in that case the knowledge could be possessed only by the one planning it or privy to the plan; and the probative value of such evidence would vary with the particularity and exclusiveness of the foreknowledge thus indicated. Explicit threats to do injury, and other express declarations of a design or plan, have of course probative value, but are rather to be classed as testimonial evidence. Note that we are here not yet concerned with the use of Design or Plan as evidence of the Doing of an Act (post, No. 121), but only with conduct as circumstantial evidence that a Design or Plan existed. 40. ALEXANDER M. BURRILL. A Treatise on Circumstantial Evidence. (1868. p. 545.) Informative Hypotheses explaining away the Evidence of an Intention. . . 2. In regard to predictions of approaching mischief to an individual who is afterwards found murdered, it may have been the fact that the accused was really speaking the conviction of his own mind, and without any criminal intention. And it has been well remarked that idle prophecies of death are quite as frequently the offspring of superstition, as of premeditated assassination. 3. Expressions of ill will.... Supposing them to have been actually uttered as proved, they may have been uttered on some sudden provocation, or in the extremity of momentary passion, or during a state of intoxication, without any real, settled, and abiding feeling of malice against the subject of them. 4. Declarations of intention.... It does not necessarily follow, because a man has avowed an intention to commit a crime, that such intention really existed in his mind. The words may have been spoken in mere bravado, or with the view of alarming or annoying the object of them; or, like expressions of illwill, may have been uttered in a moment of passion, or state of intoxication, without any settled evil purpose. 5. Threats. The infirmative suppositions applicable to these circumstances are the same with those just enumerated; with the addition of the following. Threats being considered to be either uttered in the presence and hearing of the person threatened, or intended to come to his knowledge, the sole intention may have been to alarm and intimidate him. If the accused really intended the mischief avowed and threatened, it is not reasonable that he would make it known to the object, and thereby naturally put him on his guard against the intended act. . . . ... 6. Preparations for crime. The infirmative suppositions applicable to circumstances of this class comprise the following.... The appearances indicative of preparation may have been correctly observed,... and yet may have no real connection with the accused, having emanated from no conduct on his part, but having been wholly fabricated by the real criminal or some other person; as by conveying into the possession of the accused (so as to become a subject of observation) a poison of the same description as that afterwards used in committing the crime, or perhaps the identical instrument used in committing it.... Again, the appearances supposed to be indicative of preparation may be... devoid of any real criminal quality whatever. Thus, It may be true not only that the accused had the poison in his possession before the crime, but that he had it knowingly, having actually procured it with his own hands. And yet, even in this case, the important psychological fact of intention may be wholly wanting. 41. THE CASE OF THE DRYAD. teries of Police and Crime. (ARTHUR GRIFFITHS. Mys 1898. Vol. I, p. 389.) Frauds upon underwriters and marine insurance officers cannot be said to have ceased to this day. A story of the sea that would serve as the foundation of an exciting sea romance is to be found in the loss of the brig Dryad, in 1840. The plot was cleverly laid, and proved perfectly successful for a time. The ship was lost, the insurances paid; the delinquents — two brothers Then named Wallace, one a merchant, the other a sea captain- might have enjoyed their ill-gotten gains to the end, but for the inconvenient return of some of the crew. suspicions that had been only vague became certainty, and one brother, Patrick Wallace, was forthwith arrested. The other, Michael, who had been living in the Commercial Road, absconded, abandoning his house and furniture. He was traced, in due course, to Lancaster, where he was taken. The brothers had set about their fraud with all the skill of old hands. Michael purchased the preponderating share in the brig Dryad three fourths, in fact, £1600 in all - and had expended another £600 making her "a first-class ship." Patrick Wallace took the part of securing a complaisant shipmaster, and found him in Edmund Loose, who was appointed to the Dryad with the clear understanding that he should lose her somewhere, somehow, the sooner the better. While these essential preliminaries were being settled, Michael Wallace sought out a merchant to ship a cargo, and the Messrs. Zulueta chartered the Dryad to carry goods to the value of £300 to Santa Cruz, in the West Indies. Heavy insurances were next effected on the ship and the freight. The owners got a policy for £2200 from the Marine Insurance on the first, and £300 on the latter. But the Wallaces insured the Dryad and her cargo further in other offices, and these policies standing in their names amounted to £6617, a sum far exceeding their actual holding in the ship and what she carried. The chief testimony against the Wallaces was that of the mate of the Dryad, who escaped the shipwreck, and who described the whole proceeding. He described the lading of the ship at Liverpool, and how, when Messrs. Zulueta's goods were all on board, quite one third of the hold remained unfilled. Michael Wallace was to have shipped a consignment of flannels, cloths, beef, pork, butter, and earthenware, but never did so, although