Chapter XIII: Part 13

It is naturally to be expected, that the whole medical procession will be in array against those who, by their writings, even dare to insinuate that the resurrectionists have not been induced to commit murder, on account of the great facility with which the body is disposed of, and the deep and almost impenetrable secresy with which negotiations of that nature are carried on. The whole business, however, resolves itself into this simple question: is it, or is it not in the power of a professed surgeon, to whom a body may be offered for sale, to determine, on the very first view of it, whether the subject died a natural death, or whether force or violence has been used to effect the destruction of life? If the question be answered in the negative, that the surgeon has no means of arriving at a just conclusion, what then becomes of the boasted superiority of medical science over that which was possessed by our forefathers? and yet, it is not less true, that the medical profession must shelter themselves behind this shield of ignorance, if they are to stand wholly absolved in the eyes of the country for having secretly connived at the horrid practices of the Burkers. We remember that, on the trial of Bishop and Williams, Mr. Partridge was asked by what circumstance he was led to draw the conclusion that the body of the Italian boy had never been buried?--his answer was, that he was chiefly led to form that conclusion on account of there being no saw-dust in the hair! This information was a guide to all future Burkers, to take especial care that, in any future murders, that sign of inhumation should not be wanting; but it spoke very little for the extent of medical knowledge as to the appearance and symptoms of a violent death, that the conclusion of a murder should be drawn from a mere custom in no way connected with surgical science. It is undoubted, that the body of Mrs. Walsh and of Sarah Vesey were both of them disposed of to the anatomical schools; and in one instance, it was thought requisite by the head of one of our greatest hospitals publicly to deny the fact, that the body of the former had been purchased for the benefit of that institution. We have had before us, in the evidence of young Cook, the exact manner in which his mother deprived Mrs. Walsh of her life, and we have it also in evidence, that on the following day the negotiation for the sale of the body commenced. Now, what opinion must be formed of the extent of the medical skill of those persons, and we forbear to mention their names, to whom that body was offered, if they could not distinctly and immediately perceive that it had not come to its death by natural means, but by an act of the most determined violence? It would be drawing too largely on the credulity of any one to suppose for a moment, that persons daily and hourly acquainted with every mark and symptom of a natural death, should not be able at one glance to determine, that such could not be the case with the body of Mrs. Walsh. As to the absence of the usual symptoms of burial, we are silent upon them, because it is well known, that the resurrectionists do not obtain _all_ the subjects which they dispose of from the churchyard, but that they are indebted for a great number to the obliging civility of the keepers of the workhouses, particularly those who _farm_ the poor. It is not every coffin that leaves a workhouse that contains _what it ought to do_, and although the keepers may know how to shelter themselves from the probability of a discovery of acting as principals in the business, yet there are well known methods by which they secretly connive at the stealing of a body, which being well known to be that of a friendless creature, is never likely to be inquired after, nor demanded from their hands to be buried in any other manner than at the parish expense; the absence therefore of the usual symptoms of burial, may not therefore be considered sufficient to excite the suspicions of the surgical professor, but if he be unable to distinguish on the inspection of a corpse, and even on the very first view of it, whether it came by a natural or a violent death, to what conclusion are we then naturally driven, but that medical science is one of the greatest humbugs of the day? It is allowed that the medical men, who gave their evidence on the causes which occasioned the death of Carlo Ferrari, were decidedly in error; it is true, they all agreed that he came by his death by violence; but of the manner in which that violence was committed, they were manifestly ignorant, that is if that part of the confession of Bishop is to be credited, wherein he relates the manner in which he was accustomed to dispose of his victims,--and to that part of his statement we never heard that any discredit was attached. We, therefore, revert to the original question, was the surgical professor, to whom the body of Caroline Walsh was disposed of, before it had scarcely become cold, so utterly ignorant of the general symptoms of a natural death, as not to discern immediately that no such symptoms did present themselves in the corpse then before him, and consequently that he was morally and religiously bound, as in the case of Mr. Partridge and Mr. Hill, at the King's College, to institute a full inquiry into the causes of the death of the subject, and to hold the persons in custody who brought the corpse, until the requisite information had been obtained? We know, and it is a melancholy idea to entertain, that the improvement and knowledge of one of the most useful of human sciences, are made to depend on the services of a set of the most abominable miscreants who disgrace human society. It is certain that the proprietors of the anatomical schools, and even the heads of the hospitals, although in their hearts they detest the practices of the men, yet they are obliged to truckle and to display a degree of servile subserviency to them, or otherwise the means would be cut off by which their anatomical studies could be prosecuted. We have it from the authority of the proprietor of an anatomical school, that he dare not give offence to any of the resurrectionists, for that they have it in their power to ruin any anatomical school in the metropolis. This circumstance alone may account for that apparent indifference which has been exhibited by the heads of the hospitals, and the proprietors of anatomical schools, in ascertaining the causes by which a subject came by his death; for to express any suspicion that it was occasioned by violence, would be met by the most ferocious indignation, and accompanied perhaps by threats, not of the most pleasant nature. Subjects, say the anatomists, must be had, and we must not therefore give offence to those individuals, who are the only channel by which we can obtain those materials wherewith our studies can be prosecuted. We know of one instance, in which, subsequently to the execution of Bishop, a subject was taken to an anatomical school, and the proprietor proceeded to examine it, in order to ascertain the manner of its death, and having put some pertinent questions to the wretch who brought it, which were not very agreeable to _his feelings_, he with the most violent oaths, huddled up his nauseous load in his sack, swearing that he would never bring another subject to that school. Here, then, the medical men are placed in a state of great difficulty and embarrassment. With the consciousness that they have an important duty to perform, in investigating the cause of the death of the subjects which are offered to them, they also know that if such duty be performed, they have nothing more to do than to close the doors of their schools, or follow the advice of Mr. Sleight, and take to the dissection of calves and asses. One of the most celebrated resurrectionists of the present day, and who, we have good reason to believe, was the chief instigator of all the annoyance which Mr. Hill of the King's College has received, has been heard to declare that he would be d----d if he would take a body to any place, where any questions were asked him; and this man, who possesses an uncommon degree of natural shrewdness, once retorted upon a professor, who put rather a significant question to him,--' Have you been studying to your time of life, and not be able to distinguish at once between a Burked subject, and one that has died a natural death? It is only the fool that asks questions.' Thus it is at once apparent, that some legislative enactment is imperatively called for, by which the professors and students of one of the most useful and liberal of human sciences may be released from this degrading and disgraceful state of dependence on a set of wretches, who are the very refuse of society, and their high and honourable feelings not daily and hourly wounded by being slavishly obliged to truckle to the miscreants, for the very materials by which their professional pursuits can be carried on.

