of the body 9,000 feet per day, a merely animal when we read that "Manual of their imprisonment." Yet success has not been fully attained, and the last report of the English Commissioners of Prisons shows that with the greatest variety, fifty-nine employments in fiftyseven prisons, besides those of the first class of hard labor, "consisting of work at the tread-wheel, shot-drill, crank-capstan, stonebreaking, or such other like description of hard labor as may be appointed," etc., embarrassment occurs "in finding suitable industrial labor for prisoners who know no trade which can be carried on in prison, and whose sentences are not long enough to admit of their being taught one." The warden of Michigan prison reported that out of 850 convicts in one prison, 200 were not employed and with most half time, and work on alternate days had to be pursued. Superintendent Scott, of Massachusetts, in his able address last year at St. Paul, had this to say that "if prison discipline is simply to be maintained, many forms of unproductive labor could be introduced, and the crank and tread-mill would be pre-activity, and become independent beings, with some ferable to idleness, and the question might be solved through unproductive labor." The opinion that "this can be accomplished by the introduction of instructive labor at the sacrifice of remuneration, and at a somewhat additional increased expense" is given, but he adds: "Probably since industries were first started in prisons they were never in greater peril than now owing to existing legislation in New York and Ohio and pending legislation in Massachusetts and Kentucky." It is, alas, a true bill of indictment, and unless relief comes, the judgment will be, that we return to the tread-mill. We go back to September 23, 1822, for the first operation of this instrument in the New York penitentiary, and its titles in the literature of the day, and also in the argot of criminals, sound strange to us now; in thieves' slang, "The everlasting stairs," "The wheel of life," "The caregrinder," officially known as "The Stepping or Discipline Mill" or Tread-mill, in England Treadwheel, with its substitute for use in the cells, the crank. The London Society for the Improvement of Prison Discipline seems to have published the first description and recommendation of it that we had in our State, but it was earlier used in Hartford, and speedily sought for in Albany and Maryland. It was worked either by men or women in groups of from thirty to fifty on a wheel, and as in England now, it did service then as power to grind corn or pump water for prison use. The daily task is recommended in the last report of the English commission* to be equivalent to raising the weight 14 Id. p. 14. * The reports on the Stepping or Discipline Mill published by the common council of New York in qualification is the strongest safeguard against crime, and one of the most potent influences in the reformation of the criminal;" when we think of it as an educator, as well as preventive of evil habits and evil thoughts, and men taught, as they feel their powers grow, to rise in the plane of human information of responsibility. But labor is debased, even to the eye of a convict, in the tread-mill, and certainly it is to all its apostles who guard free labor so jealously, when in this age of the triumphs of intelligence and genius, when steam and electricity multiply as we will all brute power, we reduce labor to a mere feeble animal process, to a service not equal to that of a dog or a mule. The opposite and pleasant extreme we see in the State prison of Japan, where prisoners who are worthy are engaged in works of art, in cloisonné work, in wood carving, pottery, fan, umbrella and basket making, and descend through their grades of capacity to stone breaking as the last, to which only thirty out of two thousand convicts are left. 15 The usefulness of interesting labor was exhibited, and a pathetic picture was drawn, when the warden of Clinton prison reported in 1891, that "the moroseness and sullenness of idle men when the shirt industry was suspended required tact and patience to avert unpleasant consequences." 