoner.
“Now then I leave you to consider the case with reference to the views that are raised by this correspondence. I do not think you will consider it so unlikely as was supposed that this girl, after writing such letters, may have been capable of cherishing such a purpose. But still, though you may take such a view of her character, it is but a supposition that she cherished this murderous purpose—the last conclusion that you ought to come to merely on supposition and inference and observation on this wavering correspondence of a girl in the circumstances in which she was placed. It receives more importance, no doubt, when you find the purchase of arsenic just before she expected, or just at the time that she expected L’Angelier. But still these are but suppositions. Now the great and invaluable use of a jury after they direct their attention seriously to the case with the attention you have done, is to separate firmly—firmly and clearly in your own minds—suspicions from evidence. I don’t say that inferences may not be completely drawn, but I have already warned you about inferences in the ordinary matters of civil life, and in such a case as this.[125] If you cannot say, ‘We satisfactorily find here evidence of the meeting, and that the poison must have been administered by her at that meeting,’ whatever may be your suspicion, however perplexing may be the probability against her, and however you may have to struggle to get rid of it, you perform your best and bounden duty as a jury to separate suspicion from truth, and to proceed upon nothing that you do not feel established in evidence against her.”
After retiring for half an hour, the jury by a majority in each charge found the prisoner Not Guilty on the first, and a verdict of Not Proven on the second and third charges, in which findings the Lord Justice Clerk expressed his entire concurrence.
APPENDIX A., p. 307.
POST-MORTEM EXAMINATIONS.
Evidence of Dr. Hugh Thomson, M.D.
“At the request of Messrs. W. B. Huggins & Co., of this city, we, the undersigned, made a post-mortem examination of the body of the late M. L’Angelier, when the appearances were as follows:—The body, viewed externally, presented nothing remarkable, except a tawny hue on the surface. The incision made on opening the belly and chest revealed a considerable deposit of subcutaneous fat. The heart appeared large for the individual, but not so large as, in our opinion, to amount to disease. Its surface presented, externally, some opaque patches, such as are frequently seen on the organ without giving rise to symptoms. Its right cavities were filled with dark fluid blood. The lungs, the liver, and the spleen appeared quite healthy. The gall-bladder was moderately full of bile, and contained no calculi. The stomach and the intestines, externally, presented nothing abnormal. Being tied at both ends, it was removed from the body. Its contents, consisting of about half a pint of dark fluid resembling coffee, were poured into a clean bottle, and the organ itself was laid open along its great curvature. The mucous membrane, except for a slight extent of the lesser curvature, was then seen to be deeply injected with blood, presenting an appearance of dark red mottling, and its substance was remarked to be salt (soft?), and easily torn by scratching with the finger-nail. The other organs of the abdomen were not examined. The appearance of the mucous membrane, taken in connection with the history as related to us by witnesses, being such as, in our opinion, justified a suspicion of death having resulted from poison, we considered it proper to preserve the stomach and its contents in a sealed bottle for further investigation by chemical analysis, should such be determined on. We, however, do not imply that, in our opinion, death may not have resulted from natural causes, as, for example, severe internal congestion, the effect of exposure to cold after much bodily fatigue, which we understand the deceased to have undergone. Having no legal authority for making this post-mortem examination, we restrict it to the organs where we thought likely to find something to account for the death.
“28th March, 1857, on soul and conscience,
“Hugh Thomson,
“James Steven.”
SECOND POST-MORTEM OF THE EXHUMED BODY,
April 3, 1857.
