Star.
London, England, 1825-08-09 00:00:00

This letter was tinted &elm , go. 5, and ad'-
dressed to Miss Fraiks Below Cottage, Dimcaster,
Ywkshislr• Thebearned•Gehtleman then commented
on this letterp and asked them if that was the' letter of
a mind- uhdei the influence of insanity. During the
whole period of Mr. Propert's acquaintance with Mr.
Frank, he saw
e oevnidtheenc ceontra ry,
nothing indicative of an unsound mind;
every thing of a proper behaviour.
but,zh
of Mr. Burrowes was also to the same
effect, down to the year 1821; and that of Towne,
Mary Coe, and Greaves, brought it down to the'pre-
gent time, that Mr. Frank was sane, and had not
conducted himself as represented in the speech of the
Learned Solicitor-General. Then, as to the medical
evidence of Sir George Tuthill, Dr. Warburton, and
Dr. Monroe, the evidence of the first two Gentlemen
was similar as to the •' delusion" under which Mr:
Frank was said to labour, respecting the infidelity of
his a ife, and the conduct of Mr. Bellamy towards him.
If there was not sufficient evidence for him to believe
that Mr. Bellamy was net his enemy, there was surely
no imbecility of mind in believing it. The evidence of
Mr. Norton was conclusive as to the conduct of Mr.
Bellamy. He had been at Mr. Bellamy's house and
received a letter ; the servant at the same time bringing
in a letter for Mr. Bellamy, who behaved himself in a
most uprorious manner. The only instance of insanity
in this case was the conduct of Mr. Bellamy, the peti-
tioner; for he bad said, that by the re-union of Mr.
Frank and his wife. he should lose 3,0001. a year by
the estates in Yorkshire. When he recollected the
evidence of Mr. Towne he could not but conceive Mr.
Bellamy had been pandering to his pleasures. The
Learned Counsel then proceeded to comment upon the
conflicting testimony of the Medical Gentlemen who
had been examined.. He thought it most creel and op-
pressive that every action of the life of this unfortunate
man should be scanned over and made the subject of
discussion. Ile referred particularly to the evidence of
Di. Burrowes, who had examined him patiently for
two hours; and he thought that the evidence of that
eminent individual, supported as it was by other tes-
timony, was sufficient to induce the Jury conscientiously
to say that Mr. Frank was a man of sufficiently sound
intellect to manage his own affairs. He thanked the
Jury for the patient attention which they had paid to
his remarks, and trusted most sincerely that they would,
by their verdict, relieve the mental capacity of this un-
fortunate Gentleman from that imputation which had,
as he conceived, been most unjustly cast upon it.
The Sourcing-GENERAL rose to reply. He would
have spared the Jury his own personal observations on
the case, feeling that he could add little to their infor-
mation ; but he was called upon to sift some of the ad-
verse evidence, especially that of medical ptolessors,
whose opinions upon the mere question of insanity were
opposed to the law of England, as it had existed for
four centuries past. Of the witnesses whom he had
called, seventeen or eighteen, excluding the medical
witnesses, had, after stating all the circumstances from
which they inferred it, stated their opinion to be clearly
and unequivocally that Mr. Frank was of unsound
mind. These persons were as competent to form an
opinion as the Medical Gentlemen ; otherwise, if every
one were net admitted capable in that degree of form-
ing an opinion, the Jury themselves ought not to be
sitting there; and the law ought to have left the deci-
sion to a Jury of Physicians. How did it stand on the
other side? The Jury had eight witnesses, who stated,
that they had aeon sapthing which woaid aushotiz
them in believing that Mr. Frank was of unsound mind.
Mr. Brougham, a witty eloquent man, who possessed
every quality which could make him a formidable ad-
versary, had talked of the negative cookery of the easel
for the lunacy. His complaint was far more applicable
to the case against the lunacy. Malcolm, who was
prohibited from taking a blind Gentleman to France to
witness the Coronation in the Cathedral of Rheims,
should have been called. Where was the attorney who
prepared the bond to Dr. Dickenson for 5001.? Where
was Mr. Fisher, who broke the sealed door open ? It
was very like the Scotch inn, of which Dr. Johnson had
said that the old dame's negative catalogue of provi.
sions was very considerable. Applying himself to the
definition of unsoundness given by Dr. Veitch—that of
a mind wherein the imagination overlays the judgment
—he would only state four topics, which, on that
hypothesis, would be conclusive : his opinion of his
wife's innocence—his intention of being married to a
Lady of fortune in the neighbourhood—his belief that
the postmaster intercepted his letters—and lastly,
his fondness for Dr. Dickenson, the imputed adulterer
with his wife. The repeated acts of that adul-
tery in different parts of the country. were not
shaken by a tittle of evidence. His letters proved
that his delusion upon that subject was perfect.—
Why was not this part of the case met by direct evi-
dence ? Here was negative cookery indeed ! Another
topic was his utter incompetency to manage or under-
stand accounts. Upon this there was an utter failure of
evidence, not a tingle account produced for the whole
space of? 12 years ; he had no account to settle. His
wife and children must have paid all the bills. Among
his subsidiary acts of lunacy were his irregular excur-
sions over the country, without object or direction ; and
his most dissolute manners and amours. Dr. Haslam
thought that lie might account for these more easily by
the hypothesis of profligacy and a love of wickedness.
The Learned Gentleman alluded to the case of Sir C.
Sedley, who, after a reign of religious moroseness, which
the Court thought t' dissipate with an opposite fashion
of licentiousness, stood in purls naturalibus, and exhi-
bited himself from the balcony of a tavern in Covent-
garden. That was profligacy, but not such profligacy
as that of Mr. Frank, which was incompatible with
any other state of mind than that of lunacy.—
He next applied himself to the law of the case. Upon
the state of the Roman law he might, if the mere love
of antiquarian lore would justify such a waste of their
time, have undertaken to break a lance with his learned
and absent friend, Mr. Brougham. The Roman law
did not confine its definition of mental incapacity to
fur iosus and fatuus. There was the term dewentat, and
several others of the same import. 46 Demented" was
the phrase of the Scotch law, which approached closely
to the Roman in this derivation. How long lunacy had
existed as a title or description in the Engibh books was
not precisely ascertained. Littleton, of the reign of
Henry VI. used the phrase of Non compos mends,
which from among many other cases was preferred
by Lord Coke as the most accurate which the law
could adept. Accordingly, subsequent authorities,
acceditz to the difficulty of determining the causes
of mental disease, had all adopted the condition of
soundnt as or unsoundness of mind, according to the
weight of evidence produced in the case. He repro
bolded the looseness and inapplicability of Dr. lias-
lam's theory of unsoundness, which required it to be
manifested in the same manner, at.d with the same