Up to the end of the sixteenth century the body of the suicide was treated with barbarous cruelty. This was the outcome of the canon law rather than the civil law, and the Church still clings to a belief in the efficacy of old-time procedure. Only the other day (February, 1894) the Archbishop of Canterbury said that “the increase of suicide is largely due to the now almost universal verdict of temporary insanity given at coroners' inquests;” and he further referred to the burial of suicides in consecrated ground with former practices. The sole disability under which a suicide now lies is that which he suffers at the hands of the Church, and it is to enable him to escape that that coroners' juries deliberately perjure themselves by finding verdicts of temporary insanity where there is not a tittle of evidence to support such verdicts.

It is thought best that the annotation on this subject should rather take the form of a personal communication than an editorial, and therefore I purpose setting before the readers of the Journal the chief points in the case which need special consideration.

Mr. Asquith has done wisely in commuting the capital sentence passed on Lewis in this case to one of penal servitude. The circumstantial evidence against the prisoner was utterly inconclusive; and his confession of guilt—deliberate and complete as in point of form it undoubtedly was—had a soupçon of insanity about it of which the mind has some difficulty in getting rid. The jealousy with which the criminal law regards naked confessions of guilt is justified by experience. There can be no doubt that it was mental disease which prompted the witches of old to make their false revelations as to the hideous mysteries of the sabbat. And other cases are recorded in which sometimes from insane delusion, sometimes from insanity without delusion, sometimes from sheer tódium vitó, and at other times from an infamous desire for notoriety, or a laudable impulse to shield the guilty, men have confessed, with the utmost circumstantiality, crimes which it was subsequently demonstrated that they had never committed. The case of Hubert, who falsely confessed that he had set fire to London in 1666, and paid for his falsehood with his life, is an instance in point. A still more remarkable case is that of the two Boorns, convicted in the Supreme Court of Vermont, September, 1819, of the alleged murder of Russell Colvin seven years before (Cf. Taylor, “Evid.,” Vol. i., p. 240, n. 2). It appeared that Colvin, who was the brother-in-law of the prisoners, was a person of weak mind, that he was considered burdensome to the family of the prisoners, who were obliged to support him; that on the day of his disappearance, being in a distant field, where the prisoners were at work, a violent quarrel broke out between them, and that one of them struck him a violent blow on the back of the head with a club and felled him to the ground. Some suspicion arose at that time that he had been murdered, and these were increased a few months afterwards by the finding of his hat in the same field. These suspicions in process of time subsided; but in 1819 one of the neighbours having repeatedly dreamed of the murder with great minuteness of circumstance, both in regard to his death and the concealment of his remains, the prisoners were vehemently accused, and generally believed guilty of the murder. Upon a strict search, the pocket-knife of Colvin and a button of his clothes were found in an old open cellar in the same field, and in a hollow stump, not many yards from it, were discovered two nails and a number of bones, believed to be those of a man. Upon this evidence, together with their deliberate confession of the fact of the murder and the concealment of the body in these places, the prisoners were convicted and sentenced to death. Fortunately they were not executed, as their supposed victim turned out to be in New Jersey, and came home in time to prevent their execution. He had fled for fear they would kill him. The bones were those of some animal, and the prisoners had confessed on the advice of some foolish friends, who told them it was their only chance of saving their lives in view of the strong popular prejudice and the circumstances proved against them. A similar case in Virginia recently came under our own observation. In the light of such miscarriages of justice, it is impossible not to feel a sense of relief that the convict in the Limehouse murder case was not permitted to go to the gallows.