1828 are interesting. Messrs. Isaac Collins, Stephen Grollet and Thomas Eddy, of the Society of Friends, were most instrumental in securing the necessary attention in 1822 to the disciplinary advantages of the tread-mill and furnished illustrations, some of which are published with the report of the mayor, October 28, 1822. The commissioners of prisons, England, instituted medical inquiries in 1893 upon the requisite amount of labor, and their conclusions are given with some detail in their report of 1894. They have discontinued the shot drill. With one further reflection on the State's responsibility to the young we shall leave this subject. Boys from ten to eighteen years of age fill the reformatories of the different States; in one prison of California four hundred prisoners were under twenty-five years of age; of the entire prison population of our State last year over fifty per cent were less than twenty-seven years of age. In England by the last report fiftyfive per cent of youthful criminals had been previously convicted from once to eight or ten times; and it is supposed the same ratio would prevail here. Survey from what quarter you will the field of crime, you find the roots and the blossom and the flower of poisonous plants overspreading it, and to an alarming extent. It is the devil's harvest that is constantly gathered in. In 1850 the criminal was one in 3,442 of population, in 1860 one in 1,647, in 1870 one in 1,171, in 1880 one in 855, in 1890 one in 757. Even from the Utilitarian point of view, society is to be protected by the law, and its burdens grow less if one out of 1,000 convicts can be turned from habits of crime. We know that with the best prison methods of this decade in many countries the ratio of reclamations has been encouraging, and in many instances has been large. At all events such humanizing endeavors are in the right direction. Any correct rule for prison labor will be for something more than discipline, and for the prevention of the sources and causes of crime. The inscription of Pope Clement XI teaches the correct lesson: "It is of little use to restrain crim inals by punishment unless you reform them by education," and I would add, teach them of honest and ennobling labor.* NEW YORK, September 3, 1895. W. P. PRENTICE. SELECTED TITLES FROM THE DIGEST. It is a principle of the civil law that U heirs are not holden in penal actions, and other successors as little; accordingly they cannot *In France the tide of criminality has risen several hundred per cent; so also in Germany for many serious crimes, and in Italy and Belgium, in fact over the civilized world, it is the same appalling story. During this century in Spain the sentences to perpetual imprisonment nearly doubled between 1870 and 1883, and however the statistics are analyzed the increase in crime seems real. "The Criminal" Havelock Ellis, Nat. Prison A. Rep. 1894, P. 14. be called to account for theft. But although they be not chargeable in an action on theft, they must be liable in an action to produce, if they be in possession or have fraudulently brought it about that they be not in possession; and so after the production of the article, they will be liable in a vindication (@). A condiction likewise lies against them. It is equally conceded that an heir may sue in an action on theft; for the prosecution of certain wrongs is given to heirs; so, too, the heir has the action of the Aquilian law (b). outrages does not belong to the heir. It is held not only as to that on theft, but also as to the other actions, whether civil or honorary, which arise from wrongs, that the mischief follows the person. But the action on ULPIAN. Several wrongs concurring never bring it about that impunity is given to one; for one wrong does not diminish the penalty of another wrong. One, therefore, who has stolen and killed a man is liable in the action on theft because he has stolen; in the Aquiliau because he has killed; and neither one of these actions extinguishes the other. The same is to be said if he has robbed and killed; for he will be liable both in the action for robbery and in the Aquilian. It has been queried whether if a condition have been brought on account of the theft, an action can be brought nevertheless by virtue of the Aquilian law? And Pomponius has written that the action could be brought because the action under the Aquilian law is for one valuation, the condiction on account of theft for another; for the Aquilian takes valuation for the highest at which it was during the year, but the condiction on account of theft does not go back of the time of joining issue. But if it be a slave who has committed these, in whatever action he has been surrendered for amends, the other action is barred. In like manner, if one have beaten a stolen [slave] with a stick, he is liable in the two actions, on theft and on outrages; and forsooth if by chance he have killed this same person, he will be chargeable in three actions. In like manner, if one have stolen (a) § 15 I. de actionibus (IV. 6): We term actions in rem vindications; actions in personam, in which it is contended that [some one] ought to convey or to perform, condictions. Condicere, in ancient language, is to give notice; now, however, we call the action in personam whereby the moving party claims [something] ought to be conveyed to himself by misuse, a condiction; for nowadays no notice is given in that name. (b) L. 1. D. ad legem Aquiliam (IX. 2). The Aquilian law annulled all laws which prior to it related to unlawful