We may be accused for this prolixity in our discussion on this interesting subject, but the public attention is so keenly alive to every circumstance connected with it, and to the adoption of those measures, by which a repetition of the horrors may be avoided, by which the metropolis of this country has been of late, to its great dishonour and infamy, distinguished, that we would not allow the opportunity to escape us, of treating the subject in all its various bearings, and from which, perhaps, may result the gradual removal of those difficulties which beset the promotion of surgical education.

We shall now return to the alleged murder of Sarah Vesey, from which we were led to digress by the foregoing exposition of the conflicting opinions relative to the supply of the anatomical schools, which, trammelled as they are at present by legal enactments, are wholly incompetent to furnish the instruction that is so much desired, and on which the safety and health of the whole community may be said to depend.

Mrs. Cook, unfortunately, found Sarah Vesey too ready to lend a willing ear to all her artful and villainous insinuations, and she ultimately so well succeeded as to induce the girl to quarrel with the mistress with whom she lived, and without giving her any notice, left her house at night, not even taking her clothes with her.

The sudden and mysterious disappearance of the girl excited a considerable sensation in the neighbourhood, and the most active inquiries were set on foot to discover the fate which had befallen her. Amongst others, Mr. Lea, of the Lambeth-street police-office, was instructed to make some inquiries; and learning that the girl was in the habit of frequenting Mrs. Cook's room, he repaired thither, and with the knowledge he possessed of the infamous and abandoned character of the wretch, his suspicions were strongly excited as to the manner in which the unfortunate girl had been disposed of. On questioning two of the people who lodged in the same house with Mrs. Cook, Mr. Lea was informed that they remembered the girl coming about the time that she left her place to inquire if Mrs. Cook was at home, and Mrs. Cook met her on the stairs, and said, 'Come up, we are just going to supper; we have got some herrings and potatos.' It was one of the lodgers who lighted Sarah up stairs, and the following morning, about seven o'clock, the man was looking out of his window smoking his pipe. The room which was occupied by Mrs. Cook was above that occupied by this man, and on her looking out, and perceiving that her fellow-lodger was also looking out of his window, she exclaimed with an oath, 'What are you looking after? cannot you keep to your work?' The lodger, however, was not to be removed from his station by the obstreperous language of Mrs. Cook, but continued looking out at the window; and in a short time afterwards Cook was observed to leave the house with a sack on his shoulder, apparently containing something heavy. Cook being out of sight, Mrs. Cook called to the man below, saying, 'Now, you b----y snob, are you a bit the wiser for what you have seen? Can't a person remove a little rubbish out of their house, without having a set of devils to watch us?--Take care you are not caught in the trap some day or other.' From the natural dread which every one of the lodgers in the house entertained of this horrid woman, it was not deemed prudent to prosecute any inquiry into the circumstances of the conduct of Cook in carrying away a load, as it was termed, of rubbish from the house; for although the vicious and degenerate dispositions of Mrs. Cook were well known, it was not suspected that she went the length of murdering the unfortunate creatures whom she enticed within the precincts of her loathsome dwelling.

