The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — 1855-12-18 (Liverpool, Merseyside, England)

FORTUNE-TELLER.-At Bow-street police-office, London, on Tuesday,Ellen Sheridan was committed to prison for defrauding several persons of sums of money, articles of wearing apparel, &c., in the pursuit of her occupation as a fortuneteller. The evidence proved her to be an adept in her art. In the cases against her, it was proved that, from a sovereign. to -a shilling, from a neck-tie to a top-coat, nothing was amiss in the way of spoil, which she carried away from her unconscious victims. Holy water, whiskey, blessed candles, XX porter, salt, brandy, and prayers, formed the course of medicine, never forgetting, however, to have her hand crossed with a piece of silver, or a scrap f " solid gold," procured to effectuate the radical cure of each particular patient.  THE BURDON SLow•porsosmsm CASE was brought to a close on Tuesday, at Durham, after four days' investigation, when the jury, after a deliberation of ten minutes, arrived at a verdict of "Not guilty" as against 'Joseph Snaith Wooler, who stood indicted for the wilful murder of his wife by administration of small doses of arsenic, which were .undoubtedly the cause of death. The evidence at first turned with suspicion against the prisoner, but there appeared no motive for the crime, and anything like positive proof was wanting. The judge, Mr. Baron Martin, summed up for an acquittal in the most peremptory terms. The last words of his charge to the jury are—" It is for you to say whether you can safely come to the conclusion that the prisoner administered the arsenic. I may observe that if I were to make a surmise, there is a person upon whom my fancy would rest rather than the prisoner." After the verdict had been delivered, Mr. Baron Martin observed that he would have interfered at an earlier stage of the trial—that is, he would have stopped the case ; but he thought, upon the whole, it would be more satisfactory that it should be fully heard. The Times says the following ten names exhaust the list of persons about Mrs. Wooler during her last illness. Her husband; her brother; her sister, Miss Brecknell ; a maid-servant, Ann Taylor ' • the three medical men, Dr. Jackson, Mr. Henzell, his assistant, and Dr. Haslewood; a clergyman, the Rev. Robert Simpson ; and two ladies, Miss Middleton and Miss Lanchester. And of these it would be preposterous to presume that many of them had either the opportunity or the will to do her injury. On the other hand, Mr. Wooler had lived long and happily with his wife; he 'had no motive for desiring her death; he attended her during her illness with the most affectionate anxiety; he called in her friends, he summoned medical men, and then another physician of yet higher name, to attend the case ; when the suggestion of poison was thrown out, it was he himself who urged an investigation. Another and a very remarkable point is this :—As early as the 7th of June, Dr. Jackson said that lie suspected poison ; but he took no step such as any reasonable man should have adopted who was answerable for his patient's life. He even concealed his suspicions from Dr. Haslewood. "The conduct of the medical witnesses," said Mr. Baron MaHn, "as detailed by themselves, was reprehensible." The indignation of the public will supply a harsher term. Thus, then, for the presentthe case must remain enveloped in yet 'deeper mystery from the very fact of Mr: \Vooler's clear acquittal. The concluding words of the judge must not, however, be forgotten. Suspicion rests upon another person whom we do not think ourselves justified in naming at this stage of the proceedings; but these words were not spoken to idle ears. This is, upon the whole, one of the most remarkable, cases in our criminal records, both from the circumstances and manner of the murder and from the mystery which yet surrounds