234 
VETERINARY JURISPRUDENCE. 
prove that they had been applied, and applied with impunity, in the 
course of four years, to no less a number than 68,000 sheep, to which 
they must add the sale of six years preceding. He would call before 
them persons who had used those powders, and who made no com¬ 
plaints whatever as to results ; and he thought it was exceedingly im¬ 
probable that after the occurrence of this event other persons who had 
purchased those powders had been quiet and urged no complaint. He 
did not know whether it was that Dr. Dick had stronger nerves, but 
Dr. Thompson and Dr. Wilson seemed to be disposed to regard them a 
priori, with great terror and trepidation. Dr. Thompson thought by 
possibility a sheep might get through the wash and survive ; but he 
would call before them gentlemen of skill and of eminence, who would 
test the application of those powders, and show the uninjurious results 
of their application. If the sheep had died of arsenic, it must have 
been taken into the body through the throat, and lodged in the 
stomach as food, and not in the way which had been suggested and 
entirely adopted on the other side—absorption, meaning penetration 
through the outer skin. Examination had been instituted, and it had 
been found that the mixture of arsenic would be and had been easily 
and without repugnance taken up, nibbled at, and swallowed by sheep. 
Having adverted to several other points of the defence, he, in conclu¬ 
sion, again adverted to the extreme importance of the case, which he 
was sure would receive, as it had hitherto done, the closest and most 
careful attention of the jury. He was satisfied to leave the interests of 
his client in their hands ; and in the end, he had no doubt, they would 
arrive at a conclusion which would do justice between the parties, and 
which would certainly not visit his client with so heavy a verdict as 
that which must follow if the plaintiff obtained their verdict, after a 
clear and satisfactory proof that that had happened with reference to 
the plaintiff’s sheep on the 14th of August which had never happened 
with reference to a single sheep of the hundreds of thousands which 
had been previously subjected to the same application, and which did 
not happen to any one of those other sheep to which the other powders 
of the same mixture were subsequently applied. 
Philips Spencer, the first witness for the defence—I am a wholesale 
chemist in Newcastle. In the year 1856 I supplied Mr. Elliott with 
three casks of arsenic. They were of the common commercial quality. 
By Mr. Manisty—I never tested the strength of the arsenic. I am 
not aware that there is a great deal of adulteration in the arsenic before 
it reaches my hands. 
John Elliott, chemist and druggist in Berwick, the defendant in the 
action, deposed—I served an apprenticeship in the county of Mid- 
Lothian. I started business on my own account in Berwick-on-Tweed, 
in 1844. Since then I have been in the habit of preparing and selling 
powders for washing sheep. My preparation consists of lb. of 
arsenic, 1 ^ lb. of soda ash, and 2 oz. of sulphur. In 1856 I sold 501 
packages for 25,000 sheep; in 1857, 503 packages for 25,090 sheep ; 
and in 1858, 341 packages for 16,110 sheep. Before the last three 
years I had been in the habit of selling large quantities. During the 
last ten years I have not heard of the death of a single sheep arising 
from the use of my powders, nor has any complaint of any sort been 
made to me about them. Before the month of August last, the plaintiff 
had not bought any of my powders. On the 7th of August I ascer¬ 
tained that he had given an order towards the end of July. I ordered 
two of the apprentices, Meikle and Robertson, to make up powders 
sufficient for the sale on Saturday, that being the market day. Robertson 
