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TRIAL
FRANCIS |URKE,
BEFORE
     . BALTIMORE CITY COURT,
;
                ON AN

, Indictment for Manslaughter,
BY ADMINISTERING TO
BENJAMIN M. HAZELIP
Thomsonian Remedies.

1SW-!
       BafttttHtfe:
PIUNTED BY JAMES LUCAS & E. K. DEAVER.
         1832.
(5 
w
1
 (oOO
B^3t
 W32, 
INTRODUCTION.
  A few remarks, as  an  introduction to the account of the
following trial will not, it is hoped, be considered improper,
as an elucidation of the subject of the pamphlet now before
you.  The patient,  Mr. B.  M. Hazelip, was an utter stranger
and came  to  the  house of Francis Burke twice, and com-
plained very much of pains  in the stomach, &c. and sense of
deadness of the limbs,  and pressed him to take him (Hazelip,)
through a course of  the Thomsonian Medicines, and said he
had  obtained a promise  of  the use from William Bell, who
had a steaming apparatus, and that Bell  had told him he did
not. understand enough of the mode of treatment by Thom-
sonians to feel safe in administering the medicines, but that
if he could get Burke or Ward Sears, or any other competent
person, he would render every assistance in his power. That
he (Bell) was not in possession of a right to use the medi-
cines, and although he was  in the habit of using them, and
at least once a week used the steam, yet, his information and
judgment, in  reference to others, were not to be trusted.   It
was intended, from the first notice of the trial to move that
each  should  be tried  separately—and  as Bell would be an
important  witness in  the behalf of Burke, and might have
thrown much valuable light upon the subject, when the  mo-
tion to separate  was acceeded to, an endeavor was made to
bring up Mr.  Bell's case first—this, the Attorney for the state
positively refused to admit of, and the Attorneys for the de-
fendants were compelled to go into  the trial of Mr. Burke,
thereby depriving him of the most  important  testimony in
reference to the treatment; and, indeed, the only individual
knowing to the whole of the transaction, and reducing the
Attorneys  of  Burke to the necessity of culling from the con-
flicting testimony of the witnesses on  the part of the prosecu-
tion, evidence to prove his innocence of the charge of gross
inhumanity and want of attention to the deceased.   If Bell's
testimony  could have  been obtained, it is more than probable
the Jury would have come  to a decision  in  favor of Burke 
4
without the trouble of leaving their box, (which they did for
a few minutes.)   Indeed, such was the confidence of Burke
that there must be a decision in his favor, that his appearance
and feelings were not such as are usually observed in a 'pri-
soner at the bar," on the grave charge of man-slaughter, but
of one confident in innocence, and  certain of a signal tri-
umph over  all the machinations of his persecutors, by a ver-
dict of « Not Guilty."  The object of his  enemies, (or, to
speak  more  correctly, the enemies of the excellent System
and Practice of  Dr.  Samuel Thomson,  by innocent vegeta-
ble medicines) was  apparent in the  association of  Mr. Bell
with him in the indictment, and subsequent refusal to take
up the case of Bell  first; but in this they were foiled by the
conjoint admissions of their own witnesses, and the testimo-
ny of the witnesses in favor of Burke, who was compelled to
call on his  patients as vouchers on his behalf, who testified
to cures which would have been a sufficient ground for boast-
ing to the  most successful of the members of the  medical
faculty there arrayed against him, and caused them to rejoice,
and  be proud of their unusually good fortune, in having
such high testimony to their qualifications and success.   But
instead of that, no one could crave their unenviable feelings,
when  almost every individual witness for  the  prosecution
testified to  something mortifyingly painful to them.  Every
thing had been done by his enemies to  convict him—a par-
tial Coroner—a packed Jury, and six of the medical Faculty
to sit with them, direct their operations, ask questions, re-
cord testimony, and make up their verdict—this would not
answer yet—some would not (in the Coroner's significant ex-
pression) "suit  the purpose," and a person that was not pre-
sent to hear  all  the  testimony, was brought  by him, out of
bed, at 3 o'clock in the morning, to sign a  verdict  about a
case of which he knew but little, instead of a regular juror,
Mr. Jacob  Stahl, who  had been present and saw and heard,
and knew the history of the whole matter  ;—the  Coroner
acting as prosecuting attorney in the case,  and threatening
the jury that he would  "put them all in the Watch-house if
they did not agree in their verdict;" and, the  Coroner's omis-
sion, although instructed to  do so, by Mr. Bell, to  summon
persons in the immediate neighborhood, who  were, although
previously utter strangers to Burke, supposed to be favorable
to him, viz: Mr. Sage and Mr. Sumwalt.
  On the trial before the City Court a  formidable  array of
two Professors, (E. Geddings and N  Potter) and Drs. Isaac 
5
Cole, Charles Maguire, A. Dunan, Samuel A. Jones, F. E. B.
Hintze,* and certain  relatives and friends of the deceased,
as will be seen  by the report of the testimony for the State.
But, still "the purpose" was  not accomplished—a jury of cool
dispassionate and independent, unprejudiced men, after a de-
liberate  investigation   of the testimony and pleading, which
occupied from the commencement to its termination, the very
unusual term of fifteen days, in  which they had every oppor-
tunity to calmly weigh every thing offered for their  conside-
ration and unbiassed judgment, who decided, "the prisoner
at the bar  'not  guilty' of the charges  preferred against him
in the indictment."
   Only about 16 witnesses were examined on the part of Burke
out of  127  summoned—his Attorneys  being willing to rest
the cause on their excellent and conclusive testimony for  a
defence rather  than occupy the time of the Court more than
was actually necessary for that purpose.  If the balance had
been heard^ a  mass of testimony would have been given that
would  have put even the most prejudiced of his medical op-
ponents to the blush,  because of their soulless opposition.
   The Court room during the trial was frequently crowded,
as it was a case of universal interest, but the audience, (ex-
cept the Doctors) were so  undivided in their opinions, that
Burke would be pronounced not guilty, that when the verdict
 was heard, a smile of assent was the only indication of their
 approval.

   *The redoubtable learned champion against mal-practice—the Apothe-
 cary__the vender of nostrums  and  Anti-Cholera  Snuff—the Medi-
 cal Doctor, M. L. Knapp, was, also, summoned ! the same that bled
the patient in "the temporal artery," who had a "hard, hurried, and
 spiteful pulse,"  which bled to the last moment of the patient's exis-
 tence; and, who, even up to that time, had "a distinct pulse at the
 wrist"__a patient who was "just out of the steamer," (and of course
 in a profuse perspiration; upon whose naked  body he had "ordered the
 windows and doors to be opened"—this Dr. M. L. Knapp, who had ta-
 ken so prompt and active a part in attempting to expose the horrible
 "Burking," (he forgot to mention also, the "Knapping" of the highly
 respected and wealthy Captain White, of Salem) and to prejudice the
 community against an innocent individual—who, although he had suf-
 fered considerable loss by fire, and notwithstanding the wants of a large
 family, gave up a situation by which he could support them, and risked
 the loss of health and life in gratuitously and successfully attempting to
 cure his fellow beings of that scourge or scourges, the Spasmodic Chol-
 era  in several weeks of almost incessant toil and watching—whose
 place of rest  was by the  bed-side of his patients ; and, to whom an or-
 dinary night's rest would have  been an invaluable treat.   Such a Dr. 
6
M. L. Knapp, could not be present at the  trial.  The poison was dif-
fused through the minds of the public, and then he had urgent business
of course, which called him  away—perhaps to vend his Anti-Cholera
Snuff;—perhaps, to edify the country  folks with his tales  of "Burking"
then growing too stale in the  City of hia residence—perhaps, both—it
is not known, and, it matters little what. 
COMMUNICATIONS
Which appeared in the newspapers  of the Cily of Balti-
  more, relative  to  the subject of the accusation  against
  Francis Burke.
   From the Baltimore Gazette of September 18th, 1832.

   Sir,—The undersigned asks  room to relate a case of ap-
palling character.  He cannot rest till he has given publicity
to the facts, and inquired if there be no remedy for such fa-
tal practices, no recompense for offenders of  this stamp.
Burking is only more horrid in one  particular, to wit: that
the victim is seized contrary to  his will, but here the offering
is voluntary, through delusion.  But he designs only to  state
facts, and let the public at large decide what punishment is
due to such a crime.
   I  was called yesterday  morning,  in  greatest  haste, by  a
neighbor, to see his brother-in-law, who, he said, was dying
from  being steamed by the Thomsonians.   Hastening to the
place I beheld the victim; a fine, healthy, good looking man,
of about thirty, just out of the steamer, rolled in blankets,
and lying on a  sacking-bottom,  and moaning out his last sad
agonies.  His head, body,  and extremities  were steaming
hot, and soaked, as  if he  had  been drowned in hot water.
His face  was swollen and flushed,  his eyes engorged and pro-
minent, seemed bursting  from their sockets, and his pulse,
which was  distinct at. his  wrist, was hard, hurried and
spiteful.
   I opened the temporal artery, and caused the windows and
doors to be  flung open, and his head bathed  in  evaporating
lotions—but it  was all over with him—he died with the  arte-
ry bleeding, as  it were, till  the last moment, and a distinct
pulse at the wrist.
   I was  informed that he came there, partially intoxicated,
complaining of symptoms  of Cholera, but was urged not to
go into the steam-bath, by the man  of the house, who stated to 
8
him that he was near being killed by it himself a short time
since, but he persisted in his determination and sent out  for
one to  "take him through the course," as they call it,  and
who it is plain did " take him through a course !"  I was told
that he  had taken lobelia, and  also the cayenne tincture, or
No. 6, whether by mouth or in the form  of an injection, I
cannot say, but probably both, as a large syringe was lying at
his feet—every thing  seemed left in a hurry—all was  terror
and commotion, and the operator was off!!  It is impossible
to say whether or  not he had  symptoms  of  Asiatic Cholera
in the commencement of his case.   One thing is certain, he
had no  features of Cholera in death.   It seems to me proper
to stale that  the  boiler, in this steaming establishment, ap-
peared from a hasty glance  to be a snug little affair, suitable
for a one horse power engine, having, say  an  inch and a half,
or two inch pipe of tin to convey the steam  to an  adjoining
apartment, into the receiver, in  which the subject  is placed
in a recumbent posture.
   My friend Dr. Cole, in South-street, was in attendance on
this case with me, with whom  I should have conferred  last
evening, and  solicited an examination of  the body, but for a
bilious  attack under which I have been for a  few days  labor-
ing myself, and prudence requiring  me to  avoid the night
air.
   Dr. Cole will doubtless,shed more light on this subject, as
he was  called to the  man above mentioned  who came near
being killed by a 'course,' a short time since.
   I have no object but the cause of humanity in offering  this
to the public.
                                      M.  L. KNAPP.
        From the  same of September 21st,  1832.
  Sir—I saw with considerable surprise an article in your
paper of the 18th inst. signed  ' M. L. Knapp,' purporting to
be a true statement of the 'facts' connected with the death
of an individual who had been 'steamed  by the Thomso-
nians,' to whom he 'was called  in  the greatest haste, by a
neighbour,  his brother-in-law,' which he is pleased in refer-
ence to  my  name, and  some  disgraceful  and murderous
proceedings of the Medical Faculty in Europe, to  denominate
' Burking;' a term rather unfavorable for effect in the mouth
of a M. D.j unless Mr., or Dr. M. L. Knapp,  expects by so 
9
doing to cast all the odium  of their deeds on the Thomso-
nians.   Although he pretends 'only to state facts, and to let
the public at large decide what punishment is due to such a
crime,'  I think it can be made quite  apparent  (to make use
of his own figure) that he has been very grossly ' ATnapp-ing,'
upon  ' facts,' and even made statements respecting  his own
conduct in the case, which might not  be  very acceptable to
himself, if subjected to a legal investigation—but, I will take
up  the  assault  on  my character and  the character of the
Thomsonian practice, according to  the order in which it is
made,  'and let the public at large decide'as suits their ideas
of propriety—informing them however  irregular and illegal  I
may consider the proceedings against me,  1 shall endeavor
to prepare for the tug of war between M.  D'ism  and Thorn-
sonianism, waiving for the present all minor considerations,
that I may get at the issue in the most speedy manner, when
the public will hear from me again, more fully.
    M. L. Knapp says in the first line of his statement, ' I was
called yesterday morning,' &c ; now the  fact was, it could
not be earlier than two o'clock, P.  M., and  he came  some
minutes after Dr. Cole arrived—so much  for his veracity in
the outset.   ' I beheld the victim, a fine, healthy, good-looking
man, of about thirty.'  Let the public enquire for themselves
in this particular—he stated to me that he had "been  on a
drunken frolic for some days"—and his own wife and others
say that he had no' eaten any thing to their knowledge since
Saturday morning to the time of his application to me : "just
out of the steamer ; " this  is untrue in two particulars—he
had been where he  was for at least half an hour, and that not
'out of,' but rather off from a sacking under which the steam
was applied,  regulated principally, by the wish of the patient.
' Rolled in blankets'—untrue, unless from tossing about in
his fits.  'And lying on a sacking-bottom'—positively false,
unless he admits the fact of there being his own  feather-bed
and sheet  between the patient and the sacking-bottom of the
bedstead.   'Moaning out his last sad agonies'—he was in a
state of stupor from his fits, and 'his last  sad  agonies' will
be dwelt upon in another place.   ' His  head,  body and ex-
tremities,  steaming  hot,  and  soaked  as "if  he had  been
drowned in  hot  water.'    His head, body and  extremities
could not  be steaming  hot  from the fact of  his  tossing
and tumbling  about and  getting the air about him,  and
his face and  breast being  continually well  washed  by a
large sponge full of cold water, or washed  with vinegar; the 
10
soaked appearance of the skin could not be otherwise, when
he had been kept moist for a considerable time—that, any
illiterate washer-women could have told him  would  be  the
case, whether the water be cold or hot.
   'His face was swollen and flushed'—this was not the fact
at the  time of Dr. K's arrival—it had  been so a short time
previous.   ' His eyes engorged and prominent, seemed burst-
ing from their sockets.'  Did Dr. K.  suppose it could  be
otherwise under a view  of the circumstances, and when it
was stated  that Mr.  Bell, in attempting  to  hold some spirits
of camphor to his nose, spilt "a considerable quantity  of it in
his face and eyes.   'And his pulse, which  was distinct at his
wrist, was hard, hurried and spiteful.'  A few minutes before
Dr. K. arrived, Dr. Cole examined his pulse, and said it was
too weak and feeble to justify the abstraction of blood from
the arm, and the only hope he had, was  by  taking it from the
head, which he attempted with partial success, from a  branch
of the temporal artery,  which had pulsation evident  to the
sight.  His pulse being hard, hurried and spiteful, according
to Dr.  K, and weak and feeble to Dr. Cole, conveys a  re-
flection upon the judgment of one of them, and "who shall
decide when Doctors disagree?"
   In the second paragraph, he begins  with  11 opened the
temporal artery, and caused  the windows  and doors to  be
thrown open, and  his  head bathed in  evaporating lotions;
but it was all over with him.'   I myself held the head of the
patient at the  request of Dr. Cole before  Dr. K. arrived,
while he struck, or attempted to strike a branch of the tem-
poral  artery  on the  right  side, from which some  blood
flowed, and was present when Dr. M. L. Knapp undertook to
make it bleed more  copiously-—at the time  Dr. K. attempted
to cause a greater flow of blood, I had at their request opened
a door  on the west side of  the room, and thrown up  a sash
that the patient might have more air, and then put a paper in
my pocket of a  powder of my own, used by Thomsonians to
quiet the nerves, as his had been exhausted in  my endeavors
to do so.   I observed to the persons present that as ! had  no
right to remain there I should go and attend to my business,
and left the room.   What Dr. K. did afterwards lam not able
to say,  further than he tells us; but, certainly it will  not  be
contended that a general application of chill air to the body
was  at all calculated to lessen the tendency of  the blood  to
the recently engorged  vessels about the brain, and such ap.
peared  to be the case while I was in the room.  The only 
11
1 evaporating lotion' I saw, was the spirits of camphor, and
that, I believe, it will be conceded, is a very tardy one; its
being  'all over with'  the poor man,  might, considering the
circumstances, be attributed to a different cause from what
Doctor Knapp from the tenor of his remarks would wish  to
be understood;  for he says in continuation—'he died with
the artery bleeding, as it were, till the last moment, and a
distinct pulse  at the  wrist.'   Now,  reflecting reader,  what
inference would you draw  if the relation  of this treatment
had been given by a Thomsonian or any other than a member
of the  Medical Faculty ? for they may kill  as many as they
please, and the whole attended with  the  most aggravated
circumstances;  but, with them, 'killing is no murder,' and,
indeed, as they have all the law in their own hands, it cannot
be otherwise.   If the patient died with the artery  bleeding,
as it  were,  to the last  moment, and a distinct pulse at the
wrist—what conclusion can  you,  or rather, could you draw,
if the relator was not a privileged M. D., and  possessed, in
consequence, of all the  sense and science of a chosen pro-
fessor  of omniscience, but, that the patient died of exhaustion
of the vessels about the brain, seeing that  he had a distinct
pulse  at the wrist, while the blood was flowing  from the
artery "to the  last  moment"?   1 leave you  to your own
judgment without venturing my  own opinion  against the
ipse dixit of a fearfully immaculate  M. D.; you may do as
you please  in reference to  the cause of his death ;  if you
 account for  it as I do, the  cause of the poor man's " last sad
agonies" will be apparent.
   Dr. K. proceeds in the third paragraph of his exposition,
" I was  informed  that  he came there, partially intoxicated,
complaining of  symptoms of cholera, but was urged not to
go into the steam-bath by the man of the house, who stated
to him that  he was near being killed by it himself, a  short
time since;  but he persisted in his determination,  and sent
out for one to "take him through the  course," as they call it;
and who,it is plain did take him through a course!' " Whatever
he "was informed" and how much  was told  him, I  neither
know, nor care; the  man certainly did complain  of symp-
toms  of cholera, and I knew, from all I had seen of the dis-
ease,  (and I am confident I have watched  it with more in-
dustry and perseverance of effort  to effect its cure, than any
individual of the medical faculty in  the city of Baltimore,)
if the patient had a severe attack,  as  he had been so very in-
temperate, tliero would be, under any treatment, very little 
12
ground for a hope of his recovery, and  that induced  me to
lay aside the scruples I felt to taking him in hand, under the
then existing circumstances.  It is not true that  he sent out
for me to take him through the course—he came to me twice;
both  times  he informed me that Mr. Bell  told him he was
unwilling to administer the medicines to him, without some
person to aid who was better acquainted with it than himself,
and the second time he informed me that he had bought his
own medicines, (certainly without instructions what to get
from me,) and had furnished himself with his own covering;
that Mr. Bell tendered him the use of his steaming apparatus,
and that he had  taken  a  dose of powders, which vomited
him.   Had the patient told me that Mr. B. "staled to him
that he was near being killed  by it a short time  since,"  I
should certainly have  declined having  any  agency in the
business.  It is not the practice of  Thomsonians  (however
it may be with others) to meddle  with what they have not a
clear invitation to do—if the case terminated unfavorably, I
would  ask, who that has attended many patients has lost none?
and why should J be singled out, and such powerful efforts
made  to criminate me?   Are the medical faculty angry be-
cause  in'French alley, where there was a fair test of the two
modes of treatment,  they lost  all the patients they took in
hand,  (five in succession,) and I had  eight patients and saved
six out of that number? or is it criminal in all but themselves
not to be infallible?   Whether the  patient took lobelia or
what else, he  is welcome  to believe what "was  told"  him,
'whether by the mouth or in the form of an injection" will
be known in their proper time;  and, as to the "large syringe
lying at" his (the patient's feet) it is of no consequence;  it
had not been used for some hours, and belonged, 1 suppose,
to Mr.  Bell; it was not within  several feet  of the  patient a
short time before, and as Dr. K.  has volunteered, evidently
with intent to prejudice the public mind against me previous
to a trial of  the case  before a regularly-conducted jury, it is
not improbable to suppose that he volunteered in placing the
syringe where  it was, for effect,  as the bedstead whereon the
patient lay was but brought into the room not one hour be-
fore, for the use of the patient?  Whether it be "impossible
to say" or not to say, " whether  he or not he [the patient]
had any symptoms of Asiatic cholera in  the commencement
of his case," or "features of cholera in death," must, I  sup-
pose, be still left to the extraordinary medical acumen of Dr.
K. for  a decision—this I know, he had in the first part of his 
                           13

treatment so severe spasms as to roar loud enough to be heard
in the street—that he complained of slight spasms occasion-
ally for some time after, and had very severe spasms a short
time previous to the fit which alarmed  his friends so as to
cause them to send for several of the medical faculty.  I did
not send for them, and when they came, I was so far from
being "off" that I staid and did  more than I can quite justify
myself for, as I, at the request of Dr.  Cole, held the patient's
head while he cut for the temporal artery, and then at the re-
quest of  Dr. K. opened a window and door upon the expos-
ed body of the  patient, not  because I thought it right, but
for accommodation  sake.  The ignorance  of  Dr. K. in his
estimate  of  what will  constitute "a one horse power steam-
engine"  may be ascertained best by an observation of it; in-
deed, his must, truly, have been  "a hasty glance," and if even
so, it does not follow, of necessity, that "the operator," must
use too much of  it for good  purpose, nor is the diamater of
an inch and a half or two inch  pipe of tin so dreadful as he
may imagine.   The  assertion that "the subject is placed" in
"the receiver," into which the steam is conveyed, is positively
false.  In conclusion, Dr. K. says, "I have no object, but the
cause of  humanity, in offering this to  the public;" how far he
is to be  believed  is left for "the public to  decide," when it
must have been known to him that an investigation had been
instituted, and that it was probable the whole would be tried
by the proper authority.  I consider him  but a "cat's paw"
for others, and as such, now leave him to the smiles or frowns
of "the public at large."
     Yours, &c.                    FRANCIS  BURKE.
2 
TRIAL, &c.
       [Judges Bhice and Nisbet, Presiding.]

  There occurred in this case, characterized throughout, by
extraordinary incident, the unusual proceeding of a trial of
some of the jurors upon an exception to them for favor.—
It was  suggested by the counsel that each juror, as he came
to the book, should state to the court  if he had formed and
expressed  an opinion on the case; and the question was ac-
cordingly  propounded  in  that form.—Some  of the jurors
candidly stated in reply, that they had  formed  an opinion fa-
vorable to the prisoner, and retired from the  box.—On the
question being propounded to Mr. John  E. Stansbury, he re-
plied, that he  had  not formed nor expressed any  opinion
upon the  subject; whereupon the Deputy Attorney General,
insisted that triers should  be sworn for the purpose of de-
termining whether John E. Stansbury stood indifferent or not.
Three  triers from  the jurors previously sworn, viz: Samuel
Child,  John  Durham and Henry Hanna were then sworn, and
testimony  was offered by the state to show that Elijah Stans-
bury Jr. was the purchaser of a right under the Thomsonian
patent, and that he was a practitioner of that system.  It was
thence argued on the part of the state, that as Elijah Stansbury
Jr. was the brother of John  E. Stansbury,  and deeply involved
in his feelings, in the success of this system, and consequent-
ly in the result of this very trial; that J. E. S.  was not omni
exceptione major, and of course should not be sworn as a
juror.  It  was contended  by the counsel for the prisoner,
that  the bias which the State's Attorney attempted to show
as resulting  from the relation of John  E. Stansbury and Eli-
jah Stansbury Jr. in connection with the  fact of Elijah Stans-
bury Jr. being a holder of a right, was altogether too remote
and indistinct to warrant the belief that he would not decide
according to the testimony—that the great object was to have
a fair  and impartial  trial, by  competent and  disinterested
men, and  that nothing in the present  case had  been shown 
15
 to satisfy the court that the juror, John E. Stansbury, had not
 all^those important attributes, required for his office.
   After it was decided by the  triers, that John E. Stansbury
 was competent to serve, he and the  balance of the jurors
 were sworn  in—the  indictment  was then  read,  and  the
 prisoner at  the bar plead not guilty.  The following is the
 indictment:

               STATE OF MARYLAND.
 City of Baltimore, Set.
   The Jurors of the State of Maryland, for the body of the
 City of Baltimore, do upon their oaths present, That Francis
 Burke, late  of the City aforesaid, Yeoman, and William Bell
 also, late of the City aforesaid, Yeoman, not  having the fear
 of God before their eyes, but being moved and seduced by
 the instigation of the Devil, on the seventeenth day of Sep-
 tember, in  the year eighteen hundred and thirty-two, with
 force and  arms at the  City aforesaid,  in  and  upon  one
 Benjamin M. Hazelip, in the peace of God and of  the  said
 State, then and there being, feloniously and wilfully did make
 an assault, and feloniously and  wilfully  did then  and there
 administer unto, and cause to be received by  the said Benja-
 min M.  Hazelip into the body  and bowels of him, the  said
 Benjamin M. Hazelip,  a certain noxious and injurious clyster,
 which said  clyster before that time, to wit, on the day and
 year aforesaid, at the City aforesaid,  had  been  prepared of
 various,  noxious and injurious  and dangerous  ingredients;
 that is to say,  of Cayenne pepper,composition powder, nerve
 powder, and lobelia, by the said Francis Burke and William
 Bell; and that  they, the said  Francis  Burke and  William
 Bell, did then and there feloniously and wilfully administer
 unto the said  Benjamin M. Hazelip, and did then  and there
 feloniously  and wilfully apply unto and upon the breast, sto-
 mach, belly, back, head, legs and arms of him, the said Benja-
 min M. Hazelip, a certain noxious and injurious hot vapour
 called steam, and did then and there feloniously and wilfully
 keep and detain the said Benjamin  M.  Hazelip  under the
 application  and action  of  the noxious  and  injurious hot
 vapour aforesaid called steam,  for a  long space of time, to
 wit, for  the space of three hours, and  did then and there, and
 whilst the said Benjamin M. Hazelip  was under the applica-
tion and vapour of the hot vapour aforesaid, feloniously and
 wilfully administer unto, and did then and there feloniously
and  wilfully cause to be swallowed by him, the said Benja- 
16
min M. Hazelip, a certain noxious and injurious drug, to wit,
lobelia ; and that they, the said Francis  Burke and William
Bell, by administering the clyster as aforesaid, the hot vapour
aforesaid called steam, as aforesaid, and the injurious  drug
aforesaid, as aforesaid, feloniously and wilfully  did then and
there cause and procure the said Benjamin M. Hazelip to be-
come mortally sick and diseased in his body, and of which
said mortal sickness and disease in the body of him, the said
Benjamin M. Hazelip, he, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, then
and there died.  And  so the Jurors aforesaid, upon  their
oaths  aforesaid, do  say and  present, that the  said  Francis
Burke and William Bell, in  manner and  form, and by the
means aforesaid, him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, did  then
and there feloniously and wilfully kill, contrary to the form
of the  Act of Assembly in such case made and provided, and
against the peace, government and dignity of the State.
   And the Jurors  aforesaid, upon their oaths aforesaid, do
further present, that the said  Francis Burke, late of the  City
of Baltimore, yeoman, and the said William Bell, also late of
the  City  aforesaid, yeoman, not having  the  fear  of  God
before their eyes, but being moved and seduced by the insti-
gation of the Devil, on the seventeenth day of September, in
the year eighteen  hundred and thirty-two, with force and
arms at the City aforesaid,  in and upon one Benjamin M.
Hazelip, in the peace of God and of the said State, then and
there being, feloniously and  wilfully did make an assault,
and did then and there feloniously  and wilfully administer
unto the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, and did then and there
feloniously and  wilfully  apply  unto  and  upon the breast,
stomach, belly, back, head, arms  and legs of him, the  said
Benjamin  M. Hazelip, a certain  noxious and  injurious hot
vapour called steam, and did then and there feloniously and
wilfully keep and detain the said Benjamin M. Hazelip under
the application and action of the  noxious and  injurious hot
vapour aforesaid called steam, for a long  space of time, to
wit, for the space of three hours ; and that the  said Francis
Burke and William Bell, by administering  and applying the
aforesaid hot vapour called steam as aforesaid, did then and
there feloniously and  wilfully produce and cause  a mortal
engorgement of the  blood vessels and  veins of the lungs,
brain and liver of him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip,  and a
mortal effusion of the length of one inch, and of the depth of
one inch, of a bloody fluid in  and upon the brain of him, the
said Benjamin M. Hazelip, of which said mortal engorgement 
17
of the blood vessels and veins of the lungs, brain and liver,
and mortal effusion of a bloody fluid, in and upon the brain
of him/the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, he, the said Benjamin
M. Hazelip, then and there died. And so the Jurors aforesaid,
upon their oaths aforesaid, do say and present  that the said
Francis Burke and William Bell, in manner and form, and
by the means aforesaid, him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip,did
then and there feloniously and wilfully kill, contrary to the form
of the Act of Assembly in such case made and provided, and
against  the peace, government, and dignity of the State.
   And the Jurors aforesaid, upon their oaths aforesaid, do fur-
ther present, that the said Francis Burke, late of the City
aforesaid, yeoman, and the said William Bell, also late of the
City aforesaid, yeoman, not having the fear of God before their
eyes, but  being moved and seduced by the instigation of the
Devil,  on the seventeenth day  of September, in the year
eighteen hundred and thirty-two, with force and arms, at the
City aforesaid, in  and upon one Benjamin M. Hazelip, in the
peace of  God and of the said  State, then and there being,
feloniously and wilfully did make an assault, and feloniously
and  wilfully did then and there administer unto, and cause to
be received by the said Benjamin Hazelip into the body and
bowels  of him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, a certain
noxious and injurious clyster, which said clyster before that
time, to wit, on the day and year aforesaid, at the City afore-
said, had been prepared of various noxious,  injurious and
dangerous ingredients ;  that is to say,  of Cayenne  pepper,
composition powder, nerve powder, and lobelia, by the said
Francis Burke and  William Bell, and that the said  Francis
Burke and William Bell did then and  there feloniously and
wilfully, administer unto the  said Benjamin M.  Hazelip, and
did  then  and there feloniously and wilfully apply unto and
upon the  breast, stomach, belly, back, head, legs and arms of
him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip,  a  certain  noxious and
injurious  hot vapor called  steam,  and did then and  there
feloniously and wilfully keep and detain the said  Benjamin
M. Hazelip under the application and action of the noxious
and  injurious vapor aforesaid called steam, for a long space
of time, to wit, for the space of three  hours ;  and did then
and  there, and  whilst  the  said Benjamin M.  Hazelip was
under  the application and action of the hot vapor aforesaid
called steam, feloniously and wilfully  administer  unto, and
then and  there  did  feloniously and wilfully cause to be
swallowed by him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, a certain
           2* 
18
noxious and injurious drug, to wit,  lobelia; and that they,
the said Francis  Burke and William Bell, by administering
the clyster aforesaid, as aforesaid, the hot vapour aforesaid
called steam, as aforesaid, and the injurious drugs aforesaid,
to wit,  lobelia, as aforesaid,  did  then and there feloniously
and wilfully cause and procure a certain mortal engorgement
of the blood vessels and veins of the lungs, brain and liver of
him, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, and certain mortal spots
of inflammation of the length  of  one inch, and of the depth
of one inch, in and upon the internal surface of the stomach
and bowels of him, the said  Benjamin M. Hazelip,  and a
certain mortal effusion of the length of one  inch, and of the
depth of one inch, of a bloody fluid upon the brain of him,
the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, of which said mortal engorge-
ment  of the  blood vessels and veins of the lungs, brain and
liver,  mortal spots of inflammation upon the internal  surface
of the stomach and bowels,  and mortal effusion of a bloody
fluid upon the brain of him, the said Benjamin M.  Hazelip,
he, the said Benjamin M. Hazelip, then and there died ; and
so the Jurors aforesaid, upon their oaths aforesaid, do say and
present,  that  the said Francis Burke and the said William Bell,
in manner and form, and by the means aforesaid, him, the said
Benjamin  M. Hazelip,  did  then  and there  feloniously and
wilfully  kill, contrary to the form of the Act of Assembly in
such case  made and provided, and against the peace, govern-
ment  and dignity of the State.
  Thomas  Jennings and  II. W.  Gill, Deputies  of  the
Attorney General of Maryland, for the City of Baltimore.
  Geo.  R.  Richardson  and David  Stewart,  for the
Defendant.
      True Copy—Test,
                          WM. MEDCALFE,  Clerk
                                Baltimore City Court.