Nothing would now be gained by an elaborate account of the Zierenberg case, or a justification of the verdict at which the jury arrived. Although it is probable that the plaintiffs suffered from the interposition of the Long Vacation between their case and that of the defendant, for the jury would naturally remember most vividly what they heard last, and although the terms of the libel in Truth were, perhaps, at some points stronger than the evidence warranted, it is impossible to doubt that the verdict was a right one. It is clear (1) that the plaintiffs were coarse, ignorant, and interested people, utterly unfit to have the care of inebriates, and (2) that the régime of the St. James's Home reproduced many of the worst abuses of the old asylum system which Lord Shaftesbury, who, by a strange irony of fortune, was once its President, did so much to destroy—the want of scientific or even rational classification, and the ancient, weary round of seclusion, harsh words, and blows. The reflections which the case suggests are not unimportant. It is obvious that voluntary “retreats” of this description ought to be made subject to Government inspection. It is out of the question to suppose that men of affairs like Lord Shaftesbury, Lord Aberdeen, and Mr. Samuel Morley can exercise any effective supervision over institutions of this character, or that their names are sufficient hostages to the public for their proper administration. Again, one cannot fail to observe that the disclosures in the Zierenberg case amply warrant Mr. Asquith's recent remarks to the deputation which pressed upon him the need for an amendment to the Inebriates' Acts, as to the caution with which the principle of compulsory sequestration has to be adopted and applied. It was stated in evidence that one patient at least was brought to the Zierenberg Home by a chimney sweep. It may be (Mr. Labouchere himself was, we believe, the author of the suggestion) that a contingent drawn from this humble, though deserving, section of the industrial community might profitably be added to the ranks of our “hereditary legislators.” But we have no desire to see its members, or, indeed, the members of any other class, without the special qualifications of knowledge and responsibility, left free to act as the arbiters of the liberty of habitual drunkards.

The first and altogether indispensable qualification for the work of the minister of Religion is, and must ever be, that his heart and soul are absorbed in his work. All the learning of the schools would be of no avail, and yet all possible knowledge of both men and things could find ample scope in that interesting and all-embracing field of service, the very “labour of love!” But if the heart-service of any religious minister of the Gospel is so all-important a requisite for the due performance of the daily duties of the ordinary parish priest, yet more is it so in the case of him whose daily duty, nay, whose great privilege it is to “minister to the mind diseased,” and unless the heart be really and truly in his work he can be of little, if any, good service to the mentally afflicted. Such a sad condition would prove a most prolific source of unhappiness and unprofitableness all round. “Can the blind lead the blind?” It is an old-established truth that no two persons are totally and unmistakably alike! Even so is it a moral fact that no two characters agree in every particular; and yet more, this thought brings me to the most interesting consideration of the whole matter, viz., the psychical condition of the insane, which is as varied as the physical and moral states of ordinary mortals. Quot homines tot sententió. The asylum chaplain, whose heart and soul are really and truly in the work, will make it his daily study to fathom the psychical conditions of his afflicted flock, so as to find ways and means and opportunities for the soothing balm of comfort and consolation! Very deep and sincere has been the gratitude of many a poor man or woman thus lovingly dealt with, and great the chaplain's encouragement and reward! Nisi dominus frustra.

The acquittal of the Zierenbergs on the charge of perjury in connection with their unsuccessful action against Mr. Labouchere has naturally occasioned some surprise in nonlegal circles. And yet the explanation is not so remote as might be imagined. In the first place, the issue in the perjury prosecution was much narrower than that in the libel action. In the latter, the whole conduct of the St. James's Home was impugned. In the former, the gravamen of the charge was Mrs. Zierenberg's statements, repeated impliedly by her husband, concerning their affairs in Germany and the arbitration in England in regard to the burning of their property. In the second place, a jury may in a civil case disbelieve evidence on which they would, in a criminal case, hesitate to convict for perjury. Again, in the criminal case of Reg. v. Zierenberg, Mrs. Zierenberg's evidence was not available against her husband. Lastly, the general feeling was that the Zierenbergs had already been sufficiently punished by the result of the civil action. It is, in our judgment, extremely doubtful whether the prosecution ought to have been undertaken.

As a “Chaplain's Column” has just been introduced into the Journal, the time and place seem appropriate for a short notice of the life of a distinguished man who was chaplain of a county asylum for more than thirty years.