At the time of the disappearance of Sarah Vesey, she wore a particular kind of bonnet, made of brown silk, with a very flat crown; for some months after the disappearance of the girl, Mrs. Cook wore a bonnet of the exact description of silk, and similar in the make, &c. When Mr. Lea questioned young Cook respecting Sarah Vesey, the boy said, that he perfectly remembered a girl exactly resembling the description of Sarah Vesey coming to his mother's lodgings, and one night in particular she slept on the stairs. The boy further stated, on his making some inquiries of his mother respecting the girl, that she had no father nor mother, that she had been brought up in Whitechapel workhouse, and that it was from a feeling of humanity and charity that she gave the girl a lodging for the night. Of the ultimate fate of this unfortunate girl no doubt now remains in the minds of those who, in an official capacity, have been employed to make the necessary inquiries after her, for no trace of her whatever can be discovered, subsequently to the last time that she was known to enter Mrs. Cook's lodgings.

We have good reason to suppose that the body of this girl, as well as that of Mrs. Walsh, did not go out of the parish, and a particular individual, whom we shall have occasion to mention hereafter, is strongly pointed at as having been the purchaser of both the bodies. Here then we have an instance of a healthy young woman, without the slightest indication of any disease about her, secretly murdered by a female fiend, and her body immediately sold for dissection; and the medical man, whose experience ought to have enabled him immediately to distinguish the manner in which the subjects came by their death, clandestinely purchasing the bodies, and thus conniving at and encouraging the horrid crime of murder. It is in vain to attempt to mystify the matter, or to throw over these transactions the palliation of their existence as necessary evils; the fact will still always remain uncontrovertible, that it is the great facility attending the disposal of their ill-gotten property, the great gain attending it, and the almost certain escape from detection, the buyer being almost as deeply implicated in the crime as the seller, that has brought the crime of murder in this country to a system, which appears to set at defiance the strong arm of the law, and of which the discovery of a few solitary cases, and the punishment which has been inflicted upon the criminals, have not wholly abolished.

The cellar in Mrs. Cook's house was generally selected by her as the place in which to conceal her victims; this place was always covered with straw, for as it was a place to which all the lodgers had access, it was requisite that some material should be always ready at hand, wherewith to cover any subject that had fallen under her murderous grasp. In regard to herself, she would never allow a candle to be taken into this place, alleging the danger that might accrue from the straw taking fire; but the other lodgers demurred to this prohibition on the part of the hag, declaring that, from the extraordinary number of rats which infested the place, it was not safe to enter it without a light. One night one of the lodgers descended into the cellar, and to his great surprise found an old woman asleep in one of the corners of it. The man questioned her as to the manner in which she got admittance into the cellar, and the reason for secreting herself in such a loathsome and a dismal place, but to all his inquiries she either could not or would not give an answer. There was, however, little doubt that she had been enticed thither by Mrs. Cook, and that she was on that night to be included in the number of her murdered victims.

Keenly alive as the human mind is to every thing that is extraordinary and wonderful, yet in the cases of the murders committed by the Burkers, the crime appeared to be too great to be believed. It was treated by many as an idle tale, framed to feed the vulgar appetite for the marvellous, and too horrible for any credulity to be attached to it; nor need we wonder that the most credulous should have been startled by the recital of such atrocious cruelty, which far surpasses anything that is usually found in the records of crime. The offence of murder, dreadful as it is, is unhappily too familiar in our criminal proceedings; but such an artfully contrived and deliberate scheme, such a systematic traffic of blood as were disclosed on the trials of Bishop, Williams and May, of Calkin and of Mrs. Cook, were certainly never before heard of in this country. It is a new passage in our domestic history, it is entirely out of the ordinary range of iniquity, and stands by itself a solitary monument of villainy, such as would seem almost to mark an extinction in the heart of all those social sympathies which bind man to his fellow men, and even of that light of conscience which awes the most hardened by the fear of final retribution. In works of fiction, no doubt, where the writer to produce effect borrows the aid of his imagination, we have accounts of such deeds, perpetrated, perhaps, in the secret chambers of some secluded castle, or in the deep recesses of some lone and sequestered haunt. But the awful and striking peculiarity of the cases which we have been now exhibiting, lies not in the high-wrought scenes of romance, but in the sober records of judicial inquiry; a den of murderers in the very bosom of civilized society, in the heart of our populous city, amid the haunts of business and the bustle of ordinary life, who have been, if we may so speak, living on their fellow-creatures, as their natural prey. Words would fail to convey an idea of the sensation that was excited in the court, as, in the progress of the trial, the horrid details of the murder of Mrs. Walsh were gradually unfolded, independently of the novel and extraordinary scene which was exhibited of the guilt of the mother being proved by her own offspring. At every view of this unhappy story, it assumes a deeper dye. What a fearful character does it present of cunning and violence, the true ingredients of villainy. From first to last we see the same spirit of iniquity at work to contrive and to execute. We witness no doubt, no wavering, no compunctious visiting of the conscience, nor any soft relenting, but a stern deliberation of purpose that is truly diabolical; and it is fearful to reflect that persons capable of such crimes should have been so long haunting our streets, mixing in society, and coolly selecting subjects for their sanguinary trade.