“By virtue of a warrant from the sheriff of Lanarkshire, we, the undersigned, proceeded to the post-mortem examination of the body of M. L’Angelier within the vault of the Ramshorn church on the 31st of March ultimo, in the presence of two friends of the deceased. The body being removed from the coffin, two of our number, Drs. Thomson and Steven, who examined the body on the 24th ultimo, remarked that the features had lost their former pinched appearance, and that the general surface of the skin, instead of the tawny or dingy hue observed by them on that occasion, had become rather florid. We two likewise remarked that, with the exception of the upper surface of the liver, which had assumed a purplish colour, all the internal parts were little changed in appearance; and we all agreed that the evidences of putrefaction were much less marked than they usually are at such a date—the ninth day after death, and the fifth after burial. The duodenum, along with the upper part of the small intestine, after both ends of the gut had been secured by ligatures, was removed and placed in a clean jar. A portion of the large intestine, consisting of part of the descending colon and the sigmoid flexure, along with a portion of the rectum, after using the like precaution of placing ligatures at both ends of the bowel, was removed and placed in the same jar with the duodenum, and a portion of the small intestine. A portion of the liver, about a one-sixth part of that organ, was cut off and placed in a clean jar. We then proceeded to open the head in the usual manner, and observed nothing calling for remark beyond a greater degree of vascularity of the membranes of the brain than ordinary. A portion of the brain was removed and placed in a fourth clean jar. We then adjourned to Dr. Penny’s rooms, taking with us the vessels containing the parts of the viscera above mentioned. The duodenum and portion of small intestine were found together to measure thirty-six inches in length. Their contents poured into a clean glass measure were found to amount to four fluid ounces, and consisted of a turbid, sanguinolent fluid, having suspended in it much flocculent matter, which settled towards the bottom, whilst a few mucus-like masses floated on the surface. The mucous membrane of this part of the bowels was then examined. The colour was decidedly redder than natural, and this redness was more marked over several patches, portions of which, when carefully examined, were found to be eroded. Several small whitish and somewhat gritty particles were removed from its surface, and being placed on a clean piece of glass, were delivered to Dr. Penny. A few small ulcers, about the one-sixteenth of an inch in diameter, and having elevated edges, were observed on it, at the upper part of the duodenum. On account of the failing light, it was determined to adjourn till a quarter past eleven next day—all the jars, &c., being left in the custody of Dr. Penny. Having again met at the appointed time, we proceeded to complete our examination. The portion of the largest intestine, along with the portion of the rectum, measuring twenty-six inches in length, being laid open, was found empty. Its mucous membrane, coated with an abundant, pale, slimy mucus, presented nothing abnormal, except on the part lining the rectum, on which were observed two vascular patches, about the size of a shilling. On decanting the contents of the glass measure, we observed a number of crystals adhering to its interior, and at the bottom a notable quantity of whitish sedimentary matter. Having now completed our examination of the various parts, we finally handed them all to Dr. Penny.
“The above we attest on soul and conscience,
“H. Thomson.
“J. Steven.”
APPENDIX B., p. 319.
ON THE QUANTITY OF POISON FOUND IN THE STOMACH OF A PERSON MURDERED BY ARSENIC.
Extract from Letter from Professor Christison to the Edinburgh Medical Journal, December, 1857.
“The purpose of the present brief communication is to state a case which annihilates the defence of the prisoner, so far as the large quantity of arsenic found in the stomach of the deceased may have been thought to support it.
“Dr. Mackinlay, of Paisley, very lately reminded me of a case of poisoning with arsenic, in which we were both concerned in 1842. A person came under a charge of poisoning with arsenic, and was indicted. But, on account of some informality, this indictment fell to the ground, and the trial was necessarily delayed. Meanwhile, during the delay, the general evidence was thought defective, and the trial was dropped. There could be no doubt, however, that murder had been committed. The arsenic was administered in whisky-punch with sugar, the arsenic being kept in suspension by constant stirring. The person survived at least five, possibly seven, hours, and frequently vomited a yellowish or greenish liquid. Nevertheless, I found a little spirit in the contents of the stomach; and I collected thirty grains of arsenic in substance from the stomach and its contents.
“Drs. Mackinlay and Wylie, of Paisley, who examined the dead body, and also discovered arsenic in the stomach, had scraped off a quantity of the powder of this substance from the inside upon a watch-glass. I was not made aware at the time how much had been thus obtained; but Dr. Mackinlay now informs me that the quantity was sixty grains. Here, then, is a case exactly like that of L’Angelier. Ninety grains of arsenic, and this in substance, were found within the stomach alone. If to this be added, as in Dr. Penny’s analysis in L’Angelier’s case, the probable arsenic dissolved and suspended in the contents of the stomach, and that imbibed by the textures of the stomach itself, it is impossible to estimate the total quantity in the stomach at less than 100 grains. But there was also arsenic in the intestines; and, indeed, it had actually caused purging.
“How large a quantity, then, must have been given in that instance! How strangely easy is it for a determined designing murderer to administer secretly those large quantities of a substance, whose weight should render it difficult to be mixed, and whose roughness should betray its presence when abundant! How difficult for the stomach to discharge it by vomiting. I draw no conclusion as to the question of Madeline Smith’s innocence or guilt. In common with the public at large, I am well satisfied that she escaped condemnation. But, as I have been supplied, through the kindness of Dr. Mackinlay, with the means of completing a fact, closely touching a ground of defence, which, at the time it was brought forward, I regarded as hypothetical and baseless, and which may be made much of again, were it allowed to stand, as it has hitherto done, I have thought it my duty to make the true state of the question known.”
APPENDIX C., p. 342.
L’ANGELIER’S DIARY.