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vulgarity, and one of the wits of the Parlia ment House is said to have observed on the occasion of his promotion to the honor of knighthood, " The Queen may make George Deas a knight, but no one will ever make him a gentleman." Deas was quite able, however, to hold his own, and he pun ished the wits when they came to make their maiden speeches before him. " Prisoner at the bar," he once said to an unfortunate wretch on whose behalf an infant advocate had been feebly urging " extenuating circum stances," " everything that your counsel has said in mitigation, I consider to be an aggravation of your offence." Mr. Clark con ducted the defence in the Sandyford murder case with great skill. He cross-examined old Mr. Fleming most ably and severely, and pressed upon the jury that his behavior was incompatible with innocence. Under the direction of Lord Deas, the jury returned a verdict of guilty. Then followed the curious scene which we described in the preceding paper, and which bears a strange resemblance to the denouement in the Maybrick case, except that while Mrs. Maybrick's statement destroyed, that of Mrs. Maclachlan sup ported and gave color to the defence. One or two episodes in the trial of Dr. Pritchard deserve notice here. (i) Dr. James Paterson, a well-known medical practitioner in Glasgow, had been called in by Dr. Pritchard to see his motherin-law, Mrs. Taylor. While attending to Mrs. Taylor, he was much struck with the appearance of Mrs. Pritchard, and became convinced that she was suffering from antimonial poisoning. He never communicated this conviction to any one, however, and never went back to see the patient. Dr. Paterson's position was very delicate, and it is much easier to blame him than to be quite certain that under similar circum stances one would have acted more wisely. Mr. Clark of course turned the incident to the best account. The following extract from the cross-examination of this witness may interest our readers : —

"' Did you mean to convey to us that Mrs. Pritchard had been taking antimony medicinally or that she was being poisoned?" My impression was that she was being poisoned by antimony.' ' And you formed that conviction by looking at, her?' 'Yes.' 'Simply from looking at her?' ' Yes, judging from symptomatology.' ' Now, did you ever go back to see her again?" I did not.' ' Why did you not go back?" Because she was not my patient; I had nothing to do with her.' 'Then, though you saw a person suffering from what you believed to be poison by antimony, you did not think it worth your while to go near her again?"It was not my duty; I had no right' 'No right?' 'I had no power to do it.' 'No right?' ' I was under no obligation.' 'You were under no obligation to go back to see a person whom you believed was being poisoned with anti mony?"I took what steps I could to prevent any further administration of antimony.' 'By never going back to see her? ' k. t. A." The use which Mr. Clark made of these admissions in his address to the jury was to ridicule the idea that Dr. Paterson had any such conviction as he subsequently alleged. (2) Mr. Clark displayed even greater in genuity in the way in which he dealt with Mary Macleod. "It will not do," he said, " for the SolicitorGeneral to say, ' I have established that one of two persons must have committed these crimes; and you can trace the finger of a medical man in connection with them.' Probability will never support a conviction. It will not do for my learned friend to say, as regards the death of Mrs. Pritchard, it was the act either of the prisoner or of Mary Macleod, and it was not likely that a girl of fifteen would have the skill to do it. Only by showing that it was not Mary Macleod can he bring this charge home to the prisoner." The Lord Justice Clerk, however, disposed of this point very neatly. "The prisoner's counsel," observed his lordship. "did not seem sufficiently alive ... to the possi bility that both (Pritchard and Macleod) might be implicated; and if that was so, I suppose we should have little doubt which was the master and which the servant."