Amongst the other peculiarities of the present cases, we may remark that such acts of savage atrocity are rather out of place in so civilized a community as that in which we live. They are not in unison with the moral tone of society. Crimes of violence are generally supposed to be the natural product of barbarism. They grow up to frightful maturity in that congenial soil; and all savage communities are accordingly distinguished by cruelty, and the most profligate indifference to human life. As mankind improve, and as knowledge is diffused, those crimes disappear, and are succeeded by others sufficiently odious, no doubt, but still of a less atrocious nature. The same process by which we cultivate the intellectual faculties, would seem also to open the heart to more humane sentiments, and to more kindly feelings. But however we may improve society and diffuse instruction, there is still a vast expanse of ignorance, poverty, and vice, which we may lessen by active efforts, but which we cannot altogether remove; and it is in this intellectual desert, if we may so speak, where nothing that is humane, enlightened, or moral ever springs up to refresh the eye, that crimes are produced. Under the influence of ignorance, all the best affections of the human heart wither and lie dead; and it is chiefly from those who are within its sphere that the ranks of crime are recruited, and that occasionally such wretches arise as Burke, Bishop, Williams, and Cook, who distance all competitors in iniquity, and shock the feelings of the age by their enormous crimes. It will generally be found that these criminals are not only wicked and immoral, but that they are uneducated and ignorant, living, no doubt, in a civilized community, and with certain habits of civilization, scarcely, if at all, raised above the level of savages. Hence the vast importance to society of the diffusion of knowledge, of bringing all ranks under some process of mental tuition, and of establishing schools where instruction and morality--for they go together--are retailed at a cheap rate. It is only in this way that we can insure the decrease of crimes, and more especially of such atrocious crimes as have been recently perpetrated.

It may appear paradoxical, but it is nevertheless true, that in proportion as civilization has advanced in this country, crime has risen in its enormity. The philosopher is at a loss to account for the existence of this anomaly; for if an effect be in direct opposition to the principles of the cause, there must be either something deficient in that cause, or that it has been erroneously selected as the means requisite to produce the desired end. The cosmopolite looks into the history of other nations, and comparing the extent of crime which took place whilst they were in a state of barbarism and ignorance, with that which is exhibited when they have emerged from their savage state, and the light of science and of learning has been diffused around them, he is struck with astonishment at the difference which is displayed, and is thence apt to draw his conclusion, that it would have been better for the interests of society if man had remained in his rude, uncultivated state, than, by enjoying the supposed advantages of civilization, have progressed in crime and villainy.

In regard to the principle that it is only the uneducated and the ignorant who are the perpetrators of the greatest crimes, our daily experience flatly contradicts it. May was by no means an uneducated man. And if we take a still further retrospective view, and investigate the character and condition of Burke, we are led still more decidedly to adhere to the opinion that the quantum of crime does not depend upon the extent or the deficiency of education. In fact, such is the strong tendency of mankind to revolt from the idea of such unnatural enormities being committed in aught of human shape, that when the system of traffic which had been practised by Burke and his associates first flashed in full disclosure on men's understandings, not a few were inclined to search, in some extenuating circumstances of this kind, for a cause of palliation of this unparalleled wretch's iniquity. It was at least not an impossible supposition that the wretched man might have been labouring under a total insensibility of moral and even of intellectual feeling, arising from an entire want of education, from a mind dull and inert in its perceptions, originally, and not only in after life allowed to lie waste, but rendered still more callous and impassive every day by a constant contact with scenes of infamy. Could we, indeed, imagine that Burke had been left to have his character formed under an accumulation of influences fatal and awful to contemplate as these are,--that his life had been always spent in profligate habits and dissolute haunts,--that he had been born with a ferocious and indocile nature, and bred in situations which barred all progressive movements to good,--that, in short, he never had any ideas poured into his intellect, or any human feelings generated in his bosom,--then, perhaps, it might furnish matter of curious investigation to the metaphysician, whether he were not, after all, a case which called for deep sympathy. But a sufficiency of the history of this extraordinary man has transpired to show that he at least was not placed in any such deplorable predicament. His education and rank of life, instead of having been by any means of the lowest order, were such as, in the judgment of the world, and on the authority of experience, are held of necessity to humanize and inform the mind, and to communicate perfectly just conceptions of moral distinctions. It must also appear singular that the mind of Burke was by no means closed against the truths of religion. He was brought up in the Roman Catholic faith; but as a Catholic, he was considered wonderfully free from prejudice, frankly entering into discussions upon the doctrines of his church, or those of other sects, with whose tenets he showed some acquaintance. He read the Scriptures, particularly the New Testament, and other religious books, and discussed their merits. On a Sabbath especially, although he never attended a place of worship, he was seldom to be seen without a Bible, or some book of devotion in his hands. He attended the prayer meetings which were held on the Sunday evenings in the Grass-market, Edinburgh, and was for some time remarked as one of its most regular and intelligent members. He never omitted one of its meetings, and expressed much regret when they were discontinued. In addition to this, many people hold it to have been made out that Burke was a man of strong mind, and of an understanding much superior to his condition. When, therefore, he stood convicted before his country as one who, for his livelihood, had been a wholesale dealer in human slaughter, he stood without the benefit of one single mitigating circumstance to weaken the profound sense of horror and indignation which pervaded all hearts.

