On cross-examination the witness said—
“That when she gave her the medicine about three o’clock, deceased complained that it was bitter, as witness found it was on tasting it: (it contained aloes). That when the attack came on she appeared to lose her senses very soon, her eyes being fixed, and not speaking: this was in about an hour. She spoke until half an hour after her attack, but not until forty minutes. She was in better health and spirits on the Saturday than she had been all the week. She was rubbed after each fit, and it seemed to relieve her. The jumpings and twitchings went on, on the Saturday, and she was then some hours still, and then they began again.”
Mrs. Wood added the following particulars of the last attack:—
“I went at twenty minutes to eight on the Saturday evening and found her sitting up; her husband and Mrs. Witham were with her. About eight she asked her husband for her medicine; he went out of the room to get it, and returned in about a minute with it, and gave it to her. She said it was very bitter, very hot, and very nasty, and that she thought she would get better if the attack did not return. I recommended her to try and put it off. In about a quarter of an hour after taking the medicine she began to be ill. I asked Mrs. Witham to go round and take her hand, saying, ‘this Gird is coming on.’ She was propped up with pillows. In a short time she said, ‘Off the bed’ and repeated it three times. I thought at that time she wished to get off the bed. Mrs. Witham said, ‘Oh no, we cannot.’ I do not think she was sensible after she said ‘Off the bed’ the first time. She died at twenty minutes to eleven. Dove went for the doctors; when he returned she was dead.”
Mr. Scarth, Morley’s pupil, who attended on the 25th of February, at the request of the prisoner, in Mr. Morley’s absence, said—
“I found Mrs. Dove in bed with very minute twitchings of the muscles of the face and arms, and her teeth closed—hands clinched—head thrown slightly back, and the shoulders likewise, and her feet stretched straight out with the legs. Again I saw her at seven on the Thursday night, the symptoms were the same, but her principal complaint was of pain in the shoulders and back. Her shoulders were thrown back. The attack passed off whilst I was there in about five minutes. I gave her the draught prescribed by Mr. Morley, and the convulsions ceased and did not return, and I ordered her the repetition of the draught.”
This witness had the cat dug out of the midden, in which the prisoner said he had buried it, and was present when Mr. Morley and Mr. Nunneley experimented on it.
MEDICAL AND ANALYTICAL EVIDENCE.
Mr. George Morley, a surgeon at Leeds, who had always attended the Dove family, was called in to the deceased in December, 1855, when he found her suffering from disordered digestion and nervous excitement. She improved, and he subsequently only saw her at long intervals till the 25th of February; on that day, he said—
“I found her in bed, and only observed twitchings of the arms twice. She told me she had had an attack in the morning with pains in the back and limbs, and had been often before so, and that she suffered from an excitable temperament. I thought it an hysterical attack, as she was at the age for them. Saw her every day during the week, and on the Wednesday and Thursday again saw slight jerking of the arms. On the Friday and Saturday she was decidedly better, and I did not alter my opinion of her case until the Saturday night, as I had often seen such symptoms arise from hysteria. I made the medicines antispasmodic and sedative: they would check the symptoms, and for a time seemed to do so. On Wednesday I proposed seeing another doctor, when Dove said she would not recover, and I warned him not to say so in her hearing, and that he had better call in a physician. Next day I received a note from him declining the proposed consultation, as his wife had perfect confidence in me. On Saturday I received a message that she was worse, and that I was to bring Dr. Hobson with me. Dove came afterwards to my house, and said he thought she would not recover, and that he should object to a post mortem examination. I said I thought there would be no need of one, and that she would recover. He said his wife objected to it strongly. He seemed excited, as with drink, but quite rational. We were too late to see Mrs. Dove alive. From what Mr. Scarth told me I took measures for a post mortem examination.