‘It is difficult to believe that the jury on the evidence could have brought in a verdict of guilty.’—Daily News.
‘The evidence being purely circumstantial, as well as flimsy.’—Academy.
[N.B.—Several of the above reviewers were friendly to the book on other points.]
‘In Scotland the verdict would certainly have been “Not Proven.”’—Glasgow Herald.
‘Though the evidence is purely circumstantial, it seems at first sight so strong that no magistrate could fail to commit.’—Saturday Review.
‘The evidence of guilt is very strong.’—Monmouthshire Beacon.
‘Certainly the evidence, purely circumstantial, is very strong.’—Publisher’s Circular.
‘A case of circumstantial evidence which all seemed to point one way, and to fix a horrible crime upon a young girl.’—Weekly Sun.
‘The evidence against her is damning, though purely circumstantial.’—Literary World.
These extracts, taken together, seem to me to throw a most interesting light upon the subject of trial by jury—the object of a sneer in one of the above quotations. When it is possible for a number of educated minds, engaged in highly intellectual pursuits, to take such opposite views of the same set of facts, it may surely be urged that, if miscarriages of justice occasionally take place, they are due, not so much to any defects in our judicial system, as to those native diversities of the human mind which no legislation can remove. A change is fast coming over our legal procedure in the direction of dispensing with juries, and leaving everything to the decision of a single trained lawyer. Whether this change is certain to ensure greater correctness of decision is, perhaps, more open to argument than is generally supposed.