We have touched upon this trait in the character of Burke, for the purpose of establishing the negative, that even religion is not sufficient to deter men from the commission of the most horrid crimes. We have recently had an instance in the case of Holloway, in whose mind the principles of religion were inculcated at an early period, and who professed to adhere to those principles whilst standing on the scaffold, that they were in themselves incompetent to deter him from the commission of one of the most horrid murders recorded in the annals of the country. If, therefore, neither education, civilization, nor religion be sufficient to effect the prevention of crime, to what other power are we to have recourse in order to bring about such a desirable benefit for the human race? We despair of giving a satisfactory answer to that question. The penal laws of the country have been found insufficient; in fact, notwithstanding their unexampled severity, and which is stigmatized as a national disgrace, the most heinous crimes continue to be perpetrated, as if there were no laws existing by which the criminal could be punished for his misdeeds.

It would occupy too much of our pages to enter here into any disquisition on the effect of capital punishments on the morals of the people; but we cannot forbear expressing our opinion that the legislators of this country appear to be the most ignorant of any of those nations professing to be civilized, in all matters on which the prevention of crime depends; and whilst they have before them such a splendid example of human wisdom as the code of Napoleon, they will still adhere to the customs of their forefathers, which assimilate not with the present state of society, and which have been found to be, and are declared wholly inefficacious as a remedy for the evil which they pretend to cure.

As a female, Mrs. Cook may be considered as one of the most atrocious murderers of the age in which she lived, or of any preceding one. Essentially, and in her real character, an ignoble, base, meanspirited wretch, this wholesale assassin, by the mere extinction or obliteration of every moral principle and feeling of her nature, now stands out in strong relief from the long and black catalogue of those who have most signalized themselves by their daring violation of the laws both of God and man. Ordinary homicides slay from passion or revenge; the murders they commit are the product of an ungovernable and overmastering impulse which hurls reason from her seat, and in the wild conflict of guilty passion, precipitates them into the commission of acts, which are no sooner done, than they would perhaps give the universe if they were undone. But Cook and her criminal predecessors possess the horrid and anomalous distinction of having, without the palliation of passion, or of any other motive which a just view of human infirmity can admit in extenuation, and from a base and sordid love of gain, and of acquiring the means of rioting in drunkenness, profligacy and iniquity of every sort, established a traffic in blood, upon principles of cool calculation, and an utter recklessness of either God or man, which would have done no discredit to Mammon himself. Hence it is that Bishop, Williams, and the others convicted of the horrid crime of Burking, are perhaps the only criminals who have died on the scaffold, not only without exciting an emotion of pity in a human bosom, but amidst the curses, both loud and deep, of the assembled thousands who witnessed the ignominious termination of their guilty career. The wild shouts of exultation which saluted them upon their appearance on the scaffold, and which rung in their ears with still fiercer acclamations when the world was closing on them for ever, must have appalled even the hearts of ice within their worthless bosoms, and sounded as the knell of a judgment to come, where the spirits of the slain would rise up before them, to demand a just retribution.

Were we to select any of the most atrocious cases which are recorded in the Newgate Calendar, we could not perhaps select one more appropriate to warn the juvenile offender from the horrid vice of drunkenness, than the case which is now before us of Mrs. Cook. To her inordinate love of spirits may be traced almost all the crimes which she committed. Her first step, after obtaining possession of her ill-gotten wealth, was to the gin-shop; where, having drank to excess, she would take home with her an additional quantity, wherewith to plunge herself in all the loathsomeness of drunkenness.

Would that we could here read a warning lesson to those who indulge themselves in the horrid vice of drunkenness, as the certain precursor of their final ruin, and the destruction of all their earthly hopes. There is scarcely any vice which entails more complicated misery upon the unhappy wretch that is a slave to it, than intoxication. It gradually undermines the strength and vigour both of body and mind. We every day see the most deplorable effects of this most shameful vice in the ruined health, constitution, and fortune of vast numbers of our fellow-creatures. How many ingenious and industrious persons has this vice rendered useless and worthless! How many happy families does it daily reduce to beggary and indigence! How many innocent sufferers does it involve in its deplorable consequences! How many have we known who began life creditably and reputably, with a basis on which, through industry and virtue, to rear the structure of an ample fortune, by contracting these fatal and cursed habits, have ruined themselves and their families for ever; for of all vices, there is no one so incurable as this, when it is once contracted. Other vices leave us with age; this fixes its roots deeper, and acquires strength and firmness with declining years. It kindles an infernal spark, which is absolutely inextinguishable.

