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New Zealand Mail, Issue 764, 22 October 1886, Page 22

= After a duration of eight days the Hall-Houston trial, the most remarkable criminal trial on the records of this Colony, terminated last Tuesday in the conviction of one prisoner aud the acquittal of the other* The investigation throughout was admirably fair, patient and careful. Not the slightest disposition was manifested to strain the evidence or to press the case unduly against the accused. On the. contrary, the Attorney-General, while he brought to bear all his rare powers as an advocate in pleading the case for the CrowD, nevertheless resolutely resisted the temptation, which must have presented itself, to indulge iu rhetorical declamation against a crime of such peculiar atrocity, and studiously avoided any attempt to give the facts a deeper colouring or a stronger evidential value than that which naturally belonged to them. The relinquishment also by Sir Robert Stout of the right which, as Attorney-General, he could claim of replying on the whole case after the case for the defence should be completed, was another proof that

♦there was no disposition to weigh ’hardly on the accused. It may be Yvorth while to explain here that, had

Tfche counsel for the prosecution not been the Attorney-General, he would have had no right of reply, as no evidence •was offered for the defence, ft is •only the Attorney-General who can •claim, ex officio, such right if he think ififc. It might have been very necessary that this right should be exercised had the counsel for the accused •adopted a glaringly unfair course of ■comment on the evidence for the

♦Crown. The voluntary abandonment •of the privilege was at any rate to give ■the prisoners every possible chance. The only regrettable feature in the •conduct of this memorable case was

♦that to which we have previously •drawn attention, the levity—in our •opinion very unseemly—which at times pervaded the proceedings. A curious instance was noticeable, when the

•■announcement that one person, who might otherwise have been called as a witness, was dead, instantly

-excited an outburst of irrepressible j merriment! It seemed a somewhat .■ghastly subject of mirth, but as the solemnity of the entire case failed to impose any check on the hilarity of

•those present, it is scarcely surprising that the death of a possible witmess should appear quite too funny, ;and should elicit roars of laughter. There is no accounting for tastes. We do not desire to be unjust to these easily-amused people, and it is •quite possible that the laughter may have been a semi-hysterical act, a ■relief to overstrung nerves and overstrained attention. Still such risibility is usually suppressed with some sternness in so . grave a case. The chief blame attaches to those who deliberately sought to provoke the ill-timed merriment, which must have grated painfully on the ears of the accused and their friends. y

Of the verdict as it affects the male prisoner, Thomas Hall, there will bardly be two views. Probably no ■verdict was ever returned that will be more unanimously endorsed by public opinion. No other decision -could consistently have been amvedat. The case was marvellously and crush-

ingly strong against Hall, and we cannot call to mind any instance in which the chain of circumstantial evidence was more irresistibly complete in

■all its links. The only point even remotely assailable was the medical expert testimony. “ Doctors, differ,” ;as we all know, and there are often -strange differences regarding these chemical analyses. Had there been the slightest loophole, we maybe sure that the defence would have put in rebutting evidence, impugning the value of the tests used or the accuracy

•of the deductions drawn. The mere fact ■that this was not even attempted •would be in itself almost conclusive, in the celebrated Palmer case, Sergeant Shee, who led the defence, called Dr •Letheby and several other doctors and -chemists of high repute, who 1 absolutely contradicted and utterly repudiated the results deposed to by Dr Taylor and other experts on the opposite side. Inthiscase no such defence ■was ventured upon, manifestly because it was hopelessly impracticable. The ■endeavour to upset the indictment -on the technical point that antimony, •which the prisoners charged with administering, is a, metal, and not ■in itself an active poison, but only exercises toxic effects in combination with •other elements, was ingenious but transparently fallacious. The cifcation -of nitrate of silver as an analogous -case was a very clever stroke as =an advocate’s sophism, but was palpably unsound in its because in that combination it is the ■nitric acid that is poisonous and not the silver. It is curious that the •strictly analogous case of arsenic was not brought forward in reply. The poison commonly known as arsenic is in reality not arsenic at all, but arseni-<-ous acid —-a combination of the metal arsenic with oxygen. Tet we never bear of people being poisoned by ““ arsenious acid,” frequently as deaths are recorded (erroneously) from “ arsenic ” poisoning. The ■defeuce, so tar as Hall was concerned, was, in fact, hopeless from the ‘first, and Mr Joynt could only make the best of a bad case. No link was absent; the motive was proved to begin with ; the successive administrations of the poison were distinctly traced to Hall ;• the symptoms were •displayed by the victim, and the poison was fouud to have been present in the syslem; while the keystone was supplied by Hall’s de•meanour after the arrest, which -was inconsistent with innocence. Much as we may deplore so terrible a fall as his has been, and deeply as we all must sym-

pathise with the family whom he has so grievously disgraced, we cannot but feel that his conviction is just, and his sentence no more than his horrible crime has deserved. To dilate upon the heinousness of his act would be to waste words. No language could enhance the horror of the simple statement that he deliberately planned and ruthlessly carried out a scheme for the murder of his wife for the sordid object of pecuniary profit by her death.

The acquittal of the female prisoner, Margaret Houston, was no surprise, but it will probably not command the same unanimous approval that will be accorded to the other verdict. That the jury may have deemed the charge of complicity insufficiently proved, we can well understand, but we fail to discern the necessity for so enthusiastic a declaration that no stain rested on her character. .To say the least, Miss Houston acted in a singularly indiscreet manner and laid herself fairly open to grave suspicion. There is no doubt, however, that the evidence which so emphatically contradicted the supposition of immoral relations between Hall and herself, coupled with the virtual breakdown of certain testimony which imputed to her gross indelicacy of conduct, did a great deal toward persuading the jury that the other allegations to her discredit were equally susceptible of explanation or contradiction. It is to be hoped that the painful position in which Miss Houston has been placed, through the peculiarity of her behaviour, will operate as a warning to others. The sort of free-and-easy and affectionate familiarity between the master of a house and his wife’s young and pretty “ companion,” or “ lady-help,’’ described during the late case, may be very pleasant for the two people concerned, but it has obvious dangers.