Cross-examined by the Attorney-General.—I am a lecturer on surgery. Mr. Morley, who was called for the prosecution, is a lecturer on chemistry. Part (perhaps half) of the experiments on the 60 animals were made by me and Mr. Morley jointly. There was nothing to distinguish the experiments which I made alone from those which I made jointly with him. I state the apparent results of the whole. My experiments were spread over a period of thirty years. Many of them have been made since the Leeds case. Some of them were made in reference to this case. I can’t say how many.
Now, don’t put yourself in a state of antagonism to me, but tell me how many of your experiments were made in reference to this particular case?—I cannot answer that question. The great bulk certainly were not. I was first concerned in this case about the time of the death of the person at Leeds. I was applied to. I was in correspondence with the attorney for the defence. The details of the Leeds case were forwarded to him by me, and I called his attention to them. The general dose in these experiments was from half a grain to two grains. Half a grain is sufficient to destroy life in the larger animals. I have seen both a dog and cat die from that dose, but not always. Some animals as a species are more susceptible than those of a different species, and among animals of the same species some are more susceptible than others. The symptoms in the experiments I have mentioned did not appear after so long a period as an hour. We have had to repeat the dose of poison in some instances when half a grain has been given. That happened in the case of a cat. Symptoms of spasm were produced, but the animal did not die. She had not, however, swallowed the doses. I think I have known animals of the cat species killed with half a grain.
Have you any doubt about it?—Yes.
Half a grain, then, is the minimum dose which will kill a cat?—I think it would be the minimum dose in the case of an old strong cat. If administered in a fluid state I think a smaller dose would suffice. Harried breathing is one of the first symptoms, afterwards there are twitching and tremblings of the muscles, then convulsions.
Is there any diversity, as in the intervals and the order of the symptoms, in animals of the same species?—They certainly don’t occur after the same intervals of time, but I should say they generally occur in the order I have described. There is some difference in the periods at which the convulsions take place. Some animals will die after less convulsion than others, but an animal generally dies after four or five. In one or two instances an animal has died after one convulsion. In those instances a dose has been given equal in amount to another dose which has not produced the same effect. The order in which the muscles are convulsed varies to some extent. The muscles of the limbs are generally affected first. The convulsions generally occur simultaneously.
Do you know any case of strychnine in which the rigidity after death was greater than the usual rigor mortis?—I think not. I don’t think there is any peculiar rigidity produced by strychnine.
Have you never found undue rigidity in a human subject after death from strychnine?—Considerably less.
In the anonymous case to which we have referred were not the hands curved and the feet arched by muscular contraction?—Not more than is usual in cases of death from ordinary causes. The limbs were rigid, but not more than usual.
In face of the medical profession, I ask you whether you signed a report stating that “the hands were curved and the feet decidedly arched by muscular contraction,” and whether you meant by those words that there was no more than the ordinary rigidity of death?—Certainly; I stated so at the time.
Where? In the report?—No; in conversation. Allow me to explain that a distinction was drawn between the muscles of the different parts of the body. I heard Mr. Morley’s evidence with regard to experiments on animals, and his statement that “after death there was an interval of flacidity, after which rigidity commenced more than if it had been occasioned by the usual rigor mortis.”