It was, however, against the juvenile part of the community that Mrs. Cook directed her thieving propensities, in order to supply herself with the daily means of satisfying her desire for spirits. It was about two years ago that she decoyed a little boy from his home, by telling him that she would take him to see his aunt. She conducted him through several courts and alleys, from East Smithfield to Goodman's-yard; and then, having enticed him into one of the dark corners, took from him a quartern loaf, and the change of half-a-crown. She even took the frill off the child's neck, and then told him to stay until she returned. It is, however, surprising with what acuteness some boys are apt to watch the motions of others; and on this occasion all the actions of Mrs. Cook were strictly watched by a youth, as if a suspicion had taken root in his juvenile mind that some nefarious action was about to be perpetrated. He followed Mrs. Cook and her youthful victim to Goodman's-yard, and after having watched her departure, he joined the little dupe, who was anxiously awaiting the return of the 'good old lady,' and immediately took him home to his father, a jeweller, of the name of Harris, in East Smithfield, who made the boy a present of a silver medal for his good and meritorious conduct.

When Mrs. Cook was brought before the magistrates at Lambeth-street office, charged with the murder of Mrs. Walsh, she was identified as the person who had committed the theft on the unsuspicious boy. She, however, did not deny the charge, thinking it perhaps of minor importance, and seemed to treat it as a mere trifle, and wholly unworthy of her consideration. This, however, was by no means the only case which has come to our knowledge, in which this female fiend committed her depredations on the young and the helpless. About eight months ago, she was observed by a gentleman of the name of Chapman, from his back window in Prescott-street, which looks upon the Tenter-ground, playing with two children, and giving them cakes and apples. This lasted for about half an hour, when she ultimately succeeded in enticing them out of the ground. Mr. Chapman suspected that the woman had some evil design in view towards the children, as he judged, from the style of their dress, that they did not belong to her, and went into Prescott-street, for the avowed purpose of meeting her with the children. On coming up to her, he inquired if the children belonged to her; to which she answered, that, although they did not belong to her, she knew them very well, and was going to take them home; giving him at the same time to understand, that it would be as well if some people would attend to their own business, and not interfere with that which does not concern them. Mr. Chapman, however, was not to be daunted by the rude and insolent conduct of the wretch; and on further inquiry he found that everything which she had said was false, and done with the intent to deceive him. Her real design was to decoy the children to her home, and there either to rob them of their apparel, and turn them shivering into the streets, or secretly to make away with them, to replenish her funds towards the support of her drunken habits. During the time that she was confined at Lambeth-street office, under the charge of the murder of Mrs. Walsh, Mr. Chapman came to the office, and identified her as the same woman from whose devices he had rescued the two children.

Mr. Lea informs us, that he is acquainted with five persons whom Mrs. Cook had attempted to entice to her lodgings to sleep, but who were saved by the suspicious nature of her proceedings, and the infamy of her character, which was so well known throughout the whole of the neighbourhood where she resided. One circumstance, however, deserves particular mention, as it will display the art and cunning with which this wretch carried on her nefarious practices, and against which the most wary could not be always upon their guard. There was an old woman, whom Mrs. Cook had selected as one of her victims, and into whose good graces she had tried, though in vain, to ingratiate herself. She had pertinaciously refused to accept of her frequent invitations to drink a cup of coffee with her, and to spend a _social_ hour, as both of them had a great deal of time upon their hands, which might be agreeably passed over a cup of coffee; and perhaps she would be able to raise a sufficiency to purchase a quartern of gin wherewith to regale themselves before parting. Mrs. Cook soon found, that although no immediate attraction existed for the old woman in a cup of coffee, yet that there was something which could not be resisted in the glass of gin. She therefore began by throwing herself in the way of the old woman, who hesitated not to accept the invitation to enter the first gin-shop which presented itself; and Mrs. Cook began to rise many degrees in her good opinion, on account of the kind and liberal manner in which she treated her with her favourite beverage. Mrs. Cook soon perceived that the suspicions of the old woman were beginning to be lulled; and she at last admitted Mrs. Cook so far into her confidence, as to inform her of her place of residence; and it ultimately turned out, when almost in a state of complete intoxication, that the old woman confessed that she had for some time gained a precarious livelihood by robbing little children of their apparel, or any valuables that might be about them. Mrs. Cook was, however, too much upon her guard to make the same disclosure; but she saw in the confession of the old woman a certain instrument of accomplishing the purpose which she had in view. She was therefore determined to watch the motions of the old woman more narrowly, not doubting that she should soon succeed in entrapping her in one of her petty thefts, and then the remainder of her plan was easy of execution. The opportunity was not long in presenting itself; for having once detected her in taking a coral necklace from the neck of a child, she quietly betook herself home, and in a few hours afterwards she repaired, apparently in the greatest bustle, to the lodgings of the old thief, informing her that the police officers were in search of an old woman, answering in every particular her description, who was accused of having stolen a coral necklace from a little girl; and although she did not mean to say that the theft had been actually committed by her, yet as it was by no means improbable, she considered that it was but acting the part of the friend, supposing her to be guilty, to warn her of the danger which impended over her; and in what manner could she show her regard more strongly than by offering her an asylum in her lodgings until the officers had slackened in their pursuit, or had wholly relinquished it as a fruitless task. The snare was deeply laid; but in this instance it was cunning arrayed against cunning, and the victim escaped by removing herself from the neighbourhood altogether; but she was afterwards detected in her thefts in another part of the town, and sentenced to six months imprisonment, and hard labour in the House of Correction.

