The Lambcth Poisoning Case. blank deeds, which are drawn up'with restric tions innumerable. A supply was expected in a few days. " Very well, you take this money and give me a receipt for it." This was done by the President; and the VicePresident and Treasurer being at hand, their signatures were also obtained. This receipt was immediately recorded in the County Clerk's office as a deed. A little while after the purchaser was notified that his deed was ready at the association office. He replied that he was satisfied with the receipt. He refused to accept or have anything to do with the association deed; and, much to the horror and consternation of the twelve cler gymen and twelve laymen comprising the association, persists that he has and holds a perfect fee simple. New Jersey retains the common law in much of its primeval simplicity. " Blackstone and the statutes" govern the courts, and many a lawyer will consult no other books. Notwithstanding this, there is the following well-authenticated case. This was
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a cause a'lebre before a justice of the peace, spectacled, precise, cautious. The plaintiff's attorney talked, but made no argument, as before a " J. P." such a thing would be con sidered wholly superfluous. The defendant supported his argument by a quotation from Coke's Littleton, and produced the book. That decided the question in the justice's opinion, but he asked the plaintiff's counsel what he had to say. He took the book. "Who is Mr. Cokes Littleton? " The other briefly replied. " When was this book written? " He was informed. " Where was it written and published? " This also was answered by the too learned counsel. Then the opposing attorney stormed and raved, and asked why in Heaven's name the book of a dead man who lived in a foreign land three thousand miles away should be brought out of a garret into a court-room in the State of New Jersey; and the justice promptly ruled the book out of court and of no account in this sovereign State which makes laws for itself. LLADNYT.
THE LAMBETH POISONING CASE. BY A LEÜAL SPECTATOR. T^ROM the I7th to the 2ist of October,
- - 1892, the Central Criminal Court, bet
ter known as the "Old Bailey," in London, was occupied with the trial of Thomas Mill, or Mill Cream, for the murder of an " unfor tunate" girl named Matilda Clover. Mr. Justice Hawkins, the greatest cross-exam iner in his day that the English Bar has ever produced, was the presiding judge; Sir Charles Russell, the new Attorney-General, prosecuted for the Crown; while Mr. Geoghcghan, one of the principal lights of the crimi nal bar, was leading counsel for the defence. The prisoner was a man of about forty years of age, tall, stout, and broad-shoul
dered; he was almost entirely bald; had a heavy cast in his eyes, which a pair of old gold-rimmed spectacles imperfectly con cealed; and wore a mustache and short bristly beard. He had a decidedly strong but singularly unpleasant mouth, which kept in almost constant motion; and his appear ance, as a whole, was powerfully suggestive of that of a trapped and caged tiger. The case for the prosecution was opened by Sir Charles Russell with ability and modera tion. Sir Charles is no orator, as Cockburn was; and his mastery over the mind of the average juryman is due entirely to his logical force, and his impressive, deliberate
