114 THE MICROSCOPE. 



bers of society are largely availing themselves 

 of the facilities supplied by our marvellous pro- 

 gress in art and science, for the more daring 

 commission of enormous crime ; but, providen- 

 tially, the same progress in art and science, 

 which aids the criminal in the perpetration of 

 the darkest deeds, assists the law, and in a still 

 higher degree, in detecting the crime, and in 

 bringing the guilty to condign punishment. 

 The Microscope has played a very remarkable 

 part in such cases. A few examples may prove 

 interesting and instructive. 1 



At the Cumberland Spring Assizes, in 1855, 

 an individual named Munroe was tried for the 

 murder of the paymaster of a colliery, who had 

 been waylaid in a lonely spot, robbed of thirty 

 shillings, and deprived of life, his throat being 

 savagely cut from ear to ear. Munroe had been 

 seen about the time of the murder in a field 

 near to the spot ; he had changed a half-sove- 

 reign soon thereafter, and had attempted to 

 disguise himself, and altogether change his ap- 

 pearance, by employing a blacksmith to cut off 

 the whole of his whiskers. These, and many 

 other striking points of circumstantial evidence, 



1 Chambers's Papers on the Microscope. 



