494 SUMMAUY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



for what they were worth. Oftentimes very shrewd judgments were given 

 by such witnesses ; but tlie best opinion in a delicate case was generally 

 submitted as a mere guess or conjecture, with such reasons as the observer 

 had to offer in its sui:»port, and smart lawyers generally managed to in- 

 troduce as many expert witnesses on one side as were offered on the other, 

 and so the jury, instead of being helped, were only the more perplexed over 

 the question which they were sworn truly and correctly to decide. The 

 rule of law being that any material alteration in an instrument rendered 

 the entire document void, it will be seen how large interests of contending 

 parties were often susj^ended on the correctness of the human eye — 

 unaided, it was as difficult a task in many cases as for the observer tu tell 

 by a glance the number of fibres in a leaf, or threads in a fabric offered 

 for inspection. In cases of forgery, the freedom or imprisonment of the 

 suspected party was made to turn on the stumbling judgment of unlettered 

 and unskilled men in the jury-box. But to-day, in all such cases the 

 Microscope is summoned into court, and its silent testimony solves the 

 riddle in almost every case. There is no impeaching this expert witness. 

 Call as many Microscopes to the witness stand as may be desired, they all 

 tell the same story — no conflict between them, and the case is settled 

 beyond the possibility of a doubt. In the matter of counterfeited currency 

 the Microscope has become a vade-mecum to every modern bank clerk 

 charged with the resj)onsibilities of a receiving teller. If a glance of his 

 well-trained eye awakens a suspicion as to the genuineness of a Govern- 

 ment note, he has but to place it under his Microscope and his doubt is 

 made a certainty. His testimony, therefore, in behalf of the Government 

 against the counterfeiting engraver fixes his destiny at once. The re- 

 lations which the Microscope sustains to medical jurisprudence are none 

 the less important, indeed, they are still more valuable because there Ihey 

 bear upon human life instead of human liberty merely. The criminal 

 whose garments are stained with human blood can no longer relieve 

 himself of a suspicion by saying they were discoloured by the blood of a 

 slaughtered sheej) or calf. The Microscope looks down upon them, 

 searches out the corpuscles and renders its verdict at once as to whether 

 the prisoner wears the badge of murder or whether he should go free. 

 Also in all the variety of criminal cases in which poison is suspected and 

 where felonious miscarriage is charged, the Microscope is now a swift and 

 essential witness in ascertaining and settling the exact facts — indeed, it 

 has become as indispensable to the legal profession as to the medical, as 

 might be yet more conclusively here demonstrated had we space in which 

 to expand this article. 



" We leave tlic siibject with the remark, that in the whole realm of 

 science there is no instrument yet discovered tliat, in jiractical usefulness, 

 can compare with the Microscope, and therefore it is we M^ho are inspired 

 to lU'omote and expand its sphere of science in the cultured and civilized 

 world." 



Captain W. Noble and this Journal. — We once asked a paragraph 

 writer for a periodical how it was that he and his brother professionals so 

 frequently wrote such utterly inane paragraphs, about nothing in particu- 

 lar or on such absurdly minute points that they could be of no interest 

 to any human being. His answer was that no one who had not had 

 practical experience in tlic matter coiild realize the shifts and difficulties 

 to which the paragraph writer was put. The day of publication came 

 round with the clock and the inexorable employer with equal regularity 

 demanded the prescribed amount of copy, and allowed no delays and no 



