Counsel. "And would he always fall backward?"
Witness. "Yes, sir; he repeated the operation of tottering backward. He would totter about five feet, and would lose his balance and would fall over backward."
The witness was led on to describe in detail this process of holding up the patient, and allowing him to fall backward, and then picking him up again, in order to make the contrast more apparent with what he had said on previous occasions and had evidently forgotten.
Counsel. "I now read to you from the stenographer's minutes what you said on this subject in your sworn testimony given at the coroner's inquest. You were asked, 'Was there any violence inflicted on Wednesday before dinner time?' And you answered, 'I didn't see any.' You were then asked if, up to dinner time at six o'clock on Wednesday night, there had been any violence; and you answered: 'No, sir; no violence since Tuesday night. There was nothing happened until Wednesday at supper time, somewhere about six o'clock.' Now what have you to say as to these different statements, both given under oath, one given at the coroner's inquest, and the other given here to-day?"
Witness. "Well, what I said about violence may have been omitted by the coroner's stenographer."
Counsel. "But did you swear to the answers that I have just read to you before the coroner?"
Witness. "I may have, and I may not have. I don't know."
Counsel. "If you swore before the coroner there was no violence, and nothing happened until Wednesday after supper, did you mean to say it?"
Witness. "I don't remember."
Counsel. "After hearing read what you swore to at the coroner's inquest, do you still maintain the truth of what you have sworn to at this trial, as to seeing the nurse let the patient fall backward four or five times, and pick him up and laugh at him?"