  After  a  few preliminary observations by the deputy attor-
ney general, R. W. Gill, the witnesses  for  the  State were
called up.  The testimony as given, reported by Mr. William
G. Jones, one of the jurors.
  LORENZO PATRICK was sworn, and deposed  as fol-
lows:
  I was intimate with the deceased, and knew him very well.
I  saw  him after his death. He came to me  early in the  morn-
ing, came in the room in which I was at work, after he came
he staid  about a minute, and went out and  immediately  re- 
19
turned, and again went out with a roll of blankets which he
took and went to Mr. Bell's. This was before breakfast and
about 8 o'clock.  Between eleven  and 12 o'clock  I heard
Mr. Hazelip was at Mr.  Bell's, and I immediately  went  to
Bell's.  1 there saw Mr. Bell.   He stated to me that  it was a
strong case of spasmodic cholera.  I went up and found Mr.
Hazelip on a machine they use for steaming.   He was lying
upon the machine and  was very restless; his face was much
flushed, and he observed he was not able to stand it.  He said
he never would be able to go through it.  Mr. Bell and Mr.
Burke were both  engaged in the operations.   Mr. Bell told
him  in reply to his remark, "that he never would be able to
go through it," that as he commenced, he must  go  through
it, and that he would forfeit fifty dollars if Mr. Hazelip should
not be a well  man. Mr. Bell further remarked that if Hazelip
had been an hour later in coming, his case would have been
very desperate.  I left Bell's and went to Mrs. Hazelip's, and
after I had been there a few  minutes,  Mr. Moffit's brother
came  in and asked me to go  to Bell's with him—I refused
to go, as I had just been there; he however persisted, and  I
at last, consented and went  back with Mr. Moffit.  During
my second  visit Mr- Burke was there—this was between  12
and 1 o'clock.   Burke was ehiefly in the  room  during  the
wWole time I was there.
  Hazelip sat up on the sacking bottom and  observed that
he could  not stand it.   Burke told  him that he must go
through now,  as  he had commenced, and  that if  he  did not,
he would be liable to spasms.   He made  him lie down.   I
do not say he used violence to force him down, but he told him
he must lie down, and he did lie down again. Mr. Burke then
gave him some medicine  to drink.   He gave it as medicine
and said he must take it.  Mr.  Hazelip refused to  take  it,
Burke however, prevailed upou him, and he did take the me-
dicine.  I did not know what it was, but understood it was
medicine.   I then left him,  and the next time I saw him, he
was dead.  I  went away soon after the  medicine was taken,
and saw him again -about 3 o'clock.  He was, in the morning,
apparently as well as I am.  The next time I saw  him, after I
left the shop, he was on the steamer.  When I saw him between
11 and 12 o'elock, 1 was with him about 25 minutes, and  ho
was under the  action of steam all the time I was  there.—
While I was with him the first time, no medicine, I believe,
was given him;  I believe, however, Mr. Bell  did give him
some  gruel.  I put my hand before the steam pipe, but could 
20
not bear it there, in consequence of the great heat.  There
was  no change  in the application of the steam during my
first  visit.   The  first time, Mr. Burke attended to the steam.
There were two rooms, and the pipe led from one to the
other:  it was a tin pipe.  They were rooms close adjoining.
No injection was given while I was there. Mr. Bell told me,
however, that he had given an injection, and showed me the
syringe he used  for the  purpose.  He did not say whether
more than one injection, nor did he say what composed it.
I did not ask him  the question, nor any question about the
medicine.   Hazelip said that his insides were  burning up
and  complained  a great deal.  I saw no bed in the  room.—
There were a table and chair in  the room, but no other fur-
niture  except some trumpery, but I did not pay particular at-
tention what it was.  There appeared  to  be no  preparation
in the room for a sick  person.  I heard  Mrs. Hazelip say, she
sent  a bed to Bell's, but do  not know what time she did  send
it.  Mr. Hazelip was  still on  the  sacking  bottom at my
second visit.  I put my hand on the pipe at my second  visit,
and found that it was  just warm.  When I saw him the se-
cond time, he looked  very pale, and he was wrapped  up in
blankets.  I was there about 10  minutes this time, and when
I left him, he was still on  the sacking  bottom.  He was, as
near as 1 could judge, about 28 or 30 years of age. His  con-
stitution was healthy and robust.  I knew him very well and
had  been  acquainted  with him  about  2 years.  He was of
active habits.
   Cross Examination.—I saw him on the Sunday evening
previous to the occurrence  at Bell's;   He  died on Monday.
I saw  him  on  Sunday  on the Susquehanna rail-road, and
went with him as far  as Gwynn's tavern.   I  then walked
two  or  three miles on  the  road, and when  I  came  back
I saw him  again ; he had been as far as Green Spring.   He
had been drinking,  but not  so much but that he was able to
take  care of himself.   He came to town with me, and on the
road  the car stopped, and we got out and took a glass of wine
together.  His appearance shewed he had been  drinking
before.  I accompanied him home, and saw him next  morning
when at work.   Previous to this  I had not seen him, I think,
for a day or two.   I think I saw him at his house, being well
acquainted with him and frequently calling there, sometimes
three or four times  a  week.  I saw  no appearance of his
being on a frolic: cannot say exactly when I saw him  pre- 
21
viously, but it was within four  or five days, as I often go to
his  house, and generally have found hirn engaged in his
business.  He  was  not a man of intemperate  habits, but
would  sometimes  take a glass.  I never saw him under the
influence of liquor except the particular instance  mentioned.
I was very intimate with him.  He said that if he lived on the
next Sunday he would have rode again upon  the rail-road.
He was in excellent health and  of active habits.  He was
intimate with Mr. Bell.  He lived near the corner of Second
street  and Market Space, and kept a second-hand  clothing
store,  and often carried  articles to Mr. Bell's to  have  them
dyed.   He never said to me that  he  would go  through  a
course  of medicine.   I  was very intimate with  him, but he
did not tell me he was going through a course.  The  machine
was formed of two planks boxed up at the ends, about the
length of a man, and from two to three feet wide.  He was
rolled  in blankets.   The steam pipe came out of the  other
room,  and ran into the box through the bottom:  it was wide
enough to lay on.   Between 11 and 1-2 o'clock 1  understood
he was going through a course, and was very  much surprised
to hear that he had the  cholera.  He said he felt very bad.
I thought he' had the cholera.  Mr. Bell told me that Hazelip
had  the  cholera, and he told me this  in the  presence of
Hazelip.   When I went  there Bell told me  it  was a  very
violent case of spasmodic cholera.   Hazelip did  not say
any thing about it, and wanted to come off; he was very anx-
ious to come off of  the steamer, but they would  not let him.
At the first time the steam pipe was so hot that  I could not
bear it.  At the second time it was cleverly warm;  this time
he raised up, and Mr. Bell  said he must lay down  or he
would  have spasms.   He appeared much exhausted, raised
up and set on  the plank.   Mr. Bell made him lay down, and
he administered some gruel.  I do not know what Burke gave
him at my first  visit.  Mr. Bell remarked that if he had come
an hour later his case would have been desperate.  Mr. Bell
said that he (Hazelip) was in a very fine way, and said he
was doing well.   I  left there between 12  and 1 o'clock, and
when  I returned Hazelip was dead.   The   blankets were
rolled  around  him when  I saw him on the steam  cot, and he
 was  very restless,  moving about  backwards and forwards.
 At this time, that is,  between 12 and 1  o'clock, the pipe  of
 the steamer was cleverly  warm.   Hazelip complained very
 much  that he was burning up in his insides, and said he could
 not go through it. 
22
  AMOS WEST deposed  as follows.
  I went to Bell's house about 1 o'clock on some day about
the middle of September, in consequence of hearing, I think
from some of my children, that  Mr.  Bell had  taken  the
cholera ;  and as I had a great curiosity to  see the cholera, 1
went down to his house.  I met Mr.  Bell in his dye house,
and was  very much surprised, as I had heard  he had  the
cholera.  He said he  had  a patient  undergoing  the  steam
operation who had  it, but that he was  not sick himself.  I
went up stairs, and saw Mr. Hazelip  iaying on the box,  Mr.
Burke being at this time in the room.   Mr. Bell mentioned
he had nothing to do with  it, that it  was Burke's case, that
he had consented to Burke's using the  apparatus.   Hazelip
had some clothing wound  round him,  and appeared in  a
great deal of agony from the complaints he made, and from
his appearance.   He complained very much of the heat, and
observed that the operation was a severe one.   I  felt some
curiosity  in the case, and examined him and felt his pulse ;
it was very rapid.   I requested him to put out his tongue, he
did so ; it appeared very red and was very warm.   I was in-
duced to examine it  from having understood  that  in  the
cholera the tongue was always very cold. His eyes were very
red, and appeared to be inflamed.  I had also heard that in
cases of cholera the feet were  shrivelled.   I  examined  his
feet only by feeling, the toes  did feel as if they  were shri-
velled.  I did not see them.   He had no spasms when I saw
him.  He said he had no purgings or  evacuations.   I put my
hand  under the  clothes;  it  felt warm, but I could  bear
my hand, there without inconvenience.   I did not touch the
steam-pipe.   I  was  there from  15  to 20  minutes, and
Mr. Burke was there all the time I was.  Mr. Bell was there
most of the  time; he went out, and was up and down fre-
quently,  and Mr. Moffit I  saw there, I  think.    Mr.  Haze-
lip was  under the application of the steam  all  the time.
Mr. Bell said he could ease the  steam off,  and  went  out
to stop some part of the pipe for that purpose, which  I  un-
derstood was done by means of a coek.  There was some-
thing  given  him  by Burke while I was there, and he leaned
over the cot and was very sick, and made several attempts to
vomit, but I believe did not throw up any thing.  Burke gave
him some medicine, but I  did not know  what it was.   I
knew  Hazelip by  sight.  The medicine was poured out of
a phial into a cup, and given to him out of the cup. 
23
  Cross Examination.—At the time I went into the  room
my object was curiosity, as  I  was anxious to see a  case of
cholera.   I do not recollect of making  any remark to any
one in the room.   Mr. Bell had shown me the  steam ap-
paratus some time time before.  The heat when I was in
the room  was not very severe.   At the time I left the house
I did not think him so near his end.   I then thought steam-
ing a very severe operation, and had very different impressions
of the treatment from what  I had before I  saw it.  I wanted
to satisfy myself about the cholera was my reason for going
in.   The  man complained  much  of  the  treatment.   I had
my doubts whether he had the cholera.  He  repeated  that
he could not stand the operation, and  begged them to desist.
I did not see him afterwards until after his death.  I heard
that he had died about 3 o'clock, and  I did not see him until
the coroner's inquest was held.  The jury of inquest met
about dark.   I think it  was spoken of as a case of cholera,
and whatever doubts I had  I did not  express them.
  ANTHONY MOFFIT  deposed as follows:
  I am a relation,  the brother-in-law  of Mr. Hazelip.   1
saw him about 8  o'clock, he came to my store and  bor-
rowed a couple of blankets :  as he was  going  through he
laughed, and appeared well and in good spirits.  I next saw
him  at Bell's between 10 and 12 o'clock.   Mr. Bell, Burke,
and  a small girl, were  present.  Mr. Hazelip  was on the
steamer, he  was very warm, the perspiration flowed very free
in large drops, and his face was flushed.  He appeared very
restless.   Mr.  Bell told me that  he  came to go through  a
steam, but that he would not let him without the assistance
of Mr. Burke.  I did not understand which went after Mr.
Burke, whether it was Hazelip himself or Bell.  He said
when he was on the steamer that  he  could not stand it any
longer, and  appeared very restless.  Burke and Bell talked
among themselves.   I said  to them that if either of ub were
in the same situation  we  would be  as uneasy  as  he was.
Burke said  he did not think so, that he  (Hazelip) was quite
childish.  Burke  showed me the syringe that they gave the
injection  with.  He said that they (Burke and Bell) did not
wait for medicine to operate.  He said  the injection was
composed of lobelia, cayenne pepper, and number 6.  They
gave  him medicine while I was  there.  Burke once, and I
think Bell once, and Bell gave him gruel  also.   I remained
near an hour; he was in the steam cot all the time I staid.
I did not  stay in the room all the time, it was very warm and 
24
 very uncomfortable.  I found him on the cot when I went,
 and left him on it when I came away.   The steam-pipe was
 so hot I could not bear my hand on it, and they would some-
 times blow the steam off* by turning it.  If the steam  in
 blowing off made any noise,  I  did not  hear  it.   I  do not
 think it did.  The distance from  the generator  to  the cot
 was about from where I stand to the opposite window (half
 the length of the court  room.)   Under the cot was very
 warm, could not  say but that at  all its parts  it  was  of the
 same  temperature.  There was  in the  room a table and a
 chair or two, and some lumber, but there was no bed in the
 room.   I left him on the steam cot, and was going, when
 Bell seeing 1 was going, and that I  was very uneasy,  said he
 would forfeit $50  if he would not be well in  two hours.   I
 felt his feet, but felt no cramps in them.   Bell and Hazelip
 were intimate.  He was about 28 or  30  years old, enjoyed
 tolerable  good health, was  an active and  muscular man,
 quite as strong as I am.   He was a temperate man, 1 consi-
 dered.   I saw him on  the rail-road the Sunday previous, and
 was at Gwynn's tavern with him.   He showed then that he
 had taken  a glass, but a stranger would not  have  noticed it.
 He was  perfectly sober when he got the  blankets.  On  my
 second visit, I saw him close by  the steam  bath  on a bed
 between 12 and 3 o'clock; about  3  he  was  in a state  of
 insensibility, and could not speak.  Bell  was with him ; he
 said that he had sent for a physician.   I  offered  to go  for
 one, and went for Dr. Hintze;  and  as he was not  in, I met
 Dr. Knapp in Market street, and told him  I wanted him to go
 and see a man who was undergoing the Thomsonian  prac-
 tice ;  he said he would not go; I urged him  to go; he then
said that if it was a friend of mine he would, and did accom-
 pany me.  No physician had been there when I  left him. He
 did not know me at this time, and was insensible. There were
about two  hours intervened between my first and second
visit.   Dr. Cole was there when I returned with Dr. Knapp.
Mr. Bell was in the room.   Burke had gone to attend another
patient before Knapp  came; I believe it was a ladv named
Jenkins.   Hazelip's apprentice boy brought me word.
   Cross Examination.—I was in the room when Dr. Knapp
bled him—Mr. Burke was not  there when I went for a phy-
sician, nor when I came  back, do not think I saw him the
whole day.  I  might have reproved Mrs. Hazelip for her
anxiety, but do not think I did.  1  do not recollect telling
her that I thought Mr. Hazelip was doing very well, and that 
25
 it was a very fine apparatus.   I told  Mrs.  Hazelip  that they
 told me that he was doing very well, but 1 do not  recollect
 exactly what 1  did tell  her at that time.   I  did say the ma-
 chinery and apparatus was a very fine apparatus, for that kind.
 I meant the machinery looked very well.   When I  told Mrs.
 Hazelip my impression was he was doing well,  and would
 get well, I did  so to quiet her uneasiness, as she  was very
 uneasy.   I went by their opinions, and gave their opinions
 as mine to her.  I knew nothing  but  what they told me.   I
 was alarmed, but Bell and Burke relieved it by saying he was
 doing well.
   M. B. TOWNSEND  deposed as follows:
   1 saw Mr. Hazelip the day of his  death, about a quarter
 before 10 o'clock, saw him about 10 steps from his door, and
 stopped to talk  to him—he appeared  well, and I did not see
 any thing wrong about him.  I never  saw  him afterwards.—
 I heard, that at 3 o'clock he was dead.  He was active, and
 apparently in good  health.  He lived in  my neighborhood
 for two or three years.   He would sometimes take too much
 to drink, and on the Saturday evening previous to his death,
 he drank too much.
   Cross Examination.—I saw him in my store; he  came to
 pay me some  money he owed me—he certainly had been
 drinking.   I only saw him on  Saturday, at about 5 o'clock.
   Dr. ISAAC COLE deposed as follows:
   I was called to Mr. Hazelip between 2 and 3 o'clock.—
 When f arrived, Mr. Bell and Mr. Burke and the patient
 were all in the room.  He was lying on a small trundle bed
 near the box which they used for steaming.  I considered the
 man laboring under an engorgement of the blood vessels of
 the head,  he was entirely insensible.   His face was flushed,
 his eyes were  red.  These symptoms and  the very  great
 difficulty of breathing led me  to this  conclusion.   Mr. Bell
 asked me to take charge or administer some relief, if possi-
 ble, and said they had been steaming him.  They did not tell
 me further  than to say they had been steaming him.  Mr.
 Bell appeared very anxious I should afford him some relief.
 I told him that if 1 could abstract blood, it was his only chance.
 I told Burke, that if I bled  him and he died, he  would say
the doctors had bled  him to death.  Burke was then feeling
 his temples.  He said that he would give the case up to me.
 I told him that I would not  consent to that, but  that if I
could afford him  any relief from the situation in which he
           3 
26
was  placed, I would do so.  I saw the injecting  instrument—
they said they had given him an emetic.  Mr. Bell said I
should bleed him, when I  said it was  the  only course, and
seemed anxious I should do it.   I found his situation would
not admit of general bleeding as he was  rapidly sinking.   I
made an  incision  over the temporal  artery,  but did not suc-
ceed in drawing  blood.   I then told them, they might apply
mustard  plasters to his  arms and legs.  I  saw then that  he
would die, and that further  treatment was  useless.   I left the
house a few minutes  and saw Dr. Knapp  and called him.—
He entered the room and saw that I  had attempted to divide
the artery.   Dr. Knapp said lie would try if he could  do  it;
he made the attempt and succeeded in getting as much blood
as filled his  ear two or three times;  for it ran down into his
ear.  He expired in about half an hour after I first saw him. 1
thought, when I first saw him, he would die.  The engorge-
ment of blood was very great.  Mr.  Bell  insisted  upon my
endeavoring to relieve  him,  and was very anxious  that I
should bleed him.   He  was then holding  the man's head.—
I observed to Mr. Burke, that my treatment was different from
his.  He  said I was called in to take charge.   I told him  it
was not my  case  and I did not so consider it. It would  have
been impossible for him  to have recovered if he had not been
bled.   I met his wife on the steps, and  it  was as much  to
satisfy her, as she appeared  much distressed, that  I attempt-
ed it.
   Cross Examination.— Burke  left  the room a few minutes
after Dr.  Knapp came.   I  met  Mrs. Hazelip on the  stairs.
There  was in the room a table, some medicines  on  it,'—and a
small trundle bed.  1 had to unwrap the arm to  get at the
pulse.
   We  found on the examination after death, the  brain, the
lungs and liver engorged with blood,  the lungs more than the
brain, which corroborates my opinion.  There was an effu-
sion of bloody fluid through the  brain.  The brain  and lungs
in other respects  appeared healthy.   The heart we  examined
and found it in a healthy condition.   The liver as I observed
before, was engorged with blood.  The stomach and bowels
were carefully examined, and here and there  we found patch-
es of inflammation.   The other organs appeared in  a healthy
state.  The  circulation  is stopped  by  an  engorgement  of
blood. I think this engorgement was produced by  the treat-
ment administered, taking every thing into consideration, the
means used, the  appearance after death, and looking at the 
27
causes to produce that appearance.   If he had been subject
to intoxication, such treatment would have still more aggra-
vated it, the  tendency of steam being always to produce a
great excitement of the system; this and the vomiting had a
tendency  to  force the blood  to  the  head.   The  effect of
stimulants at  any time is to occasion the same result.  This
disgorgement of blood on the brain must have been recent,
as it could not have continued, and the man have lived.
The inflammation on the  bowels had the appearance of being
recently produced. Steam baths are sometimes resorted to; such
for instance as that  used by Dr.  Jennings, but I have never
used one except by the application of hot bricks.  His looks
were of a full  habit, and appeared about 27 or 28 years of
age.  Cayenne pepper is a strong  stimulant, and is, I believe,
never used as an injection, but by the advocates of this sys-
tem;  but I have known brandy used under particular circum-
stances.  The summer before last when many died of drink-
ing cold water, I used brandy, and sometimes procured re-
lief.  I  never knew lobelia to be used by any, except the ad-
vocates of this system.   The effect of lobelia it is said, is to
act as a purgative.   1 have never used it, and have no know-
ledge of it myself.   Cayenne is an active stimulant, lobelia
is also.   Lobelia I do consider ought not to be used by any
but  those who are judicious and  acquainted with its effects
and qualities.   I consider it  a dangerous article, and think it
improper to be  used  without experience of persons of good
judgment.  His pulse was too feeble to be bled from the arm.
Bell sent for meat first.   I was examined at the coroner's in-
quest, which was held about 8 o'clock in the evening.  1 was
present  at that inquest.   Bell and Burke both stated before
the jury that they had administered lobelia and cayenne pep-
per, and that it had the effect they intended.  They said the in-
jection  was composed of No.  6, and the composition pow-
der.  They gave what I consider large dozes, a tea spoonful
of lobelia.  I am not certain how much is an ordinary dose,
ten or twenty grains I think, but do not know how to mea-
sure  by tea spoonfuls.   The cayenne pepper was given in
the composition powder.   The medicine produced vomiting.
They have a  powder,  No. 6, given as an injection with lobe-
lia also, with a nerve  powder.   The injection was of No. 6,
and  they referred to the book—the cayenne is one of the in-
gredients of No. 6.
   I  do recollect a case in which 1 have known Mr. Burke to
have administered.   At  the  time  the cholera was raging, a 
28
female was attacked in French alley, she was in a back room.
I felt her pulse—it was laboring under cholera.   Burke was
treating her.  It was too dark in the room  for me  to  see
much of her situation.   1 then left her.  Burke  said she re-
covered.  I saw her on Saturday, and on Monday I met some
of the members of the society, who said she  was mending.
1 am not aware of having expressed any surprise.
  I saw nothing like cholera in the case of Mr. Hazelip,
there was no cramps, but there was convulsions.   The lungs
were  slightly adhered to the chest, but that could not have
produced his death.  There  was some disease of a chronic
character,  but  it could not  have caused his death.  I con-
sider the effect of the treatment was to aggravate these slight
chronic diseases; they could  not have produced his death;—
and for all the effect they could  have caused, he would have
lived to an old age.  When I first came, there was a tendency
to convulsions, which I attributed to the pressure on the brain.
They have a powder they use, which they call  No. 6—I have
seen it.
  The Court then  adjourned until  10 o'clock to-morrow.

