248 
tively upon questions of politics or religion ? 
Would it be hard to find ‘good men and 
true’ who would give under oath greatly 
differing opinions concerning the propriety 
of instituting free trade or establishing an 
inheritance tax? Experts are subject to 
the same errors of judgment as befall the 
rest of professional humanity, and when 
their opinions clash they are entitled to 
the same respect that we grant to the mem- 
bers of the bench when they hand down 
the decision of a divided Court. 
One fruitful opportunity for disagree- 
ment always arises when questions are 
brought into Court touching upon matters 
newly discovered and apart from the well 
beaten path of common professional knowl- 
edge. Doubt is often left upon the minds 
of those seeking the light, even when the 
testimony is given by the specialist who 
originally developed the new point in ques- 
tion, for one cannot be expected to be 
thoroughly educated in that which he has 
himself but recently discovered. 
Many of us have dreaded to see the 
‘ptomaines,’ or putrefactive alkaloids, make 
their way into Court with their mysti- 
fying influences upon Judge and jury and 
their tendency to protect crime. Now 
they are in, what is to be the end? Even 
with no ‘Ptomaine theory’ possible, the 
ptomaine form of argument is not un- 
known. The writer was once asked in 
an arsenic case whether he was willing 
to swear that at some future time an 
element would not be discovered giving 
the stated reactions now called arsenical. 
Such nonsense is, of course, instituted to 
impress the jury, and is suggested by 
similar questioning in the alkaloid cases. 
A recent and somewhat amusing instance 
arose from an attempt to introduce the 
rather new conception of ‘degeneracy’ into 
a murder trial. The defence sought to 
show that the prisoner was a ‘ degenerate’ 
and offered expert testimony as to the 
SCIENCE. 
[N.S. Von. VI. No. 137. 
meaning of the term and as to the signs 
whereby such a condition was to be recog- 
nized, whereupon the prosecution called 
attention to the fact that the defendant’s 
experts themselves exhibited every one of 
the signs in question. 
Having said all that he was to say, and 
having stated it to the best advantage, 
should the expert depend upon the stenog- 
rapher so recording it as to allow of its 
being used in future without correction? 
Decidedly not. 
The average stenographer is unfamiliar 
with technical terms, especially such as 
are chemical, and the witness who fails 
to supervise the minutes may find out later 
that he has sworn to a most remarkable 
array of ‘facts.’ The writer once dis- 
covered that he had recommended, as a 
very efficient method of purifying a city 
water, the filtering of the entire supply 
‘through a layer of black mud.’ Not to 
take your time further, let us summarize 
what has thus been briefly said : 
The expert witness should be absolutely 
truthful, of course; that is assumed, but 
beyond that he should be clear and terse 
in his statements, homely and apt in his 
illustrations, incapable of being led beyond 
the field in which he is truly an expert, 
and as fearless of legitimate ignorance as 
he is fearful of illegitimate knowledge. 
Mounting the witness-stand with these 
principles as his guide, he may be assured 
of stepping down again at the close of his 
testimony with credit to himself and to 
the profession he has chosen. 
Wiiiam P. MAson. 
RENSSELAER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE, 
EER ON Nees 
CURRENT NOTES ON ANTHROPOLOGY. 
ARAUCANIAN STUDIES. 
Dr. Ropotro Lenz continues his excel- 
lent studies on the Araucanian dialects and 
folk-lore, in the ‘ Anales de la Universidad 
