e, the matter is brought before the chief
society of the capital. Evidently, this plan would not work well here.
In Prussia it was formerly, and may still be, the custom for an expert
holding a fixed appointment under the government to investigate the
case, and to send his report to the Royal Medical College of Prussia.
A standing committee of this body, after investigating the matter,
sent the original report, with their comments, to the ministry, by
whom it was referred to a permanent commission of experts. The report
of the latter body, with all the other papers, was finally sent to
the criminal court. This method seems complicated, but it resulted in
giving to Prussia the best corps of experts the world has ever seen,
as well as the most eminent individual medical jurists.

It is not, however, the object of the present paper to urge any
especial method of reform, but to call attention to the need of
it, and to show that the present evils do not grow out of the
imperfections of medical jurisprudence, but out of the methods of our
criminal procedures. Certainly, the matter needs investigation, and
it is hardly possible but that some practicable means of relief could
be devised by the deliberations of a mixed commission of lawyers and
medical jurists of eminence.

H.C. WOOD, JR., M.D.

[Footnote 13: The utter absurdity of Dr. Williams's assertion is shown
by the fact that on the first and second trials of Mrs. Wharton he
affirmed that the violent convulsions, the extreme muscular rigidity,
the retentive stomach, seen in the last day of General Ketchum's life
were due to tartar emetic, and that to tartar emetic were due the
excessive vomiting, the motionless prostration and muscular relaxation
of Mr. Van Ness on the Sunday and Monday of his illness. Tartar emetic
the sole possible cause of precisely opposite symptoms!]

[Footnote 14: The parsimony of many legal authorities is an indication
of their want of appreciation of the differences in men. Not
rarely medical experts are forced to sue a borough or county for
compensation, even when the fee has been agreed on beforehand. In
Huntingdon county, Pennsylvania, some time ago a woman was arrested
on the charge of poisoning her mother-in-law, and the stomach of the
deceased was sent to Professor Reese of this city for analysis. Warned
by previous experience, he refused to make the analysis without a
written agreement as to the fees. Nearly three months were spent by
t