The Sun.
London, England, 1844-11-26 00:00:00

invested in the joint names of Burgess and Elder,
with Mr. Grant as trustee, and the address of Elder
proved to be No. 51, Federal-street, Boston, and that
of l3urgess to be about fifteen miles distant from that
city. About 34,000 dollars, another amount, as we
were given to understand, invested in the Stocks, in
the names of Burgess and Elder, by Messrs. Reynold
and Grant, and about 3,000 more were in the hands
of the Marshal of the district of Massachusetts, and
the whole of this money will be brought over by John
Forrester in the next steamer, if, as is expected, the
legal proceedings considered necessary under the
novel circumstances of the case, be completed in time.
The regular transfers have been regularly made, every
facility having been rendered by the gentlemen who
had bean employed by the fugitive, to give effect to the
new law under which the messengers from the Bank
of England were sent to act. In fact, all the parties
in whom any power was "vested in America, expressed
the strongest desire to aid the exertions of our officers,
being determined to show that they were very far
from wishing to see their country the refugiumpeccato-
sum of England, or any other nation.
One of the communications speaks thus of John
Forrester :—" The utmost credit is due to Forrester
for his untiring perseverance, his devotedness, and
his efficiency. Sleepless in his efforts, and straight-
forward in his demeanour, he secured friends wher-
ever he went who were ready and anxious to stand
by him, and also at once enlisted their good-will in
his behalf. No one could have discharged the re-
sponsible duties committed to him with more inte-
grity, zeal, or success."
It was supposed that the death of Elder, who
strangled himself in the gaol of Boston, would have
been the cause of some delay and other inconvenience,
but so willing were the authorities to give every op-
portunity to the Bank of England messengers to ob-
tain restitution of the stolen property, that there ap-
peared to be no chance of the slightest procrasti-
nation.

The purchase made in the names of the fugitives
was, we believe, all good stock, and no doubt is en-
tertained that it will realise the prices given for it.
An inquest was held upon the body of Elder before
Mr. Pratt, at Boston, and it was stated before the
jury that the deceased was found dead in the gaol
by strangling himself with his silk handkerchief, the
same handkerchief being fastened to the grate of the
room of the prison.