In regard to the manner in which Mrs. Cook disposed of the bodies, a considerable degree of light was thrown upon it by an anonymous letter, received by the Hon. G. C. Norton, of Lambeth police-office, in which letter some dark insinuations were thrown out respecting a medical gentleman, who was in the habit of giving lectures within four hundred yards of Mrs. Cook's house. It was also stated in this letter that Mr. J----y was very fond of cheap subjects; and, in fact, intimating that his house was the receptacle of dead bodies, no matter by what means they were procured. In consequence of the receipt of this letter, Mr. Lea requested Mr. J----y to attend before Mr. Norton, as it was natural to suppose that some information might be elicited from him, which might supply some links that were wanting in the chain of evidence against Mrs. Cook; for it was not improbable that the body of Mrs. Walsh might be actually traced into his possession. Mr. J----y, however, when before the magistrate, positively denied all knowledge of the body of Mrs. Walsh; and further, that he never knew the prisoner under the name of Cook, but under that of Ross; and that was merely from attending her in his professional capacity. At the time when she was under examination in the name of Cook, Mr. J----y almost took upon himself the character of her advocate; and he endeavoured very much to draw Mr. Norton's attention from the statement of young Cook, and even to discredit it altogether. He alluded particularly to that part of the statement which touched upon Mrs. Walsh having taken coffee with Mrs. Cook; as it was not to be supposed that a person of her character was not better acquainted with the anti-narcotic power of coffee, than to administer it to the person whose life she contemplated; and consequently the taking of the coffee would go in some degree to defeat the measure which she had in view. He himself, he said, always took coffee to keep him awake, whenever he had any nocturnal cases in hand; and there was no proof adduced that any soporific medicine had been administered to Mrs. Walsh, which, in all probability, would have been the case, had she committed the murder with which she was charged. He then proceeded to remark on the impossibility of the death of the old woman having taken place, according to young Cook's statement, without the most violent struggle; and further, that it almost amounted to an impossibility for Mrs. Cook to have committed the murder by her own individual power, without the assistance of some other person; nor was it likely that the father of the boy should be standing all the time that the work of death was going on, near the fireside, and withhold his assistance towards the accomplishment of the murder.

There is an old adage, which says, an injudicious friend is a dangerous enemy; and in this instance the warm and indiscreet manner in which Mr. J----y espoused the cause of Mrs. Cook, only aggravated the suspicions against her, at the same time that neither the private nor the professional character of the individual himself was exalted by the measure.

On leaving the office, Mr. J----y said to Lea, 'Some one will be let in for this by and bye;' an insinuation which had at the time its various interpretations; but the one to which the greatest probability was attached, was, that it had some reference to the collusion which existed between himself and the accused parties, relative to some previous transactions in the disposal of dead bodies, all of which were supposed to find their way to the lecture-room of Mr. J----y.

At another examination of the prisoners, Mr. J----y attended voluntarily, as he alleged, to speak to the magistrates. The prisoners, it being then early in the forenoon, were not yet brought up for examination; and Lea informed Mr. J----y that, if he wished it, he might then communicate to the magistrates what he had to say, as, most probably, several hours might elapse before the prisoners would be brought up. Mr. J----y, however, declined the offer, saying he would wait until the prisoners came; and he did actually wait in and about the office for nearly four hours. That a conduct of this kind was calculated to excite suspicion, may be easily conceived; for an individual seldom enters into the defence or justification of an accused person, without some ostensible motive being displayed. Friendship, or a long acquaintance, or personal interest, may induce a person to come forward and exert himself to obtain the exculpation of the accused party; but in the present instance the question was asked, what connexion could possibly exist between Mr. J----y and the Cooks, to sanction the zealous manner in which he presented himself to espouse their cause, at the same time that, on a previous occasion, he had publicly stated that he knew nothing at all about them? Mr. J----y has been heard to declare that he could always get plenty of cheap subjects, if he had the means of paying for them; and it has been ascertained, that although Mrs. Cook may be regarded as one of the most finished Burkers of her time, yet that she never disposed of any of her victims in those quarters where it was supposed she would most readily apply, and where the greatest prices were to be obtained, namely, the hospitals and the anatomical schools. She appeared to be contented with almost any sum she could obtain, to satisfy the immediate necessities of the day; and therefore the probability exists that she did actually dispose of her victims in that quarter, where confidence was established, and where cheapness was a primary object.