                        Thursday Morning, 10 o'clock.
  DR. COLE,  continued—When I reached  Bell's, Hazelip
was lying on the bedstead, the windows in the room were all
down.   The patient was wrapped up in blankets.   A sudden
check of perspiration is likely to produce serious consequen-
ces, particularly where there  has been  a great  excitement of
the system; and a  sudden  check  of the perspiration  would
be likely to produce those symptoms of congestion which  I
alluded to yesterday.  The day was very  pleasant and fine,
the air was clear.   The mischief was done before I entered
the room.   The man was sponged with cold water by Burke,
while in a state of perspiration.  I did not know, until they
told me, before the jury of inquest, what  they had done, and
the treatment they had pursued.  The sponge  was  used,
while the steaming was going on.  He was in  a profuse per-
spiration when I reached there.-  He was sponged with cold
water On the face and breast,  while steaming.   I attribute the
symptoms  to the operation  of the whole treatment; from the
steam  and  internal stimulants administered.  I cannot ex-
plain why the patches  of inflammation were in the bowels.
If the  strong stimulating medicines used, had come in con-
tact with the bowels,they might have produced general inflam-
mation. No one  part of the stomach is  more likely or pre- 
29
disposed to inflammation than another.   Neither is one part
of the bowels more liable to inflammation than another.  When
I felt his pulse it was very feeble, and that was the reason 1
did not bleed, or attempt to bleed, from the arm.  The red-
ness of the face and eyes indicated congestion, and I thought
it necessary to  abstract  blood from the artery.   1 could not,
in his then state, adopt general bleeding.   1 am not acquaint-
ed with lobelia, and have never used it.  I always considered
it a very dangerous medicine when administered by persons
not well acquainted with its effects, and I have always found
other medicines to answer the same purpose.  Dr. Cutler was
I believe, the first one who has introduced lobelia into  recent
notice.   It has  been recommended by physicians as a speci-
fic for the asthma.   I believe a distinguished physician used
it upon himself, and took it in the form of a tincture, by dis-
solving it in spirits, and threw as much into it as the  spirits
would abstract.  All our  medical works mention lobelia, as
dangerous, and J do think  it a dangerous article, in unskil-
ful hands.   About  ten  grains of  lobelia, in  dry leaves, is an
ordinary doze; this is sometimes increased to twenty grains.
The valerian is used as a nervine.  They have a powder they
call No. 6.   I am  well  acquainted with it.   I am frequently
subject to a nervous head ache; and, in  one of  my visits to
a friend's house, at his request,  1  took a little  of  it  to re-
lieve  my head ache, but it had not the effect.  The lungs in
the case of Hazelip, were  more  engorged  than the  brain.
There  might  have been a strong  predisposition to that en-
gorgement.   The tendency  of the vapor bath is to excite all
the vessels on the surface of the body, and unite the circula-
tion  on the  surface.  In this case, I discovered the  brain,
bowels  and lungs,  were  affected by this steaming.  It  would
not have a tendency to relieve congestion, if the steam was
continued for a length  of time.   All the circumstances led
us to the conclusion that he came to  his death by the treat-
ment pursued.   If it were not for the testimony at the post
mortem  examination, by  which  we  learned the treatment,
which  had been pursued, we might  not have been able to
come to any positive conclusion  upon  the  subject; it was
only by hearing the treatment, and, then an examination of
is effects, that we came to the conclusion.   When I made
the attempt to  open the artery, I told Bell to apply mustard
plasters to his feet and arms.  I then  went away.  1 did not
know  any  other physician had been sent  for.   The only
change I caused in the  treatment was the attempt  to sever
           S* 
30
the artery and the  application of the mustard plasters.   Dr.
Knapp, when he came, asked for a lancent, and cut the ar-
tery.  Burke was then holding the head of the patient,  and
also washed  his face with  camphor.  The windows were
open, and Hazelip was wrapped up in blankets.   The win-
dows were continued open  during rny second visit.   The
head of the patient was slightly elevated, but I do not  recol-
lect that a chair was placed behind him, or what was thereto
elevate it.  There are too windows in the room.   The room
is a small one, and his head was about as far  from the win-
dow as where  I now  stand to Mr.  Stewart.  The door  was
also open.  Dr. Knapp was then in attendance, and I left the
man thinking  he  must die.  Mr. Moffit was the person who
went for  Dr. Knapp.   Mr. Bell sent for me.   When there is
an engorgement of the blood vessels,  we bleed without refer-
ence to perspiration.   Mr. Burke has been practising for some
time.  He has on  several occasions invited me to attend with
him, to see his cases, and it was in consequence of this gen-
eral invitation, as well as a special one, that I went to*see his
patient in French  alley.   I attended a family who had Smith
and Thompson's  system  of medicine in  their house,  and
were  very partial  to  it;  but they would  never  administer
without  advice.    They frequently  urged me to abandon
the system I practice, and adopt it, alledging that if 1 did so,
I would find it profitable.  At the decease  of this  gentleman
his books were presented to me.  The common characteris-
tic of cholera is congestion, nofcinflammation. I did not  disco-
ver in this case any symptoms of cholera  when I first went,
nor did I find  any on the post mortem examination.  1 never
had an opportunity of being  present  at the dissection of a
case of cholera.   Writh regard to cayenne  pepper, we  might
perhaps give 6, 8% or   10 grains ; a tea spoonful is about 30
grains.   I weighe'd it to ascertain the  quantity.   I  would not
under any circumstances give more than the 6,8, or 10  grains
more than two or three times a  day. It is my  deliberate
opinion,  formed from  what I saw while in the room, as well
as at the post  mortem examination, that his death  was occa-
sioned from  the treatment which  he received.   The  report
of  the inquest was drawn  up by Professor Geddings.   The
jury asked our opinion, and  we retired to consult upon the
case; our opinion was  given unanimously.  I know of no
blank sheet being signed by the physicians.  The  report  was
signed by all the physicians  present.   We examined all  the
witnesses before the jury of inquest. 
31
  BARNET  McCAULY deposed as follows :
  I saw a man in the steam bath, did not seu  him after his
death.—I do not know positively that it was Mr. Hazelip,but
believe it was.  1 went there through curiosity  to see a man
going through the steam.  Mr. Seabrooks told me that there
was a man up stairs who was going through the steam.  He
lives with Mr. Bell.   When I got up to the  room,  I  found
Mr. Burke, Mr. Bell, and Mr. Moffit there.  This was about
11 o'clock.   Mr. Hazelip seemed to be in a very uneasy situ-
ation  from perspiration.  He asked how long for God's sake
he would be kept there.  The reply was that it would all be
over in  ten or fifteen minutes; I  do  not  suppose that I
staid more than fifteen minutes;  he was  on the steam cot all
the time I did stay.  There was nothing said about Dr. Hintze
being sent for.  I saw  them  give him nothing, but  saw Burke
reducing the steam.  The steam came very rapid.   The pipe
was very warm, and I was  obliged in feeling  it  to put my
handkerchief between  it  and my hand, and then  it felt very
warm.  The  place where I felt the pipe was about the cen-
tre, between the fire and  the steam cot, and  this  was  about
five or seven minutes before I went away.  They did not ap-
ply any thing more than  phials to  his nostrils, nor did they
give him any thing while I was there.   He did  not ask to be
released more than once.   He did ask  how long he would
be kept, and received for answer not more than  ten or fifteen
minutes.
  Professor GEDDINGS.—When I first saw Hazelip he was
dead.  I was requested by  the  coroner  to conduct the post
mortem examination.   The coroner informed me  that a man
was treated by the Thomsonians, and that he was found dead.
1 found his body in the third story of Bell's house, and ex-
amined  it externally,  but found  no marks of  injury except
the artery which was cut by  Dr. Cole, and a slight abrasion
on the instep of the right foot, not of recent origin.  There
was great rigidity of the body, the muscles  were  very rigid.
On laying open the cavity of the chest the lungs were found
muchengorged with blood, the surface  of the  left lung ad-
hered slightly to the  chest; this  appeared to have been of
long standing, and to have had nothing to do with the recent
circumstances.   The  heart  was  found  perfectly  healthy.
The  heat in  the  cavity was  very great, more  so  than I
was  accustomed  to see  such a  long period after death—
The  same elevated temperature was found in the cavity
of the abdomen.  The stomach when laid open  was found 
32
 to  contain a  dirty looking fluid, part  of  which was mu-
 cus, and  part perhaps  what  had been administered.    On
 the  lining membrane of  the stomach there were  several
 patches of inflammation  of considerable  extent.  The sur-
 face of the membrane exhibited some symptoms of disease
 of long standing.  Some pappulae which  had nothing  to do
 with the present case.  The small intestines were lined with
 mucus.  The  lining  membrane had al.so  patches of inflam-
 mation in lines or streaks.  There were also some points of
 deep colour,  bloodshot  appearance.  The evidence of in-
 flammation in  the  large intestines less manifest; their con-
 tents were considerable;  they were the natural  contents of
 the organ.  Towards  the lower parts called the colon of  the
 intestines, there  were several inches narrowing.   This con-
 traction I conceived of old  standing, and  had no connexion
 with the present case.   The  surface of the liver exhibited
 small white globular spots, called tubercles, varying from the
 size of a pin's head to that  of a pea. The same  tuberculous
 degeneration existed in the substance of the liver, the vessels
 were slightly congested.  The other organs in the cavity of the
 abdomen  were healthy.  The appearance of the liver was
 that of old standing.   We next examined  the brain;  the  se-
 rous coverings of the brain  was somewhat  injected  with
 blood; there  was  also a slight congestion of the vessels of
 the substance  of the  organ.  There was  a bloody fluid  in
 the cavities of the organ, and its lower surface.  After the
 organ was removed a considerable quantity of this fluid sunk in-
 to tiie cavity in which  the spinal marrow is contained.  This is
 all I am able to state relative  to the post mortem examination.
 I have heard what Dr. Cole has stated, it  is substantially the
 same as I should  have expressed. We all concurred in  the ex-
 amination. There were patches of inflammation on the stomach
 and intestines,which appeared of recent origin. The morbid ap-
 pearance of the  brain and  covering I conceived of recent
 origin.  The slight congestion of the liver  was also of recent
origin, but taken  separate  from the rest, should not have  con-
 sidered it of much importance.
  From the post mortem examination, and the  testimony
 given before us at that time, I concluded,  and it  is now my
opinion, he came to his death by the medicines which  were
 administered, particularly the lobelia and  the steam,  which
 were applied  at  the  same time.   Mr. Bell, Dr.  Cole,  Dr.
 Knapp, Mr. West, and Moffit, were examined before the  jury
 of inquest. I considered the steam and the lobelia as  having 
33
caused the most injury.  I consider lobelia as a safe medicine
when administered in proper  doses, and  with discretion.  J
have the same opinion with regard to the steam bath.  1 have
seen  similar appearances in  death  from  other  causes.  I
came to my conclusion  from the post mortem examination
and the testimony produced at that time.  I should not have
arrived, perhaps, at the same conclusion from the appearance,
without taking into  consideration the treatment pursued.  I
should  have considered, from  the history of the circum-
stances, and the evidence before us, and  am  decidedly of
opinion he  had no serious  disease when he went to the
steam-cot.  The immediate  effect of steam  carried to the
extent it was in this particular case, was to occasion an inor-
dinate excitement of the system, acting as it did on the whole
surface of the body, ^nd of course effecting the whole sys-
tem.   The effect of this excitement would be to increase the
circulation,  and consequently to produce a  greater flow of
blood to  the  heart and other organs.  Under these circum-
stances, those vessels which receive the greater quantity and
flow  of blood would be more likely to suffer  by the extraor-
dinary excitement. The organs are the stomach, the intestines,
the liver,  the lungs, the heart and the brain.  The kidneys
frequently suffer under similar treatment, as was followed in
this case, but  did not notice any particular marks in this par-
ticular case.  The  effect of this would  be  to exhaust the
organs of their powers, and  to give rise to inflammation in
some of the structures.  [By  permission  of  the  court, Dr.
Geddings read  extracts from Fordyce, Banks, Solander, &c,
giving a history of the difference of effects between steam and
dry  heat.]
   [After  reading the  extract, the Professor resumed as
follows:]
   The system is able to undergo a higher temperature in a
dry than a moist bath.  With regard to  cayenne pepper, it is
called a stimulant;  its effects not so widely diffused as some
others.  The jury themselves are able to decide how large a
quantity can be used with impunity ; but when the system is
highly excited, it is very mischievous, it is sometimes used to
relieve the organs  when  they  are  languishing.   A system
inordinately excited would  be very injuriously effected by
cayenne pepper.  To illustrate it, a glass of wine may be
taken when in health, and  enlivens the system ; but m acute
 inflammation  it would be endangering health.   I consider that
  ,alf  a tea-spoon full to a healthy system would produce no 
34
injury.   Lobelia is  an  active stimulant,  and  a  narcotic
remedy.  I have frequently administered it in small dost-s;
it  produces  an excitement and a  tingling sensation  at the
finger ends.   In large doses,  say ten or twenty  grains in
substance, it produces vomiting and sometimes purging. The
usual dose  of the tincture is from  thirty drops to a  half
ounce—the  medium dose  is  one drachm  in  tincture.  1
generally give it in tea-spoon full  doses.  If the  court  will
again permit me, I  will read for the information of the jury an
extract  relative to lobelia, from  Barton's Medical Botany,
v.  1, p. 187.
   [The Dr. here read the extract,  and having concluded re-
sumed as follows:]
   I consider it highly dangerous when the system is excited
to  administer cayenne pepper.   A tea spoonful of tincture of
lobelia is given, up to about half an ounce. I have seen many
post mortem examinations.  During  the prevailing epidemic
I have seea about twenty, and have seen the same redness,
but a great dissimilarity  as regards the fluids and the natural
contents of  the organs.   In cholera  cases, after the spasms
develop themselves, the watery evacuations continue, and fre-
quently until death.   In every case of cholera I have seen,
the watery evacuations have existed more or less, but spasms
have not always.   I  have seen within 2  or 3 days a case of
cholera  without spasms.   I  have examined  from  15  to 20
cases during the epidemic. The internal warmth is frequent-
ly  an accompanyment of the  cholera.  The warmth often
continues for a long time.   1 would  not wish to  be under-
stood as endeavoring to convey the idea that the warmth  1
have heretofore mentioned in the cavity, proceeded from the
vapor bath.   I have  frequently used  lobelia.   I never have
known  it from my own  observation  to  be administered in
larger doses  than a tea spoon full at one  time, larger doses I
do consider dangerous.  To all the questions we put to  Mr.
Burke, he made the most candid  replies.   I thought I could
perceive that there  would be an examination  of the case af-
terwards, and  told  him  that if he would in  any way by his
answers implicate  himself, not to reply; he, however,  was
very candid, and did answer all the questions asked before
the jury of inquest.  He told us he had administered a tea
spoon full of the powder of lobelia,  and not producing the
effect, he gave a second  dose not quite  so large; he also
stated that he had administered a heaping table spoon full as
a;  injection. That he had given it but  twice into the stomach. 
35
He further said  that he  had administered  the composition
powder and the  nerve  powder.  There was something said
of No. G;  but do not recollect whether by Mr. Burke or some
one else.
  In giving lobelia or  any other medicines as  an injection,
it requires a larger quantity, the parts being less susceptible,
less highly organized, and less sympathetic  relation.  Gene-
rally, a double dose  is  given as an injection, and  it always
requires stimulating properties to operate the bowels in this
way.   When the injection  operates, it would depend  upon
the time it had been retained; if a long while, the effect might
be mischievous although  discharged.  If 1 had known nothing
of tins case except  from  the post mortem  examination, I
could not have said that he  died of the steam or the lobelia.
In Russia they go from a vapor bath into a cold room imme-
diately with impunity.  I  confess, my  own impression  is,
that it  would be very dangerous here.  A  sudden  check of
perspiration is always dangerous.   The check of the perspi-
ration  in this case, was brought about,  but  half an hour be-
fore death, time  had not  elapsed to produce congestion from
that cause.  The powder is much stronger  than the tincture.
Burke  stated that what he was administering he did  not con-
sider fresh, and, consequently not  strong.  He said he fre-
quently administered lobelia in much larger doses with good
effects.  1 told  him  this did not agree with my own experi-
ence.  This was my reason for asking why he administered
in such large doses.   Mr. Burke  said  he sponged  the man,
and that he regulated the steam.   Wrhen  he noticed an ex-
citement,  he sponged him about the neck,  head and breast,
with cold  water;  and this, while under a profuse perspiration;
he said, that when the man became too much excited, he
regulated  the steam by reducing it.   Burke answered all our
questions  with the greatest  candor.
  Dr.  H1NTZE. I saw  Mr. Hazelip on Sunday evening; he de-
sired me to prescribe for him, seemed very much excited and
agitated, complained of being fatigued, and said he was afraid
he would  get the cholera. He said he had been  riding on the
rail road.  He asked me if  he had  not better take something
to prevent the cholera.  I always  disapproved of preventive
medicines.  He inquired my opinion  and the propriety of his
undergoing a Thomsonian course.   I told him any man was
a fool unless he was sick, to take medicines.   He said  if  he
took a  course, he would not be liable to  the cholera for the
season. My reply was,  perhaps if he took  the course,  he 
36
would take no other disease. I examined him as to his bow-
els—he had undergone some fatigue.  I advised him  to go
home and apply a feather poultice 1o the back of his  head,
and a bread and butter poultice to the inside of his stomach,
and he would be well.  He said his  bowels were regular.  I
told him none but quacks administered preventive remedies.
This  was about 11 or 12 o'clock at night.   He  had been
drinking.   Occasionally he would take a frolic on Saturday
evening.   1  attended his family for 4 or  5  years, and knew
he was easily excited.  He said he had drunk several glasses.
A man easily excited would be very readily excited by any
stimulant.  He was of a sanguineous temperament.
  Dr. POTTER.  I have heard all  the evidence given, and
do not.  consider that the medicines used in this  case are
generally used by regular practitioners.  Upon a healthy sys-
tem I think  there is  no  use of  applying them.  A man in
health needs nothing as medicine. It is an experiment which
may do much mischief, and can do no good. These remedies
always produce more or  less mischief in large doses.  The
system is not indifferent  to  these medicines  under any cir-
cumstances.  Cayenne pepper  is not a  poison, but when
given  in a slate of great excitement, produces mischief; it pro-
duces increased secretions.   Lobelia  is sometimes introduced
as a remedy for the asthma—the system then will take a  large
dose; in other cases, such as a liability to inflammation,if it
does not act as an emetic, it  does  as  a purgative.  The hem-
lock  is a narcotic, it has not the same effect as all narcotics.
ft is a poison when given in large doses.   The use of warm
or vapor  bath is  of great service, if  properly  regulated and
used with judgment, it excites the surface, which  is some-
times  serviceable in the form of vapor.  The system cannot
continue it as long moist as dry. Dr. Jennings has tested
the  theory of vapor baths.   1 have  used  lobelia in asthma
and affections of the lungs, and some other diseases.   In a
high state of excitement,  it  ought not to be administered.—
It produces excitement by vomiting.   They have stated the
inflammation to be in patches in the bowels;  some part of
the bowels will always be affected by it when taken  in large
doses, if not ejected immediately.  If a man understands the
construction of the system upon which they are to act, and ad-
ministers with care, they are  safe.  We have sometimes more
difficulty to prevent persons taking medicines than to induce
them to do it.  Hemlock  is a poison.  I know it well__it
grows three or four feet high. 
37
  Dr. COLE.   I did state when I was up before, or intended
to do so, that I believed  cayenne pepper ivas administered.
  Dr. GEDDINGS.  I have ho recollection of Burke saying
cayenne was given in the stomach.  Universal  experience
has proved, that when there is a predisposition to any disease,
a strong excitement of the passions may lead to that result;
for  instance, fear or grief acting upon a system easily excited
at a time when there is a predisposition to any disease, may
produce that disease.  The use of ardent spirits, acting upon
a system that would  be  easily excited, and at such  a time,
might be a predisposing  cause of cholera.  Steam will  pro-
duce spasms in the whole system.  I stated that the contents
of the organ  only, were dissimilar to cases of cholera.
  Here rested the testimony for the prosecution.