MEDICAL EVIDENCE IN THE
CASE OF BELANEY.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE MEDICAL GAZETTE.
Sir,—Will you do me the favour of inserting this
letter in as early a number of your journal as may be
convenient; it is an answer to one I have just seen,
and which appeared in the Herald of the 17th inst.,
purporting to be a review of the medical evidence
given by myself and Dr. Thomson at the late trial of
Belaney, and accusing us of having allowed ourselves
to be directed by general evidence, of having assumed
wrong premises, an drawn conclusious from them
which were not warranted : three charges sufficiently
grave and serious to call for a reply, especially as they .
are put forth by a medical professor under the form
of a scientific dissertation: I can, and do, sympathise
with the Rev. Mr. Belaney, and hope that no word or
act of mine will give a tone to the general impressions
which are everywhere formed respecting the unfortu-
nate death of his brother's wife • and I assure him that
I was actuated by the same feelings when I entered
the Court to give evidence at the trial, being con-
vinced that general reports neither did, nor could,
come within the scope of my inquiries, which had
reference merely to the medical facts; and for the
purpose of arriving at these, and removing every
tittle of doubt or objection which ingenuity might
raise against them, I had instituted experiments under
every variety of form and circumstance, the results of
which, and not of any readings or hearsay, I detailed
honestly and as clearly as I could to the jury, never
allowing myself for one moment to be swayed by a
double-meaning question, or by any party feeling;
and it must also be remembered that t was not unac-
customed to such investigations, but that the circum-
stances of my position had for many years demanded
an almost daily examination into them.
Among the wrong conclusions with which Dr.
Glover charges us, are the following :—He says, I had
no right to assume that the cry of Mrs. Belaney was
a shriek, or that it was the effect of the poison. Now
I do not know that I have anywhere made such an
assumption. It is merely asked of me, whether
animals, under the influence of prussic acid, do not
cry out? To which I answer—yes, that it is a con-
stant effect: and then it is inquired of me whether,
after this cry, there would be a possibility of walking
to bed and 'telling the cause of the disaster ? To
which I reply, " Certainly not ! for after the shriek all
sensibility and volition cease." And Dr. Thomson
confirms my statement. This was no answer given
hastily and inconsiderately, but sought for amidst
multitudes of experiments and observations ; nor is it
in any way invalidated by the case quoted from
Christison, or, indeed, by any case within my knows
ledge that has ever been upon record. There can be
no doubt, as this and other cases show, of a capability
of speaking after the exhibition of the poison; but
this is not the argument ; it is, whether there can be
conversation after the shriek—which .1 maintain is
impossible. With respect to the other question,
whether Mrs. Belaney's cry was a mere call to her
husband, or a scream resulting from the poison, I have
never offered an opinion, although Mr. Garrett stated
in his evidence that Belaney told him it was a scream.
Again, according to the husband's statement, Mrs.
Blaney called the drink hot; and I am asked, if
prussic acid has a hot taste ? and reply, " No; that its
taste is bitter." I have tasted it again and again, and
on two occasions in quantities sufficiently large to
produce faintness; yet Dr. Glover maintains, by an
unnecessary, an inapplicable, and a most unlearned
dissertation upon the chlorides, bromides, and iodides
of cyanogen, that it must be hot,—though I cannot
see how this affects the master of fact arrived at by
myself and another, who is nearly the only individual
who has lived to record that its taste is inexpressibly
bitter.
In next part of the review Dr. Glover pronounces
our ens% ers to be an outrageous piece of cruelty. It
was known that Belaney, although he called himself
a medical man, used no efforts to recover his wife, and
we are asked whether the remedies for prussic acid
ate generally known in the profession ? To which
we reply, that they shOuld be, inasmuch as .they are
everywhere taught ; and I think that we were
warranted in making such a reply, when it is re-
membered that for sixteen years or upwards they have
been publicly and emphatically taught in our schools,
and are constantly being brought before the profession
in one form or another ; that we have professed works
and journals, and charts, to teach them to us; and if
Dr. Glover's "old and young acquaintances, who are
in active practice," do not happen to know them, it
can surely never palliate, or in any way remove the
culpability of the charge of gross neglect and ig-
norance; nor can it be admitted as an argument of
the universality of su'h ignorance : if it did, Heaven
knows, there is necessity enough for reform in our
profession ; but most singularly, when Dr. Glover
finds it convenient to make Belaney a judicious looker-
on, he argues for the propriety of his conduct, and
says, that when he stood by ready with his lancet, he
was acting in accordance with the views of Orfila,
Christison, Magendie, and others. And why, may I
ask, did he not further act in accordance with common
affection and common honesty, and try to save her ?
To crown the whole of this part of Dr. Glover's
review, he tells us that we do not know the remedies
ourselves; notwithstanding the whole tenor of our
evidence, that she might have been saved.
Lastly, as regards our opinion, that a smell would
exist for some time in the room where prussic acid
had been spilt, Dr. Glover expresses his dissent in toto,
although it has been stated that my conclusions were
drawn from experiments made under circumstances as
nearly as possible like those of the case in question ;
and in conclusion, without staying to comment on the
pseudo-scientific character of the review, meant evi-
dentl3, to catch the popular ear. I will merely ex-
press a wish that it had been written with a more
"conscientious spirit."
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
1-INRY LETHEBY, M. 8.,
Lecturer on Chemistry at the London Hospital.
12, Tredegar-square, Oct. 31, 1844.

SIR W. FOLLETT.—The Attorney-General,: Sir
W. W. Follett, is expected in England shortly from
the Mediterranean. A Government steamer will be
placed at the disposal of the learned gentleman to convey
him to England or Marseilles. Sir William is decidedly
better.
FUNERAL OF DR. ARERCEOMBY.—The funeral
of this eminent physician took place at Edinburgh, on
Wednesday, and was attended by the members of the
Royal Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons, amounting
to about one hundred and fifty, and a great
number of other gentlemen, friends of the deceased.
His remains were interred in the West Church-yard.
TILE ECLIPSE.—The commencement of the eclipse
on Sunday night was not seen in the metropolis, owing to the
hazy weather. About midnight the darkness was in-
tense. A little before one o'clock, however, the moon
appeared tolerably clear, and for nearly half an hour
before the last contact with the shadow was distinctly
risible.
EXTRAORDINARY BIRTII.—A poor woman of the
name of Mutnford, residing in Angel-alley, Bishopsgate-
street, and whose husband earns about 9s. a week, was
yesterday morning delivered of two boys and a girl,
living and likely to live. They had four before this event
made them the parents of seven, all in one room, and in
very deplorable circumstances. This case is a very
lamentable one, and is represented to us as one well
deserving the charity of the public.
On Wednesday a large brass mortar, weighing
about nine tons, was landed at the Dockyard, from the
Cornwallis, and is to be sent round to the eastward. It
was brought from Trincomalee, said to have been taken
by the Tartars ; it was found buried in the mud, and is
supposed to have been there about 200 years. The orifice
of the piece is about 21t. 31 in., and it appears to be of
good worktuanship.—Devonport Independent.