The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-09-14

cal Jurisprudence whose tits with
Professor WITTHAUs enlivened the
day quite as much as did the clashes
between the aggressive Mr.. wELLMAN
and the poison expert Of the defence,
DR.. SoHELLE, who was so enraged by
| Mr.. WELLMAN's methods that he
spoke Of duel. The illegal array in
the trial of DR.. MEYER for the poison
ing of GUSTAV BAUM was the same as
that Of the Buchanan case, except that
LEWIS STUYvEsANT CHANLER was
added to the defence.
| While the trial Of the Guldensuppe
case was not on a par dramatically
with the poison mysteries of the '90s
it attracted much attention, not only
through the /intricacy and brutality
of the crime itself but because of the
fighting qualities of the lawyers,
MARTIN THORN being defended by
WILLIAM +. HOWE and Mrs. mack by
FREDERICK B. HOUSE (now the magis-
terlal foe Of speeding motorists) and
NANNY FRIEND. The legal victory in
that trial lay in the ability to make
the woman turn States evidence
faster than her evil partner.
The medical experts gave way tenn
porarily to the handwriting experts
and both GLASSES of scientists were a
Joy to the court room habitues-in the
Dolly Reynolds case; yet there was
distinction enough among the lawyers
engaged, what with Mr.. MCINTYRE,
Mr.. OSBORNE and FORBES HENNEssY
for the People, and HOUSE, FRIEND and
ROBERT NJ. MOORE for the defendant,
DR.. KENNEDY, who went free after his
third trial. But in the MolineuX
case the poison sharps were to return
and the professors~of chirography to
remain. The matter of prosecution
and defence was practically confined
to Mr.. OSBORNE, for the District Attor-
ney's office, and BARLOW S. WEEKS,
now a Justice Of the Supreme Court,
1 for ROLAND BURNHAM MoL1NEux.
1t is unlikely that any more terrific
legal duel has been seen In an Ameri-
can court in a murder case; not even
when former Governor ROBINSON was
| lighting for LIZZIE BoRDEN's life in
the court house at Fall River.
OSBORNE used every stroke that he
had learned under NIcoLL, employed
every device of his own remarkable
cunning, to bring damning evidence
before the jury, and pursued to the
end the untiring and relentless meth
DDS which made him famous, then
and later, as an examiner.
The idle went to the court for
drama and OSBORNE gave 1t to them.
"Motive?" he cried. There" pointing
to the defendants wife, "sits the mo-
tlvel' 1t was worth day on hard
bench to watch him OBVIOUSLY try to
bring the name of the dead BARNET
into the case; and bring it in he did.
The fact that the admission of testi-
mony relative to BARNET's death, in
a case where MoLINEUx was accused
only of the death of Mrs. ADAMS,
caused the Court Of Appeals to set
inside the verdict did not detract one
whit from the interest aroused by
OsBoRNE's effort to insert the wedge.
Incidentally, young lawyers who
shrink from criminal cases will re-
member-if the appearance of DANIEL
WEBSTER in the White murder trial
is not enough-that the argument of
the Molineux case before the Court
of Appeals was made by lawyers no
less distinguished than DAVID B. HILL
and JOHN G. MILBURN.
Those were days of somewhat grim
pleasure for the retired but not tired
business man. In our spacious court
rooms the most accomplished MUIR
derers of their day appealed to the
the eloquent speeches or the keen
questionings of acute lawyers. No
admission, no war tax, no bother
with programmes. The drama
changed from day to day, the unex-
pected happened almost beyond ex-
pectancy. The spectator at the Har-
ris trial knew that when that show
was finished DR.. BUCHANAN would
soon follow. The New Yorker Of that
day who survives is likely to grum-
BILE now that there are no good GRIM
inal lawyers, or no first class mystic
rious murders, or no really expert
witnesses-or at least that something
is missing, not to say wrong. If he
is half an optimist he says that, while
murders run on, the police catch the
criminals and extract immediate con-
LESSONS. If he is a pessimist he
thinks the murders are still COM
mitted but never discovered.
The Goat or the Staircase.