  WARD  SEARS deposed as follows:
  A person came to my place with  a roll of blankets.   I
have since  ascertained that it was the deceased.   I was then
in Larrabee's store.  He  wanted me  to take him  through  a
course.  He was purchasing medicine.  I told him I did not
attend to that busines.  I finished putting up his medicines,
and he went away and said he was  going through a course.
I referred  him to Francis Burke.  Burke got medicines of
me and practised in cases of cholera, and I heard he was
about to adopt the practice of medicine as his regular busi-
ness.
   Cross Examination.—I believe he got some  composition
No. 6, nerve powder, cayenne pepper, and lobelia.  He said
he was going  through a  course;  and I put  him  up as much
medicine as I thought sufficient  to carry him through.  No.
6 is never  put up in a powder, it is always  a  liquid.  It was
the  same prescription I  put up  for him  that I had  done in
cases of cholera.  I do not practice the system myself.  I
keep the books and medicines for sale as agent for Thom-
son.   I gave Mr.  Hazelip the medicines but not the book.—-
He did not become one of the  subscribers to it.  He paid
me for the medicine, I think,  S7£ cents.  I do give informa-
tion more than is in the books, which is confined to the
members of  the association.
   To the question propounded by the Attorney General, what
other information is given to  the subscribers to the  publica-
tion of Thomson more than is contained in the  book itself?
the counsel for the defendent objected.  After  a discussion
of  the question before the court, the Chief Justice  decided
            4 
38
  that the question was not relevant to the case, that the inves-
  tigation was not one which embraced the advantages of this
  system of medicine or the other system, but that it narrowed
  itself down to the plain language of the indictment, and to that
  question the whole investigation must be directed, that, there-
  fore, he was of opinion that any question which went into the
  merits of the system of practice, was  not relevant to this case.
  The Associate Judge stated, that he did not altogether agree
  with, the opinion of his learned brother, as he thought it neces-
  sary to a correct investigation of the  charge in the indictment,
  that an investigation should be had into the means which the
  party charged might have of obtaining information relative to
  thesystem which he practiced, and what that information might
  be which  he  could  so obtain, but that in the present situa-
  tion of the court, there being a vacancy on the  bench, there
 was  no  course left him  but to  acquiesce in the opinion de-
  livered by Judge Brice.
   WARD SEARS continued—I  am agent  for Dr.  Thom-
 son.   I give no information except what is derived from the
 books and my own experience.  Burke has  been some time
 engaged in the  practice of medicine; I  think about 4 years.
 He has held  a right  under the system  for 5 or 6 years.   1
 have lived for about 5 or 6 years in Calvert street.   Burke
 purchased  the right and  lived in Washington.   He has been
 in Baltimore,  I believe, about 4 years.   1  never saw him  in
 Washington, never having visited it  while he was there.  He
 did  not  always  follow the practice, but did occasionally.—
 From what I know and  have heard  of him, I consider him
 very  skilful and  competent  to  practice medicine.   I never
 was present in any one instance that he administered prior
 to the late epidemic.   Burke is a printer by  trade.
  Dr. JANNEY.   I have practiced  medicine about  5 years
 in Virginia, but not very extensively.  I was  studying 15 or
 20 years with  my father.   He was not a regular  practicing
 physician, but kept an apothecary, and  never practiced  for
 pay.  I practiced for two years without pay, and my neigh-
 bors anxious I should practice  medicine, and not being able
 to do it gratuitously, I commenced it regularly. I have turn-
 ed my attention  a good deal to Thomson's medicines since
 I got  his book, and I have examined  all the medical authori-
ties to ascertain  the effect of his medicines before I  would
consent to use them.   I took it myself first to try its effects.
I took five tea  spoons full at different times in powder and
during- the same  day before it puked  me.   I have frequently 
39
 taken it, always one tea spoon full at a time, this being about
 16 grains—I have never  taken more at a time; but I repeat
 it till it operates.  I have used lobelia frequently upon others
 during the last 2 years, commencing with  16 grains and wait-
 ing about 50  minutes, and  then  repeat the dose,  but lessen
 the quantity, and  continue it  in this way until it operates.—
 Up to the time I have mentioned, my medicines were of the
 kinds usual with medical men.   From the experience of my
 father, and  my own experience and the knowledge which I
 have obtained of  lobelia, I should certainly say it  Was not a
 poison. I always use it when  I want to cleanse the stomach.
 I have used the tincture of  lobelia about two tea spoons full
 as  an injection; sometimes  less,  sometimes more  for  injec-
 tions.  If I wish to reduce a fever, I giv?  it in small quanti-
 ties to produce perspiration;  a greater quantity produces an
 emetic.  I give sometimes a fourth of a grain of tartar emetic
 for that purpose and to produce  perspiration, and mix with
 it some ipecacuanha.  I have employed lobelia as an injec-
 tion with tea made of bay bark.  I have never lived in Bal-
 timore.  Hemlock is not a  poison as has been stated here,
 but it is perfectly harmless.   It is taken from the bark of the
 pine tree, and is not poison.  These medicines can do no
 harm in any case or under any circumstances, they sometimes
 may do no good.
   Cross Examination.—I practiced  for five years  under the
 old system of medicine, and  for nearly two  years I have
 practiced the Thomsonian system.  I was  not made  a con-
 vert by reading Thomson's book.  The book induced me to
 examine and try the medicines, and  I have, since I have as-
 certained their effects practiced the  principles  the book con-
 tains.   I frequently use other  medicines.   I associate them
 with the others—and the more I have used Thomson's medi-
 cines, the better I am  satisfied of their efficacy.   I believe
 they are not injurious in any disease, in many  they certainly
 are beneficial.  I believe a man has  a natural gift to ascer-
 tain the things of nature.  I believe that life is heat and that
 blood  is heat, and that blood and  heat  are synonymous as
 regards the animal system.  I believe that  all constitutions
 are naturally alike.   I also believe that a fever is an effort of
 nature to relieve itself of disease, and  that such efforts may
 sometimes be carried too far, and to  too great  an  extent.  I
 do not think that all constitutions are alike in  every particu-
 lar, but that there  are diversities  and degrees  in the consti-
tutions of men.  I do believe  that medicines adapted to the 
40
cure of all diseases  grow spontaneously upon our soil, but
that the discoveries of men have not yet found them out.  I
think men possess natural gifts to examine the things of na-
ture; that is, that a man possesses a  natural talent  for some
particular business—some, for instance, having a partiahty for
mechanical pursuits:  others, for other kinds of business, this
I call strength of mind, and this I call natural  gifts.  I  be-
lieve  all constitutions are dependent upon heat  and blood
for life;  and that the life is the constitution of man, healthy
action and  diseased  action forming the two constitutions.—
I believe that  all diseases of  the human  family, are caused
by the morbid circulation of the blood.   To  ascertain  this,
some judgment is required; and  this we ascertain by  the
pulse.   Twelve  months is  generally necessary to acquire a
knowledge  of  the pulse.   Some men can obtain  this know-
ledge sooner than others;  some in  three months,  some in
twelve months.  Students of  medicine  ordinarily,, in about
six months. I believe that nature never furnishes more blood
than is necessary, and required for health.   I frequently have
used  the steam bath.   I have  carried persons  through a
course of Thomson's system;  generally, we keep them un-
der the  effects of the steam for ten  minutes.   I  have been
myself under the effects of steam for thirty minutes.   It was
when I  had the  bilious fever.  I took the  lobelia and appli-
ed steam, with bricks and water poured over them while they
were hot, and  immediately  had blankets wrapped round me.
I am sure it cured  me without having recourse to any other
remedy—and  I am also satisfied that I had the bilious fever.
I have  frequently  used  blisters, but I now think  they  are
much oftener used than is necessary, and that  it is a torture
which ought not to be so generally adopted.   I think fevers
all have one common  cause, that  they arise from a mucus
lining the stomach, which cuts off and stops the supply which
feeds the blood.   The effect of this mucus is, to stop  this
supply.   Blood, I consider, is  life, and heat is life.   I have
never studied anatomy except slightly, and I have never had
the advantage  of attending any dissection.
   The court adjourned till 10 o'clock to-morrow
   EPHRAIM  LARRABEE deposed  as follows :
   I never  was acquainted  with Mr. Hazelip.   I  never saw
him that I recollect of before the morning of his death, when he
called at my store to purchase medicines.   This  was about
9 o'clock.  He came in,  and walked up and complained to
me of great pain and pressure in the stomach.  This was on 
41
   the morning of the day on  which he died.  He expressed a
   great deal of fear that he was going to have the cholera, and
   that he was then taking the  disease, and said his bowels had
i   been and were then much out of order. I confess I was greatly
   surprised at  his manner, and that he should have addressed
   himself to me, but could only account for it from his mis-
   taking me for Mr. Sears.   I certainly thought he was not
   right from his manner, or that he had been upon a spree.   I
   wanted to get rid of hirn, judging from his appearance that
   he was an intemperate man.  I was, as I said, very much sur-
   prised that he should  address  himself to  me.   At this time
   Mr. Sears came in, and I gave him up to Mr. Sears, whom he
   then  appeared  to recognize.   He told Mr. Sears  he wanted
   him to take  hirn through a  course of medicine, and said  he
;   thought he  was  getting  the cholera.  Mr.  Sears declined
   doing so,  and told him he  did not practice the system, but
   recommended him to go to Mr. Burke.  He went away, and a
   few hours after I heard that he was undergoing a steaming.  I
   understood they had sent for several physicians.  It was about 9
   o'clock when he came to my  store. If I were to give an opinion
   of Hazelip when at my house, I should say he was either a very
   sick man, or  that he was labouring under great apprehension
   of having the cholera.  His whole appearance was that of a
   man under great  excitement.   He complained of his bowels
   being out of order for some time.   1  expressed my surprise
   that he  should have come up to  me in the manner  he
   did.  Some one said he had been on a frolic, and his appear-
   ance justified such a belief; he was also certainly very much
   excited and alarmed. Mr. Sears had great difficulty in getting
   rid of him.  Hazelip wanted me before Mr. Sears came in, to
   give him medicine, but I refused.  I saw Mr. Sears go to the
   scales, and weigh out the medicines  for him.   At this time
   the cholera was raging, and  nearly at its height, in Baltimore.
   This  was, 1  believe, the  17th of September.   I  have known
   Burke for some time, and  consider him very  skilful  in  his
   practice;  so  much so, that I  would trust  myself into  his
   charge in preference to any other physician.   I knew of a
   case which  was  called  cholera in French alley, a woman
   named Caroline Ruark.   She was very ill, 1 should judge,
   from what Dr. Cole told me, and he said he had seen her. I re-
   collect it very well. It was before the case of Hazelip. One
   of the first cases which occurred in French alley.  The Board
   of Health were there at the time this case occurred.   There
   was another case in the same place, a Mr.  Nash, who is now
              4* 
42
 in  the penitentiary.   These occurred on Sunday morning.
 Burke attended these  cases,  and was  assisted by several
 others.   I was laboring under a severe diarrhoea, and  being
 much debilitated, could  not go into the house to assist  them,
 thinking it imprudent to expose myself in the condition I then
 was.  On Sunday morning, I recollect the circumstances very
 well, I was sitting at my door at the corner of Cheapside and
 Water streets, when Dr. Cole came by, and in a familiar way,
 as we had frequently spoken together of  the cases in French
 alley, asked me how Caroline  Ruark's case came  on, with
 the expression, "I mean is she alive?"   I told him she was
 not only  alive, but that  there were great hopes of her.   He
 replied, "You cannot save her; the diarrhoea has progressed
 so far that you cannot check it, and without that you cannot
 save her; she must die." I went back and got some powder,
 and Mr. Burke  will recollect my taking it to  him.  Burke
 administered in this case; he was the one that had charge of
 it.  I did not see her;  as I said before, I  was very much
 debilitated, too much  so to go in.   I went to the house, but
 did not see the patient.  I know the woman  is now  alive,
 although Dr. Cole then told me she could not be saved.   He
 also stated to  me  that Michl. Jenkins, who was  then  sick,
 would get well.   Michl. Jenkins  died, and this woman did
 get well.   I went to  get the powder, and recommended it,
 because Dr. Cole had  stated to  me that  the diarrhoea could
 not be checked. I went to see Mr. Burke, and gave it to him,
 and recommended it.   The Board of Health were all there,
 with the exception of  professor Jameson.  I frequently have
 recommended hemlock powder.  I never saw the woman I
 have  been speaking  of until she  was  pronounced out of
 danger.   I knew she was alive after this, in consequence of a
 man named Jenkins having orders to take up all such persons
 in that place, and his having seen  her there.   Dr.  Swartze
 was also there, I believe, at the time  this woman  had the
 cholera.
  FRANCIS BURKE, Junr,
  Mr. Hazelip on the morning of the day on which he died
 called three or four times between half past 9 and 10  o'clock'
 and solicited father to  administer to him his own medicines!
 He had been there before I saw him, and I understood had
 said that Mr. Bell had  offered his cot for him to.go through a
steaming.  He said he  had  his own medicines which he had
purchased himself, and  was very  anxious  to  have them
 administered.   The second time I  saw him call, father was 
43
up stairs,  and he dropped what he had and went with him.
The first time Hazelip called was before I had got up.
  HENRY SUMWALT:
  I saw Hazelip at the time he was going through the steam-
ing.   On Monday,  which was the day  of his death,  I was
passing by Bell's house, and saw a crowd, and understood a
patient was there under treatment for the cholera.   I went in,
and found him in a profuse  perspiration.   Bell  and Burke
were  both there, and the patient was on the steam cot.   I
asked Bell what had caused  the  cry  I  had heard of.   Bell
answered and told me that Hazelip had very violent spasms.
I asked Hazelip how he then was; he  replied that he was
then  very  much relieved.  He  was yet somewhat restless.
There was some other conversation passed, which I do not
recollect.  I soon after went away.  Burke and Bell seemed
while I was there,  both of them,  to be very attentive to  the
patient, who said he was somewhat easier.  My enquiries of
Bell relative to the cry I had heard of, and the occasion of it,
were made in the hearing of Hazelip  and  within a few feet
of the steam cot.
   Cross Examination___I  was  in the room about fifteen
minutes, I  should  judge, and it was about 10 or 11 o'clock.
I cannot be positive  as to the exact time.  They gave him
nothing while I was there;  they  applied  some salts  to  his
nostrils. I presume they had given him a clyster, but do not
know  positively.   I did  not see them give it, but I should
judge they did from seeing the apparatus,  which was lying
on the floor, near the fire place.  I think  Bell told  me that
they had given  him an injection, but am sure he did not tell
me of what it  was composed.   I did not hear the cries
myself, but there  was a crowd  collected round the house,
and it was from them that I had heard of the cries.
   MR.  SAGE:
   I saw Mr. Hazelip on Monday, which was the day that he
died.  I saw him about as near as I can recollect half past 11
o'clock.  I went there with  Mr.  Sumwalt, staid there with
him, and we came away together.   All the  time I staid there,
Mr. Burke and Mr. Bell appeared very affectionate,  attentive
and kind to their patient.   I belive he was asked how he
felt, and replied thathefelt much easier. Complained,however,
of spasms in his legs; this was when the steam was off; when
the  steam was  on, and he was under the effects of it, he
said  he was easier.  I remained there from a half to  one
hour. 
44
   Cross  Examination.—There was  nothing  given  him
while I was there that I saw, except a little water gruel.  He
did not vomit, nor had he any passages while I staid.  It was
about half past  10 o'clock.  I do not know that they gave
him  an injection, as  I did not see it  while I was there.   I
went  in  with Mr. Sumwalt and  came  away with him.   1
should think we were there near half an hour.   When we
first went from the store into the house there was nobody in
the room  but Mr. Burke  and xMr. Bell.   Sometime after,
two or three individuals came in.  I do not know who they
were.  Mr. Sumwalt spoke several times to Mr. Hazelip, and
I also spoke to  him.   I do  not know who was  there.   He
complained a good deal of spasms in the legs.   He was
covered with blankets, laid over, I believe, as commonly, and
not wrapped round him.  When he complained of the steam
it was immediately stopped off by a stop-cock,  which was
attached to the pipe for that purpose, and which checked the
progress of the  steam.  It was.regulated several times, and
was stopped at one time eight or ten minutes.  It was fre-
quently  checked  while  we were there ;  and whenever he
complained of the steam being  too severe, it was stopped by
the cock.   When  it  was stopped off, and the  patient got
colder, the spasms came  on,  and the steam was then let on,
as he said he felt easier.   The size of the cot  was about
eight feet in length and  three  in  breadth, and  set  on the
floor.   On the top was a sacking-bottom.   I did  not see any
plank on the sacking-bottom.   He was covered entirely with
blankets.   While I was there, for the greater  part of the
lime, Messrs. Sumwalt, Bell and Burke,  were all that were
present.  The steam-pipe was  entered under the box, and
within about one foot of the end.  It was  a small  tin pipe,
perhaps two inches in  circumference.   I  did not see any
force used to continue him on the steam-cot, nor do I believe
there  was any used while I was  there.   He was persuaded as
any other physician would.   He was not confined upon the
cot,  but seemed at liberty to go whenever he pleased, no
force being used  to compel him  to stay on it.  He did not
desire, while I was there, to be let off.  I did not hear to
the best of my recollection, any one ask to send for a physi-
cian.  The steam was  always reduced  when he complained
of its being too hot.   They  did tell him,  that if he could
stand  it he would be better; if not, they  would  let off the
steam; but no force was used.  Burke observed while I was 
45
there, that  it was  childish to complain of the oppression
of the steam, for  if it  was let off he would immediately
have spasms.
  ABNER POPE  deposed as follows
  I was present  at  the  house of Bell.  I was coming up
Second  street, and when nearly  opposite to Bell's house,
I heard a  distressing groan.   I remarked to Major Stans-
bury, who was with me, that that was  a  cholera groan, and
told  him  that as  the  cry  seemed to proceed from Bell's
house, the patient was over there.   We finding no obstruc-
tion immediately went up stairs, and as soon as  I got into
the room, I remarked that there  was  a Thomsonian there.
I saw a gentleman on the steam-cot.  He  complained of
violent cramps in  the arms and legs.   I gave him a roll of
brimstone to clench in his  hand, as I had heard that it had
proved of service in cases of cramps, and I mostly carried a
piece with  me for that purpose; but I do not know whether
it was  any virtue in the brimstone itself,  or whether  it  is
merely the act of grasping something in the hand, that proves
of service, but I know it has proved serviceable  in cramps.
He asked for another piece;  but as I had but one,  I sent out
for another.  He wanted it to clench  in the other  hand   It
was  soon procured and given to him, and he soon said he
was better,  and  that they, or something else, relieved him
very much.  There was given him some composition tea, and
he was hugged up in blankets, which produced a pretty good
action of perspiration.   We were  then about going, and he
said, "Pray,  gentlemen, don't leave me."   I remained, and
told him I  thought he  was in a very good  way,  and that he
was  in good hands.  I heard the  groans in the street from
the third story of the house, and  immediately said, '-There
is a  cholera groan."  A cholera groan is one of great distress,
a piercing cry, the groan of one in great pain.  I  have seen
many afflicted with cholera,  or  what was  called cholera,
previous to this case.  The symptoms were  similar in this
as in other cases of cholera.  I had  but one piece of brim-
stone,  and carried  it with me to try  its efficacy in cases  of
cramps,  but for no  other purpose.   I sent  out  to get  the
other piece so that  he might clench one piece in each  hand.
I recommended  him to clench it,  as I had often  heard that
brimstone used in that way would remove  cramps.  He was
exceedingly alarmed, and to rny mind, frightened, and said,
" Pray,  gentlemen,  don't leave  me."  The brimstone was 
46
simply held in the hand;  a roll of it about four inches long-
I had heard from those to whom  I  had recommended it to
be tried in this way, that it had proved serviceable.  I never
tried any thing in this way except  brimstone, in order to
prove whether any other hard substance clenched in the hand
would  remove cramps, and do not know whether it would
or not.  My impression was, and always has been, that it is
the brimstone which has this effect.  I gave it to him in one
hand, and sent and got the other,  which was also given  to
him.  After this, he  covered himself up in blankets, and no
person took it from him  that I  saw.   I examined the man
while he was on  the steam-cot.   He then complained  of
cramps; his face was  a little flushed.  1 did not remark  his
eyes.   The flushed face is not always an accompaniment of
the cholera until  after steaming.   He  said that he  had
cramps.  I do not know it, except from his assertion, that he
had  violent  cramps,  and  I  should judge that they  were
violent from  hearing  the cry in  the  street.   I do not posi-
tively know that the cry proceeded from Hazelip, but believe
it did, as  I  knew it  was some one who had  the cholera.
There were spasms.  He shook; whether from fright, cholera
or spasms.    I  do  know he was much alarmed.   When
I went into the room,  his arms were not covered;  they were
placing blankets around him, and gave him a little composi-
tion.  There  was no  discharge from the  bowels while  I
remained.  I  cannot explain exactly how I can  distinguish a
cholera groan.  It is a groan of great distress, and I was sure
the groan I heard proceeded from some one laboring under the
cholera.  I am no professor, only in my own family, where
I make use of Thomson's medicine entirely,  and  no consi-
deration should deprive me of it.   It  has always answered
the purpose I  intended it  should.   I did not feel  Hazelip's
pulse while I was there.   I took hold of his arms.   I use the
Thomsonian medicines myself.  I took a little nerve powder
this morning, expecting a  keel hauling  from what I had seen
Dr. Cole undergo when he was called up.   1  own  a right,
and am a member of the Friendly Botanical Society.   One
of the  provisions  of  becoming a member,  is, that we  are
bound  to  give  all important  information  to  others who
may purchase the rights,  and may become  members  of  the
society.   There  is  some other  information  more  that  is
obtained from Thomson's book,  which we are  bound  to
communicate  to each other, but which I do not feel at liberty
to tell here. 
47
  The  Attorney  General  here  insisted that the  witness
should be directed to declare what this information of im-
portance which the members profess to communicate to each
other was.   He stated   that the publication  of Thomson
shows upon its face, that there is other important information
connected with the  practice of  this system; and to obtain
which, he refers those who purchase the book to  some other
source.   Now it is necessary to a correct understanding  of
this question, that the court and jury should understand the na-
ture of  the information,  and the object in referring to another
source to obtain it,  instead of the  book itself.   That this
was important to be known  in this case, to decide how far
these men  are practising  a system  which  the  knowledge
they have of it proves to them is pernicious  in its effects, and
that this information should be communicated to us to enable
us  to understand the tendency of the administration of the
system  of practice which we are now investigating.
   The  Court stated that it was anxious that the case now
before  them should  be  understood  as not an investigation
of any system of medicine.  Some latitude  had been allowed
in  the  investigation, but it was  only by consent  of the par-
ties; but when an objection was raised  to the question, the
court was bound to say  it did not consider the  question as
relevant to the case.   If the investigation was to be allowed
to proceed, and the discussion of the different systems of prac-
tice pursued, were permitted, there is no knowing where the
case would stop ;  it  would  never be terminated.   The court
had seen that different professors  and different schools of
medicine differ upon questions of practice in this room, and
who should decide between them ?   We are not competent
to say whether Thomson's system is better than the old, or
whether the  old is better than Thomson's.   This is a matter
which  the court cannot decide, and  we  are sure the jury
cannot.   And  we would ask,  what  is quackery ?   We  are
sure  that  we  are unable  to decide what it is.  Altogether,
the question must come to the  language of the indictment,
which is specific, and to these specific  charges the investiga-
tion must be limited.  The testimony, therefore, proposed to
be produced, is not relevant to the case.
   MR.  POPE continued :
   There are privileges  attached  to  the  membership  of  the
Friendly Botanic Society, which I do not  feel at  liberty to
State.   I have understood that Burke holds one of these
rights.   It bears date, I  think, the 17th of April, 1837.   I 
48
 have gone through a course of medicine myself on the Thom-
 sonian system.  First I took composition ; then I took com-
 position again.  The  third remedy is sometimes an injection.
 Lobelia  comes next,  cayenne pepper comes next;  next in
 order we throw  it up.  Sometimes we take a good  drink of
 anti-canker  tea,  next about  half  a  pint of good porridge.
 The porridge won't come  up.  The nwe  take  a little more
 composition, number 6, or  cayenne, at discretion.  Then take
 a  little  more porridge.  I  make mine of corn gruel,  and  use
 with it a little molasses.   Then we throw up  again, but  the
 porridge won't come  up.   But we must go back ;   I forgot
 the steam.   We take  the steam before the emetic.   This is
 my experience and practice, and generally after the injection.
 Injections always operate.  We  always steam before  the
 emetic.   We apply the steam before we empty  the stomach.
 We take the emetic to cleanse the stomach.   What we call
 canker is a mucus substance, which comes from the stomach.
 We apply the steam from five to twenty-five minutes.  I have
 applied  it that long  on  myself,  but never have  taken it
 longer.   I have taken  it when I was slightly unwell.  I have
 gone through a regular course when I have  been slightly
 unwell.   I have never had a very severe attack  since I have
 been in possession of a right.  The certificate is dated 27th
 March, 1830, and  I have never had any severe sickness since
 I have taken these medicines.   The first time 1 was  very ill
 was in  1819.  I  had  the  yellow fever.  The  next severe
attack I had  was in going  to the western  country.   I think
in  the year 1825.   I have never been  very  sick since.   I
have been very well since 1830. I have had no serious spell
since, but have been frequently slightly sick, and have made
use of these medicines. Whenever I have felt unwell, I have
taken Thomson's  medicines, and they have proved  always
beneficial. I have had  better health since than I ever had be-
fore. I had for several years what they call the consumption,
and it is to Thomson's medicines I attribute mv present hpalth
  ELIJAH  STANSBURY, Jr.
  I was with Mr. Pope on his visit to Bell's; we went there
together.  Mr. Pope called at my house, and we  came up;
and in going up Second street,  heard some moaninw.   Pope
remarked it must be a  cholera patient. I do not know which
proposed to go in.  Pope appeared to be acquainted with the
cholera groans.  We walked up stairs, and found a man on
the steam-cot, undergoing  the Thomsonian treatment  He
complained very much  of spasms and cramps in his arms and 
49
  legs.  Bell only was  present when we first went in.  Burke
  was not present.   Bell was rubbing his arms with number 6,
.  tor  the purpose of allaying the spasms.   I  expressed  my
;  opinion that the current of air in  the  room would  do more
1  harm than the rubbing would do good.  His arms were ex-
|  posed as far as his elbows.   The steam  was introduced at
  his feet.  Mr. Pope pulled out of his pocket a roll of brim-
*  stone, and put it into  Hazelip's hand ;  he seemed too warm.
  I  examined  his feet, and thought it  was warmer than was
  necessary.  I advised Bell to reduce the steam, and he  did
i  so by  turning it off.  We remained about tfifteen  minutes.
  He  complained of pains in his  arms and  legs for five or
:  six  minutes, and  then  seemed relieved,  and ceased com-
  plaining.   After this  Burke  came in, and said he had been
  after medicine.  He then gave a dose  of composition, and in
  a few minutes he  was considerably easier,  and  not in so
  much pain.   I  have  seen cases of cholera  during the  epi-
  demic in this city.  I was called  to, I think, eight cases.  I
  thought them cases of cholera.   Other persons thought so,
  and  expressed their opinion that they  were cases  of cholera.
  I was unwilling to  risk my own judgment.  I called on Mr.
  Myers and Mr.  Williams, whom I had known frequently to
  have practiced in cases of cholera, and  with jreat success.  I
  would say unhesitatingly, that the exhibition and symptoms
  of the case of Hazelip, and  those I have attended, had a
  striking similarity ; they had  all cramps, and were measurably
  the  same.   I generally took such persons as I undertook,
  through a whole course, but not all.   I never applied steam
  to the system generally, except by means of the application
  of hot bricks to the body  and  feet.  I never had an opportu-
  nity  of using the  steam-bath.  When I  have applied  the
  steam, I have continued it until the spasms were removed.  I
  have sometimes been obliged to continue it for four  hours at
  a time.  I give the composition first.  I  have had a right about
 three months; not before the epidemic.   I commenced in
 consequence  of  the illness  of my wife.  Myself and  Mr.
 Williams attended her.   Cramps  and  spasms were  what I
 judged the cholera by. 1 have found  the tongue ven cold.
 Hazelip's pulse was  fuller  and  quicker  than I generally
 found it.
   ROGER BROOKE.  1 have used no other medicines in
 my family for two years than the Thomsonian medicines,
 and  have  also given  them to some of rny  neighbors and
 friends who have urged  me  to do so.  The  plant  lobelia,
            5 
50
which has  been so often spoken of, I have known  from my
boyhood under the name  of eyebright, a name given to it
for its great virtues in curing inflammation ot the  eyes.   Jt
has proved very effectual in curing diseases of the eye, and 1
have known it to be applied after all the remedies recommend-
ed by the regular physicians have failed, and to succeed.  I
have  known one application of the green  plant to  prove ef-
fectual in cases of the most violent inflammation of the eyes.
I have reason to believe that our standard writers who have
treated of  lobelia, have labored under a great mistake.  Dr.
Waterbouse and others who have treated of it seem to have
confounded it  with  another plant.   The lobelia  inflata is
not poisonous,  as many have described it.   Cattle will eat it
at all times; but  the lobelia cardinalis spoken of by Dr.
Bigelow, I have never known cattle to browse upon.  These
two they have  confounded together; when they are very dif-
ferent plants, and their effects are entirely different.  I have
never known a plant  of the lobelia cardinalis to be browsed
upon—this is the plant which Dr. Bigelow  has described.—
   I have taken lobelia myself several times, and 1 have fre-
quently administered  it with success to others.  In  a case of
hemorrhage of  the lungs of one  of my neighbors  who had
been  under a course  for years of the  usual remedies, and at
last determined not again to apply for medical aid.  1 was
solicited  to administer, and I felt the responsibility  of the
case.  Having read  Dr. Waterhouse and the defence of Thom-
son, and having confidence in him, I was induced to  try them.
and checked it  in less than three hours.  The patient got  up,
eat hartier than I did, and  used  active exercise, and  is now
in good health.   He was as  white as the wall.  He stated that
he discharged  more the last time than at any previous time.
I thought that  if I could  equalize the  circulation, I might
succeed.   Some medical gentleman said it would stop itself.
They then tried to pursuade  him, there  was in a large one.
less danger than in a small  one.  I did not use lobelia in this
case—I used cayenne, No.  6, composition powder, ginger tea
and steam. This stopped the hemorrhage.  My object was to
get the circulation equalized.  It was about 9 o'clock that 1
was  sent  for—the blood  continued to  discharge for seme
time—It was checked before 12 o'clock.  It returned, how-
ever,  and continued to discharge, and  appeared as if he was
puking it up.    It was  blood from the lungs,  I have no  doubt.
The blood was  florid,  or light colored.
   I have  never had reason to suppose  any injury to result
from the use of lobelia.  I have  taken antimonial wine, tar- 
51
tar emetic and ipecacuanha as an emetic, but I consider that
lobelia is  much the easiest medicine to effect that object.  It
relieves the stomach without any of the nauseating feeling
which the others produce.   The doses of lobelia  are gene-
rally a tea spoon full at a dose of the powder, and to be re-
peated in 10 or 15 minutes. I have taken myself three doses;
and repeated  them  in that time sometimes as high  as  7
tea spoons full.   It  sometimes  operates on  me  the  first or
second tea spoon full.  I believe it is of importance  to have
it fresh.   I have used cayenne  pepper  in my own  case, and
ilways carry a bottle of it with me.  I am subject to  depres-
sion of spirits, and find it necessary to have it with me—if
I take a little of it in the morning, it causes a glow over the
whole system, I feel  exhilerated and enlivened for the whole
day.   I have a cold  and dyspeptic stomach, and find it ser-
viceable to take a little cayenne.  In case of violent pains,
a half a tea spoon full will afford relief.  One of my neigh-
bors was  taken violently with  spasmodic cholera,  and sent
for me to administer relief.  I  sent my son with directions
to give half a tea spoon full, to  observe its effects, and if it
was borne well, to repeat it.  The person was in violent pain;
the husband was  so  frightened that he could render no as-
sistance, and-the full tea spoon  full was given in mistake.—
The consequence was, she was  relieved,  and  soon  well.
1 have found cayenne pepper the most permanent, powerful
and purest stimulant known.   Other stimulants shatter the
nerves.   When  I had typhus  fever,  my physicians gave me
brandy.   Brandy is  not so good as cayenne in  such cases.
This I have learned, as well from my own experience  as from
the medical authorities.—I  have studied the nature, and con-
sulted authors on the subject of  cayenne.  Rees' Cyclopedia
has an  article on it.  A gentleman  lately  read authorities
to guard  me  against using it, and attempted to satisfy me
that it had  injurious effects.   Dr. Wright also represents
it as being very effective in some fevers which prevail when
no  other  medicines  can  have the same effect.   A work by
Dr. Wright, of Barbadoes, treats of the good effects  of cay-
enne in some  particular diseases.  I never had  the smallest
reason to  suppose it  has done any injury.
  More than twenty persons  have reported  to me  the  good
effects they have  experienced from the use of cayenne pep-
per, and  many of them have declared that  they would not
use any other  medicines except in extreme cases.   I drop a
little cayenne  in a glass of water, and take it in that  way for
the dyspepsia, and think it very valuable for thst, as well as. 
52
 other diseases. Dr. Bigelow has described lobelia cardinalii
 as with a bright red blossom, and growing along the margins
 of streams of water.
   Hemlock is not poisonous.  It is a tree nearly resembling
 pine or spruce with leaves like the spruce, but it certainly is
 not  poisonous as my own experience has fully proved, as well
 as others whom I have known to have used it  without any
 fear of its effects.  I freely use it, and my family also use it.
   Nerve powder has been recommended by several eminent
 persons, as valuable in  some  diseases, and  it is freduently
 used by persons who have habituated  themselves to the use
 of opium and laudanum.  To some that I have recommend-
 ed it, they have said they were much obliged to me for sug-
 gesting it, as it had the  effect to quiet their nerves without
 having the same stupifying effect that  opium has.   This I
 have found from  what I have tried myself.
   Composition powder I also  use freely, without  any appre-
 hension of its consequences, and with the same good effect.
 I took some of it this morning.   It  has also an enlivening
 effect, and tends to warm the stomach, to use the expression
 which has been so often  hinted at here, it keeps the internal
 above the external heat.
   Canker I understand lobe synonymous with„and the same
 as what is called acrid  humor, or in other words  the princi-
 ple which produces the  decay and decomposition of plants.
 Dr. Mitchell terms it the principle of decay.   Children  have
 often what is termed the canker rash which relieves them by
 its eruption.   I  have never known the medicines  which I
 have mentioned  to prove injurious, but invariably the  con-
 trary.  I have applied them in the greatest variety of diseases,
 such as violent cases of dysentery accompanied with violent
 pains, so much so as to render the patient  refractory.  I have
 also  used  them with  advantage in cases of  bloody flux.  I
have had a patient that had  been under treatment" for more
 than a week, by two physicians who were  near me.   I gave
him  some of the composition and some  no 3;  and, lastly,
some of the lobelia.  He had the scarlet fever, accompanied
with an inflammation of the  breast.  By the use of these
remedies he was relieved in an hour.  I never administered
the vapor  bath without the patient  expressing the greatest
satisfaction.  Although the patient, when about to commence
the steam  application, was suffering violent pain—they have
always stated that while under its effects, they were enti-ely
free from pain.   In the first stage of a cold, a little  stimu- 
                           53