On one occasion Mr. J----y presented himself to the magistrates during the time that the prisoners were under examination; and although he was very pointedly asked the cause of his thus presenting himself so voluntarily before the magistrates, yet he sheltered himself under the plea of a love of justice, and therefore that he considered himself bound to come forward and state, in common justice to the accused parties, that he knew nothing at all about them, nor did he possess any knowledge of the manner in which they had disposed of the body of Mrs. Walsh. Having given this statement, Mrs. Cook turned to him, saying, 'Thank you, Sir; thank you, Sir.'

No doubt whatever exists that great suspicion attaches to this individual in regard to his dealings with the Cooks; for he was frequently heard to say, that he knew where to obtain cheap subjects, if he had but the means of purchasing them. In justice to him, it must, however, be stated, that no direct proof has ever been adduced of any of the victims of Mrs. Cook having fallen into his hands, nor during any part of the examination of Mrs. Cook or her husband was the name of this individual ever implicated. It is not to be supposed that at this remote period any clue will be obtained as to the actual disposal of the body of Mrs. Walsh, but of its ultimate fate, no doubt whatever rests on the public mind.

The police establishment of Worship-street had, however, scarcely finished their labours with Mrs. Cook and her associates, than the attention of the Worship-street officers was directed to other circumstances, which afforded strong grounds for suspicion that several Burking murders had been committed by some persons who had recently taken a house in Severn-place, Three Calfs'-lane, Bethnal-Green, described as a lonely spot near the fields between Bethnal-Green and the Whitechapel-road. A search-warrant was accordingly issued, and executed by the Worship-street officers, who apprehended three persons whom they found on the premises.

The prisoners, George Bradley, a young fellow about twenty years of age, Sarah Skinner, a young woman with whom he cohabited, and Louisa Covington, alias Carpenter, his sister, were placed at the bar for examination before Mr. Broughton; and Sarah Bradley, an elderly Irishwoman, mother of George, who had gone to the office to see the prisoners, was taken into custody, and placed at the bar with them.

Mrs. HANNAH SMITH, a respectable-looking, middle-aged widow, deposed that she lived at No. 6, Severn-place, and the two young women at the bar lived in the next house, No. 7. She had also seen a young man there, whom she believed to be the prisoner, George Bradley.

The prisoner, who wore a fustian jacket, was ordered to put on a white great-coat produced, and his hat, and the witness then said she was sure he was the person whom she had seen go in and out of No. 7.

The witness proceeded to state, that they were very small houses, only one story high, and the partition between them so thin, that in her apartment she could hear any talking or noise in the next house. On Wednesday evening she was sitting at work in her lower room, close to the partition, and heard a female voice faintly but distinctly cry 'Murder, murder!' and she then heard one man say to another, 'Hold the b----h, hold her!' Some boys then tapped at the window of No. 7, and called out 'Burkers,' and a female went and opened the door, but they had ran away.

The prisoner Covington here went into hysterics, and the examination was suspended until she recovered.

The witness, in continuation, said, that after what she had already stated took place, all remained quiet until about half-past eight o'clock, and she then heard a noise in the same room, like persons cording a box, and after that there was a stamping noise upon the pavement before the door, which was then opened.

Mr. BROUGHTON.--Was it a stamping of feet, as of persons carrying a load, or by way of signal?

WITNESS.--It was the signal used by the persons who went to that house. They always stamped upon the pavement, instead of knocking at the door. She then heard them carrying something out, and she went to her own door and looked out, and saw a box put upon a lad's head. She could not positively say that it was the prisoner Bradley. Three men then came out of the house and went after him, and two women followed. Witness then went back into her room. She did not give any alarm.

Mr. BROUGHTON.--You appear to be a respectable woman, Mrs. Smith; but how did it happen, that, having heard the faint cries of 'murder,' and some hours afterwards the cording of a box, which you saw carried away, you did not take any measures for having the parties stopped, by alarming the neighbourhood, or calling the police.

The witness said she did not know what to do. She felt some alarm for herself, and did not like to venture out; and she had not heard or seen a policeman pass between the time of her hearing the cry of murder, and the carrying off the box. Her niece, who lived with her, was at home at the time, and heard and saw the box, but had returned home after the cries of murder.

Mr. BROUGHTON.--You are badly off, indeed, in such a lonely situation, if you had no policeman pass all that time.

Mr. YOUNG, a police inspector, of K division, said that policemen were on duty, and must have been frequently past; but the witness might not have heard them, as they did not call the hour, like the old watchmen.

Mr. BROUGHTON.--Did you hear anything more of the people at No. 7 that night?

The witness said, that at nine o'clock, or shortly after, she heard a tap at the door, and the stamping of feet again; and looking out, she saw another box brought out, and put upon the lad's head by a tall man, who had on an old Witney white coat, and a dirty white hat. The box was followed by the men as before.