injury, those of the XII. tables as well as others, § 1. The Aquilian law is a plebiscitum, in that Aquilius, tribune of the people, obtained for it the approval of the populace. and abused another's female slave. he will be chargeable in each of two actions; for the action for damaging a slave may be brought against him as well as that on theft. Likewise, if one have wounded a slave whom he has stolen, there will be occasion similarly for two actions that of the Aquilian law and that on theft. ULPIAN. When one wishes to prosecute an action which arises from wrongdoing, he will be remitted to the ordinary procedure if he wishes to sue for pecuniary damages, and he will not be compelled to subscribe a criminal accusation; but if he wishes to have punishment of the affair prosecuted extraordinarily, he will needs subscribe a criminal accusation. CHRONIC ANTIMONIAL POISONING. Two CASES WHICH FIGURED IN THE COURTS COMPARED BY PROF. DOREMUS. [Abstract from paper read before the Medico-Legal Congress in New York city.] T would be difficult to find in the annals of IT medico-legal literature two cases more worthy of detailed study than those to which your attention is called for a few minutes this morning. They present in some respects such marked contrasts and in others such confirmations that they form for the jurist, the toxicologist, and the physician a rare opportunity of judging of the methods of conducting criminal causes, of the limitations of expert medical testimony, of our knowledge or our lack of it regarding the effects of certain poisons, and the value and necessity of chemical research on occasions where it would apparently be valueless. The very titles of the cases arrest our attention at first glance. "The People Against the Rev. George B. Vosburgh," "The People Against Henry Meyer, alias William Reuter, alias Henry Meyers, alias Hugo Mayer, jointly indicted with Maria Meyer, alias Emilie Bauer, alias Maria Meyers." The records of antimonial poisoning, except in a few accidental cases, show that it has been resorted These to by persons in the better walks of life and possess ing more than the average intelligence. cases follow the rule. The reverend gentleman who was brought to the bar, was not so unfamiliar with toxic agents as would appear from his testimony, as Had the prosecution in the Vosburgh case been able to produce the evidence they obtained just after the case was closed, of his having purloined the tartar emetic from the store of a druggist friend, and with whom he had had desultory talks on the subject of poisons, the defendant never would have sworn that "I have never had tartar emetic in my hands, until I passed a powder of it over the table in this courtroom." Though acquitted by the jury, the druggist's disclosure brought from the public so strong and general a verdict of guilty, that the pastor speedily departed for regions where his true char acter was unknown. Meyer was one of a party of rascals leagued together to defraud life insurance companies, and one of his pals turned State's evidence and declared that Meyer had shown him a paper in which was "brechweinstein" (tartar emetic), and that he had witnessed the use thereof on the food given the poor deceived wretch who was party to the plot, but lost his life through the treachery of those he thought his friends. It is of paramount importance, in prosecuting a case of alleged homicide by poison, to prove the purchase or possession of the poison. The cause of the people against Vosburgh met one of its greatest obstacles in not being able to prove the former at the time of the trial. Every effort was made through detectives and the evidence of druggists who had sold tartar emetic, both in Jersey City and New York, to secure this important evidence. Most of the druggists questioned had not sold any Vosburgh went, and he never dreamed that his antimonial preparations, even the one to whom store of tartar emetic had been depleted until, by some inexplicable impulse, he was led to look at the bottle on his shelf, when the whole question of where Vosburgh got his supply became clear. About an ounce of tartar emetic was missing from the bottle. The defense in the Vosburgh case was conducted along remarkable lines. They made no opening. They put the defendant on the witness stand, but not the wife. Nor did the wife appear for the people. Poor, frail, delicate and over-wrought creature, she wavered between substantiating the averments of her family in accusing her husband and her affection for him, with perhaps an added fear of disclosures concerning their married life, was shown, unfortunately, subsequent to his acquit which might be brought to light under cross-exami tal. Meyer was possessed of considerable medical knowledge, though his practice was irregular — he was known as Dr. Meyer. Vosburgh, from his calling, could