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without being found out, and no greater test of innocence can be 
given than the fact that as soon as he is charged, and while there 
is time to inquire into and test his statements, a man gives an 
account of the transaction which will stand the test of further 
inquiry. 
Nothing could be more favourable to innocent persons accused, 
say of murder, than the opportunity of explaining their own case in 
the witness box; and nothing could be more fatal to those who are 
guilty, and who would necessarily have to rely upon a fictitious or 
hypothetical defence. 
- How Poverty INFLUENCES JUSTICE. 
In the present day, the defence offered by a prisoner is very 
much a question of means, and I desire to make a few observations 
upon the difficulties which attend the poor when they are face to 
face with a grave charge. 
For the well-to-do, probably our criminal procedure presents no 
particular disadvantage, for an able solicitor is at once consulted, 
and in his hands all that is needful is done. Every stage of the 
preliminary investigation is watched. A brief is carefully prepared 
and counsel instructed, so that there is not a point omitted. We 
may feel sure that under such circumstances if a prisoner is 
innocent he will have but little difficulty in establishing his 
innocency. On the other hand, the poor prisoner, in addition 
to his intellectual disadvantages, is hampered at each step by want 
of means, and when a wrong conviction occurs in an English 
Criminal Court, it is usually caused by treating a poor and ignorant 
man as if he were rich, well advised, and properly defended. Let 
us suppose the case to be one of murder, and that an individual 
has been charged with it. In the case of a rich man, a solicitor 
immediately instructs a medical man to watch the Jost-mortem 
examination on behalf of his client, which step has the important 
influence of checking the observations of a scientific nature made 
by the medical men employed by the police. The eye often sees 
what it expects to see, and a medical man looking out for certain 
appearances which the information he has received leads him to 