lating medicine and the application of the vapor bath prove
of great use—the only danger is in coming out of the bath,
which requires great care.  I am  generally governed by the
feelings of the patient, as to the length of time I continue
the application of steam—as  soon as complaint is made of
its being oppressive, I would desist.  While the operation of
the s-team is  going  on, I always have  prepared  some warm
stimulating  medicines to be administered at the same time,
and I have always heard  the  patients express themselves as
being entirely clear of pain while  in the bath.   I also con-
sider the vapor bath as beneficial in cases of chronic  pains,
and have seen the good  effects of it.  I produce the vapor
which I  use for this purpose, by putting hot stones in water,
which is the same in principle as the steam bath.  I have not
the same conveniences for a steam bath as some others, and
make use of this simple plan as a substitute, and find it an-
swers the same good  purpose.  I always regulate the  steam
by the feelings of the patient.   Some years ago I had an op-
portunity of seeing Dr. Jennings' vapor bath; but I consider
its application as entirely different from Thomson's bath.  It
produces very much the same  feelings as going into a stove
room.   It wants  moisture, and without this I consider much
of its good effect is lost.  I never had one patient who un-
derwent  the operation of the vapor bath, but what expressed
pleasure  in it.  At first, the  patient is a little uncomfortable,
not being able to breathe freely, but after continuing e few mo-
ments, it produces a very pleasant,  soothing  sensation.   I
took Thomson's directions, and continued the steam generally
15 or 20 minutes, but always had  reference to the  feelings
of the patients—sometimes  they wished  it to be continued
longer, and I have done so without experiencing any injuri-
ous effects.   1 used the vapor bath and the medicines at the
same time.   In burns, frost-bites and chilblains,  I have used
them with much  satisfaction.  I have  used  the vapor with
bricks, to patients who have been so ill as not to be able to
set  up, by heating them  and pouring water over them, and
then wrapping them up in blankets;  and  I have sometimes
kept them under  the influence of this steam all night, for the
purpose of  keeping up the perspiration, or to  use  one of
Thomson's homely  phrases, until we obtain a heat that will
hold.   Sometimes I have seen patients so low as not to be
able to speak, come out relieved.   I consider the system of
Thomson as very much adapted to the cure of all forms of dis-
eases. I have had a great deal of ill health, and have had the 
54
 practice of 10 or 12 physicians, and have often been bled with-
 out relief;  and as far as I have tried it, consider it injurious.
    I have actually tried these  medicines in a variety of dis-
 eases, some of them contradictory in their nature, some in-
 flammatory, some the reverse, and I have  relieved them  in
 the course of a few hours, and have always found these me-
 dicines to have their desired effects.  I consider them as in-
 nocent, warm and comforting  to the stomach.   According to
 my simple opinion, the stomach is invigorated  by the appli-
 cation of Thomson's medicines.   I consider  the derange-
 ment of the stomach as the cause nearly of all disease. I con-
 sider that when you have applied warmth and energy tothe sto-
 mach, the functions are more likely to be performed.   I have
 found warm liquids always pernicious to weak stomachs, but
 the application of cayenne affords energy to the stomach,
 and thereby imparts energy and warmth  to the whole system.
 I  endeavor  to apply Thomson's principles  as far as I under-
 stand them, the object of which  is to get up the vital heat of
 the system.   And to give the bath  before the emetic, as you
 by that means prepare the emetic to operate with  more ease.
 I  believe in the  inward and outward  heat spoken of by
 Thomson, and that if you deprive the stomach of  its warmth
 you deprive it of so much of its power of action, and dis-
 turb the whole system.  The outward heat is that which ap-
 pears on  the surface  of the body; the inward heat is that
 which  is  contained  in  the stomach.   So that we have two
 heats,  inward and outward.  The  principle upon which
 Thomson  acts, and which I believe to be a reasonable doc-
 trine, and  seems to agree with  common sense, is to keep the
 internal above the external heat, that is above the heat of the
 atmosphere; to keep the fountain  above the stream.   I did
 not adopt the system  of Thomson  without  reflection and
 examination, and  the more I have reflected upon and  ex-
 amined it, the better  I am satisfied with it.   I have learned
in  a very severe school.  I have gained much of my infor-
mation upon these subjects from my own  experience.  I am
now 58 years old, and have had much sickness, and  some
very violent  attacks.  So that it was not merely from reading
that I have adopted it, but also from the actual experiment of
 their beneficial effects.   Rees in his  Cyclopedia, which  I
consider good authority upon most subjects, gives the opinion
of some celebrated medical writers, which serves to support
and corroborate this system,  I have read Dr. Waterhouse.
He did not consider Thomson so. illiterate that he could not pro - 
55
perly explain his views, and illustrate so as to render them intel-
ligible.  The principles  of  Thomson's system is, that heat is
life, and that cold is death.   That there is a constant warfare
kept up in the system between  these two  principles of heat
and death.   And that in all cases of death,  it is  because
cold  has prevailed.   This  is the principle of this system,
and going upon  this impression, it is, that  the medicines are
applied.
   I have suffered very much from rheumatism, and have tried
many remedies;—have  used mustard seed, and almost every
thing that has ever been used for the rheumatism, until I bar
came so bad that I could not ride on horseback  at all.  When
I became acquainted with Thomson's medicines, I used them
and always found relief in  a few hours.  The  difference be-
tween mustard seed and cayenne pepper is this, that the mustard
seed  are volatile, and that  the cayenne pepper is permanent.
All volatile remedies are injurious;  they have a tendency to
derange the nervous system.  Cayenne instead  of deranging
it, strengthens  and supports it.  Brandy  is  volatile in  ifes
effects, but after the  excitement which has been but tempo-
rary,  has passed  off, it leaves the subject more depressed than
before.  1 have  used  brandy in disease, and  it has injured
me.   If I lake  a dose  of cayenne in the  morning it  is per-
manent—it lasts all day.  It produces a liveliness of spirits,
a warmth  and glow over the whole system which continues
through the day.  I frequently take it in the morning to pro-
 duce this effect, knowing that it is harmless in Us nature.
   The first time I took  lobelia it was  fifteen minutes before
it acted.  Physicians in my neighborhood think it too inert;
my own experience, as well as all the information I have been
 able  to collect relative to it, proves it to be the contrary.
   Lobelia Lnever used to act as a cathartic.  Thomson says
 that  in a  practice of thirty years, he never knew it to act in
 that  manner,  and this  agrees  with my own experience.  I
 never knew, much as I  have used  it, that  when it was taken
 into  the  stomach that it has produced that effect.    I never
 gave an injection of it, nor have \ ever given  an injection of
 cayenne.  That is an operation I  have never performed my-
 self.   I have given  directions upon the subject, and referred
 the   nurse to Thomson's book  for  further advice, and have
 known it to have been  done, but never performed it myself.
 Cayenne pepper I consider one of  the most permanent stim-
 ulants  that can  be had.  The steam bath will afford warmth
 to the system, when on the point of an ague, and has a ten-
 dency to restore the warmth to. the surface—but I doubt very 
56
much  its being highly stimulant.  1 look  upon it  as acting
pirectly  contrary, producing  perspiration  which causes foi
the time a debility and relaxation of the system, consequent-
ly it cannot be  said  to  possess the stimulating  properties
which the cayenne possesses.   The  internal vigor of the
system sends the blood to the surface.  I  think  the vapor
bath relaxes the system.   It  causes  the volume of the pulse
to be much enlarged.  The volume  but not its quickness.—
The blood flows from the heart, but as to  explain  its opera-
tion or the general action of the human  system,  I  do  not
pretend to do  it.   My reading h;is not been very extensive,
I have tried to be a practical man, and am better able to give facts
than theories.  I have an opinion upon all subjects which come
before me, some of them  may be taken up falsely,  but I still
have an opinion of my own;  but if I were to attempt to ex-
press  that opinion, I  might  only  display  my ignorance.   1
consider that  the steam  bath removes many obstructions in
the system  by directing  the  circulation to the  surface.  1
don't think I am  able to define  all that acts upon the system
as stimulants.   I  have always found by my own experience,
and the knowledge I have found from other sources, has sus-
tained me  in  the belief  that the vapor  bath  has  a relaxing
tendency, and its effect is  to drive the blood to the surface of
the body, and that it causes an increase in the volume of the
pulse.   In the  administration of the steam bath,  I have al-
ways been governed by circumstances and feelings.   I consi-
der lobelia to be rather stimulating.  It has a tendency to
loosen the phlegm; it imparts a warmth over the whole body;
it produces nausea, and the effect of this is, that it is likely
to cause the person to break out into a perspiration.  Lobe-
lia  I have no  doubt stimulates.   And I think I may safely
say so, not  only from  my own experience  of its  effects but
from  the authority of others, who have  used it extensively
and have given this as its character.   The first case in which
1 used Thomson's medicines was a case of intermittent fever,
which  was relieved by their application.
  The second case was a swelled mouth,  occasioned from
a violent cold.  In this they had  also a happy effect.  I have
repeatedly used them  since  in  rheumatism, ■ scarlet fever,
quincy, inflammation of the breast  from  cold,  dysentery,
cholera morbus, cramp cholic, and for aught  I know, spasmo-
dic cholera  (we  used  to  call it crarnp cholic), and all the
premonitory symptoms, such as disorder of the bowels
  I would ask leave to state one matter in justice to myself
U has been stated that there was some sort of pledge of 
57
secrecy on  the part of those who practice the Thomsonian
system, or  that they  obtained  by  some means information
which was  not  to  be revealed  to  any one  but  who  also
practiced  the  system.  I wish it to be distinctly understood
that I know of no such information as has been alluded to,
and I have felt it due  to myself to make this statement,  as 1
consider it  a  sort of imputation upon  my character that I
should be connected with any secret association.   J know of
none.   I look upon the matter  alluded to by Thomson in
his book where he refers to his agents  for information, not
contained in it, merely to allude to the fact that he was so
illiterate and unacquainted with the terms used in midwifery,
that if he undertook to give  directions  upon  that subject, it
would be done in such language as would  be unfit to be
published; that  therefore he thought it  most advisable to
refer to his  agents for the information upon this subject.  I
considered that it referred to widwifery  alone.
   MRS. LYDIA PETERS :
   I think it  was  last spring three years  that Mr.  Burke
attended me.  I had been long and severely indisposed.  I
think for fifteen  months.   Dr. Thos. L. Murphy came to see
me several  times.  Dr. Murphy said he could do nothing
more than he had done.  This he also told my mother.   He
brought another doctor with him.  I do not  know what he
said to my mother, but they were discharged.  I think his
name was Smith.   I do not know  whether it was professor
Smith or not.  He was a small man; do  not  know whether
he wore spectacles.   Burke  was sent for after they  were
discharged.  I had been confined  to  my bed part of the
time, and part  I was able to be about the house; but did not
go out.   I experienced no relief from the treatment of Dr.
Murphy.  1  consider that I was entirely cured by Mr. Burke.
I experienced  great relief immediately upon the application
of his remedies.   My  father and  mother both attributed my
cure to the skill  and attention of Mr. Burke.   In  about six
or seven weeks from  the time he first came,  I was entirely
relieved, and have continued in good health ever since.  Mr.
Burke manifested during the whole time he attended me, the
greatest kindness in his treatment,  was very  attentive,  and
altogether his conduct was entirely satisfactory to myself and
all my family.
   LAMBERT  S.  BECK:
   I  was attended by  Mr. Burke about  four  years ago  last
June.   I was severely afflicted  with what I supposed was a 
58
bilious affection, and had been attended by physicians for nine
or ten days, and took some medicine which they gave me.  I
then called on Mr. Burke, who was then  in Washington.
This was on a Friday morning  about sunrise.  I was  very
sick, and had some difficulty in calling upon him.   In about
two hour3 Mr. Burke called, and gave me some medicine, and
I went through a  course, and experienced great relief, and on
Saturday I  was entirely relieved.  I, however, remained in
the house on Saturday; on Sunday I went to church, and on
Monday  morning went to my  regular  business.   I called
upon Burke at his house, and he prescribed for me.   I could
scarcely get  to his house, I was so unwell.   I was about six
hours under the  course.  Commenced on Friday about two
hours of sun.  I  had  read the book, and knowing that Burke
was practicing in that city, and having  heard  him spoken of
very highly,  I applied  to  him.   Burke had been practicing
about two years, and 1 have known of  his attending a great
many persons, but never heard of any  complaints either of
his practice  or of  his  attention  to his  patients.  I think I
administered the  medicine to my wife myself, when she was
sick, soon  after.  I  have  ever  since.   I  went through a
course of that they call the Thomsonian system.  I have the
books.  Burke assisted me, and I went through the  balance
myself as he directed me to do.  Before I went into the  bath
I was in violent pains; and from the time I  went into it, in
about fifteen minutes, I  was as much relieved as  I am at
present.  I took  medicine while I  was  in the steam-bath, in
the same manner as is usual with the Thomsonian system.  I
took first a small quantity of pot ash.   I then  used composi-
tion freely, then the  bath, and  went  through the regular
course.   I took  the  lobelia, and immediately cascaded.  I
freely threw  off bile, and at every operation felt better.  I took
medicine internally to keep the internal heat above the out-
ward heat.   The operation of the  steam was continued for
some considerable time; and after I had been I think about
six hours under the effects  of the  medicine, I was relieved.
I was worse on Friday, when I went to Mr. Burke, than I
had been before.   It was a bilious affection,  and the  fever
was  very high.   I did not  at that  time take  advice from a
regular practicing physician.  I  had read Thomson's book,
and heard that Burke was practicing, and this was the reason
I  sent  for him.  He was practicing in Washington,  and
had  been for about two years.   Burke called in about two
hours after I  called on him, and he assisted me in beginning 
59
the course, and then he left me with directions how to pro-
ceed, but  do not recollect whether he returned.   I  never
heard any complaint of Mr. Burke.  I knew he attended a
great many patients, and have heard some of them speak very
highly of his skill and attention.
   MOSES SCHUMAKER:
   I was attacked about nine weeks ago with the cholera, and
Mr. Burke attended me where I then boarded.  He gave me
a good steaming, and sweating tea to drink.   He staid with
me all the time.   I was in a much better way soon after he
commenced.  I was then in the west part of the town.  He
attended my wife next morning, and cured  her.  We both
had  the cholera.  My sister-in-law took the cholera in a few
days;  he attended, and  cured her  also.   I had very much
cramps through  my legs  and  arms, so much that I could
hardly bend them.  I had the  diarrhoea the day  before.
Much cramps in my limbs, feet cold, no perspiration on the
skin.  I  was afterwards two hours in a profuse perspiration,
produced from hot bricks.  I  was laying alongside rny wife,
and  we were treated alike.  He was so attentive that he never
left my bed  until I was safe; the same with my  wife and
sister-in-law.
   MRS.  WILLIAMS:
   Burke has not administered to me extensively himself.  I
was  laboring under a very severe chronic disease.   I had
been moving, and was much agitated by the fatigue attending
it.   I was seized with violent pains in the stomach, attended
with cramps in the stomach, which seemed to adhere to the
back.  I  immediately sent to my  husband, and  requested
that  Mr.  Burke might be sent for, always having felt a prefer-
ence for  his practice from what I had heard  of  him from
those who he had attended.   Burke mixed some medicines,
which he came up stairs and gave me, which  soon afforded
me  relief.  The dose was repeated during the night.  The
medicine I  took was  composition tea, cayenne pepper, and
nerve  powder.  He  mixed a  tea-spoon full, and  divided it
into two doses.   Applied steam to the feet, which was con-
tinued during the night, and repeated the doses of composi-
tion. The attack was very severe.  I was much prostrated, and
my breath cold.  On the next morning I was much  better, my
stomach relieved of the pain, and my breathing also  much bet-
ter.  My husband then carried me through a regular course, and
 I stood the  steam as long as  I could bear it.  My husband
gave me the emetic, generally  three  doses, sometimes not
more than ten minutes between them;  he would then give 
60
 me as much nourishment as he thought proper.  Before the
 application of the steam I have frequently taken a large tea-
 spoon full of cayenne:  and while under its effects, another
 dose.   I  have  given within fifteen minutes two tea-spoons
 full  of cayenne, and within twenty-four hours six  or  seven
 tea-spoons full.   I continue the treatment till the patient is
 entirely relieved, and I have never seen it fail.  During the
 last six months I was afflicted with a severe chronic affection.
 I  applied to  Dr. Jameson, who pronounced  it an internal
 schirrus, or cancer.   He said that perhaps the application of
 washes might prove  of service, but thought it doubtful, and
 considered it almost certain that  to effect a cure it would be
 necessary to  use the knife.  I  told  him I had some idea of
 trying Thomson's medicines, without letting him know who
 I was.  He said  he did not understand Thomson's medic nes,
 that perhaps they might sometimes prove of service in par-
 ticular diseases.  I asked him why relief was generally the
 result of applying the steam.  He said it produced relaxation,
 which was beneficial in some cases.  My husband stated that
 he did not wish to control  me in  my  choice, that he left it
 to my own judgment to decide what to do.   I concluded that
 if the application of  Thomson's medicines would not relieve
 me,  I  must  die.   I  commenced  going through the entire
 course.   1  have  gone  through  forty-six  courses  in  six
 months, have drank  composition  tea as I would tea made of
 any innocent herb.  This tea I  drink almost every night, and
 S take some nerve powder also.  During the day  I felt violent
 pains,  and sometimes burnings  for the whole day.   My hus-
 band would make a  mixture of No.  5, cayenne and  nerve
 powder, and give it to me, and I have experienced great relief
 from it.   I still continue to take  medicines,  and find  I  am
 gaining strength, although I am  not entirely relieved, but my
 life is much more comfortable to  myself.   Mr. Burke was in
 practice with my husband for several months; and although
 he attended a  great many  persons afflicted  with almost  all
 diseases, yet we heard of no complaint from any one that he
 attended.  His  natural disposition is that of being very  kind.
 My husband has possessed  a right to practice this system  for
 about six  years.  I have often  practiced it myself.  I have
 given the medicines to children  and  ladies of the most deli-
 cate  constitutions, with  perfect  safety ; and  I recollect one
 c'seunder my charge in which  1  gave seven tea-spoons full
of lobelia, and  the steam on all the time.   My own health
has been worse than  it is now, although it is not now good. 
61
1 have left my room  to come here, when 1 do not go out of
my room to my "meals.  When we first bought the book 1 had
a sciatica, or rheumatism, in  my hip, and at that time I went
through three courses  before I was  relieved; but my hip
being weak, I applied  strengthening  plasters, as I was di-
rected.  1 have gone through much suffering since that.
  I have attended a great many ladies who were affected with
the Jiver complaint, some of whom were  severe cases,  and
have  afforded them  relief.   I  consider that for  the steam
bath, the steam box is preferable to the use of hot bricks. If
the apparatus of a box cannot conveniently be had, why then
the bricks can be used; and I have often known them to be
applied with good effects.   I have attended several ladies in
one day, and take Thomson's book as my general guide and
rule, and vary it to particular cases to my own judgment.  1
have never known, nor have I seen any danger whatever, to
arise from the use of any of these medicines.   I have known
seven persons to go through a course in one day, and all to
be relieved.  I have known them  to be applied to children
from  one month old  to  ten or twelve years, likewise upon the
most delicate  ladies ; some of them have been  brought in
carriages, being too ill to walk, and after having gone through
a course, have left much stronger than when they came.   We
have relieved some of the patients in the course of one hour.
I recollect one case of  a lady who came, who stated that Dr.
Baker had told her it was the only thing could be done for
 her.  I  have frequently taken an emetic.   I have taken
 lobelia six times  a day for six  days  in  succession.   I was
 once taken ill soon after a confinement. My nervous system was
 much diseased.   My husband at this time was absent  from
 home, and I was  very ill.  I had not slept an hour in twenty-
four for a week.   My child was also sick,  and the attention
 which it was necessary I should pay it, occasioned my taking
 cold.  I asked to  be  put  into the  steam box, and taken
 through a course. I stood in it and was seated in it altogether
 near  twenty  minutes.   I afterwards  had  bricks heated red
hot, and five of them quenched, applied  all around me, and
my side rubbed  with number 6.   I  then went  through  a
steam for six days successively, and in a day or two after-
wards I was about  the house, and  able  to attend to my
business.   I continued  wrapped up in blankets all that night,
and during the  next day and until night, I  was under the
effects of a constant steam,  and they gave me nourishment,
and continued the medicines between, to keep up, as we
            6 
62
term  it,  the internal heat;  to  keep the fountain above  the
stream.   From  my own experience, 1 believe the medicines
will do no harm in any  case.  All the representations I have
heard of Mr. Burke,  go  to say that he has always been very
attentive and kind to his patients, and indeed I often think
the Thomsonians make  slaves of themselves.  They attend
at all  hours of  the night, and frequently sleep upon chairs
or lay upon the  floor, as Mr. Burke has  often done, in order
to be  near if he should  be wanted, and  the  better to wait
and attend upon  his patients.   ! do not think there are any
people as attentive to the sick as the Thorusonians.
   Mrs. FAITHFUL.  I know Mr. Burke, and have seen some
of his practice, as he attended upon my  family.   He is very
attentive to his  patients, at least  as far as I have known, and
he generally succeeds in  his cases. I have often heard in going
through town that he had been uncommonly kind.to the sick.
He has been remarkably attentive in rny family, and  I  do
think  they are more like slaves in their practice than others.
I had  a young  woman  who was taken with  the cholera  in
my house—she had  violent  spasms and cramps all night-
Mr. Burke  attended her, and was very  successful and very
attentive and kind.   I had a daughter who died, but she did
not take the medicines.  She was struck with death when
she was first taken, and   nothing could be done.  In all the
cases of Mr. Burke, as well as my own family,  he was uncom-
monly kind.
   E. LYCETT.  About the 4th or 5th of September, I was
taken with the dysentery, and was attended by a regular phy-
sician who was  thought  to  be as well skilled  as any gentle-
man in the city, practicing  medicines.  The first  thing he
did, was to occasion a  loss of blood, and I  took  about 60
grains of calomel. I was  left  so liable to take cold that I could
not go out without occasioning  a wheezing  in  my  throat.
which made it difficult for me to speak so as to be heard,  or
understood.  Soon after this, a young man who  came from
England with me, an apprentice,  was also taken.   J was ad-
vised to try to obtain  relief from a course of the Thomsonian
system.   I was  much prejudiced against it, and  refused  to
do it.    His disease was  the  dysentery or the diarrhoas, and
soon turned to the bilious, and then to the yellow  jaundice.
He was as yellow, as we call it, as a guinea; and finding be was
getting worse, I began to think of the course of treatment—
I, however, determined that my young man should go through
first, which he did; and found such great relief, that I 
63
dueed to try it myself.   I went through  a  course, and I  felt
entirely relieved, although I had not been  well for 10 or 12
days before;  and I think it entirely relieved me.   I submit-
ted to go through a regular course, and  I have been well
ever since.  He was  with me constantly  for  four hours,  and
was very attentive the whole time.   This gentleman's course
began about 4 o'clock, and continued until 10 o'clock, when
he  left me, with bricks applied to my feet.  1 went through
the course for the purpose of procuring  relief from the diffi-
culty I had of breathing, and I found it to  cure it effectually.
   ABNER POPE.   I  do know of the  practice of Francis
Burke in French ailey, during the  cholera.   There were, 1
think, eight cases of cholera in that place,  which he had charge
of,  and  1 was with  him every day during  the time. The first,
I think, was Caroline Ruark'scase—this  was in the afternoon
at 4 o'clock.   It was a  case of great violence, and admitted
to be so by every one that saw her.   She has recovered,  and
is well.  She was under Burke's system,  and 1 thought Burke
was uncommonly attentive.  He slept there on  chairs.   In
one or two  instances of the cases there, 1 carried  coffee to
them.   The others were all thought to  be cases of cholera.
1 saw all of them myself.   Burke recovered six out of eight
cases which he had.  I saw all that  he cured. Generally the
treatment was the same in  all the cases,  sometimes the quan-
tity of  medicine given, was  larger than in others.  There
was no steam applied  except  the application of hot bricks,
except the case of Nash.   He was put on  a cot.   I got an
order from the mayor's office for blankets.  I understood he
was steamed  on the cot until the next morning.
  Mr.  WILLIAMS.  I  have known Francis Burke for  20
years.   It was through me, that he  purchased a  right to use
Thomson's book and medicines.  1 had heard frequently of
his success as a practitioner.   In the spring of 1829, having
great confidence in his judgment, and my practice having in-
creased very much, I requested him  to come on from Wash-
ington and join me in  practice.  We formed a society  of 20
persons, and  wrote on  to Thomson  for  rights.  My practice
requiring  assistance,  he came, and  we  associated  logether,
and he  practiced  with  me very successfully, and with great
attention.   I  heard he  was practicing  in Washington, was
the reason for my sending on—he was successful and atten-
iive, and was  considered skilful in the use  of the medicines.
   Cross Examination.—We generally steam until  the  pa-
tients become nauseated, or until we discover from their  ex- 
64
pression, a fulness of the stomach.  We then  remove them
from  the steam, if  in  the steam box,  if they  are  lying, we
still go on with the steam.  These are the general rules, and
I should consider them as sufficient guides in all cases.  We
calculate  that the  circulation  will be  increased in  certain
cases.  In violent fever, the pulse will be softened.   I think
our heating medicines equalize the circulation throughout the
whole system.   This is a rule  in our system, and I never
knew the rule to fail.  The effect of it  is to cause the system
to expand, and to cause it to circulate the blood more freely,
We never apply steam without  the accompanying medicines.
This  is another  general rule which we  never depart from.—
W'hile the patient is under the effects of the steam,  we apply
stimulating medicines.  Lobelia is a stimulating medicine.—
Cayenne pepper also stimulates, and uniformly regulates the
circulation.
   Mrs. JAMES.   I have passed through two courses of the
Thomsonian practice, and derived a high degree of  benefit
from  their effects.   I could not attribute it to any thing else,
but believe that it was this system which was of such great
service to me.   It  was applied  under the direction  of Mr.
Williams.
   SAMUEL F. REYNOLDS.   I  am  well acquainted with
Francis Burke, and  have  some knowledge of the  skill and
capacity with which he treats his  patients.  I was with him
when  he attended  the  cases of cholera which occurred in
French alley.  I was with him there, both day and night for
some time, and  always found  him successful, very  attentive
and kind.  Burke  and myself attended 8 cases in French
alley, and cured 6  of them; some of  which were very des-
perate cases—and  the  physicians said they  could not be
cured.  I have been with him at other and  various  places,
where he was attending patients  afflicted with the cholera,
and have always seen the same attention  on  his part under
every circumstance.  He left his business and started out at
the time  the cholera appeared in this city—and when he was
much engaged in his business.   I consider  him a  discreet,
sensible man.   A  man of strong  mind and  discreet  judg-
ment—so much so,  that when I am at a loss how to treat any
patient I might have, I always apply to him for advice, what
course to pursue.  He  is thought, by  those who have used
Thomson's medicines, and are acquainted with him, to be a
skilful practitioner,  a strong minded  man of good sense.  I
judge of the quantity of steam which we apply to the patient 
65
by his symptoms while under the treatment.  When he finds
himself relieved or nauseated, it is then customary to draw
the steam  off.   I have seen no instance  where it has  not
produced nausea.  We use our judgment  to direct us how
long to  continue the steam; and, in making up this judgment,
we have reference to  the  symptoms of the patient.   I have
seen no instance where we have not given relief.  Wherever
I have seen Thomson's medicines administered, I have  always
found that they have  had the effect which was intended.—
We inquire into the general  feelings of the patient, in order
to direct tlie length of time necessary to continue the use of
the applications.
   MISS  H. Y.  WILLIAMSON.   I was indisposed in 1829,
and remained so until  1830.   I was attended  by several  re-
gular physicians in the state of Pennsylvania.   Their judg-
ments were such, that  the second time they came, they de-
clared that nothing could be done to relieve me.  My dis-
ease was an  abscess of the lungs and  an enlargement of
the heart;  and  it was  the opinion of the physicians, that I
could not possibly be cured.   In August of 183], my disease
increased very much, the consequence of which was, frequent
bleeding from the lungs and  great weakness. On the 16th of
September, I  arrived in Baltimore.   I  went to my uncle's,
who lived on the Fall's road.   1 then took  three courses of
Thomsonian medicine, which was attended to by Mrs. Coates,
and from this treatment, I experienced great relief, and found
that I was getting much better.  I then came under the care
of Mrs. Williams;  and after having been under her  charge
for some time, I found  such  health as I had not enjoyed for
four years,  and remained in pretty good health until last fall,
when 1 was again taken with the same  complaint, and was
attended by Mr. Williams, his wife, and Mr. Burke.   I was
again in pretty good health,  sufficient to attend  to my ordi-
nary business.   On the 25th  of September I was again taken
very ill with the same sort of abscess of  the lungs; and, also,
the bilious  fever.  I  was so ill, that my friends who were
around thought rne in  a dying state, and wrote a letter to my
father, informing my family of the situation in which  I was,
and their expectation of my  death in a short time.    In this
situation I sent  for Mr. Burke, he took me through a regular
course, and it had such an effect upon me as I had never be-
fore witnessed;  and I  have been recovering to  this time,  t
lay for two weeks so ill as not to be able to help myself, and
all the time I found Mr. Burke very attentive and kind.  He
           6* 
66
 came frequently, and seemed to feel great interest in my im-
 provement and encouraged me by  the assurance, that he
 thought I would yet recover.   His  attention and kindness to
 me was  such that I said I would  rather  see him  than any
 other person in the world.  I thought myself, that  I was at
 the point of death, and  had not the most remote idea of re-
 covering.  Mr. Burke's attention was  greater than I ever re-
 ceived from any physician, although I had been attended by
 several, and I got better  from the commencement of his at-
 tendance.  I know by the discharges, that I had the abscess
 and bleeding from the lungs, and this  was the opinion of my
 physicians in Pennsylvania.  I had a violent fever about five
 days before I took the medicines.   I took six tea spoons full
 of lobelia, as strong as it could be made, in the course of
 three or  four hours.   When I  came to Baltimore, I  weighed
 70 weight, and my recovery was so great, that  when  I re-
 covered, I weighed  154.   I now enjoy better health than I
 ever did  before; my physicians in Pennsylvania said  1 had an
 abscess, and that  I could  not  recover.  So great is the the
 change in me, I do not think my friends in Pennsylvania will
 know me.
  EDWARD  NEEDLES.  It has  not been long since I be-
 came acquainted  with Francis Burke—only since the  intro-
 duction of the cholera into this city.   I consider him a man
 of intelligence, a  smart man, an astute man, and a  man of
 good  judgment—my wife was  under his treatment—she was
 relieved by him in a short lime.  I consider him very skilful
 in his practice.
  EDWARD  N.  SWEENEY.  1  became acquainted  with
 Mr. Burke one day before the  announcement of the cholera
 being in  Baltimore was made in the public papers.   Since I
 became acquainted  with  him, I had  many opportunities of
 seeing hirn, and consider  him  a  man  of judgment.   I con-
 sider him decidedly  the best Thomsonian in this city of my
 acquaintance, except  Mr. John M. Williams, and suppose he
 is better, as he had more  practice.  I  do not know it.   I do
 consider him a skilful man and a man of good strong mind.
  One morning during the prevalence of the cholera, I heard
 a knocking at my door at four o'clock, and  on opening the
 window, a man asked  me if there  was  not  a doctor  lived
there.  I told him that he  was  mistaken, that there was one
 further down  the street, and inquired what was the matter.—
 I have held a right  under this system, for some time, but
 never have made a regular business of practicing it, and th«
J 
67
more I have investigated it, the better I am satisfied of the
mistaken treatment of the faculty.)  The man said his wife
and child had the cholera,  and  that they lived  in  Wa<*on
alley, and, that if I would consent to come and  see if any-
thing could be done, he would give any thing he was  able.
I told him I did not practice for money,  but that  as  he was
so anxious, I should go, I would see if I could do any thing.
I went to his house,  and found five children—two of them
sick, and the mother, Mrs. Oram, totally  collapsed. She was
speechless and unable to move.  The man said, that  he was
told, Mrs. Oram was so far gone as to be beyond any hopes;
but that he wished I would  try to  do .something for the chil-
dren.  My feelings were much moved on the  occasion, and
I gave  them a dose of medicine, and such is  the tendency
of our medicine, that as soon as it was taken, it had an effect.
It was the medicine No. 1;  the strongest preparation—and
which,  on account of its strength,  has been jocularly  termed
Sampson.   I  told the man, after turning round and looking
at Mrs. Oram, that if it were my case, I would not  give it up;
he begged me, that if  I thought any good could be done, to
do it.  I gave  her some of  the same medicine, I  had given
the children, and I took a tea spoon full and  a half of the
strong lobelia, and poured it  down her throat.  We  had to
force her mouth open  to do it.  As soon as she swallowed it
she moved, and I found  the medicines had taken  effect.   In
a few minutes, I  told them I thought it was probable she
would recover, and I went for Mr. Burke and Mr. Reynolds.
The child lived about six days.   I left  the cases with  Mr.
Burke, and he attended  very particularly and attentively to
them;  being there nearly all day  and night, and  only slept
upon chairs.   The woman  got better, and is now cured—i
saw  her yesterday.   I  also  knew of another case  of Mr.
Burke's in which he was the one that administered, and  that
with success.   This was  the  case of a woman at Bromley's
tavern, near the Marsh market, who had violent convulsions.
They had been out to find Burke;  but he could not be found.
There were not exactly  the same  symptoms in all the cases,
but still I believe that  all disease is produced from the same
and  one general cause.   Mr. Burke  gave her a viol full of
the same medicines; about 3 ounces; and as it did  not re-
lieve.  TWe are by no means particular about the quantity of
medicine, neither do we care  any  thing about symptoms.]—
My brother gave him another for her; a viol of lobelia, after
I did, and this all of the strongest preparation,   I do  con- 
68
sider Mr. Burke as a man of good judgment, and very atttn-
tive to his  patients, and that  he has sacrificed much time in
attending during the cholera.   I hope this court will, before
it adjourns, give my friend a diploma.
  EPHRAIM LARRABEE.   I consider Burke  a man of
judgment—a sensible man; and if  1 were sick, and at the
point of death, I would prefer him to any other man.   I be-
lieve him a man of judgment, and a very smart man.
  DR. COLE.   The  symptoms of congestion of the lungs
and brain,  might be discovered by  any  one  acquainted witL
the subject.  By convulsions, flushed countenance, redness of
the eyes, insensibility  of the  pupil  of  the eye to  light, eyes
immoveable, state  of the lungs, great difficulty of breathing,
these are all symptoms of congestion.
  The progress of congestion  would have been discovered
by the pulse to a certain extent.  The pulse  becomes slower
in congestion, in consequence  of the circulation  becoming
impeded, and requires a greater effort of  the system to sus-
tain the circulation.  The treatment would produce a violent
and  strong  circulation, then congestion.   This can always be
discovered  by the symptoms.  They had all manifested them-
selves before  I got  there.
  ABNER POPE.  It was between 11 and 12 o'clock that
I was at Bell's, on  the morning of Hazelip's death.   I judge
so from the circumstance of soon after going to dinner.  I
was there  about a quarter  of an hour, and  I dine between
one  and two o'clock.  I had been to Elijah Stansbury's, near
the   causeway,  and was returning.   Some time after break-
fast I left home and went to Stansbury's.   Stopped at E. Lar-
rabee's on  the  route,  probably half an hour.   Went from
there to Godfrey Myer's, and I think from there to  Stansbu-
ry's.  I don't  recollect  whether Myers was  at home or not.
stopped there but a short time; and I think I went direct from
there to Stansbury's.   I  don't  know how long we  were at
Stansbury's; after I left  there I came direct to Larrabee's to
attend a committee meeting  there.   I  was on the opposite
side of the street from Bell's, and the sound seeminw to come
from above induced me to look up.
  MR. MOFFIT.  I  did not see Mr. Pope  there,  nor Mr.
Stansbury.
  MR. WILLIAMS.  I  stated  that the  criterion by which I
should judge the proper time to remove the patient from the
steam box,  would be when nausea was produced, or indica-
tion of fullness of the stomach.  While  the patient was con- 
69
fined upon the steam cot, I would  not withdraw  the steam
entirely—this would make him liable to a chill and return of
spasms.  I  would reduce the steam, but not  remove it en-
tirely.   Hence the  difficulty  of breathing by a pressure on
the heart.  I would not take the steam entirely  off.   I would
have reduced it,  which can be done as  quick as we can turn
the finger, by turning a cock part round.  I have kept up the
action of steam until the patient has complained, then I have
reduced  it,  and continued it until the object was accom-
plished.   1 have known persons kept in a high state of pers-
piration by the use of sleam.  I have kept N. Hynson sitting
and standing together, one hour  and  a  quarter, and I have
kept my wife continually  under the influence  of the steam
from bricks, for two nights and one day.
   This closed the testimony  on the part of the defence, the
counsel for  the defendant stating, that they considered out of
respect to the court and jury, who had already been a long
time considering this case, they would not examine any other
of the numerous  witnesses that had been summoned  in sup-
port of the prisoner, and considered that enough had been
said before  the  jury by them to furnish a clear view of the
whole case.