not have bought or kept poison about him without exciting suspicion; Meyer, on the other hand, was entitled to have and use poisons. nation by the defense. During the trial she ran away, fearing she might be compelled to take the witness stand. While the defense did not deny that antimony had been discovered by chemical tests in medicine, food and wine, they made a bold attack on the experts for the prosecution, tried to get up a personal altercation between them and their own experts, and to thus weaken the scientific value of the evidence. They then made all sorts of insinuations as to how the poison could have gotten into the specimens, and practically charged nearly every witness for the prosecution with collusion in a scheme to defame the Rev. Mr. Vosburgh. But in no one line of procedure were the prisoner's counsel more effective than in that of beclouding the minds and exhausting the jury by the mass of medical testimony they forced into the case. Physician after physician was questioned and crossquestioned by each side regarding the woman's symptoms, condition, recovery, etc., as well as on the general pathology and symptomology of chronic antimonial poisoning and "rheumatoid gout,' which the defense claimed was the cause of Mrs. Vosburgh's illness. Only two of the many physicians who appeared as witnesses had ever of their own experience had an opportunity to observe cases of chronic antimonial poisoning. refutation in the Meyer case. Thus, it was questioned whether there could be "tolerance" to antimony; whether the doses found in the tea, water, etc., if partaken would not have produced immediate death; whether when elimination began it would not proceed regularly until none remained in the system. Indeed, one of the medical witnesses for Vosburgh went into an elaborate arithmetical calculation regarding the elimination and the amount of antimony that might exist in Mrs. Vosburgh's body. The record of the chemical analysis in the Meyer case has just been published in the journal of the American Chemical Society, being a paper read by me at the May meeting of the New York section. Very considerable quantities of antimony and arsenic were found in the alimentary canal. The antimony extracted and weighed would in the form of tartar emetic have weighed 6.64 grains. The arsenic extracted and weighed, if calculated to arsenious oxide, would have weighed 5.92 grains. While drawing conclusions of a scientific character from the testimony presented in murder trials has grave disadvantages, many of the most vital facts to the forming of opinions being wholly want The rarity of chronic antimonial poisoning was ing, yet we feel warranted in the belief from the reequally revealed in the Meyer case, where no physi-sults of the analysis of Brandt's kidneys that at or cian could be found who could testify from his own about the time of his death only small quantities of observations of the symptoms developed in persons antimony would have been found in the urine, suffering from the effects of antimony partaken dur-probably a greater amount of arsenic. This would ing a considerable period. show that the elimination was defective, notwithstanding the large quantity of antimony existing in the body. The records of about sixty cases were collected by the writer, at the direction of the district attorney in the Vosburgh case, and a resumé of symptoms compiled therefrom. While the defense tried to belittle this testimony, the disclosure on the part of the other physicians of lack of experience in chronic cases made his deductions fully as competent as theirs. It was necessary to bring the symptomology of chronic antimonial poisoning before the jury in some way, and this seemed about the only way. Very little can be said concerning the lines along which Meyer was defended. The opening address by counsel in the first trial substantially admitted a conspiracy, of which Brandt was a party; they denied, however, that the body exhumed was that of either Brandt or Baum, and at any rate that any toxicologist could ascertain that the antimony and arsenic found had not been introduced after death. At the first trial only a few witnesses were examined regarding these issues. A more extended case was developed along the same lines at the second trial. Meyer was not asked to take the stand, for obvious reasons. Many of the arguments brought forward by the defense in the Vosburgh trial meet with complete Such a state of things would fully accord with what authors on these topics state in regard to experiments on elimination of poison, and with the records of actual cases of poisoning. The finding of arsenic along with antimony in Brandt's body introduces another element that adds to the unique character of the case. Diligent search at the time of the trial and since has failed to bring to light a case where these