I90 APPENDIX. 



liberty which is usually conceded in cases of importance. 

 Whatever may be the importance of a case to a prisoner, 

 nothing ca7t justify the putting of questions in a loud and 

 instilting tone to a skilled professional witness. The very 

 mild rebuke administered to counsel on this occasion was 

 not likely to produce much effect, and accordingly this trial 

 presents, in a concentrated form, all the defects of our 

 method of getting at truth by cross-examination. The 

 result is seen in the unsatisfactory nature of the verdict, 

 which was against the medical and general evidence in the 

 case. 



Witness should be Master of his Subject, and 

 clear in his own Mind. 



However anxious an incompetent witness may be to ap- 

 pear learned, and however hard he may labour to show it, 

 he will ever find it a difficult business to make the Court 

 and counsel believe that he is really so. To appear really 

 learned he must be able to make the subject on which he 

 gives an opinion clear., and to give satisfactory reasons for 

 this opinion. He must be not only a thinker, but must 

 satisfy others that he is master of the subject. Take almost 

 any one of the important scientific questions upon which a 

 professional witness is called to pass an opinion, and unless 

 he has looked at the subject before with a purpose to under- 

 stafid it — comprehending its extent, w.eight, and relations — 

 he will find it to have suddenly assumed an importance he 

 has not suspected, just at the time when the discover}^ will 

 add to his confusion. It is better to make this discovery 

 in the quiet stillness and security of solitude, than under 

 the eye of a judge and the severe scrutiny of counsel A 

 man, whether learned or not — whether in court or out of 

 court — will talk clearly upon a subject he well understands, 

 whether it is scientific or otherwise : but unless it is clear 