Captain Loose had signed bills of lading as having received them. A suspicious circumstance was the insufficient quantity of provisions sent for the crew. It was usual to send enough for both outward and homeward voyages, but barely enough for the first was provided. The ship was also badly found. There was no proper log-line on board; the pump was never made to suck; the longboat was fitted with tackle, and ready to launch at a moment's notice. Nothing happened, as the weather continued "set fair," but they steered a strange course, northward, deviating from the customary track, and first sighted land at Virgin Gorda, and, holding on, ran close to the breakers off Anagada, both of them rocky reefs on the outer fringe of the West Indies. The captain was called up from below, while the mate put the ship's head about. But the captain, coming on deck, seized the helm and ran her straight for the breakers. Now the crew interposed, swearing they did not mean to lose their lives for the captain's pleasure, whereupon he left the wheel, and one of the crew raking it, put the ship's head round. Two days the course was between the Silver Keys and the north of St. Domingo, but so much. too near the former, which are dangerous rocks, that the Dryad struck upon one of them, but again she escaped, this time with the loss of her rudder. They then coasted along the coast of St. Domingo, close in shore, and after passing Cape Hayti struck on a reef at Cape Cruz. She might have been got off, for she was making no water, but no efforts were made. The crew with the captain deserted her, but not before one of them had detected a large hole under her stern which could not have been made by a rock, but was, no doubt, the captain's work from one of the staterooms. He was never brought to trial, however, for he died before proceedings were taken. Both the Wallaces were found guilty and sentenced for life. 42. THE CHICAGO ANARCHISTS' CASE. (W. WILLS. stantial Evidence. Amer. ed. 1905, p. 154.) In the Chicago Criminal Court, eight anarchists were found guilty of murder, seven of them being condemned to death. [The judgment was affirmed in 122 Ill. 1.] were August Spies, Michael Schwab, Samuel Fielden, Albert R. Parsons, Adolph Fischer, George Engel, and Louis Lingg. The other, condemned to fifteen years' imprisonment, was Oscar W. Neefe. The seven On May 1, 1866, many workmen in Chicago struck to obtain a reduction of their working day to eight hours. There was great excitement, and many meetings and speeches. On the 4th of May, such a meeting was held at the Haymarket on Randolph St., in Chicago. This meeting was addressed by several of the defendants, and during the address of Spies a charge was made on the crowd by 180 policemen. Bombs were thrown and guns fired at the policemen, and six policemen were killed and six wounded. The defendants were tried for the murder of one of these policemen, Michael J. Degan. The corpus delicti was established by undisputed evidence. Degan was killed by a bomb; of that there was no doubt. It seemed equally well established that not one of the defendants threw the bomb, but they were charged as accessories. It was shown that they were all members of several anarchistic societies, particularly one known as Circum the International Arbeiter Association, often called the "Internationals" and the "I. A. A." This association was divided into groups, of which there were about eighty in the United States. Certain members of each group were armed and drilled regularly. The most proficient of these armed groups, including the defendants, were also members of a more exclusive organization known as the "Lehr und Wehr Verein.' Each member had a Springfield rifle and other weapons, and each was known by number only. The object of these societies was the destruction of organized society and the right of private property. The members openly and secretly advocated the destruction of property, the murder of officers of the law and of property owners, and the general use of deadly weapons, dynamite, bombs, and other explosives. The group of defendants published three incendiary newspapers, - The Arbeiter Zeitung in German, published by Spies, Schwab, Fischer, and Neebe; The Alarm in English, published by Parsons and Fielden; and a still more inflammable sheet called The Anarchist, published by Engel. These papers published the signals by which the anarchists were called together at various times, the signal for the meeting of May 4th being "Ruhe." They constantly advocated social revolution and war upon the police and the militia. Their articles, written by the defendants, contained hundreds of expressions like the following: “Daggers and revolvers are easily to be gotten, hand-grenades are cheaply to be produced; explosives too can be obtained." "Workingmen, arm yourselves." "We wonder whether the workingmen will at last supply themselves with weapons, dynamite, and prussic acid." "If we do not bestir ourselves for a bloody revolution, we cannot leave anything to our children but poverty and slavery." "One man armed with a dynamite bomb is equal to one regiment of militia." "Dynamite is the emancipator." "Assassination will remove the evil from the face of the earth." Articles were published on "How to use dynamite properly," "Manufacturing Bombs," "Exercise in Arms," and extracts were published from the book of Herr Most, giving detailed instructions in the manufacture and use of bombs and other weapons. many public speeches the defendants had advocated the killing of the police and the militia, using the same arguments and the same language as in their written editorials. The date for beginning the "social revolution" was May 1, 1886, for the reason that various labor unions were to strike at that time for the eighthour day. These defendants did not approve