   The following report of the addresses to the court is from
the notes of Francis Burke—they may not embrace all that
was said  on the subject,  verbatim,  but, he hopes, that they
who heard  the  speeches of Messrs.  Gill, Richardson  and
Stewart, delivered, will see a pretty  faithful transcript of the
ideas, if not always exact words, made use of in the manage-
ment of their arguments.
   Mr .Gill,  the deputy Attorney General for the  State, rose
and addressed the jury on the part  of  the prosecution, and
said that the duty he had  to perform  was  one of a novel
character.   The  Grand Jury had,  in  the discharge of the
duties and responsibilities  devolving upon  them, presented
the prisoner at the bar, on a  charge of manslaughter.  The
charge was  one, the prosecution of which, was attended with
great difficulty and delicacy,  because, in its consideration, it
embraced subjects involving  not only the character of many
individuals, but dangerous consequences to the  peace  and
well-being  of  society—consequences, frequently, entirely
irreparable; to  discountenance  which, laws were  enacted,
and the administrators of them who were authorised to watch
for the general  good,  were bound, to punish their infraction. 
1
                            70

 In any other case,  if the enquiry did not embrace subjects
 of so grave a character—was but one of the many  ordinary
 occurrences in life, he would not feel authorised in so marked
 a manner, to call their attention to  it.  The case before the
 court,  to the consideration of which he was  so  earnestly
 endeavoring to confine the attention of the jury, was  one of
 extraordinary interest.   You will see, gentlemen, said  he,
 that the difficulty and importance I  allude to,  grows  out of
 the circumstances of the case as presented  to  the  court—it
 affects not the changeful variant interests of society,  which
 may be diverted into other channels, and leave an opportunity
 to repair the evil incurred—no, gentlemen of the jury, those
 may be  subjects   ordinarily  sufficiently grave to occupy
 your valuable time ;  but the case  before you  rises in  the
 vastness  of its magnitude far  above all others that may be
 named, when you are told that it affects the human system;
 its  operations, its  health,  its  life.   It is not sufficient to
 believe that the individual  is prompted  to the deed  by no
 malicious wish  to  work injury to  his fellow.   A desire of
 gain is too liable to lead men  astray ; and  when  we  super-
 add to it the grosser motives which  blind the judgment  and
 influence the conduct of many, you will perceive the pressing
 necessity of guarding well every avenue to abuses in  this
 particular.   Error in judgment on the part  of the  patient is
 likely to involve him in difficulties and dangers, from  which
 he  may not be able to extricate himself from the false  repre-
 sentations of heartless, designing persons.  Experience proves
 that the most innocent medicines may be administered injuri-
 ously.  Take an hundred persons, have them attended with such
 medicines—some would get well without any medical treat-
 ment—all they may need will be a little cessation  from the
 intense application  they pay to  their ordinary business,  and
 they will get well.  A  large majority of the balance will,
 under  ordinary medical treatment, get well—there yet are a
 few whose cases require  the utmost  attention and  care,  and
 all  the resources of the well  informed in the healing  art;
 place such as these  under the care of the unskilful,  and they
 will certainly kill  them; in the charge of the skilful they
 vyill as certainly recover.   Question the conduct of the indi-
 vidual  through whose agency this  evil has been produced;
 call him  to this bar to answer for  his misdeeds, and imme-
 diately all that conceived themselves to be benefited bv  his
 medicines, come into court  and  willingly testify to the  value
of those  medicines  to which they attribute their relief.   In 
71
case that individual is incompetent to judge correctly, what
remedy is indicated by a perfect knowledge of the character-
istic symptoms of the disease, every attempt he  may make to
remove the evil may be fraught with the most pernicious and
fatal consequences, which may be enhanced in  its reprehen-
sibleness—-in the enormity of its character, by rashness and
inattention to  the plain  dictates of humanity.  You are, at
least, to determine whether  gross rashness, ignorance, and
lack of that tender care for the condition and sufferings of
the individual, the  causes of whose death you  are called to
investigate,  was not the procuring means which occasioned
the death of the individual, to answer  a charge of which the
prisoner at the bar was  presented by the grand jury, and
brought  before this honorable court.   Take a view  of the
circumstances connected with the case, and  you will see a
blind infatuation on the  one part, and a  manifest lack of
judgment on the other.   But before we proceed to a further
investigation of the treatment, let us  examine the means of
instruction furnished, and the spring to action of the author
and his followers.  Observe  his labored attempt to deceive
the reader,  and  rouse up evil passions in the possessor of his
book.   Be not deceived by appearances—in  the present case
a party of individuals and Ihe prisoner undertake to remove
disease, and pretend  to  do so for the benefit  of society at
large. Before  we admit the position, (and I would be as ready
to allow all  reasonable credence to the professions of others as
any gentlemen  in this  court, if proofs did not justify the
reverse,) will  it not be well to test the motives which seem to
aovern the individuals coming before the court for the defence,
the prisoner at  the bar,  and  the  author of this little  book
[Dr.  Thomson's Guide  to  Health].   We  have a right to
examine it, because by scanning its contents, we may be able
to arrive at  a  knowledge of the motives and  principles of its
originator.  I have carefully  read it, that due  justice might
be rendered to its merits or demerits,  as well as to the  case
more  immediately  presented  to  the  consideration of the
court,  and  must confess  rny  surprise  that there are to be
found in this enlightened community, and among  its mem-
bers, those  who vend,  and those who circulate it.  What
does it contain ?  It tells a lamentable story of the evils
occasioned  by the use of medicines which have been received
into common practice, and  borne and  triumphed over the
test of ages, as  useful and salutary.   Here the  author is evi-
dently engaged, not in presenting to  the  cool  judgment of 
72
the reader remedies which have been tested by men of close
investigation and deep  research, but in  inflaming  the  bad
passions by putting forth libels on the conduct  and motives
of a respectable and  learned  body  of  men.  Not by  their
appearances, but by their principles ought all  their motives
to be judged.  The performance of the duty is a painful one,
but justice imperiously demands the performance of it at this
time from me.   It is  necessary to advert to the words of the
fountain head  of its  slanders  to  learn whether a spirit of
rivalry or an anxious  desire to afford relief to  suffering  hu-
manity,  is the predominant principle.  [Here  the Attorney
General  read from p.  11, " The practice of the regular phy-
sicians," &c  "to mankind."]   Is  there any thing to justify
this r  Does the conduct of that community deserve such a
character?  It is but  an  address to prejudice and not to the
reasoning  faculties of  men—it promotes  the  exercise and
indulgence  of feelings,  which should  be carefully avoided.
Again—p.  11," Much has been said and written upon fevers,
by the professedly learned Doctors of Medicines,"  &c; this
class of  individuals pay no  attention to the origin  and  appli-
cation of proper remedies.  All his effort is used to sustain
the fever, and he says, p. 15, '-The doctor uses all his skill
to kill the fever—" nature is heat"—" heat is life"—and thus
he  argues in a circle, arriving always  at the starting  point.
Again, he advances a  new doctrine, pp. 18-19, "Naturenever
furnishes the body with more blood than is necessary for the
maintenance of health," &c.  Here he boldly  charges even
eminent physicians with  practicing it for experiment sake
even  on  themselves!  The  charge of experimenting is, evi-
dently, only a design to mislead the reader.  Another—pp.
26-27.   He comes boldly and  unmaskedly forward, and
enters his caveat against certain medicines, which  he abuses
in no measured terms, still keeping in action a full share of
the tenor of his slanders.   1 have before me a whole chapter
headed " On giving poisons as medicine."  The author says,
"The practice of giving poison  as  medicine,  which  is so
common among the medical faculty at the present day, is of
the utmost  importance  to the public, and is  a subject  that I
wish to bring home to the serious consideration of the whole
body  of the people  of  this country;  and  enforce, in  the
strongest  manner, on their minds, the  pernicious conse-
quences  that have happened, and are daily taking  place, by
reason of giving mercury,  arsenic,  nitre,  opium, and  other
deadly poisons, to cure disease.  It is admitted by those who 
73
make use of these things, that the inlroducing them into the
system is very dangerous, and that they often  prove fatal."
To cover the ground he assumes, and mislead the judgment,
so by the occasional utterance of a  truth he may have the
semblance of a cause for his observations, and an  excuse for
ignorance and want of skill, he proceeds : "Those who make
use of these things as medicine, seem to cloak the adminis-
tering them  under the  specious pretence of great skill and
art in preparing and using them  ; but this kind of covering
will not blind the people.   If they  would examine it, and
think for  themselves, instead of believing that  every thing
said or done by a learned  man  must be  right;  for poison,
given to the  sick by a person of the greatest skill, will have
exactly  the  same  effect as  it  would if given by  a fool.*'
Here we  find the  author purposely mis-stating the subject^
and evidently with the view to  slander others,  and thereby
the better  to cover his own  selfish designs.   Indeed, the
whole book appears to me  a work  full of  deception;  and
they that vend, and they that advocate and own it,participate
in the criminality of its author, by  endeavoring  with  their
countenance and support to palm it upon the community as a
truth, and the book as a work deserving of attention.  " This
covering" will not exempt  themselves from a censure wher-
ever  the  book is candidly examined.  No medicine  is as
harmless in the hands of a  fool as with a skilful  practitioner
who has made the subject the theme of his study by years of
painful  and  laborious  investigation.  Nothing is harmless
when taken  in  improper  quantities into  the   stomach—
even the  most  nourishing and  innocent food we   eat,
may  be  partaken improperly and  inordinately  of, and do
serious  injury.  The science of medicine is more compli-
cated, and the evils of the mis-application of proper remedies
is attended with more  pernicious consequences, than devia-
tions from propriety, in the administration and reception of
healthy food. The subject of medicine, for the  purpose of
practicing to afford relief, should never be meddled with by
any but  men of extensive  reading and close investigation.
The author has a whole chapter headed, "The doctors with-
out a system." Hear how he slanders a respectable and learned
profession.  " That the doctors have  no system is a fact pretty
generally acknowledged by themselves; or, at least, they have
none that has been fixed upon as a general rule for their practice.
Almost every great man among them has had a system of his
own, which  has  been followed  by  his adherents, till some
           7 
74
other one is brought forward more fashionable." Writh him,
when a man has  discovered any  thing  superior in its kind,
no advance is to be made—no  improvement sought after—
and no deviation from or change of views can take place in
relation to any subject of investigation,  without just ground
for an  implication of the correctness of the  motive.  The
whole medical world  are accused  of  being  governed  by
fashion, and men  of sound judgment and  correct habits  are
sweepingly maligned by this new light, and  charged not only
with want of principle, but also (page 34, bottom) with being
weakly moved by fashion in the adoption of their views and
practice.  "Thei* practice is founded on visionary theories,
which  are so uncertain and contradictory that it is impossible
to form any  correct general rule, as a guide to be depended
upon."   I cannot take the time to follow the  author through
all his malignities and mistatements, but I expect to be able
to convince you, gentlemen of  the jury, that  the assertions
I  have made and may yet find occasion, in the prosecutidn of
the case to make, are fully sustained by the developments of
Thomson's book.   I proceed—p. 132, on the subject of mid-
wifery—"I have given instruction to several  who have bougii!
the right, and their practice has been attended with complete
success.   Many  men   that I  have given the  information
to, have since attended their own wives,  and I have never
known an instance of any bad consequences; and if young
married men would adopt the same course, it would be much
more proper and safe, than to  trust  their wives  in the hands
of young inexperienced doctors, who have  little knowledge,
except what they  get from books,  and their practice is to try
experiments; their cruel and  harsh  treatment, in many in-
stances, would induce the husband to throw them out of the
window, if permitted to be present; but, this is not allowed
for the very  same reason."  Herein is contained not only a
repetition  of slander against the  learned faculty, viz : want
of judgment, and cruel  and harsh treatment,  but the author
has, while he rails at the study of the science, the effrontery
to teach  others,  what  he  is  evidently ignorant  of, and
rail at such as have made themselves  acquainted with  the
science, as a regular branch of their indispensable study :—
the purchasers of this book must  know  that they have been
deceiyed,and cannot but be convinced that  they are tamper-
ing with life, when  they attempt to practice upon its system
and medicines.   I return to page   117—an article written
on the subject of  "Worms," Thomson says-—" The common 
75
practice of the doctors  is to give calomel and other poisons
to kill the worms : this must appear to any one who examines
into the subject, to be very wrong as well as dangerous; for
the  worms  cannot be killed  by it, without poisoning the
whole contents of the stomach.  I once knew of a case of a
child, who, aftereating a breakfast of bread and milk.was taken
sick : a doctor was sent for, who said it was caused by worms,
and gave a dose  of calomel to destroy  them, which caused
fits; the child vomited, and threw up its breakfast; a dog.
that happened to be in the room ate what the child threw up;
he was soon taken sick and died;  the child got well.  The
fortunate  accident of the child's throwing  off its  stomach
what it had  taken, probably, saved its life; for, if there was
rnough poison to kill a dog, it must have killed the child."
The general principles as set forth, and relation of facts ad-
vanced in this book, all go tospeak one motive—one deliberate
and continual  determination to slander the physicians of the
whole world.   We stand in society  in  various relations to
each  other,  and  there may be a few, (of which number I
think the author  makes one) who  are selfish and malignant,
and do not study  to  advance the interests of humanity, who
care little for the miseries of the rest, except only as it  fur-
thers their base  motives;  but, gentlemen of the jury, your
own observation teaches you that the great mass are anxious
to do what is  right and proper.  Judge the gentlemen of the
medical faculty (and it is not  reasonable  to  suppose that
men bred and educated as they are, would lose by a compa-
rison with the mass of men) by, but the same rule—is there
any  excuse  for the  indiscriminate attack made upon  both
them and  the character of their profession ?  Can the  mo-
tives which would actuate to such deeds be honest?   If the
mind of Dr.  Thomson was not completely imbued with  a
spirit of rancour, he would have put forth a  book of quite a
different sort  of  character—after modestly advancing his
views  which  conflict with generally  received opinions, he
would have rested the success of them  upon  the supposed
plausibility  and  certainty  Of  his premises and  deductions,
and calmly appealed, not  to  prejudice  and  passion, but to
the sober collected  judgment of the purchaser.   Had  he
done so, a discriminating public would judge of it by its in-
trinsic merits,  (if it has  any) and the author  be held in res-
pect even by his opponents, who would not feel aggrieved if
he enjoyed the meed of a well earned fame.  But the appe-
tite for slander must be  satisfied, and the prejudices  and bad 
76
 passions of its readers be put in a ferment—and for no other
 purpose than to set men at variance with each other.   The
 mind sickens at the debasing view—it is time  to leave it.   1
 now come to the examination of the merits of the testimony.
 The case was presented  for  the consideration of the grand
 jury; they view it in its relations to, and  bearings upon the
 well being of society, and aware that, if such practices were
 suffered to go unpunished,  it would become an evil of great
 magnitude, and perhaps be  attended by a wide spread deso-
 lation of life, and were determined to  do all  in their power
 to arrest its progress.   They have found a bill charging the
 prisoner at the bar in the words of the indictment, with kill-
 ing Benjamin M. Hazelip.   You have heard the testimony on
 the part of the state.  I leave it with you for the present.
 Among the witnesses for the  defence  we find the testimony
 of Mrs.  Williams,  she had a disease, and, notwithstanding
 all the boasted information  which Dr. Thomson imparts, and
 all the knowledge acquired  by practice, the character of her
 case is not understood, and  Dr. Jameson has to be consulted,
 and his opinion obtained to  shew her to be beyond a cure by
 the use  of the ordinary  medical treatment.   She tells you
 that  she  has very largely  used Thomson's medicines, and.
 that she  thinks  she would  have  died  were it not for their
 surprising virtues—but notwithstanding the glowing terms in
 which she speaks of them, her countenance evidences  that
 she is not cured of her malady.  Miss Williamson appears
 on the stand, and with all the warmth of a grateful recollec-
 tion of supposed benefits, tells  you of her complication of
 woes, and that the prisoner  at the bar snatched her from the
jaws of death.   She considers her cure  a miraculous display
 of the skill of the prisoner  at the  bar, and the virtues of his
 medicines—and, truly, if all the  testimony for the prisoner
 be true, the age of miracles has not ceased yet.  Mr. Sweeney
also bears the like testimony  to the character  of the priso-
ner—goes into a description of the quantity of the medicines
given in certain cases, and tells you in addition that he con-
siders one single medicine good  under all circumstances and
varieties  of diseases.  Mr.  Sweeney  owns a  right to  use
Thomson's book and remedies.  I  speak of this to shew the
false principles under which  men may act, and how far they
will go in support of  the position they have taken.   Sweeney
was called to attend  the case  mentioned by  him in Wagon
alley, and he gave up the case to the prisoner—of course it
must  have  been a very  desperate  case.   He tells you  that 
77
  he has known lobelia to be  used to good advantage in large
  quantities ;  and that a patient  of the prisoner, Mary Jewett,
  took two phials  full  of the strongest preparation which  he
  significantly calls Sampson,  before relief was obtained; and
  from the  reckless manner in which  it was  administered in
  large quantities, I confess, I  am strengthened in the opinion
  that their proceedings are prompted  and regulated by false
  principles of humanity.  This  Dr. Thomson tells his folio w-
'  ers that he  has made discoveries in medicine  which puts  to
  flight the necessity of all further inquiry upon the subject—
,'  looked over all the difficulties and impediments' which might
  occur in future practice, obviated or overcome the whole, and
1  now he offers them his book, the contents of which have for-
  ever, banished  the necessity of  further investigation—all fur-
  ther examination—all further action  in  this address to self-
1  love and pride.  Yes, gentlemen, this Dr. Thomson dares to
■  assume the  attributes  of Divinity, and tells the world that he
  has found the  grand desideratum—the  elixir  of life—in " a
L  general medicine," " which  is  universally applicable  in all
!  cases  of disease."  I hope the court will not think me too
;  tedious, if I read the following extracts in exposition of the
'  principles of  this grand  and  desirable "universal"  secret
1  " remedy," which, even in his relation of the manner of  its
:  discovery, bears constant marks of the  egotism of the dis-
i:  coverer : see  p.  6, of the introduction.  " It is  true, that
f  much  of what  is at this day called  medicine,  is  deadly
  poison ;  and  were people to know what is  offered them  of
i:  this kind, they would  absolutely refuse to receive it as a medi-
  cine.  This I  have long seen  and known  to be true; and
i  have labored hard for many years to convince them of the
  evils that  attend such a  mode  of procedure  with  the  sick;
>■  and  have turned my attention to those medicines that grow  in
'- our own country, which nature has prepared  for the benefit
' of mankind.  Long has a general medicine  been sought for,
i and  I am  confident I  have found such as are universally ap-
i plicable in all  cases of disease,  and which may be used with
: safety and success, in the hands of the people."
   " After thirty years study, and repeated successful trials of
 the medicinal  vegetables  of our own country,  in all the dis-
 eases incident  to our climate; I  can, with well grounded as-
 surance, recommend my system of practice and medicines to
 the public, as salutary and efficacious."
   Page 7.   Great discoveries and improvements  have been
 made in various arts and sciences since the first settlement of
             7*
i 
78
 our country, while  its medicines have been  very  much ne-
 glected.  As these medicines, suited to every disease, grow
 spontaneously upon our own soil.   [Here the attorney general
 remarked that in this  place Thomson had forgotten one ma-
 terial  ingredient in his  medicines—the most  powerful and
 permanent stimulant he used, cayenne pepper, certainly did
 not " grow spontaneously upon  our own  soil "—it was an
 article of foreign growth.]   As they  are better adapted to
 the constitution ; as the price of imported drugs is very high,
 it follows,  whether we consult health, which is of primary
 importance, or expense, a decided preference should be given
 to the  former; as an object of such magnitude as no longer
 to  be  neglected."  Hear his description  of the  manner of
 obtaining his wonderful  discovery, page 7.  " Possessing a
 body, like other men, I was led to inquire into the nature of
 the component  parts  of what  man  is formed, I found  hiru
 composed  of the four elements—earth, water, air, and  fire.
 The earth and  water I  found were the solids; the air and
 fire the fluids.  The two first I found to be the component
 parts;  the  two last kept  him in motion.  Heat, I found, was
 life; and cold, death.   Each  one that examines into it,  will
 find that all constitutions are alike.   I shall now  describe
 the fuel which continues  the fire, or life of man.   This is
 contained in two things—food and medicines,  which are in
harmony with each other; often grow in the same field, to be
used by the same people.   People who are capable of raising
their  food, and  preparing  the same, may  as easily learn
to collect and prepare  all  their medicines, and administer the
same when it is needed.  Our life depends on  heat; food is
 the fuel that kindles and continues that heat.   The digestive
powers being correct, causes the food to consume;  this con-
tinues the warmth of the  body, by continually supporting the
fire."
  Page 8.  " The stomach is the depot from which the whole
 body is supported.  The heat is maintained in the stomach
 by consuming the food*, and  all the body and limbs receive
 their proportion of nourishment and heat from that source;
 as the whole room is warmed by the fuel which is consumed
 in the  fire place.   The  greater the quantity of wood con-
 sumed  in the fire place, the more heat and support through
 the whole man.    By constantly  receiving food  into  the
 stomach, which is sometimes not suitable for the best nour-
 ishment, the stomach becomes foul, so that the food is  not
 well digested."  [I suppose, said the attorney general in that 
79
case, all  that is necessary is to give large quantities of cay-
enne pepper, and burn  it out as we do a stove pipe :  yes, I
see it is  by  the paragraph  below!]   This  causes  the
body to lose its heat, then the appetite fails; the bones ache;
and the man is  sick in every part of the whole frame."  Af-
ter these very sublime and philosophical reasonings he turns
to his evidences on the subject.
   Page 9.  " I have  found, by experience, that  the learned
doctors are wrong in considering fever an enemy.  This I
found by their practice in my family, until they had five times
given them over to die.  Exercising rny own judgment, I fol-
lowed after them, and relieved my family every time.  After
finding a general principle  respecting  fevers, and reducing
that  to piactice, I found it sure in  all disease, when there
was any nature left to build on;  and in three years constant
practice, I never lost one  patient."   Here is a grand dis-
covery, which if the statement  of the relator is to be trusted,
will keep men alive to an interminable age—men  need not
die now—the secret of prolonging life is at length discovered;
and the whole is simply this—when the stomach  is out of or-
der, to give largely of cayenne pepper—burn out the flues,
and you can  apportion  life to any given quantity.  He says,
page 10, " It has been acknowledged, even by those who are
unfriendly to me and  my practice, that my medicine may be
good in some particular  cases, but not in all.   But this is an
error.  For, there are but two  great principles in the consti-
tution  of things, the  principle of life,  and the  principle of
death."  He says, in the same paragraph—" Names are arbi-
trary things—the knowledge of a  name is but  the cummin
and annis,  but  in the  knowledge of the origin of a malady,
and its antidote, lies the weightier matters of this science.—
This knowledge makes the genuine physician ; all without it
is real quackery."  Thomson  has  defined the cause  of dis-
ease, and the effect of disease the same—the remedy being
heat,  it does  not need much reflection to know  what, under
the practice of his system,to apply as a remedy—give heat;
give cayenne, and the disorder must vanish.   Surely no man
needs  long to remain in darkness, and commit the  sin of
•' quackery."   Hear  him again—what  parade he  makes of
superior  intellect—with  what complacency  he  sounds the
praise of his  wonderful endowments!   What little  depen-
dence is to be put upon  human learning! how  useless  and
injurious!  Page 11.   "A man may have a scientific know- 
80
 injurious!  Page 11.   "A man may have a scientific know-
 ledge of the human frame—he may know the names in every
 language, of every medicine, mineral and  vegetable, as wtll
 as every disease, and  yet be a miserable physician."  Thesi
 are  truths which are  evident to all, as they come within the
 experience  of all; but, surely, this can bear no  analogy to
 the  qualifications of  such a man  as Thomson.   The possi-
 bility may exist, that some men of very extensive information
 may  not, owing to some unusal peculiarity in them, be good
 physicians.   The case widely differs  when the individuals or
 individual are not in possession of a cultivated mind to quali-
 fy them for  the practice.   The  first pre-supposes  an occa-
 sional  incompetency from, perhaps, a certain habit or pecu-
 liarity—the  supposed  case of  an  individual without  the
 necessary education, involves in  i*s  stating only  the idea
 of utter disqualification and  improbability—it  cannot  vviih
 any   semblance  of  correctness be tortured to mean that an
 ignorant man like Thomson may be capable of performing the
 high  duties of a physician. With all the supposed incapacities
 of a  man of science in the knowledge of  diseases and their
 remedies, it is preposterous to conclude, with even all his dis-
 qualifications, that  he is no better as a physician  than the
 most illiterate.  It is gross folly enough, to  feed the mind on
 flattery in any individual, but  when it is furnished and swal-
 lowed by the individual himself, it  is  truly disgusting and ab-
 horrent.  This Dr. Thomson, who, it  seems cares not what
 false  principles he puts forth so that he may vend his book-
 hear  how adroitly he applies  to  himself, expressions, which
 the author of them would  never  have  uttered, had  he sup-
 posed the possibility of the abuse made of them in this book.—
 "But, there have been men, without this, to boast  of, from
 the earliest ages of the world,  who  have arisen, blest with the
 sublimcr powers of genius, who  have, as  it were, with one
 look,  pierced  creation,  and, with  one comprehensive view,
 grasped the whole circle of science, and left learning, itself,
 toiling after them in vain."  It cannot be misunderstood-
 he intends this should  be applied  to  himself.  Yes! he  has
 studied 30 years to accomplish this task, and  all the infor-
 mation he can give is a farrago of nonsense contained in this
 little  book.  Here, in his own distempered fancy he  has em-
 bodied a fund of valuable information—a something which
 did not admit of change, to which  all the world might look
 and be healed.   If the  concluding  sentence is not sheer non-
sense in reference to Thomson, then, 1 must  confess, I have: 
81
 ever been laboring under the greatest disabilities to the pro-
 per formation of a sound judgment—delusion and  error..—
 It  is the conclusion he draws from the premises he has stated
i above, in his own favor.  "A man never can be great without
. intellect;  and he never can more than fill the measure of his
I capacity.  There is a power  beyond the reach of art, and
}. there  are gifts that study and learning can never rival." Yes,
I gentleman of the jury, this ignorant, great Dr. Thomson has
; obtained a knowledge which puts down all science, and lenves
fc learning toiling after it in vain.  Yes, a  knowledge of this
;• book  will quallify a man  to cure the whole catalogue of the
i sufferings of  humanity—''there is a power beyond the reach
.of art," and he has it by  intuition—"and, these are gifts that
c study and learning can never rival," and,  this man, according
t to his own notion, has attained them! and to perpttuate the
( idea, he has adorned his book with a portrait of  himself, hav-
ing this motto—"His system and practice originating with
; himself."   He  endeavors,  by  direct  flattery, to get within
ntheir judgment, and tells them that his long experience and
.: great success  prove that his medicines may be used with safety
i, and success  by any  person—that all constitutions  are the
. same, and all diseases are alike, however opposite their na-
: ture.   I have heard of mathematics  being taught by a game
..of marbles, but to prove that  the science of medicine, or a
^knowledge of the curative art, could  be acquired without ef-
fort would be a problem  more difficult to solve than mathe-
maticians or any others have yet undertaken.  Nothing can be
 learned without labor and attention—and nothing  is more
' difficult to acquire a correct and useful  knowledge of, than
 the science of medicine.   Notwithstanding all  the  facilities
•afforded  by books,  &.c, many  are totally ignorant of certain
 arts and sciences—they are not easily acquired  by  any per-
"son—and, perhaps it  may be mcessary to the well  being of
"society, that  it  is  so.   Thomson  and  his followers have
'brought all diseases to one  general standard, and they know
 of but one general remedy—all else  "is but the cummin and
' annis'''' but in their <>one general remedy," -lies the weightier
' matters of this science."   Men cannot be too careful  when
 they  tamper  with  that they never  can restore.  Scarce has
 Thomson  begun to  repose under  the shade of his laurels
eand to reap  the benefit  of the sale  of his rights, when  his
J quiet is disturbed by the  innovating hand of another aspirant
'after fame—in the first page of his address to the public, he
'complains—"Many  persons are practicing my  system,  who 
82
 are in the habit of pretending that they have made great iin.
 provements, &c," and  says, "the public are, therefore, can.
 tioned against such  conduct," &c.   Elias Smith says, he has
 made improvements on Thomson's practice, and  Thomson
 bawls out against the  innovation, and  cautions  the public
 against the evils  attending "such  conduct."  Thomson, in
 his own estimation,  had now become a regular physician—
 From the expositions which have been made respecting tr>
 correctness of the system and practice revealed in this book,
 you,  gentlemen of the jury, will  be able to determine how far
 men  are to be benefited by the use of it.  The prisoner is to
 be responsible  to the laws, if  he is proved  to be guilty of
 gross rashness and ignorance, and  the book  binds  him hand
 and foot to the  principles of it—if he varies in the  least, he
 is deprived of  his right, and  denounced by its author as an
 innovator, and  no longer  worthy, nor entitled  to the privi-
 leges and immunities of membership.  The cardinal princi-
 ples are set forth in  page 89, sections 3,  4, 5.
   ''That the  construction  and  organization of the human
 frame are, in all men, essentially the same;  being formed of
 the four elements; earth and water constitute the solids of
 the body, which are made  active by fire and air.  Heat, in a
 peculiar manner, gives life and  motion  to the  whole; and,
 when entirely  overpowered,  from .whatever  cause,  by  the
 other elements,  death ensues."
   "A perfect  slate of health  arises from a  due balance of
 temperature of the elements;  and, when it is, by any means.
 destroyed, the body  is, more or less, disordered.  When this
 is the case,  there  is  always a diminution of  heat, or an in-
 crease of the power of cold, which is its opposite."
   "All disorders are  caused  by obstructed perspiration, which
 may be produced by a great variety of means; that medicine,
 therefore, must be administered, that is best calculated tore-
 move obstructions  and promote perspiration."
   "Earth, water, air  and fire" compounded, form  the man,
 and the whole treatment to be pursued in the removal of the
 various diseases  to which he is exposed, are contained in two
things—heal and medicines, without reference to symptoms
or contra-indicaticns.  No complaint should be  made of his
consumption of  food-—the  more he eats, the warmer he is—
and, the warmer he  is, the  better health he enjoys.   Now,
gentlemen, of the jury, it is known, that many diseases create
an inordinate appetite—here the great fundamental principle
is observed to eat largely, for the purpose of keeping up the 
83
 inward heat above the outward.   Does not such a plan over-
 load the stomach, paralyse its digestive powers, and lessen its
'.'warmth in proportion to the shock given to them?   How is
 t to be accounted for on Thomson's principles?   The terms
 ood  and medicine are sometimes used synonymously, and
 ie says—"If it is agreeable in one case, it is agreeable in all."
 What  do  they mean  by heat upon the  surface?   I  do not
Comprehend  what dependence  the outward heat or atmos-
pheric air has upon the inward heat.  The stomach is called
 he focus of the inward heat—it is gerferated in the stomach.
 The supposition is, that the outward  heat will be  exceeded
■ >y the  heat  of the stomach, as  it is constantly originating
 .here,  and  evolving from it—yet  they contend that the out-
 ward  heat  may  be  greater than that  from  the stomach.
  Here  Dr.  Geddings,  by  permission,  read a  case  from
                  where the patient is said  to have emitted
>' a stream of cold air from his nostrils," in a certain disease.]
 The Thomsonians contend that heat is life; and, of  course,
 .here is no life, by their rule, without heat.   What are we to
do with the cold blooded animals—have they not life ?  The
)lii»ook says,  " Life, blood, heat and nature,  are  synonymous
ji.erms."  Here  we have an outward and inward heat, and an
coutward and inward life; an outward and inward nature—
nnd, for aught  I know, an outward and inward blood, too,
 for they are all  synonymous!   Surely  Thomson did  not
'■understand himself when he was putting forth these follies.
(tie is  more powerful  in using the weapon of slander than in
iinny thing  else.   [Here the attorney general read an extract
from  a work  on Animal Heat,  shewing that  the natural
 lemperature of  the blood of man was the same in all cli-
mates.]  Other authors say that the origin of heat  is  in the
•lungs and blood—it appears more reasonable that it  should
 be there than in the stomach.   Is there any other motive for
respiration  than  to produce vital  heat ?  For this, only, it
,appears essential to human life.
   The origin of Thomson's heat is in  the stomach, which is
 constantly  exposed to diminution by the action of the  atmos-
 pheric air  and a variety of other agents.   Thomson said,
he had  long sought for  a  universal   remedy—but,   if his
system is based upon  such untenable principles, it is danger-
ous to  carry it into practice.  I now come to the considera-
tion of the evidence of the witnesses who have given in their
testimony before  the court—but,  first let us make inquiry
into the condition of the man who died.  Patrick and  Moffit 
84
both say that they saw him on the morning of the day on
which he died.   They  say that they did not know that any
thing was the matter with him.   Larrabeesays he complained
of pains and oppression in the stomach and bowels, and
appeared very much  alarmed;  bulTownsend says, he saw
him at about a quarter  past ten near his own house, and that
he did  not appear ill.  Sumwalt tells you that he  did not
know, that Hazelip had spasms,  but that  Bell  told  him that
Hazelip had.   Pope and  Stansbury say that he had spasms.
The testimony  of the witnesses conflict  much  with each
other;  you are the best judges of who, what, and how much
of these statements is to be believed, when the whole is taken
in conjunction with the testimony of Dr. Hintze, that he was
called upon late on the night previous by Hazelip, and that
nothing but alarm ailed him at  that time;  and, in conjunc-
tion also with the testimonies of all the physicians that were
present  at the post mortem examination,  that the body of the
deceased had no internal marks  of recent disease.  Next,
Hazelip was seen on  the steam-cot by Patrick, Moffit, West
and McCauley—they all testify  that Burke and Bell gave, or
had given Hazelip medicines, and at the same time he was
lyincr on the cot and  under the influence of the  steam—that
Hazelip asked to be let off, but that they prevailed on him to
stay on  the steam-cot;  and again, that he sat up  on the cot,
and that they persuaded him to lie down—that Hazelip ap-
peared very restless, was in a profuse perspiration, and that
Burke  and Bell  gave  him  composition  powder,  lobelia,
cayenne pepper, and number 6 ; and that they said they did
not wait for  the  medicine to  operate.   Townsend says he
saw Hazelip near his house at a quarter of ten.  Patrick says
he saw him on the steam-cot at between eleven and twelve
of that  day.   We may, therefore,  fix the  time of the com-
mencement of the steaming at half past eleven ;  and, by the
concurrent testimony of all the witnesses for the prosecution,
he was free up to that  time from all appearance of disease;
and  all  say, that while on the steam-cot he had no appear-
ance of disease.   Moffit says when he went to see Hazelip
the second time, it was between two and three o'clock, and
he found him on the bed, beside the steam-cot, in a state of
insensibility.  And West says he saw  him on the steam-cot
at fifteen to twenty minutes past one, and  then  no bed had
arrived, or was in the room. All who speak positively on the
subject during the operation of the medicines and steam, say
that there was no preparation of the sort in the room. Suppose 
85
we fix the  time of his being relieved from the operation of
the steam to  two o'clock, Hazelip then must have been at
least two hours and a half under the operation of the steam.
Lobelia is an article so dangerous in its qualities and vehe-
ment in its nature, that it is not safe to be administered indif-
ferently in disease, and only in a few cases; but in any form
it is  to be admitted cautiously, and with a well informed and
well  ripened judgment;  but in this instance it appears to
have been administered in excessively large doses, and with-
out attention to symptoms and indications ;  conjoin with this
the constant action of the steam for two hours and a half, at
such  a high temperature  as to be complained of by  Hazelip;
that  the steam excites the vessels on the surface to  increased
action, and brings the whole circulatory system in  rapid and
violent  action;  and when carried  to  too great an extent,
ceases to excite,  by  overwhelming the heart and arteries.
Does not  this  shew that  mal-treatment caused  Hazelip's
death ?   You have been  told, too, gentlemen of the jury, that
the action  of all the medicines, &c. administered, are vehe-
ment in their action, and violent and dangerous in  their ope-
ration and effects.  Lobelia is represented as an acrid and
poisonous article—it may or may not be so.   The witnesses
for the defence say it  is  not.   Pope says it casts up what is
offensive, but his porridge is not thrown up by it.   I do  not
believe him.   There are a  great variety of remedies which
may be used with indifference, but it did not appear that  the
lobelia  was an article of  thai description.  [Here the attorney
general read Dr. Barton's remarks  on lobelia.]  Gentlemen
of the jury, Dr. Barton, from all  the information and expe-
rience  he possessed,  says—"If lobelia  does not puke  or
evacuate speedily, it frequently destroys the patient in five or
six hours."  With permission,  I will read to  the jury cases
tried in the courts on the subject, from which you may be
able, in view of the testimony in this  present case, to make
up your decision; and first, I  would beg leave to read  the
trial of the author of the system and discoverer of the medi-
cines upon and with which the prisoner at the bar practices.
It is the case of Samuel Thomson, 6 Massachusetts Reports,
p. 134.  The recklessness of Thomson and his ignorance are
here shewn, in undeniable evidence ;  but the  judge in-
structed the jury, on submitting the case to them, that as the
prisoner was there on an indictment for murder, for wilfully
and  maliciously killing  Ezra  Lovett, his patient,  unless it
could be proved  that the act was  wilfully and maliciously
            8 
                            86

