The San Francisco call., 1898-12-23
Startling Double Record of a Day in a Great
 City.

court anu Jury lHdl dIe U ylL6 M her for her life She has told of
 her career in this city, particu- larly since she met John P. Dun ming and gave to him perhaps all the fidelity that a woman can give. Mrs. Botkin has wept upon the witness stand in mock seriousness or honest reflection of scenes and incidents that reached a climax in the death of two innocent women. Mrs. Botkin has held hundreds of men and women in listen ing silence at the recital of tragic events. She has lisped her story of illicit love and domestic infidelity into the ears of hundreds of morbid hearers. She has denied tfat she was concerned, in the remotest degree, in the death of John P. Dunning's wife or Mrs. Deane.
 Mrs. Botkin proved to be the sur prise of the defense. When she was called as a witness she saw an oppor- tunity to pose, and she accepted it.. Her manner on the witness stand justi- fled the sobriquet of little English woman" that she has received. Mrs. Botkin was never nearer England than the boundary line of Missouri, but she affected with more or less success the affectations that most Americans be- lieve to be English.
 The accused woman told how and where she met John P. Cunning. She declared that she assisted the prescott ing witness when he was in sore finan- cial distress. She said that she found him harassed by creditors and in daily fear of the heavy hand of the law. Her womanIy sympathy was excited, and she aided him the best she could
 
 helped him t of his difficulties and he became a constant attendant at her side, haunting her apartments and liv- ing, it seemed. as she commanded.
 To cover the ground that other wit nesses had touched upon, Mrs. Botkin entered into a minute description of the s-snes that H sre ezIacted st 927 Geary street. In passing she paid her com pliments to Mrs. Seeley. and while de- claring that she did not like the woman, she admitted that her sons interests demanded certain concessions to the lady. whose age will not bear a critical inspection. Mrs. Botkin was perfectly frank in outlining her rela- tions between herself and her husband. "I gave him my youth,'' she said. and I will not permit him to divorce me now"
 Mrs. Botkin spoke quickly and nerv- ously There was neither break nor hesitation in her story. Now and again she forgot her crude English accent and spoke in English that Americans understand She told. sub stantially as the story has been related before, the relations between her and Dunning. She passed quickly over hot rfi with her lover and discussed the incl dents that came with the accusation of herself. In most positive terms. embellished here and there with ,lanner and method that were essen tially melodramatic, she declared that she had never bought box of candy in the shop" of George Haas. Fur ther than that, she declared she had never been in the shop" of George Haas in her life.
 Time and again her attorney would interject a question, and when he did not Mrs. Botkin would ask dramatically if she should continue. She denied positively that she had ever bought a handkerchief at the City of Paris, and she declared that during her residence at the Victoria Hotel no parcel, from the City of Paris or any other local shop" had been sent to her.
 Mrs. Botkin spoke her story as if she had learned it by heart. More than once the court reporter was forced to ask her to speak more slowly. The lady was by no means excited She overlooked no detail in the long taIe- Her discussion of poisons at stockton after the announcement of the Dover murders was a critical point. She GOV cred it by declaring that "heaVy neul- cines had been prescribed TOT her' anu in her fear of them she discussed thelr effect with her physician. She mann tained that on July 31, 1898, the critical day of the case, she never left her apartments at the Victoria Hotel, eX- cept to telephone to her physician
 It was then that her attorney asked her a strange question. He demanded to know what happened to Mrs. Botkln when she learned that the wife ana sister-in-law of John P. Cunning had been poisoned. Mrs. Botkin replied that the news threw her into uncon- sciousness for several hours. And how do you feel now?" the attorney asked.
 q feel most deadly" was the strange reply. And Mrs Botkin was weeping.
 Her tears were quickly dried when she began the discussion of Miss Lizzie A. Livernash. She said that this wom- an came to her and won her confidence on the plea that she had felt as Mrs. Botkin felt and with a fellow feeling felt compassion. Mrs. Botkin then de- tailed all the secret history of the strange relations between herself and her husband, and when the hour of ad- journment came she was still on the witness stand under direct examina- tion. She will resume her testimony this morning.
 Mrs Botkin was not the only import ant witness placed on the stand by the | defense Dr. George M Terrill testi- | fled that on the afternoon of July 31, |