By Lord Campbell—What do you assume the symptoms to have been on the Saturday night?—A state of great excitement in a less severe form; that Mr. Cook described himself to have been very ill.
T. Nunneley
Examination resumed—What else?—In a condition that he considered himself mad for two minutes, caused, he stated, through some noise in the street.
Now, adverting to the symptoms described on these three occasions here in the Court, is it your opinion that they could have been produced by the poison of strychnia?—They did not resemble what I have seen to follow it. He had more power of voluntary motion—sitting up in bed, moving his hands about, freely swallowing, and asking to be rubbed and moved, and a greater length of time occurred from the taking of the pills supposed to contain strychnia and the occurrence of the symptoms, much greater than any period that has occurred in my experience.
Does any observation occur to you on the screaming?—The screaming foreran the vomiting. I have never seen an animal vomit after taking strychnia, nor scream as an expression of voluntary exercise. Where there is so much spasm there is an inability on the part of the patient to vomit. I have a case, which is related in the 10th volume of the Journal de Pharmacie, in which attempts were made to give emetics without success.
With reference to the post-mortem observations of animals poisoned by strychnia, could you form any opinion on the post-mortem examination of Mr. Cook whether he had been under the influence of poison?—They differ materially in the particulars I have mentioned. The heart is stated to be empty and contracted, the state of the lungs not congested, the state of the brain not congested.
In the case of the paroxysms of the animals what has been the course of the subsiding of the paroxysm?—Gradual. I have never known a case of a severe paroxysm return, and then a long interval of complete repose for several hours. I have known it for half an hour.
I have experimented on the bodies of animals poisoned by strychnia with a view of discovering the strychnia poison from a few hours up to the forty-third day, the body being perfectly putrid in the latter case. In no one case have I failed to discover the poison.
Suppose a person to have died under the immediate effects of strychnia poison, in the first paroxysm after its administration, and his stomach to have been taken out and put into a jar on the sixth day after death, in your opinion must strychnia have been found in the body on proper chemical analysis?—If it were there.
T. Nunneley