of the eight-hour agitation, except as a means that they could use to bring about total destruction of society. They expected the discontent and want accompanying the strike to drive many workmen to the ranks of the Internationals. The defendants urged all to procure arms for the successful resistance of the authorities during the continuance of the strike. They even made arrangements to purchase guns in large quantities. In In the meantime they had all been experimenting in the manufacture and explosion of bombs. Particularly the defendant Lingg had been so employed. It became material to show that the bomb with which Policeman Degan was killed had been manufactured by Lingg. To this end it was proved first that the bomb was round. Several witnesses who saw it thrown so described it, and moreover, it was not of the material of which ordinary gas-pipe bombs are made. The manufacture of round bombs requires greater skill and greater secrecy. Lingg was shown to have manufactured such round bombs in large numbers. It was also shown that a basketful of his bombs had been carried to the Haymarket meeting. In the next place, the bomb was exploded by means of a fuse. The bombs that Lingg had constructed were all made of two semiglobular shells fastened together, filled with dynamite, and fired by means of a fuse passed through a hole bored for the purpose and attached to a fulminating cap. Further, the pieces of the bomb taken from Degan's body were of the same chemical composition as the bombs made by Lingg. They were composed of tin and lead, with traces of antimony, iron, and zinc. There is no commercial substance containing all these ingredients. In Lingg's bombs the tin had been added to the lead to procure sufficient resistance for explosion. The bomb that exploded had on it a small iron nut, which was extracted from the body of a bystander. This indicated that the two semiglobular halves of the bomb had been fastened together with a bolt. Practically all of the bombs made by Lingg, and later discovered, were made of the two semiglobular halves, bolted together, and this nut taken from the body of the bystander exactly fitted those bolts. Lingg himself had been seen making such bombs, with a handkerchief over his face to prevent the inhalation of gas. He had bought dynamite. bought dynamite. A poisonous gas exhales from dynamite. The con clusion follows that he put dynamite in the bombs that he was seen to make. In Lingg's room, after the murder, were found various articles, among them the following: a cold chisel, a file, shells, loaded cartridges, sheets of lead, bolts, two empty gas-pipe bombs and two loaded with dynamite, a rifle, a round bomb loaded with dynamite, a piece of block tin, a piece of candlestick composed of tin, lead, antimony, and zinc, fuse of various lengths, and fulminating caps. He had every ingredient necessary for the making of bombs like the one that killed Degan. ferences in the exact amounts of these ingredients in the different bombs would be accounted for by the fact that he made each semiglobe separately with a small ladle over the kitchen stove, casting each in a small clay mold made by himself. Dif Lingg's purpose in making the bombs is to be found from the purposes for which the International Arbeiter Association existed. These have been before stated, and were made apparent from the publications and speeches of the other defendants. There was evidence of a distinct plan on the part of the defendants to attack the police of 43. MADAME LAFARGE'S Mysteries of Police and Crime. 1898. One of the greatest poisoning trials on record in any country is that of Madame Lafarge, and its interest is undying, for to this day the case is surrounded in mystery. Although the guilt of the accused was proved to the satisfaction of the jury at the time of the trial, strong doubts were then entertained, and still possess acute legal minds, as to the justice of her conviction.... In the month of January, 1840, an iron-master, Lafarge, residing at Glandier, in the Limousin, died suddenly of an unknown malady. His family, friends, and immediate the whole city on the night in question. Members of the Association helped themselves to bombs brought by Lingg to the rendezvous, and were to make separate attacks upon the police stations, gradually concentrating to fight in the center of the city. This plan had to be changed because the police were concentrated near the neighborhood of the Haymarket. There was a vast array of evidence of the foregoing sorts, and the defendants were convicted under a statute of Illinois making accessories punishable as principals. The Court found that Degan's death was directly brought about by the conspiracies and plans of the defendants and other "Internationals." The bombs were made and obtained in pursuance of the plan. The meeting was called at the Haymarket on the appointed evening. That day the signal "Ruhe" was printed, to begin the revolution. In pursuance of the plan, and varying from it only as was made necessary by the location of the police, a bomb was first hurled at them and then the "Internationals" opened fire with guns. The jury were justified in believing that the bomb was thrown either by a member of the conspiracy or by an agent employed to throw it. Vol. I, p. 193.) neighbors at once accused his wife of having poisoned him. This wife differed greatly in breeding and disposition from the deceased. Marie Fortunée Capelle was the daughter of a French artillery colonel, who had served in Napoleon's Guard. She was well connected, her grandmother having been a fellow pupil of the Duchess of Orléans under Madame de Genlis; her aunts were well married, one to a Prussian diplomat, the other to M. Garat, the well-known general secretary of the Bank of France. She had been delicately nurtured; her father |