Many of those now present will probably agree with me that the law of criminal responsibility, as at present laid prisoners is not the same in England, Ireland, and Scotland. The existing law is ruled by the answers of the judges to certain questions put to them by the House of Lords in reference to the case of the “Queen v. McNaghten,” tried in 1843.

Some time since, when moved to speak on behalf of the insane population of Irish Workhouses, I did not fully contemplate the many difficulties of the task before me; and now, when we are on the eve of promised legislative measures, it may seem unnecessary to enlarge on this subject, as it is to be presumed that the philanthropy which has urged the Executive to take up the cause of pauper lunatics in our Workhouses, has formulated a Bill embracing all that the heads of the Lunacy and Poor-Law Departments can suggest. Nevertheless, it may not be without effect to elicit from those present to-day, representing as they do the special knowledge of insanity in this kingdom—I may indeed say in Europe—some expressions of opinion on a subject which in one shape or another must have been presented to their observation in the course of their experience. In asking your attention I feel that the subject commands your sympathetic interest, as, of all others, you can fully realize the extent and malignity of the disease, and the urgency for suitable remedies.

With the increasing publication of monographs on various branches of medicine, the compilation of a treatise on nervous and mental diseases, or on any other class of diseases, must become more and more tedious and difficult, readers becoming more and more critical. But, without being too exacting, one may still be disappointed with Dr. Carter Gray's work, and after careful perusal we can but award it lukewarm praise. As we shall have occasion to show, it is of decidedly unequal merit—some of the chapters, with the author, we take it, at his best, leave nothing to be desired; but in others we find but scant descriptions, and there are important omissions—omissions which we cannot (after reading the author's preface) qualify as non-essential.

My attention has been drawn to the question of fresh Lunacy Legislation for Ireland, by the report of a Committee which was appointed by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1891 to enquire into the lunacy administration of this country.∗

The result of the Local Government Board inquiry in the Lewisham alleged workhouse scandal is on the whole eminently satisfactory. The Board do indeed find that indiscreet and improper observations were made in Mariano Williams's presence by the superintendent of casual wards, the male attendant, and the master of the workhouse; that there was unexplained delay in providing him with the special diet prescribed by the medical officer, and that he was detained for an undue period in the receiving ward without the supervision of a paid officer. But in regard to all the main charges against the Guardians and workhouse authorities, the report of the Local Government Board is a verdict of complete acquittal. They hold that the medical officers acted with bonâ fide and professional discretion in arriving at the conclusion that Williams was of unsound mind and had suicidal tendencies; that no complaint can be made as to the manner in which his removal to the asylum was effected; that his location in the same ward with Fox was necessitated by the want of adequate accommodation, and that Fox was not a raving maniac, but was already in a state of coma at the time of Williams's admission, although liable to convulsive seizures which might cause commotion. These findings show how much foundation there was for the indictment presented against the Lewisham Guardians, and accepted in certain quarters, whenever it was presented, with a settled determination to treat its formulation and proof as one and the same thing, and with an exuberance of invective which would scarcely have been justified if Williams had been a latter day Norris. There is nothing that the more emotional section of the British Press and public find half so attractive as a lunacy scare.

I desire to call attention to a mode of treatment which has not yet been generally adopted in cases of goitre, and to submit two cases in which thyroid gland was administered. The preparation used was five grains of the extract in tabloid form. The result in both cases was highly encouraging, though one was much more so than the other from a mental point of view.

This is a novel written “for a purpose,” the purpose being the exposition of heredity. We are suspicious of such productions for the reason that it is impossible to blend dry scientific facts with the ordinary attributes of popular reading in such a way as to prevent imagination overcoming accuracy. This work, though interesting in many ways, cannot be said to successfully dress science in a popular garb, while it contains many elements of danger to ordinary novelreaders. As to technique, we need hardly say that word structure and word painting are masterly. The plot may be described as a weaving of horrors, psychological, moral, and physical, into a tale of rural and domestic life, the latter being just of that easy and natural character which does so much to promote, whether for good or evil, the intaking of the more active incidents.