The practice is also reprobated by Tertullian,[[64]] who has described the instrument with which the operation of penetrating the ovular membranes was performed, “est etiam æeneum spiculum quo jugulatio ipsa dirigitur, cæco latrocinio εμβρυοσφακτην appellant, utique viventis infantis peremptorium.”
It is hardly necessary to remark that such an operation, unless performed by a skilful surgeon, will be very liable to endanger the life of the female. Guy Patin relates the case of a midwife who was hanged at Paris for occasioning the death of a lady in that city, by an attempt to procure abortion by this method. On her trial she said she had frequently practised it with success; but, in this case it seems, the instrument had pierced the body of the uterus, instead of passing through the os internum. We have already noticed a parallel case which occurred at Durham, see page [72].
In cases of criminal abortion the medical practitioner may be called upon to deliver an opinion upon the circumstances of the case. The data from which he is to draw his conclusions have been already fully investigated in different parts of this work. We must therefore refer the reader to the Physiological Illustrations of Conception and Parturition, vol. i, p. 230, and to our directions for conducting the dissection of the uterus, vol. iii, p. [67], for the solution of the different problems to which the consideration of the subject may give origin.
INFANTICIDE.
In cases of alleged infanticide, the evidence of the forensic physician is of the highest importance, and as his opinion upon such an occasion must necessarily go far to influence the judgment, and direct the verdict of the jury, he should be fully prepared to appreciate the difficulties of the case, and to clear away the numerous fallacies, and popular prejudices with which the subject is embarrassed. To Dr. William Hunter, the profession and the public owe the deepest obligation, for the philosophical and humane manner in which he examined the general value of physiological testimony in proof of the commission of child-murder. Previous to this enlightened dissertation[[65]] it is to be greatly feared that many unfortunate women had fallen the innocent victims of false theory and prejudice. The objections, however, so forcibly urged by Dr. Hunter against the validity of certain physiological tests, although well calculated to awaken inquiry, in order to divest such evidence of its fallacy, were not intended, as some have imagined, to discard physiological testimony altogether. With this conviction, we shall proceed to a critical examination of the various proofs which physiology has been supposed capable of affording, in support of an accusation of infanticide.
The objects of this inquiry may be conveniently arranged under four divisions, viz.
1. To ascertain whether the child was born alive?
2. If born alive, whether its death was the result of natural causes; of wilful murder; or of negligence and abandonment?
3. If its death arose from the want of due care, whether such negligence should be regarded as criminal or accidental?
4. Whether the woman accused presents on examination, such appearances as correspond with her supposed relations to the child?