Mr. Williams.—“Nor what its effect was on the heart?”
Witness.—“No.”
Mr. Williams.—“Do you not know that the lungs are very much displaced in some cases of spinal curvature?”
Witness.—“Yes, they are.”
Mr. Williams.—“Is not the heart very much displaced?”
Witness.—“Yes.”
Mr. Williams.—“You say this irritation of the stomach was consistent with poisoning with vegetable alkaloids, and yet you have never seen a case of such poisoning?”
Witness.—“I have not; I did not take means to ascertain whether the appearances were post-mortem. I know—only from Taylor’s ‘Medical Jurisprudence’—that vegetable alkaloids have produced these symptoms.”
On re-examination, the witness said that “he could not think that the death was caused by anything he saw in the curvature of the spine; that if death had been caused by pressure on the arteries, he should not have expected to find the symptoms of irritation in the stomach which existed after death; that displacement of the lungs and heart had not been, in this case, produced by the curvature of the spine, and, if there had been much displacement of either, he could not have failed to observe it.” Dr. Little was equally inexperienced with Dr. Berry in cases of poisoning, but agreed with him that the curvature of the spine in the lumbar region had not displaced either the lungs, the stomach, or the heart, and that the patches on the surface of the stomach were of recent date—“might have existed for days, but not for weeks, but not without the patient suffering.”
Mr. Bond, the Lecturer on Forensic Medicine at the Westminster Hospital, detailed the various portions of the body which he put aside for chemical analysis and delivered to Dr. Dupré; the receipt of two pills given to him by Dr. Berry, one of which was taken out of one of the capsule boxes after the boy’s death, and the other brought to Dr. Berry whilst he was in attendance on the deceased, and two packets of sweets, and part of a cake. He further confirmed the evidence of Dr. Berry as to the results of the post-mortem examination, with the exception, that Dr. Berry had omitted to state that “the whole of the lungs were somewhat congested, and the anterior part of them exceedingly so, and that the body was not decomposed.” In his opinion there was nothing to account for death from natural causes, and he attributed it to poisoning by some vegetable alkaloid, such as aconitia, a fatal dose of which could be given in one of the capsules. The appearances on the post-mortem examination were, he considered, such as he should expect to find in death by aconitia. He agreed also with the other medical men that the grey patches on the stomach were recent, due to intense irritation, and would cause the deceased great pain, and induce vomiting. On the question of the probable effect of the curvature of the spine, he gave the following most material evidence:—