What do you ascribe Mr. Cook’s death to?—It is irreconcilable with everything I am acquainted with.
By Lord Campbell—Is it reconcilable with any known disease which you have ever seen or heard of?—No, my lord.
H. Letheby
Re-examined by Mr. Serjeant Shee—Do you mean to say it could not be the result of any variety of convulsions, however violent, though not classed under a particular description of convulsion?—We are learning new facts every day, and I do not conceive it to be impossible that some peculiarity of the spinal cord, unrecognisable except the examination be made immediately after death, may produce symptoms like these.
When you say it is irreconcilable with anything you have heard of, do you include anything you have heard of strychnia poison as well as anything else?—Certainly I do.
Is the vomiting of the pills just before death inconsistent with what you have known and observed of strychnia poison?—It is not consistent with anything I have observed.
Have you ascertained whether, if you touch an animal which is beginning those minor premonitory symptoms, but which as yet has had no paroxysms, this brings the paroxysms on?—Yes.
Was not the Romsey case exceptional from the manner in which the strychnia was administered and the quantity of the dose?—Yes, it was. It is quite consistent with all I am saying that the ringing of the bell by the lady the moment she felt anything of uneasiness would produce the paroxysm which ultimately was observed. In my judgment, it is not safe to argue from the symptoms of a case in which the paroxysm took place only a few moments after the ingestion of the poison, and it was in a fluid state, to what may be the probabilities in another case.
R. E. Gay
Mr. Robert Edward Gay, examined by Mr. Serjeant Shee—I am a member of the Royal College of Surgeons. In 1855 I attended a person named Foster suffering under tetanus. He had an inflammatory sore throat, muscular pains in the neck and the upper portion of the spinal vertebræ. He was feverish, and had the usual symptoms attending catarrh. On about the fourth day the muscular pains extended to the face. A difficulty of swallowing came on, the pains in the muscles covering the spinal vertebræ and in those of the lower jaw increased. In the evening of that day the jaw became completely locked; the pain came on in the muscles of the bowels, the same in the legs and the arms. He became very much convulsed throughout the entire muscular system. He had frequent and violent convulsions of the arms and hands, and afterwards of the legs. The difficulty of swallowing increased up to the ninth or tenth day. Not a particle of food, either solid or liquid, could be taken or introduced to the mouth. An attempt to swallow the smallest portion brought on the most violent convulsions. The convulsions were so strong throughout the whole system that I could compare him to nothing more than a piece of warped board in shape. The head was drawn back, the abdomen was forced forward, and the legs were frequently drawn upwards and backwards. The attempt of feeding with the spoon, the opening of the window, or placing the fingers on the pulse frequently brought on violent convulsions. He complained of great hunger. He was able to speak. He repeatedly cried out he was very hungry, what would he do if he could not eat? and he was kept alive till the fourteenth day by injections of a nutritive character. He screamed during these convulsions, and the noises he made were more like those of a dying man. About the twelfth day he became insensible. The convulsions, although very weak, continued till the fourteenth day, when he died. He was by business an omnibus conductor. He had been ill some few days—it might be a week. He had no other hurt or injury to his person of any kind which would account for these symptoms. His body was not examined after death.