 done, an action on the case could  not be; and they were
 bound, however satisfied  that the patient, Ezra Lovett, came
 to his death from the improper administration of Thomson's
 medicines, to  decide in  his favour; and upon that ground,
 the jury found a bill of  « Not guilty."  But this is not the
 case  with the present suit—neither do the judges enjoy and
 exercise powers to the same extent as they  do  in Massachu-
 setts  ; the jury in  the present case may find their verdict as
 they  may determine from the nature and weight of the testi-
 mony.  I now, said he, intend reading a few cases which stand
 in immediate reference to the question  under consideration.
 I  begin with the opinion of Chief Justice Story  in White v$.
 Travers;  and  English  Reports,  edited  by Sergeant and
 Lowber, King  vs. Edwin Martin  Van  Butchell,  p. 474;
 King vs. Jno.  St. John  Long.  All  these go to  shew,
 that  where there  is  not due  caution  observed  in the
 administration  and qualities  of the  medicines, the prisoner
 should be guilty of the crimes alleged against him.  Was not
 Hazelip under the application of  the steam for  two and a
 half hours ?  Was not the whole treatment carried to excess ?
 If the prisoner  at the  bar is not convicted upon the evidence
 before the court, an immunity from responsibility will be the
 consequence;  and thereafter, any man that chooses to get
 Thomson's patent, may go forth and kill or cure, without fear
 of punishment.

   [The reporter regrets the necessity of being compelled to
 say, in addition to  the general defectiveness of  his  report,
 that   at the time Mr.  George R. Richardson  commenced his
 address to the  jury on the part of the prisoner, his attention
 was called  off to answer some inquiries made by his  witnes-
 ses, and,  consequently, he was  unable to  commence with
 the speaker;  and  before he was disengaged, Mr.  R. had
 entered deeply  into the merits of the cause,  and  became so
 animated and impressive, that the repoiter, instead of record-
 ing leading sentences, passively gave his  feelings the rein,
 and followed Mr. R., whose  mind seemed loaded with the
 facts  as recorded in the testimony—and whose tongue illy
 afforded vent to their  rush for utterance.   Mr. R.  had been
 much indisposed for some weeks previous to the  trial, and
 was then apparently very  feeble ;  but, notwithstanding, he
 addressed the jury from twelve o'clock  until half past one,
 and (being exhausted and obtaining a respite by adjournment,)
from three to half past six.] 
87
  Mr.  Richardson followed  Mr.  Gill in his quotations, and
in several  passages  read by  Mr. G.  shewed  that he had
stopped short of giving Dr. Thomson's  ideas,  and thereby
presented them in a  wrong form, and observed that such
was the case with nearly all his quotations—and that but in
one only, there was  a semblance of truth in the charge of
slander of the medical faculty by Dr. Thomson, and that had
some  justification  in  their  persecutions, &c.  of him.  He
next went  into investigation of the  nature of  the disease,
and proved  by the testimony  of Pope,  Stansbury and Sage,
to the  fact of his having spasms—the admission of Sumwalt,
that it  had been stated that Hazelip had had spasms, without
being denied by the patient—that Pope and Stansbury, from
their  knowledge  of  the disease,  considered it as a case of
cholera;  and  Dr.  Geddings'   admission,  that  with some
slight  difference, that the appearances after death were such
as is   usual in that disease; and  to prove that  the appear-
ances  about the  brain were also concomitant,  he read ex-
tracts  from  Good's  Study of  Medicine, fourth American
edition,  v.  1, p.  178 (from the Bombay Reports, p. 62)—
"• Several  instances  were heard  of at  Hoobly, and other
places, of natives being struck with the disease whilst talking
in the  open air;  and who, having fallen  down, retched  a
little,  complained  of vertigo,  deafness and blindness,  and
expired  in  a few  minutes.   Mr. Gordon gives a history of
many cases  of this kind.  At Bellary, a tailor was attacked
with what was supposed to be cholera, and instantlyexpired,
with his  work in his hands, and in  the very attitude in which
he was sitting."   And, pp. 182-83—"I  have said that the
living  power during  the whole of this  melancholy  event,
seems  to have been  very feebly recruited from its fountain,
Or not  recruited at all.  The latter appears to have been the
case in the  island  of Ceylon, where the disease raged with
even more violence than on  the Indian continent; and the
patient very  frequently expired in twelve or  fifteen hours
from its attack.   A dissection  of those  who perished thus
early in this quarter, has put us in possession of some inter-
esting  facts, varying  in a few  particulars from those that
occurred on post-obit examinations in the island  of Bombay;
and which will, 1 trust, uphold me in  making this  remark.
The brain was, in these cases, chiefly  the congested organ,
the liver  sometimes appearing to  have no congestion what-
ever;  and  hence the  inactivity produced  in the brain, by
the nauseating state of the stomach, must have been  greatly 
88
augmented by oppression," Sac.   Mr. R.  then took  a rapid
view of the  medicines—their nature, their  usefulness and
harmlessness, as proved by all the witnesses for the prisoner.
The testimony of Mrs. Williams, a female in delicate health,
who had taken forty-six courses of Thomson's medicines,
and with benefit, within the  past six months, and her very
full testimony in reference  to  her treatment and  success
with other females who had  used them.   The  case  of Mr.
Lycett and  his  young  man;  Mr. Shumaker, his wife and
sister; Mr. Needles;  Mrs. Lydia Peters of a disease pro-
nounced incurable, &c,  and Miss H. Y. Williamson, who
attributed her recovery from  the very verge of death  to the
skill of the prisoner.  [In  this part  of iiis subject he  was so
touchingly eloquent and  feeling, that many were observed
wiping the tears which rapidly chased each other down their
cheeks.  The speaker's voice trembled from the force of his
feelings, and his chin quivered;  and the tear, so unusual to
a counsel in a trial of an individual in whose case he had but
a transient interest, was seen to start from  his eye and join in
the general sympathy.]   After this, he recounted tlie testi-
mony of every individual knowing to the character, &c. of the
prisoner—that he was competent, attentive, feeling, &c., and
that this was the character  of  the prisoner for  at least the
last four years, without one  exception, by  the  united testi-
mony of the witnesses in the  city of Baltimore; to which was
superadded the testimony of Lambert S. Beck, to the practice
of the prisoner  in  the city of Washington previously; and,
that nothing  on the part of the testimony for the State went
to shew that the prisoner was lacking in attention in the case
before the court.   In fine, the prisoner had been proved by
abundant testimony to be competent, successful, attentive,
tender, and to possess all the  qualifications  necessary to
recommend him to  public confidence; and if even in  a few
cases he was  unsuccessful, it could not be laid to his charge as
a fault, but to the  impotency and fallibility attendant upon
the  exercise of the best judgment  in such cases.   If such
were not the correct view, then, a physician of the most pre-
eminent talents might, from malice, or a spirit of rivalry, be
brought to the bar, and, to say the least of it, be subject to
much  vexation and loss of time, if  not  to punishment and
loss of character,—when  the utmost exertions in his power
had been made to ensure success.  Mr. R. cited the following
case in proof of the correctness of his position :
  Rex vs. John Williamson, O. B. 1807,  Sergeant and Low-
ber's Reports, p. 497, v. 14. 
89
   The  prisoner was indicted  for the murder of Ann Dela-
croix, at the parish of St. James, Westminster;  he was also
charged with manslaughter by the coroner's inquisition.
   Lord Chief Justice  Ellenborough (in summing  up), said,
" There has not been a particle of evidence which goes  to
convict the prisoner of the crime of murder ; but it is still for
you to consider, whether the evidence goes so far as to make
out a case  of manslaughter.   To  substantiate  that charge,
the prisoner (a"surgeon) must have been  guilty  of criminal
misconduct, arising either from the grossest ignorance, or the
most  criminal inattention.  One or other of these  is neces-
sary to make him guilty of  that  criminal negligence and
misconduct, which is essential  to make out a case of man-
slaughter.  It does not appear that in this  case, there was
any want of attention on his part," &c.
   Mr. STEWART said:—A few  years since I was engaged
in a suit in which was seen arrayed (not a few physicians  of
ordinary intellect,  and  reputation for acuteness, opposed  to
each  other,  but  a marshalling of learned professor against
learned  professor of different colleges, but  of the same school
in deadly conflict, bringing with them all the talent, research,
and erudition of which they were capable, and each support-
ed in  his position by witnesses of acknowledged  merit in the
practice of medicine, but  with  views of treatment,  although
in some points alike, essentially different from each other.—
The consequence was,  an  elaborate  investigation  was entered
into, to  prove (what a  court and jury will never be compe-
tent to  decide upon)  whether of  the views and  treatment
which are almost as various as there  are  physicians, the ac-
cusers or  the accused  are right.   A court  can  only decide
where there is manifest inattention  to the  plain duties of pro-
priety in the administration of medicines undeniably perni-
cious, and where there is palpably a recklessness and want  of
attention, and gross ignorance.  For where modes  of treat-
ment  and preference of means only, are the subjects of con-
tention, there are such a variety of contradictory views  in
the medical world, that they themselves, are at constant issue
with each other, and to leave the decision of correctness be-
tween their discrepancies to the judgment  of such as had not
been able properly to examine the whole ground of the contro-
versy, would be truly putting  dangerous prerogatives in the
hands of the ignorant and unskilful, in  such matters; for,
gentlemen of the jury, "who shall decide, when  doctors dis-
agree."   The case before you is not of the character 1 have 
90
just alluded to—here is not an embattleing of Thomsonian
with Thomsonian—not with  them is to be found  theory af-
ter theory, and system after system chasing each other in in-
terminable succession until they vie in number with the stars
in the firmament—no, gentlemen, they have one system and
one mode of practice, which, notwithstanding  the  variations
necessery to meet the  attacks of the various forms of dis-
ease,  are simple in their form, innocent and salutary in their
effects, and adopted, received and  administered,  without a
single reservation  by thousands, and  perhaps tens of thou-
sands of our fellow  citizens throughout our widely extended
country, of all ranks, conditions and grades of talent, as such,
without dissent or controversy; this is not a too highly colored
assertion—go where you  will—east, west, north, south, you
will find the disciples of Dr. Thomson  scattered abroad—
a large and multiplying class of useful individuals—question
them respecting the system and medicines of Samuel Thom-
son, and they are, with an undivided voice, pronounced in-
nocent and powerful in the banishment of disease and death.
Truth has been  truly said,  in the emphatic language of a ner-
vous  writer to have  " but one side," and  the  universality of
their  reception by those best acquainted with the system and
practice of Dr.  Thomson,  seem to go far to prove  them true.
I am  not here for the defence of any system, but to defend
my client  against  the charge of manslaughter as preferred
against him in  the  words  of the indictment—the system of
Dr. Thomson, the book, with all his assertions contained in
it, is  before the public—edition after edition has been printed,
the medical faculty have access to it, as  is instanced by the
book in court, owned by Dr. Cole; and  they have not been
able  or undertaken to controvert  what is  there published.—
Until that takes place they cannot  complain of an injustice
too slight  for comment.  Reference has been had to the trial
of Samuel Thomson in the Massachusetts Reports, by the At-
 torney General—it is not to be considered official, but copied
 into  them from  improper statements of the case.   That case
 was got up by a Dr. French for the purpose of putting down
by persecution,  what he had  failed  to do by his practice.—
The  same gentleman, not long afterwards, became a fugitive
from justice for his misdeeds.  Such should ever be the fate
of the unprincipled  tyrannical  persecutor.  Look  at the pe-
culiar situation in  which Thomson was placed, and then say
if there be not some excuse—some  palliation for the causti-
 city  of his remarks.  Listen to Thomson's account of the 
91
I treatment he has received, which he prefaces by a quotation
I from Dr. Harvey, p. p. 13, 14.  "By what unaccountable per-
1 versity in our  frame does it appear, that  we set ourselves
; against any  thing that is new?  Can any behold,  without
i scorn, such drones of physicians, and after the  space of so
 many hundred years' experience and  practice of their prede-
 cessors, not one single medicine has  been detected that has
 the least force, directly/ to  prevent, to oppose, and  expel  a
 continued fever?  Should any, by a more  sedulous observa-
 tion, pretend to make the least step towards the  discovery of
 such remedies, their hatred and envy would swell against him,
 as a legion of devils against virtue;  the whole  society will
 dart their  malice at  him, and torture him with all the calum-
 nies imaginable, without  sticking at  any  thing  that  should
 destroy him, root and branch.  For he who professes to be
  a reformer of the art of physic, must resolve to  run the haz-
  ard of a martyrdom, of his  reputation, life and  estate."
    Thomson then goes on  to state what has taken  place in
  his own person.—"The treatment which the writer  has re-
  ceived from some of the learned physicians, since  his  dis-
  covery of the  remedy for fever, and  various other diseases,
  is a proof of  the truth of this  last saying of Dr. Harvey.—
  They have imprisoned him, and  charged him with every thing
  cruel and  unjust; though upon a fair  trial, their  violent deal-
  ings have come down  upon their  heads; while he has not
  only  been proved innocent before the court,but  useful; hav-
  ing relieved many which the other physicians had given over
  to die."
    Again, page 9.   This [his success  in practice] greatly dis-
  turbed the learned  doctors, and some of them undertook to
  destroy  me, by reporting that  I used poison ;  though they
  made no mention of my  using  their  instruments of death—
  mercury, opium, ratsbane, nitre and the lancet.  I  considered it
  my duty to withstand them, though I found my overthrow was
  what they aimed at.  A plan was once laid to take me in the
  night, but I escaped.  Next, I was indicted, as though I had given
  poison, and a bill brought against me for wilful murder. I was
  bound in irons, and thrust into prison,to be kept there through
  the winter, without being allowed bail.  I petitioned for, and
  obtained, a special  court to try the cause, and was honorably
  acquitted, after forty days imprisonment.  I maintained my
  integrity in the place where my persecution began.   In five
  years, while vindicating this new and useful discovery, I lost
 five thousand  dollars, besides  all the persecution, trouble, 
92
loss  of health and reproach, which has been in connection
with the  losses.   "What  is there inexcusable in his retort
upon such men?   My colleague has shown that the attorney
general has  not  quoted but a part of Thomson's  views, and
by the context Thomson has not been guilty of such falsity
as he is charged  with.
   Thomson enters largely into a description of  his system
and practice, and  quotes considerably from medical authors
respecting the  character  of their own medicines—is there
any thing improper in  this  ?  He undertakes to recommend
his system and practice, on the ground of a thirty years' ex-
perience of their usefulness.   This he tells the purchasers of
a right to use them in his  book.  Is one of the many pur-
chasers prepared  to  disprove the correctness of what  hat
been said ?  My learned friend, the attorney general, charges
the witnesses as coming into court, as volunteers, to testify
for the prisoner—what impropriety there is in so  doing, I
know not, but such is not the fact—they are compelled to
come here  to  testify for  him.   The attorney  general  has
carefully avoided to consider the  correct view of the case of
Miss  Williamson.   Disease had  made serious inroads upon
her frame—unable scarcely to speak—an  abscess  wasting
her vitals, and the presence of considerable fever—who that
heard her so touchingly and artlessly relate the tale  of her dis-
tresses and recovery, heard it unmoved? who doubted its truth
in every particular ?  If Mrs.  Williams  be not cured,  the
blooming countenance of  Miss Williamson bears testimony
to the skill and success of the prisoner at the bar, that col-
leges  and diplomas can never confer.  Her father had been
sent for to see her die.  Miss Williamson  has gratitude to
her deliverer—could it be otherwise?  The attorney general
charges the whole body of  the Thomsonians in this city, who
attempted to relieve their fellow  citizens  during the preva-
lence of the late epidemic,  which threatened a desolation of
our city, with having a conscience for themselves and a con-
science for  the  community—they had,  gentlemen of  the
jury—it was a conscience which induced those truly  brothers
of charily to leave the comforts and delights of their homes,
and seek out, and  endeavor to save the lives, of their suffer-
ing fellow-beings, and at  the  peril of their  own.   It is no
disgraceful conscience which induces its possessor to seek to
secure the comfort and safety of  his  fellow creatures in  the
stead of his own, in the day of calamity—a conscience which
seeks, not theirs, but them  ; and,  that too in a disease which 
9:1
had  baffled  the united skill of the physicians of the four
quarters  of  the  world.   The physicians had theorised and
tested every where, and to no good purpose.  The deceased
it is  proved  had  cholera,  was intemperate, and under the in-
fluence of great  fear.   Fear  has been said to be a proximate
cause of that disease—and where it is found in  connexion
with the  disease, it  is attended  with fatal consequences.  A
certain physician said,  "I killed so many, &c. fear killed the
rest."   From what has been said and written upon the sub-
ject, take it for granted  in cholera, where fear and intempe-
rance are present, you may give the patient up as gone.  Pa-
trick, Moffit, Townsend, and Dr.  Hinlze,  say  Hazelip was
intemperate, and Dr. H. says he was fearful.   West tells you
he had  shrivelled  feet.   Dr. Geddings unwillingly bears his
testimony that it was a case of cholera—he  says that a super-
natural heat is a remarkable  attendant upon cholera, and not
the  product of  the steam.   [Here the attorney  general re-
joined and stated the opinions, and what was read by Dr.
Geddings on the capacity of enduring dry  and moist heat.]
Professor Geddings admitted that he would not have known
what had occasioned the death of Hazelip if the  prisoner at
the bar had  not very candidly and unreservedly informed him
that  he  gave him certain Thomsonian medicines and steam,
which have  not  been extensively used by Dr. Geddings, and
of which he knows but little from  actual observation—while
the  witnesses testify  that they and the prisoner have used
every thing  here complained of to  a greater extent and deci-
ded  benefit.  The other  articles appear to be passed over as
harmless, and the  lobelia and  steam which Prof ssor Ged-
dings supposes  was the cause of  Hazelip's death, are no
longer a  tenable ground for  conviction.  Professor Geddings
says the  lobelia produces a warmth and  glow throughout the
system; in this case the indications demanded it, and it was
used for the  purposes he acknowledges  it is  good to pro-
duce.  The only difference on  this point is Professor Ged-
dings who knows scarcely any thing of  lobelia, but what he
has learned  from another who gets nearly all his knowledge
from hearsay, that  it is  a dangerous medicine—while the
witnesses on the part of the prisoner, who  have  used, and
very  frequently seen it used  in much larger quantities, say it
is not dangerous, but harmless, and was never known to do
injury—in this  number is Roger  Brooke,  a gentleman upon
whose judgment and veracity we  can safely rely, who says
'ie has known it as a remedy for disease of the  eye, under 
94
 the name of eye-bright for forty  years, and for the last two
 years as lobelia; and although  his acquaintance with it has
 been extensive, he never has had reason to think the admin.
 istration of it calculated to injure.
   I look upon the present case rather as a triumph for, than
 a trial of my client, and hope when the attorney general has
 closed his remarks, and the case is sent to  the jury that they
 will give their verdict without leaving the box :  for the com-
 petency,  kindness, and character  for every qualification and
 duty of  a physician,  are abundantly  proved to be possessed
 by Mr. Burke.

