The Sun.
London, England, 1851-02-17 00:00:00

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TESTIMONY OF THE INSANE.
(tl''rntre the Institute, Medical Journal.)
A case of considerable interest, and of some nicety in
medical jurisprudence, has recently been brought to the
notice of our tribunals. An unfortunate inmate of Arm.
atrong's Pauper Lunatic Asylum, at Peckham, died unex-
pectedly in December last, and upon examination his left
arm aed four of his ribs on the right side were found to be
fractured. His keeper had made no report of any casialty
having happened to him, and, in fact, denied all know-
ledge of how the deceased came by the injuries which
caused his death. We do not, of course, desire to dis-
cuss the merits of an investigation which involves the
most serious consequences to the party accused, and is
still pending; but it cannot prejudice him to state that
the keeper's denial was not relied upon, and an inquiry
took place before Mr. Carter, the Coroner for the county
of Surrey.
At this inquiry a difficulty arose, which Mr. Carter
had neither the legal knowledge nor the good sense to
grapple with. It was clearly his duty, if once satisfied
that there was reason to believe that the deceased had
met his death by violence, to examine every witness who
could give evidence of the circumstance, and to leave their
final admissibility to be decided by the highest authori-
ties—the judges of the land. To Mr. Carter, however, it
appeared otherwise. With the exception of the keeper,
who was under suspicion, and who had asserted his
ignorance of everything relating to the transaction,
no ono could depose to the treatment of the
deceased, but his fellow lunatics. The jury was anxious
that some or one of them should be examined, Mr.
Carter, however, refused to take this course, on the
ground that a person declared by law to be lunatic,
was by law an incompe tent witness ; and the
jury, in the absence of sufficient evidence,
eriived at the unsatisfactory verdict of " Man-
eslaughter against some person or persons unknown."
We would here interpose this obvious comment, that if
Mr. Carter's view cf the ease were correct, the keepers
of our pauper lunatic asylums might be guilty of the
utmost brutality to their patients, with an impunity al-
most certain.
At this stage of the proceedings, however, the Com-
missioners in Lunacy interfered. The Coroner's Court
had not performed its functions well, nod the keeper was
therefore by the direction of the Commissioners ap-
prehended on Saturday last, and charged before
Mr. Norion, the magistrate, with the man-
slaughter of the deceased. Here the scene was entirely
changed. The counsel for the prosecution intimated his
intention of calling one of the poor men from the in-
firmary where the deceased was kept, and who could
speak to important facts. Accordingly, to use the lan-
guage of the reporter, " Richard Donelly, a red-faced
tunny little :Mailman, mounted the wituees-box," and
being questioned as to the nature of an oath, to which
questioning (we again quote the reporter) "his answers
were as lucid and satisfactory as could be given by the
Bishop of London or Cardinal Wiseman, he was al-
lowed to be sworn, and detailed a narrative, which upon
the face of it, whatever be its value, seems clear and con-
nected, and which elicited from the magistrate the com-
pliment, that he as well as everybody who had heard it
was convinced of its truth. The result is, that the
keeper has been committed to take his trial at the ensu-
in,, sessions of the Central Criminal Court.
With the guilt or innocence of the keeper, we at
present have nothing to do. In the interests of that
profession which we aim at worthily representing, it is
indeed of the deepest moment that the care of the in-
sane should be entrusted to persons of judgment
and humanity ; and that wherever violence and
inhumanity are proved they should promptly be checked
and punished. But we are now only concerned in di-
recting attention to the different course pursued by the
coroner and the magistrate as to the examination of a
witness declared by law to be " cf unsound mind," and
to ascertain which of them acted in accordance with the
known principles of medical jurisprudence.
As we have already suggested, our opinion is, that
the coroner was wrong, and that a person tendered as a
witness in a judicial proceeding is not necessarily in-
competent because he has been pronounced insane. To
hold otherwise were to confound all distinctions, and
contradict the general experience of those who have
made insanity their study, and explained the various
aberrations of that complex machine—the human mind.
In order fully to sustain our opinion we will consider
this interesting topic, first in its legal and then in its me-
dical bearings.
The competency or incompetency of witnesses was once
a much more subtle and difficult inquiry than it has now
become under the ameliorating influence of the Legisla-
ture. Many legal impediments to a full investigation of
facts have been swept away in the progress of time, and
what time brings, knowledge. The distinc,ion between the
admissibility and the effect of evidence has been more
clearly defined, and the prevailing rule is to refuse as
seldom as possible the admission of testimony, leaving
its force and value to be determined by the wisdom and
experience of the tribunal before which it is given.
Some test, however, of competency, that is of admis-
sibility, must be laid down and abided by. In all
civilized and Christain countries, before a witness can
give evidence, an oath is administered to him, upon the
obligation of which he is to speak the truth. We need
not allude to the excepted case where an affirmation is
made instead of an oath taken. The principle is the
same, the form different. Such is the law of England.
The test then is, does the party tendered as a witness
understand the nature and acknowledge the obligation of
an oath? If he does he is competent as a witness. An
infant of tender years cannot understand the nature of
an oath, therefore by our law it is incompetent.
An atheist does not recogeize the obligation of an oath,
therefore, by our law he, is incompetent. But a mud-
man during a lucid interval may be ard leas been ex-
amined in our ceurts as a wan( as, and to apply the test
to the instance before us, the witness Richard Donelly,
having satisfied the magistrate that he understood the
nature of au oath "as well as the Bishop of London or
Cardinal Wiseman," he was properly admitted as a
witness.