two poisons were used as toxic agents. Arsenic has been detected where antimony was the cause of death, but it existed as an impurity in the antimony. Not so in this case. The testimony of Muller is borne out by the distribution of the two poisons as shown by the analysis of the various organs. Brandt, like Mrs. Vosburgh, was slow to die. Having been reduced almost to the point of death, the coup de grace came through the administration of arsenic. Taylor, in a monograph on poisoning by tartarized antimony, cites similar cases, where the deceptive symptoms produced by tartar emetics paved the way for a demise effected through a second poison to remain unsuspected by the attending physicians. Abstracts of Recent Decisions. ATTORNEY AUTHORITY.— Where the record fails to show that an attorney had no express authority to enter a consent decree, by which a definite fee was given him, the objection that an attorney cannot have implied authority to consent to such decree cannot be urged. (Schmidt v. Oregon Gold Mining Co. [Oreg.], 40 Pac. Rep. 1014,) CHAMPERTY. Upon the trial of a suit for infringement of a patent, it appeared that the suit was brought by an assignee, to whom the patent had been assigned, fourteen years after its issue, and when it was known to have been infringed, under an agreement that such assignee should prosecute suits against infringers, at his own expense, and divide the recoveries with the patentee: Held, that such agreement constituted champerty, and that the bill should be dismissed. (Kieper v. Miller [U. S. C. C., Penn.], 68 Fed. Rep. 627.) CONSTITUTIONAL LAW SPECIAL LAWS.- An act by which the general assembly attempts to exempt counties from the operation of general laws on account of trivial differences in population is not of uniform operation throughout the State. (State v. Bargus [Ohio], 41 N. E. Rep. 245.) - A CORPORATIONS RECEIVER'S CERTIFICATES. court of equity has no power, without the consent of all lien creditors to authorize the receiver of an insolvent private corporation, whose business is not affected with any public interest, to issue certificates which will be a paramount lien upon its property, for the purpose of carrying on its business, unless it be necessary to do so in order to preserve the existence of the property or franchise. (Fidelity Insurance, Trust & Safe Deposit Co. v. Roanoke Iron Co., U. S. C. C. [Va.], 68 Fed. Rep. 623.) INSURANCE-INSURABLE INTEREST-ESTOPPEL. Where plaintiff, who sold land on which was a building covered by an insurance policy, took back a judgment for part of the price, and under the advice of the secretary of the insurance company, who knew the circumstances, delivered the deed to the purchaser without transferring the policy, and paid the assessments under the policy for three years, up to the time of a loss, the company is estopped from asserting that the policy was void for want of an insurance interest in plaintiff. (Light v. Countrymen's Mutual Fire Ins. Co. of Lebanon County [Penn.], 32 Atl. Rep. 439.) ---CHANGE OF GRADE. MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS-CONTROL OF STREETS A city has the supreme control over the streets, pavements, etc., and determines, in the exercise of its functions, everything in connection with their grading, paving, and condition according to its best judgment; and where it chooses to grade its streets so as to leave only a two inch depth of gutter, instead of six, it may do so without being subject to any control of the courts. (McHale v. Easton & B. Transit Co. [Penn.], 32 Atl. Rep. 461.) RECEIVERS Though a receiver appointed by a court of equity is by statute exempt from garnishment in his own State the federal courts of another State will not refuse to entertain garnishment against him on a petition properly presented by citizens within the jurisdiction, when no objection to the jurisdiction on other grounds exists. (Central Trust Co. of New York v. Chattanooga, R. & C. R. Co. U. S. C. C. [Tenn.], 68 Fed. Rep. 685.) EXEMPTION FROM GARNISHMENT.- TRADE-MARK - UNFAIR COMPETITION SIMULATION OF LABELS.-When a defendant has been enjoined from using a label almost identical with that of complainant, he will also be enjoined from resorting to another label, differing in detail from complainant's, but so like it in general appearance as to deceive consumers, if not trade experts. (Cuervo v. Owl Cigar Co., U. S. C. C. [N. Y.], 68 Fed. Rep. 541. New Books and New Editions. Law of Naturalization in the United States of America and of other countries. By Prentiss Webster, author of "The Law of Citizenship in the United States." The value of such a work, not alone in its application to this country, but also as a comparison of the laws of different States which can be used as a guide in framing new and better laws, cannot be over-estimated. Our form of government tends to |