   Mr. GILL rose after the  conclusion of the address of Mr,
 Stewart, and said :—
   Gentlemen of the jury—there is  one part of the address
 of the attorney  for the defence (Mr.  Stewart)  in  which I
 heartily concur.  If the jury see  no reason to  believe that
 the death of Hazelip  was not caused  by the medicines of the
 prisoner at  the  bar—and that the  prisoner at the bar is not
 chargeable with ignorance, want of attention or  humanity-
 then  in  this case  they need not  retire from their seats to
 make up a verdict.  The statements  made  by the witnesses,
 go to prove that there are cogent  reasons why Mr. Burke
 should be convicted, and I hope, whatever defects may have
 been  discoverable in my management  of the case,  the jury
 will bear  in  mind  that  they are to rely  on  the testimony of
 the witnesses  and the laws having reference to the subject,
 I  have given  much attention to this case, and  have indus-
 triously put in requisition  all my  sources  of  information,
 and  after the most laborious and patient investigation of its
 merits—guided by  the  best light of which I am  capable,-!
 can candidly say, I discover in it a subject of the deepest in-
 terest to  the cause of  humanity, and the happiness of the
 community—and, that it would  greatly advance  both, if, by
 a decision adverse to  the prisoner  at  the bar, a  stop  could
 be put to the further spread of a practice founded upon such
 wild and uncertain speculations as those of Thomson.  I am
astonished any one can  be so  misled  by it as to  dare to un-
dertake the cure of disease with such foolish and dangerous
Fn^n.  k    . 1S !T U  a somethi"g so ""accountable that  I
know not  how to admit or comprehend  that there is not im-
proper and base motive  in its whole bearing and  history.   I
am not disposed to wish that  Mr. Burke, if i„„ocent, should
be condemned and punished-and hope the whole court will 
95
 do me the justice to believe the assertion.  The jury should
 not be misled, and I hope  that nothing that has fallen from
 me will  have a tendency to mislead their judgments in the
 smallest particular.   I am hereto advance rational arguments
 and honest and fair conclusions.  If I  discharge my duty in
 these particulars, whatever  is the event—whether Mr.  Burke
 be acquitted or condemned, my duties to the society in which
 I live, and to the laws of the state, which I am here for the
 support  of, are performed, and  no censure because of the
1 consequences can be attributable to me.  The same may be
 said of the gentlemen who act as counsel  for  the prisoner.
 We must arrive at a knowledge of the subject under discus-
 sion by a careful examination  of all its principles and bear-
 ings,  and present them for the  consideration of the court.  I
 yet contend that it is not allowing sufficient scope to the in-
 vestigation  if the view in the present case does not  embrace
 both the principles and the practice of Thomson in  connex-
 ion with the  qualifications of Mr. Burke and the treatment
 pursued by him.  Is the system of Thomson sustained by
 fair and  logical arguments ?  Do  the counsel for the priso-
 ner enter into an  examination of it.  Press them to it and
 they tell you that there is no necessity for an  examination
 into its  merits—if so, how  then can correct conclusions be
 drawn on the propriety of  the  administration of their medi-
 cines—the counsel for the prisoner say, and the bench say, it
 is unnecessary  for the trial of the case before you.   I am
 sorry for it, and must submit to the weight of circumstances.
 I still think while we are disposing of the subject it  would
 be better to decide upon the whole ground of controversy,
 and  settle  the question  for the  benefit of the community.
 Notwithstanding the decision  of the bench, I hope I shall
 be indulged if I occasionally advert to Thomson's system or
 rale of government  in the administration of the medicines.
 The counsel for the prisoner would confine the whole subject
 to a sort  of mathematical argumentation.   Thomson says all
 constitutions are alike—and they defend the doctrine that all
 persons should be treated alike. Because  one person may be
 steamed  three or  four hours without injury, another person
 may be  steamed the same  length  of time without cause for
 reflection upon the operator or administrator, if the  case ter-
 minates unfavorably.  This appears to be the rule of argu-
 ment of the defendant's  counsel.   Let us not be led astray
 any longer by wild and visionary postulate, but judge of the
 principle by testing and carrying it into all the minutiae of the 
96
practice.  If the practice  be not safe then is the principle
false, and the principle and practice being at discord, they
can, neither, with safety  be depended upon,  and both  are
dangerous in their application to the removal of disease, and
particularly so  in  the hands of the  illiterate.  Let us come
back to  an  examination of the bone and sinew of the argu-
ment.   If all  constitutions are alike, then must  all  persons
laboring under disease be necessitated to submit to the same
sort of treatment.   Lobelia and steam must be administered
alike to all.   No one having any share of common sense
would admit either the premises or conclusions to be  correct.
We know all diseases have different degrees of  virulence and
some are opposite in their nature.  Others  vary in their type in
different constitutions—different climates, and  under differ-
ent circumstances of attack—yet, must  they  all  be  treated
alike—will  one general  mode of  cure—one general  remedy
relieve from all ?  The cholera is  said to  be the bane of the
intemperate, and that the temperate are most likely to escape,
because the attack takes place under different circumstances
in the one from the  other.  But would any one be so fool-
hardy to apply  the same  remedy for the relief  of  both in all
the varieties and shades of attack.  Certainly none would dare
to do it without richly meriting, at least, the charge of insanity.
If all other sources of information are proscribed but what is
contained in this book  of Thomson's,  where can  Francis
Burke get general skill to practice medicine safely and suc-
cessfully.  Why gentlemen, Thomson and  his  followers, de-
ny  the  use  of  medical  skill—they hold  general  science in
contempt, and  treat with derision,  all arguments which go to
yay that  if they practice, they  should have  a general know-
ledge of medical science.  It does more—by the assumption
that a universal infallible remedy has been  discovered, it
checks the spirit of research and prevents all attempts in its
followers from  essaying to make future beneficial discoveries
on the subject, and entrenches them in impenetrable ignorance,
the better to prevent them from seeing the falsity of his ar-
rogated powers of divinity, in the immutability  of his system
and  practice; for, if every thing  has been  already done to
perfect the art of healing, all further exertion on the subject,
all further research is worse than useless—it is a censurable
waste of time.   The present epidemic, which now desolates
our beloved  country, is characterised by  symptoms and  ef-
fects novel in their nature, and awful in their termination.__
The most acute, learned and patiently labored investigations 
97
have been made, in order to ascertain its causes, the reason
of its erratic deadly spread, and the best means of cure—they
yet disagree—but they disagree as men confident in the purity
of the intention of their competitors in science—all  their
writings  teem with respect for  the motives, (however they
may differ in their conclusions) of each  other.  A confidence
is  apparent that a spirit of universal charity, and anxiety  for
theuniversal  spread of useful  knowledge pervades the gene-
ral mass—for true "charity thinketh  no  ill  of his neighbor."
Is this the case with Thomson  and his followers?  Every
page—nay, almost every line in this book shows it is not.—
Misrepresentation, misconstruction and  malignity and self-
ishness are stamped  in indelible characters on  every page—
and the grossed minds of its purchasers partake of the hate-
ful disgusting food, and the  poison enters, and is diffused
through all their intellectual powers.   A spirit  of blind con-
fidence is generated  in their  minds.   The medicines, how-
ever powerful in their nature,  because  a small quantity may
not injure, it is argued, are innocent and harmless in large ones,
and a reckless and injurious course of  administration which
should, by some means, be speedily put a stop to, immediately
prompts them to teem out to be swallowed by the too credulous
suffering patient the means of  death, in the effort to  save life.
It appears evident, that the Thomsonian remedies  have not
been administered, in the present case, with sufficient care
and discretion.   The medicines may, in some cases, and un-
der certain conditions of disease, be very useful, but in others,
they  must certainly do much harm.  Whether  the treatment
of the patient by the prisoner has been beneficial or not, is
the legitimate subject for our  investigation, and I am bound,
by every consideration of duty and honor, to pursue  it.   I am
bound to make  inquiry into it, without  looking to the conse-
quences which  may grow out of it.  The question  of mere
exercise of humanity, is not involved in it, nor does it, only,
enter into the argument, what is the motive ?—the deed  and
the consequences of a  blind administration of such  medi-
cines, is what most  claims our present  attention.   Where  is
the prisoner's skill to be derived from? he denies himself the
means of access to its acquisition—he shuts  out the  means
of its attainment.  The counsel for the prisoner, in argument
 against  the  medical faculty, says, they have  theorised  and
 theorised uselessly, and that they are themselves but visionary
 supposers.   Dr. Brown, they  say, supposes disei.-   to be ori-
ginated  by too great or too small  a degree of  he;; — : nd, that
            9 
98
he boastingly said, give him a brandy bottle  and a lancet,
and  he could  cure  all diseases—if there was too great ex-
citement, he would  bleed—if too little, he would stimulate.
When the cholera first appeared, every leading physician had
a mode of treatment peculiar to himself.  Camphor and a
variety of other  things had their day, and  were vanished—
one after another had been recommended, and as often given
up—but they did not stop to say what effect they had upon
the general mass. No man, possessed of common sense, will
believe that they did not benefit many, but if better could be
substituted, it was  proper and right it should be so.   The
deliriums of fancy are not to be relied  upon.  Dr. Brown's
doctrine of too  much irritability and depletion was not more
visionary  than  Thomson's doctrine of heat  and  cold—the
keeping the fountain above the stream,  if below  it, by the
brandy bottle and letting down the heat by bleeding, bore a
strong analogy to Thomson's system of lobelia and steaming.
The lancet and the steams run parallel with each other—they
are both  depletives.   The theory of Thomson is by no means
new ; it is as old as the history of medicine—"heat  is life,'1
says hippocrates, and all the authors which succeeded him,
reiterate  the same doctrine; but they are not mad  enough to
blend cause and effect, as  he does.   Dr. Sangrado says to
his pupil, Gil  Bias  and the  rest of his  household—"drink,
my children, health consists in the suppleness and humecta-
tion of the parts;  drink  water in  great  abundance;  it is an
universal  menstruum that dissolves all kinds of salt.  When
the course of  the blood  is  too  languid, this  accelerates its
motion ; and, when too rapid, checks its impetuosity."  [Here
the court were indulging in  laughter.]   I have no design to
turn a grave subject into ridicule.   I am engaged in exposing
gross folly.  Thomson's universal menstruum or remedy is
heat, applied  in the two-fold novel practice  of lobelia and
steam.   Dr. Thomson has put forth one single agent, which
 is, and sustains the principle of life—heat.   But what be
 means by  heat,  he does not seem to understand, himself, and
 of course, I that do not  understand him, cannot tell you.—
 This I understand, at least—Thomson has started with, and
 maintained throughout his book, a deliberate  design to slan-
 der the whole medical world.  "The regular  physicians" are
 charged with trying "how much" poison "a patient can bear
 without producing  death."  The charge  is too malicious and
 preposterous to need comment.  With great self-complacency
 he  talks of the "learned doctors,"  and describes them al- 
99
though "learned" as ignorant of the plainest principles of their
science.   The "learned doctors" bleeding is against the con-
stitution and  life of the patient.  The learned  counsel  for
the defendant says, as an excuse for his slanders, Thomson
has been put to great  trouble and  expense, causelessly, by
certain  of the members of the  medical faculty—if it were
true, it  affords  no excuse  for  the  indiscriminate  slanders
which he deals out against the whole body—it is no excuse
for slanders at all.  Let gentlemen recollect the trial, read to
the court of this same Thomson, from the Massachusetts Re-
ports—let them read it  carefully, and they cannot come from
an examination  of it without feelings of detestation and hor-
ror, for the contemptible  discoverer of  medicines, which, in
his low cant,  he terms ram-cat, well-my-grizzle, and of such
stuff as "will go down, presently, and unscrew his  naval!"—
I am  not, strange as it may seem, coining names in contempt,
but repeat what the witnesses on oath  say, were the  names
given to his medicines by Thomson  himself.  Thomson must
be exceedingly ignorant of botany—in his description  of  the
plant from which he manufactures his nerve powder, he says,—
''There are four species of this valuable vegetable, one male,
and three females," &c. "The male is called yellow umbil,"
&.c.  "The female kinds are distinguished by the color of
the blossoms, which are red, red and white, and white," 8tc.
Was  such a thing ever known,  that in four "species" there
was but one male, and that one, of a different color from  the
three females, who have  distinct  colors, and yet the "four
species" preserve  their distinguishing characteristics of color,
and are propagated by "one male."  Truly, Dr. Thomson is
a surprisingly great discoverer! he is as much in advance of
the rest of the  world  in the knowledge of the science of
botany, (for he distinguishes the sexes of plants by the color
of the blossoms,) as he  is in  the science of medicine!
   An argument  has been forced out by the defendant's coun-
sel, to prove that the administration of the lobelia and  steam,
was in accordance with the ideas of the physicians—on  the
contrary, the physicians say,  that they are improper and dan-
gerous remedies.  Dr. Geddings tells you, that the immedi-
ate effects are, "to increase the circulation, and, consequently,
to produce a greater flow  of the blood to the heart and arte-
ries;" and, if carried  to a certain  extent, Dr. Cole says, "it
would not have a tendency to relieve congestion."  It is con-
tended on  the part of the defence, that they cannot do harm,
and that lobelia is  perfectly innocent—it is so efficacious, that 
100
 Mr. Sweeney calls it sampson.   Such a name is usually given
 to indicate  strength—I presume it is  so in the present in-
 stance; and, the greater the strength,  the  greater the injury
 liable to its administration.   The steam, as argued by the de-
 fendant's counsel, is not, necessarily,  small, because  of the
 size of the  aperture through which it enters the pipe—nor of
 the pipe, which is proved to be of the diameter of one inch;
 as is seen on the table of the  counsel.  The temperature of
 the steam, does not depend  upon the  pipe—the smaller the
 pipe, the greater the degree of heat from the steam, because
 the greater  the quantity of steam, the  greater the power of
 resistance  from  the  surrounding atmosphere.   [The  court
 smiled.]  I was not present, and did not know its tempera-
 ture and power of action, but have treated the subject on the
 gentlemen's mathematical principles.  This one thing is cer-
 tain—there were evidences of gross inattention and ignorance
 displayed in this part of the treatment.  The force of steam
 was so great that one of the witnesses  had to put his bander-
 chief next the  pipe,  before he could grasp it—and the dis-
 tance of the generator  from the steam  cot required great
 force of heat to propel it so far  and to keep up such a high
 temperature.   The physicians all say that it is their concur-
 rent opinion, the lobelia and steam administered in such ex-
 cess, were the cause of Hazelip's death.  That  they will pro-
 duce injurious  tendencies—affecting the stomach, intestines,
 lungs, liver and  brains—and give rise to congestion and in-
 flammations of their most important structures—because the
 increased circulation to the surface is  produced by an in-
 creased circulation of the heat and arteries, and when over
 action by its continuation  is produced,  engorgements, &c.
 are the necessary consequences.  [A comparison was then in-
 stituted between the degree of credence to be paid to the
 character  of the testimony, which went to show  that  the
 witnesses for the defence had  not equal judgment with the
 physicians in matters of fact respecting the tendency of the
 medicines administered—after  which,  the  attorney "general
 submitted the case to the decision of the jury.]
  Judge Brice then gave the jurv the followina
                       CHARGE.
  "This is certainly a case of much  importance, not only to
the public, but to the practitioners of medicine in general, as
well as to the individual whose conduct  is  now the subject
of investigation  ; and as it is not one of ordinary occurrence,
the jury will no doubt be  rather gratified than  otherwise in 
101
having the  assistance  of the court in  making up a correct
verdict.
   We have had several occasions  in the progress of this
cause, to state what we now think proper to repeat, that it is
not your province to decide on the  merits or demerits of the
Thomsonian theory and mode of practice, compared with
others.  Whether he has or has not made any valuable disco-
very in the science of  medicine,  as he  and his followers
assert he has, must be referred to the discussion of the learned
faculty and the test of experience; the province of the crimi-
nal code,  which we are called on to  administer, is confined
to  the  investigation of human actions and  motives  only.
Your inquiries, therefore, will be directed to what  was  the
actual effect and  operation  of  the  medicines used on  the
person of the deceased as causes of his death, and the qualifi-
cation of the prisoner to administer them, without regarding
the  particular system  or theory on which  his  practice is
founded. It will  depend upon your opinions on these subjects,
whether the death of the patient shall be attributed to  the
prisoner as his misfortune or his fault,—mistake or a crime.
   To support the issue on behalf of the State, it  must be
proved to your entire satisfaction that the deceased  came  to
his death by the  means stated  in  the  indictment.   If you
should be of opinion, that he did not, there is an end of the
cause; the prisoner must be acquitted—but if on the con-
trary, you shall be satisfied that the death  was caused by  the
medicine  used, and  other treatment directed by  the pri-
soner,  the latter   will be  criminally  responsible   for  his
agency, provided you  shall be satisfied from the evidence
that he was either grossly ignorant of his profession, or was
guilty of gross rashness and imprudence in the management
of the case under his care.  The first principle is adopted by
the  law  to prevent ignorant persons from a presumptuous
tampering with human  life, and  the second to enforce  the
duty of diligence in the administration of the means of cure
when once commenced.
   To avoid the imputation of gross ignorance, it  is not  ne-
cessary that the  physician shall have pursued any prescribed
course of study, or be attached to  any  particular system  of
medicine—nor is it material in the view of the criminal code
whether he has been licensed by the faculty or not; but it is
incumbent on him,  when required,  to give satisfactory proof
that he had, at least, what the law books term a general com-
petency,  and that  he  had acquired  from study or practice 
102
and observation, such a degree of skill and experience in his
profession  as  would  warrant a  discreet and  conscientious
man in believing  himself competent to discharge the duties
he had undertaken to perform.   In deciding on this part of
the case, the prisoner  will  be entitled to the benefit of the
very respectable testimony given of his skill and long expe-
rience, and of the success with which  he and others have
administered the same remedies which were used in the case
under consideration.  If you believe this testimony, we think
he will be  entitled to an acquittal  from the charge of gross
ignorance.
   If the general competency of the prisoner  is established to
your satisfaction,  the remaining enquiry will be as to  the
correctnesss of the imputation of gross rashness and extreme
indiscretion in the application of the means of cure adopted
by him.
   This is certainly a grave charge, and  if supported  by the
testimony, will justly consign  the prisoner to infamy  and
punishment;  but  before you  draw  such  a conclusion, it is
proper for  the court to inform you  that the  fact ought to be
sustained  by such cogent and irresistible proof as  will leave
no rational doubt on your minds of its truth; for where there
is a rational doubt, the rules of law, as well as the dictates of
charity,  prefer attributing the melancholy event to any other
cause which  is  consistent with the prisoner's innocence,
rather than to that reckless and criminal  indifference to
human suffering, which is characterised by gross rashness and
 want of due care.   Physicians are all deeply interested in the
question of responsibility  in cases  of this kind—they  are
often obliged  to  exercise a discretion which to by-standers
and unskilful  persons  may appear rash and unfeeling;  but
which may, nevertheless, be dictated  by  the soundest judg-
ment and  the kindest feelings  towards the  patient, and an
anxious desire to  promote his recovery.  To use the language
of Lord Hale,  "God forbid that a  failure should subject the
unfortunate practitioner to a criminal  prosecution, when he
has done the best he could to effect a cure."
   It will be for you, gentlemen, to apply these principles to
the  present  case, according to your understanding  of the
testimony.
   To  sum up the whole,  the court are of opinion, and so
direct the jury, that if they shall  find from the testimony  that
the prisoner was either grossly ignorant of his profession, or
acted with  improper rashness and want of due caution in the 
103
care of his patient, and shall also be of opinion that the
death of the patient ensued from the causes assigned in the
indictment, then they should find a verdict of guilty ;  but, if
on the contrary, the jury shall be of opinion, that the pri-
soner was possessed of reasonable competency in the line of
his profession, and that he applied the remedies to the best
of his judgment, and with an honest design, to effect a  cure
or prevent disease, he  is not guilty of the alledged crime,
although  the death was owing to the causes set forth in the
indictment."
        Verdict of the Jury, "NotGuilty." 
CONCLUSION.
  The subscriber begs leave to say a few words, in reference
to the subject of the preceding pages.   The gentlemen of the
bar either could not, or would not in  time,-furnish him  with
their arguments to the jury, and he was jcompelled'to mak«
use of his own very imperfect  memorandums,  taken during
the trial, for the purpose of giving  every satisfaction in his
power, to an anxious  public, respecting its whole history.—
As has been said before, the report of the testimony is  from
the notes of Mr. William G. Jones, a  member of the pannel
which tried him.   If  the undersigned  has omitted to record
any part of the arguments, mis-stated  the views of the speak-
ers, or failed in presenting any part, in the forcible, clear and
conclusive manner in  which they were delivered, he sincerely
craves their pardon.
  To the public, he would say, it appeared  to  him very un-
kind in the physicians, to whom he attributes the cause of all
his  vexations, to treat him as  they have done.  He has al-
ways  endeavored to manifest  a respectful and friendly de-
meanor towards them, for the proof of which, he refers to the
testimony of Dr. Isaac Cole—whom, until he proved himself
otherwise, he considered a friend.  Antecedent to the visi-
tation of the cholera, the subscriber followed his occupation,
(a printer,) without even the most remote expectation of re-
suming the  general practice of medicine, according to the
Tomsonian System, in the city of Baltimore.  When he heard
of its fearful ravages in other places, he was  half inclined to
go and grapple with, and lend  his aid in  subduing it—but,
his  lack of pecuniary  resources operated as  a  sufficient  dis-
couragement to restrain  him. The Cholera, at length, came—
it invaded the peace  and  lives of his fellow citizens.   Day
after day, he heard that the number of its victims were in-
creasing, and that the efforts of the scientific were inadequate,
and the spirits of many of them quailed, and  shrunk  from
the presence of the victims of  the fell destroyer—he  had
given, to alleviate  the miseries of his  fellow  beings, every
moment in his power to spare—but the cries of bitter distress,
demanded more—he gave  his all—his days and his utmost 
105
stretch of mind, and physical powers in furtherance of the in-
terests of others.*  There was a point beyond which his pecuni-
ary means could not be extended, and after laboring through the
brunt of the evil, but before its disappearance, he was compelled
to the decision—either to abandon the situation held in reserve
for him, when he chose to return to it, or abandon some of his
patients in their hour of greatest need.   What could he do ?
The cares and necessities of a large afid helpless family, re-
quired that  some safe provision should  be made  for them—
but,  what must  he do ?   The lives of his fellow beings de-
pended upon his attention  to them—in the face of,  perhaps,
penury and want—he determined  to cleave to the service  of
mercy rather than to selfishness.   Until  then  he  had never
charged nor received, pay from a single  individual for all he
had done.  The first opportunity that offered, which was but
a few days thereafter, Mr. Hazelip, (the gentleman with the
cause of whose death  he was  charged, and arraigned and
tried  by the criminal court in tliis^city,) was  forcibly wrested
from  him, and after the treatment pursued by Dr. Cole and

   •In addition to what is stated, in his conclusion, the writer  would
take the liberty to acquaint his fellow citizens, that, "before the chole-
ra was at its height  of destructiveness, but after  a demonstration of
the usefulness of Thomson's medicines had been  made—the writer be-
came the medium of communication between several of his Thomso-
nian brethren and the City Council, wherein it was proposed to attend
cholera  patients  in an hospital under their superintendance and con-
 trol, but furnished by the city, with the proviso, that, if the Thomso-
 nians  were not more successful  in that establishment than were others
 under like circumstances, then the  practitioners were not to be paid
 for their services, but if successful, what the city deemed a proper salary.
 Finding, through a friend, that  the committee appointed to consider it,
 were  expected to report unfavorably, on the ground of impropriety,
 because of a law of the state, which denied the priviledge of charging
 for  services, to any  but the members of  the medical and chirurgical
 facultv ; the subscriber changed the proposal, for the purpose of ob-
 viating that objection—and offered for himself and his brethren to  la-
 bor, &c. without remuneration.  But this proffer was also refused.
   Another case,  not unlike the above—two gentlemen, Thomsomnns,
 (one of whom had had very considerable practice) hearing that the
 cases of cholera were very numerous and fatal at the new alms house,
 proposed to attend all in their power under the Thomsonian system of
 practice without hope of reward.  Some of the trustees, (I  think they-
 call them) all that were present, agreed to the proposal—but, when
 the gentleman stated the object to the presiding physician, he promptly
 refused the proffered aid,—choosing rather to let  his patients run the
 risk of death, by his countinuance of their former mode of  treatment:
   1 cite the above circumstances to show  that the "conscience" of  the
 Thomsonians has proof of being liberal. 
107
Dr. Knapp in whose hands he died, persecuted and manned
by  many with all  the untiring malice of demons,   if the
treatment of >Mr.  Hazelip by me, (which I  deny) caused hia
death—some little allowance for the frailty  of human effort
might  have been made by men who were in the habit of
losing patients.   I had notv sought stealthily to foist myself
into practice.   1 went  openly and  boldly into it—not igno-
rantly, but knowing what  was called for by the necessities of
the times.   I had practiced successfully, and  was confident
in the applicability of  Dr.  Thomson's System and Practice
to meet the disease which the celebrated Magendie of France
characterized from all others by the saying " it (the cholera)
began where other diseases ended—in death."   In that con-
fidence, I took a delight in inviting the members of the med-
ical faculty to witness  my efforts—I invited all that gave me
an opportunity, among that number I invited Dr. Cole.   If
he  did  not visit my cases often, I was not censurable.  I
knew, or rather heard from good authority (I will not say how
honorably) that Dr. Cole had Thomson's book, and thought,
that as  he had,  or  ought  to have some knowledge of  the
medicines, he might see their good effects, and profit by it,
without the humiliating necessity of appearing to stoop to be
taught by the  practice of an irregular and  ephemeral physi-
cian.   I thought  he  would be able the better to save life—I
thought to impart to him, unasked,  the cheering evidences of
truth—but, at the first opportunity  the adder stung me, with
a view to the death of, at least, my reputation.   And he was
so ignorant too of Thomson's medicines, that he said to me
in the presence of his medical brethren and the coroner's
jury when I was before them, in reference to those medicines;
"I know all about  them;" and afterwards,  swore in open
court (he knew so little about them) that the No. 6, (a liquid
mixture) was a powder!  To this / will not demur, however
unaccountable—but, would advise such as  are  anxious to
know  "the whole truth, and  nothing but the truth," to  ask
James Gray, in Calvert street, two  doors North of Water st,
whether some  certain Dr.  Isaac Cole of his acquaintance,
has not purchased of him No. 6, at sundries, with an  ex-
pressed intention  to use it in conjunction with spirits of tur-
pentine, as an  embrocation on his  patient or patients.  "Let
justice be done—though the heavens fall!"   After what  has
been testified to in court—perhaps it may not be necessary for
Dr. Cole to report  that the  body of Mr.  Hazelip " was so
hot "on the post mortem examination  "that he could not 
108
bear to put his hand within it," and that " it was hot enough
to cook an egg."  Cooked to death "without an abrasion of
the  skin "—he  has  conceded to  me an art, not common to
men!  Dr. F. E. B. Hintze, good  soul, can now find some
rest  for  his tongue—he need not now hold forth to a large
concourse of people in  Second street, and  call  me by many
hard names—two defeats in one court  house are, or ought
to be sufficient  for a gentlemen of his stultiness  of effort.
To  Dr.  M. L.  Knapp, I  would say----but, "let  the dead
rest;" it  is, as a  certain  coroner expressed it, "a  case of self-
suicide."   Against the balance of  my medical opponents and
others, I have no  unpleasant  feelings;  and can cheerfully
and  heartily say—"bide ye well, and betide ye well."
  To the public,  let me mention, enpassant, that my straight-
ened circumstances would not allow me to await their bid-
ding as a Thomsonian practitioner—my  little all  had been
expended in relieving others from disease, and defending my-
self against the  machinations of my pursuers, and the re-ac-
tion could not be waited for; when by hard  labor and penny-
saving, I  can  be possessed of the necessary et cetera for
successful and genteel practice, I  intend, again,  to buckle on
the  physician, and enter the medical field, as  a practioner
with Dr.  Samuel Thomson's Patent Vegetable  Medicine.—
Until then,            Farewell,
                                   FRANCIS BURKE. 
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