OF THE VETERINARIAN. 
133 
If I have perverted or outstripped truth, I will apologize; but 
the editors must too plainly see what Messrs. Davis, Leigh, and 
Quick (for I must consider them fellow-workmen) would have 
done if they had been able. Was not every circumstance swelled 
to the utmost? Do the editors think that old Davis supposed 
the blood to have issued from an artery, because at an interval of 
more than two hours from the time of death it was too hot to be 
venous? Or can anyone believe that, had he imagined the blood 
to have issued from an artery, that circumstance would have been 
altogether lost sight of in the indictment? Do the editors sup¬ 
pose that Mr. Leigh was in reality so ignorant and credulous as 
to believe what he professed to believe in his evidence on the 
trial ? If so, I believe Mr. Leigh will not thank them for the opinion 
they have formed respecting his abilities. I am perfectly willing to 
give Mr. Leigh his choice, as on either ground I feel “justified,” 
in my criticisms on his evidence. Had it been mere discussion, 
their evidence would scarcely have admitted of palliation; but 
where reputation and purse where involved, what can the utmost 
candour offer in apology? 
I respect truth and honesty, although it operate on the side of 
error. No man ought to be blamed for honest belief; but surely 
no man ought to state as fact even an honest opinion; and where 
doubt exists, even a court examination does not sanction a high 
toned and positive assertion. If witnesses proceed with teme¬ 
rity, on the presumption that “hard swearing” carries the point 
in court, they, “ like other men, must take the consequences” of 
exposure outside those favoured walls. 
Did they not, in evidence, run foul of sense, veracity, and even 
decency itself? Would a moderate dereliction from truth have 
elicited from the judge the animadversion, that the evidence of 
two of them was outrageous? And, finally, can it be unjustifiable 
in me (in rebutting a lying report sent forth to the public by some 
one who is ashamed of owning his own production) to publish the 
evidence they gave in court? Or is there a shadow of injustice in 
my drawing correct inferences from that evidence? I shall take 
leave of this subject by asserting that “in the account of the 
trial I am not unjustifiably severe, and that Davis, Leigh, and 
Quick, do deserve all that is said of them.” 
I cannot understand why the editors of “The Veterinarian” so 
peremptorily “refuse to give up the authority on which their 
previous statement rested” (report in No. for Sept.). Has not 
some Bristolian drawn a bill in that statement which he cannot 
honor, and which, if backed by his name, would reflect dishonor 
oil himself 1 The profound silence of the editors is calculated to 
excite suspicion that it is even so. 1 certainly “ feel, for the pre- 
