of the circumstances attending and resulting from it, it was
disgraceful, especially on the part of the medical witnesses for the
crown, in their conduct towards the one for the defence--Dr. Carson. I
have before me an authentic "Report of the Trial," "A Vindication of
their Opinions," published by those witnesses, and Dr. Carson's "Remarks"
on that publication, in which he exposes their shortcomings with a
master's hand, in a style as terse as it is bold, and as elegant as it is
severe; never were the weapons of irony, satire, and invective more
effectively used; his impeachment is as withering as his victory at the
trial was complete. The authors of the "Vindications" had not only done
what in them lay to ruin him in every conceivable way, public and
private, but they had exposed themselves to his "Remarks," all-pungent as
they were, by going into court and giving opinions founded upon "the most
disgracefully deficient dissection ever made." The sore which they had
inflicted upon themselves at the trial did not heal under the caustic of
the "Remarks"; and so the doctor became a victim to local prejudice,
passion, and persecution. But he gained to himself a world-wide
reputation which outlived them all; the honours of the French Academy
were bestowed upon him, and he took his stand among the literary and
scientific magnates of the day. As to the trial, the theory of the
prosecution was that the prisoner caused the lady's death by
administering a poison to procure abortion, and it was based upon a hole
in the coats of the stomach, and a peculiar mark in the uterus; the
medical witnesses for the crown affirming that the former could not have
arisen from any other known cause than poison, and the latter a sure sign
of recent delivery. No poison was found in the stomach or intestines,
nor were the supposed contents of the uterus ever found, and no other
part of the body was examined. The hole in the stomach presented the
same appearance, and was described in the same terms as those which John
Hunter had called attention to as occurring in certain cases of sudden
death, where there was no suspicion of poisoning, and caused by the
action of the gastric juice. Doctor Carson accepted Hunter's facts, but
propounded a theory of his own, being guided to his conclusions by the
experiments of Sir John Pringle and Dr. Bride, in reference to water at
the temperature of 90 degrees dissolving animal substances. He
successfully c