The Psychology of Poisoning. barely assisted nature and made his fate se cure, her conscience probably plagued her constantly for awhile, afterwards only now and then; finally it became adjusted to cir cumstances. A part of her life—the poison ing part—was ignored by her in her general estimate of herself; and with each successive crime it was further removed from considera tion. It is this comfortable quality of con science which enables us to do things we would shudder at when done by others; but on the other hand it keeps many a man who has done a bad act from becoming bad all through. Bluebeard doubtless possessed such a quality in high degree. A very similar case was tried in England in 1850, which has become one of the famous poisoning cases of the century. William Palmer was charged with murdering his friend, John Parsons Cook, at Rugeley by the use of strychnia. Palmer was in serious financial straits for several years before Cook's death. He had obtained temporary relief by means of an insurance which he had placed upon his wife's life a few months be fore she died, and he had tried to place other insurance upon other lives. At the time of Cook's death he owed about twelve thousand pounds on bills, to which he had forged his mother's indorsement. The bills would shortly fall due, the creditor was pressing, and exposure was imminent. Cook died suddenly while in Palmer's company, under circumstances which, in connection with the post-mortem examination, led the jury to find that Palmer had poisoned him. The motive for this act apparently was to get hold of Cook's ready money and his betting-book, worth in all about eighteen hundred pounds. The difficulty in the prosecution was the in ability of the chemists to find in Cook's body a single trace of strychnia; the later develop ment of chemistry makes this fact more sig nificant than it was then thought. But on the whole evidence there can be no reason able doubt of the prisoner's guilt. The interesting feature of this case, for purpose of comparing it with Mrs. Robin
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son's, lies in the similarity of character of the defendants. In a letter to Lord Campbell (who presided at the trial) Palmer's brother described Palmer's character with unques tioned fidelity to truth. "His frank sincerity, his courage, his faithful loyalty to his friends, his temperance, his performance of the duties of religion, his social relations in the charac ter of father, husband and son, won for him the love and confidence of all who ap proached him." "His was in all respects the very opposite of that cool, calculating, cow ardly, crafty temper which is essential to the poisoner, and we know cannot co-exist with those qualities which my brother possessed." He certainly loved his wife: but an examina tion of her body showed that she had been poisoned, and if Palmer had not been con victed of murdering Cook he would have been indicted for killing his wife. It was suspected also that he had poisoned a brother upon whose life he held a policy of insurance. These cases, as well as others previously studied, would seem to indicate with certainty that a "cool, calculating, cowardly, crafty temper" is not essential to a poisoner; and that the most amiable qualities and strong religious feelings cannot prevent a man from killing his neighbor for love or money. The cool, crafty, cowardly temper appears, however, to have existed in full measure in our next criminal—Mudgett, called also Holmes and other names. His trial in Phila delphia in the fall of 1895 was one of the most sensational on record. It began by a motion for a continuance on the part of his counsel; upon its disallowance by the Court counsel threatened to withdraw from the case, but were restrained by the Court by a threat of disbarment. Holmes himself, how ever, dismissed them and began the trial as his own counsel; but in a short time he re called them. Throughout the case he and his counsel fought not wisely but too well; and by their contentious course brought out many damaging facts which might well have remained unproved. At one dramatic mo ment in the trial the wife of the man for