Such we believe to be the law. All cur great law
writers have recognized two kinds of insanity or mental
unsoundness—dementia naturalis and dementia acci-
dentalis. The one means idiotcy, the other madness—
the one born with the sufferer, and permanent; the
other, permanent, temporary, violent, or partial, and
having a different operation and a distinct influence upon
every individual whom it seizos. Of the former class,
none would be found competent as witnesses; but to
establish a universal rule which should exclude the latter
would be a manifest solecism in jurisprudence, and tend
on occasions to a lamentable failure of justice.
We have hitherto abstained from mentioning the ac-
tual delusion which Richard Donelly, " the funny red-
faced little,lrishman," was labouring under, because it was
not important in reference to the legal bearings of this
question. It is, however, important as to the medical
bearings, and before entering upon them, which we shall
do in a subsequent article, we beg to inform our readers
that this poor fellow was labouring under the harmless,
and perhaps to him not altogether disagreeable idea,
that "sometimes he had one butt of beer and at
other times two butts of beer in his inside." We shall
have as little difficulty in showing that such a delusion
ought not in fact, as we have already shown it does not
in law, incapacitate a man from giving his testimony in
a court of justice.

PRODUCTIONS FOR THE EXHIBITION.--IMFROVE-
MENT IN COSTUME.—In November last a declaration was
issued, bearing the signatures of a large number of Royal
Academicians and other artists, complaining that the present
European costumes (particularly the male attire) " is in-
consistent with grace, simplicity, or dignity of aspect, devoid
of all requisites for dignified historic painting, utterly incon-
gruous with sculpture, and no less unfavourable to the living
figure, both as regards appearance and convenience ;" sug-
gesting to designers and makers of every anicle of dress to
avail themselves of the favourable opportunity afforded by
the Exhibition to display " such forms as may afford a series
of transitional changes from the present fashion to a style
consistent with the foregoing views and the advanced tastes
of the age." Among those who have specially turned
attention to this subject are Messrs. IL J. and D.
Nicoll, of Regent-street, who intend devoting a
great portion of the space allotted to them in the
Crystal Palace for the exhibition of the various court and ge-
neral male attire worn in this country during the past two
or three centuries, the object of which will be to show the
practicability by gradual transition of arriving at a graceful
and elegant costume, calculated for properly displaying the
human figure, and annihilating the existing inelegant, un-
classical, and monotonous dress in which the limbs of the
masculine portion of her Majesty's subjects are daily to be
seen envoloped. One of the garments in this collection is
a modern Paletot, registered on the 13th inst., the merits of
which are the dispensing with as many seams as possible,
those seams which are preserved flowing in curvilinear lines,
in accordance with Hogarth's line of beauty. Of the_marste.-
rial at present used in the construction of gannents,.nAlevery
Nicoll will show 200 specimens of woollen clotri .
these
lthlnglauddsitalliodu
variety of colour and shade, and of the fines_otrtm,oric ,
t he
te alter-
nateth the
whole will berel
e rangednf thien
darkera semicircle
n y th ei nj
lighter
radiated;tecro
baoefi,,
giving
pinleaasmin
Tartan of every known
to this, will also be displayed, t
enclosed a
Clan (79 in number).
Protectionists wa4 held at CZM-
A meeting gasseiffveecgtilt Ifrtawmiellgi'e;
of
l'rt
resolutions attribtr,ii,g agricultural
bridge on Saturday, whenons
of free trade were unanimously
adopted. presided. A county Y
eft. byvse
coveted
'if
c r
The Earl of
adopted.
be held at Ely on the sann•ssubject.
ng is about W
lodgings at Colchester,
MURDER AND SUICIDE AT COLCHESTI R.--ITI our
distress t,owtobine
eturday we detailed the circumstances under which
paper:of
woman, living together in
man an.
a and—the woman with her throat cut, and the man
were fe
hanging from the bed-post. Their names were George Von-
glr-;n a Charlotte Parmenter. They appeared to have been
in a state of destitution. At the inquest, on Friday, after
hearing all the evidence that could be obtained, the jury
came to a verdictk That the woman was murdered byYon-
der, and that he afterwards hung himself in a fit of temporary
derangement."

SUNDAY TRADING PREVENTION BILL—OR Satur-
day the Bill brought forward by Mr. William Williams to
prevent unnecessary trading on Sunday within the metropo-
litan police district and City of London was printed. It
contains twelve clauses, and is to come into force on the let
of November. Sunday trading is prohibited afternine o'clock
in the morning, under a penalty of ss. for the first offence.
Medicine, milk, cooked meat, and newspapers, before ten
o'clock, are exempted, as also publicans, from the operation
of the Act. Barbers are not to open shop
egooVesndercalling after ten o'clock on Sunday morning..
ex-
posed for sale. If penalties are not recovered _ _ a
saved from the operation. Constables may seize or exseerrciransetethareter
the Act must be commenced
hiagin yoekslaire„ is full •
dadiniviahs
i. bne
sevenAcl lmproceedings
days.it ted
. motion.
tothuendlierouseoolforCo_rre:o.nciroarlourrgteeonf
tb ea- u r
litul. has been made
a Itn ounce,is
As
isu steam-engine,
ee intended
by an ingenious workman in •
The Right Hon• the
Speaker gave his first Parlia-
mentary Saddlewoeft.
dinner on Saturday lust, at his temporary official
mdei ;de' forng beingi
tnhee exhibited
Gwree iagt Exhibition,
residence in Eaton square.

SE OF OYSTER-ROAM-4)11 Wednesday one
of the French
war steamers which arrived here on Monday,
which were dredging on the Proud limits, sad toilk them to
9 captured eleven oyster-boats,
on her fromcn Szti.rulls.ellier

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