The Portland daily press., 1885-02-03
TEE LIBBY TRIAL.
The Expert Testimony Occupies
the Entire Day Yesterday.
The Court Room as Usual Crowded
With Spectators.

murder of Lydia Snow showed no abatement
OF interest on the part of the public and even
the corridors in the building below the court
room were crowded with people blocking the
approaches to the county offices anG rendering
the transaction of necessary business very in
convenient, especially for ladies. Mrs Libby,
the prisoners wife, remains at Scarboro and
was said not to be as we'll yesterday.
ALoNZo JORDAN,
resides in Portland, is AZ years old. Testified
to fit that Libby had on the steamer Consti-
tuition on the way from Boston to Ship Island
in 1862 He said he fell down and was assist
ed below to the hospital; didn't see him when
he fell or how he acted.
DR.. SETH C. GORDON,
resides in Portland; is practicing physician
and has been for 20 years. Delirium trsmens
ordinarily is a disease of the nervous system,
characterized by delirious hallncinations a
fear of impending evil and muscular trsmers.
ing the use of alcohol for long continued
time, 30 that We get what is called alcoholic
poison. 1t is always caused by alcohol De-
Hrium may come from great many other
causes, but delirium tremens applies to q pois-
on condition of the system due wholly to Alec
ally, as matter of defniteness, divide il into
three degrees. The first degree Is character-
lied by those symptoms that have given Won /:
that is,a man under the effects of this for few
minutes at time will have an hallucnation; ;
that is, imagine he sees things that do not ex
list; he may see strange sights and strange peo-
pie and hear strange sounds that do not exist;
he may fancy that people are in pursuit OF
him, and he is in pursuit of some one else and
Tor a few minutes they will seem real to him
end then there may be period of conscious
ness, when he sees that this is not real and
laughs at it. In few minutes the thing re-
turns in some other form. That is the usual
course in the early stages attended with more
or less muscular tremor. 1t may go on to
what we term the second stage, when all these
things become intensified and when the delir-
lum becomes continuous. AT such times the
patient fears that officers are pursuing him or
he may fancy he has quarrel with everybody,
but as a rule the patient under the influence of
delirium tremens fears evil to himself and his
disposition ordinarily is not to fight, but fears
some impending evil
In the third stage the typhoid condition fol-
lows, and low type OF delirium like that
which attends typhoid fever sets in, and COL
lapse and death may enEue.
ID large majority of all cases the patient
gets well if he is in fair condition to start
with. Men who have periodical sprees rarely
have delirium tremens. A man may have q
long continued drunk and not have delirum
tremens. The man most liable is he who drinks
regularly every day and who keeps his nervous
system constantly under the effects of intoxi-
eating liquor He may not take enough to be
kept constantly poisoned by it day by day,
when he stops then deirium tremens comes
Delirium tremens always come from a suspen-
sion OF the alcoholic stmulsnt, and never OF
rarely ever, comes while the patient ia keep
ing up his or ginal standard of drinking Il Is
ffimHl3Ht from he
brain that this delrium comes on. The man
will usually remain under the influence of
opium for 8 or hours, but less time under
the influence of alcohol because there are
more avenues of escape.
And since all fear is one of the m ost promin-
ent symptoms of delirium tremens the effect
of long continued use of alcohol upon
the mucus membrane of the stomach is to
make it congested SO that the stomach rejects
alcohol and everything else. Vomiting is one
OF the common symptoms at that stage.
The doctor was then asked in series of cues
lions what it would indicate in a man who had
been heavy drinker for years having left off
one week, who wss restless to a degree that
would attract attention, walking unsteadily al
though not intoxicated, going into barber
shop three times In one day, asking the same
question of the same person three or four times
In succession, walking alone through the street
and talking to himself, etc., and he answered
that they were all syssoms of delirium tremens
in the primary stage. He was asked whether
or not man who had been using LIQUOR con-
stantly in large amounts for period of years
is liable to loss Of consciousness and to move
and act automatically, land he said that was the
general belief OF men who had the largest ex-
perience in the matter, but he had not had
any such case come under his own observation.
He said If such condition of things did ex-
let man would talk and perform whatever he
did in manner that would be to an observer
natural. In snch o case the will is in abey-
anoe as it is in dreams or sleep walking.
Epilepsy does not usually take the form of the
patient remaining unconscious during great
length OF time. A man subject to epilepsy
would be more likely to have these states of
Inconsistencies. If man acted as Libby
did in the room Just before the shooting it
would indicate an excited nervous condition,
and taken in connection with the acts of the
previous afternoon would be another symptom
Of dellrium tremens. The tendency of q man
In delirium tremens is not to commit acts of
violence although anything of this kind is liza
bic to occur.
On cross-sxamination, DR.. Gordon stated
that all his answers had been based on a n.y.
pothet1cal case, not from the evidence in pro-
eress. Epilepsy is hereditary. The character
OF epilepsy was described. A man going about
talking ordinarily and trading couldn't have
an epileptic attack. A man with delirium
rremens coming on is generally irritable. If a
man for week previous to given act was
doctor would not expect an attack of de-
lirium tremens A man with delirium tremens
as rule has no impulse to fire a revolver, but
rather to get away from some imaginary cause
OF alarm. The habitual use of liquor produces
tremulousness and unsteadiness of limbs.
when there is no delrium trenens. A man is
more unsteady, when he is not drunk, after
long use of intoxcants. SleeplesSness attends
a man addicted largely to drunkenness when
the effect of liquor works Off When q man
is bordering on delirium tremens his stomach
is liable to reject everything. food and water,
besides liquor. Some Of the best medical au-
thoritiss now state that the cessation of
drinking has no connection with the beginning
of delirium tremens. With one or two exec o.
tions all the symptoms described in the ques-
tons asked By counsel for defence might be
produced by long continued habits of drink
ing without delirium tremens.
The Attorney General went over each seps-
rate thing which Libby did according to the
evidence on the afternoon and night Of the 4th
of September.
The doctor stated that no one of these acts in
itself indicated hallucination. When asked if
he thought the raising himself on the bed,
cooking the pistol and pointing it at an intrud-
or would indicate hsllucination, the doctor
thought that would be the best possible evil
denoe of that state Of mind.
Afternoon Proceedings.
DP cnpn0T prsunru,