Trial of Mary BlandyPart 2 out of 6Establishment of Half-Pay, and that you do not issue any Moneys remaining in your Hands due to the sd. Lieut. Cranstoune." This shows the view taken by the Government of the part played by Cranstoun in the tragedy of Henley. There will also be found in the Appendix an extract from, a letter from Dunkirk, published in the _London Magazine_ for February, 1753, containing what appears to be a reliable account of the last days of Mary Blandy's lover; the particulars given are in general agreement with those contained in the various "Lives" above mentioned. Obliged to fly from France, where he had been harboured by one Mrs. Ross, his kinswoman, whose maiden name of Dunbar he had prudently assumed, he sought refuge in Flanders. Furnes, "a town belonging to the Queen of Hungary," had the dubious distinction of being selected by him as an asylum. There, on 2nd December, 1752, "at the sign of the Burgundy Cross," after a short illness, accompanied, it is satisfactory to note, with "great agonies," the Hon. William Henry Cranstoun finally ceased from troubling in the thirty-ninth year of his age. His personal belongings, "consisting chiefly of Laced and Embroidered Waistcoats," were sold to pay his debts. On his deathbed he was received into the Roman Catholic Church. The occasion of so notable a conversion was fittingly marked by the magnificence of his obsequies. "He was buried," we read, "in great solemnity, the Corporation attending the funeral; and a grand Mass was said over the corpse in the Cathedral Church, which, was finely illuminated." The impressive ceremonial would have gratified vainglorious Mr. Blandy had circumstances permitted his presence. Some account of the descendants of Cranstoun is given in a letter by John Riddell, the Scots genealogist, hitherto unpublished, which is printed in the Appendix. George Cranstoun, Lord Corehouse, Cranstoun's nephew, was afterwards an eminent Scottish judge. A word as to the guilt of Mary Blandy and her accomplice, which, in the opinion of some writers, is not beyond dispute. The question of motive in such cases is generally a puzzling one, and in the commission of many murders the end to be gained, always inadequate, often remains obscure. Barely does the motive--unlike the punishment which it was the sublime object of Mr. Gilbert's "Mikado" equitably to adjust--"fit the crime." Mary was well aware that she could not be Cranstoun's lawful wife, but hers was not a nature to shrink from the less regular union. Her passion for him was irresistible; she had ample proof of his chronic infidelity, but, in her blind infatuation, such "spots" upon the sun of her affection, were disregarded. She knew that, but for the L10,000 bait, her crafty lover would surely play her false; her father was sick of the whole affair, and if she went off with the captain, would doubtless disinherit her. As for that "honourable" gentleman himself, the inducement to get possession of her L10,000, the beginning and end of his connection with the Blandys, sufficiently explains his purpose. Was not the spirit of his family motto, "Thou shalt want ere I want," ever his guiding light and principle, and would such a man so circumstanced hesitate to resort to a crime which he could induce another to commit and, if necessary, suffer for, while he himself reaped the benefit in safety? Had he succeeded in securing both his mistress and her fortune, Mary's last state would, not improbably, have been worse than her first. So much for the "motive," which presents little difficulty. Then, with regard to the question whether, on the assumption of his guilt, Mary Blandy was the intelligent agent of Cranstoun or his innocent dupe, no one who has studied the evidence against her can entertain a reasonable doubt. Apart from the threatening and abusive language which she applied to her father, her whole attitude towards his last illness shows how false were her subsequent professions of affection. She herself has disposed of the suggestion that she really believed in the love-compelling properties of the magic powder, though such a belief was not inconceivable, as appears from the contemporary advertisement of a "Love Philtre," of which a copy is printed in the Appendix. She told her dying father that if he were injured by the powder, she was not to blame, as "it was given her with another intent." What that "intent" was she did not then explain, but later she informed Dr. Addington that it was to "make him [her father] kind" to Cranstoun and herself. In the speech which she delivered in her own defence she said, "I gave it to procure his love"; and again, on the conclusion of Bathurst's reply, "It is said I gave it my father to make him fond of me: there was no occasion for that--but to make him fond of Cranstoun." In her _Narrative_ she repeats this statement; but in her _Own Account_, written and revised by herself, she says, "I gave it to my poor father innocent of the effects it afterwards produced, God knows; _not so stupid as to believe it would have that desired, to make him kind to us_; but in obedience to Mr. Cranstoun, who ever seemed superstitious to the last degree." Here we have an entirely fresh (if no less false) reason assigned for the exhibition of the wise woman's drug; only, of course, another lie, but one which, disposes of her previous defence. Of the true qualities of the powder she had ample proof; she warned the maid that the gruel "might do for her," she saw its virulent effects upon Gunnell and Emmet, as well as on her father from its first administration, while her concealment of its use from the physician, and her destruction of the remanent portion, are equally incompatible with belief either in its innocence or her own. Finally, her burning of Cranstoun's letters, which, if her story was true, were her only means of confirming it, her attempts to bribe the servants, and her statements to Fisher and the Lanes at the Angel, afford, in Mr. Baron Legge's phrase, "a violent presumption" of her guilt. Cranstoun, even at the time, did not lack apologists, who held that Miss Blandy, herself the solo criminal, cunningly sought to involve her guileless lover in order to lessen her own guilt. This view has been endorsed by later authorities. Anderson, in his _Scottish Nation_, remarks, "There does not appear to have been any grounds for supposing that the captain was in any way accessory to the murder"; and Mr. T.F. Henderson, in his article on Cranstoun in the _Dictionary of National Biography_, observes, "Apart from her [Mary Blandy's] statement there was nothing to connect him with the murder." These writers seem to have overlooked the following important facts:--The letter written by Cranstoun to Mary, read by Bathurst in his opening speech, the terms of which plainly prove the writer's complicity; and the packet rescued from the fire, bearing in his autograph the words, "The powder to clean the pebbles with," which, when we remember the nature of its contents, leaves small doubt of the sender's guilt. "A supposition," says Mr. Bleackley, "that does not explain [these] two damning circumstances must be baseless." The nocturnal manifestations experienced by Cranstoun, and interpreted by his friend Mrs. Morgan as presaging Mr. Blandy's death, must also be explained. Further, it would be interesting to know how the defenders of Cranstoun account for the warning given him by Mary in the intercepted letter--"Lest any accident should happen to your letters, _take care what you write_." That this was part of a subtle scheme to inculpate her lover will, in the circumstances, hardly be maintained. As Mr. Andrew Lang once remarked of a hypothesis equally untenable, "That cock won't fight." Would Cranstoun have fled as he did from justice, and gone into voluntary exile for life, when, if innocent, he had only to produce Mary's letters to him in proof of the blameless character of their correspondence? and why, when on his death those letters passed into Lord Cranstoun's custody, did not that nobleman publish them in vindication of his brother's honour, as he was directly challenged to do by a pamphleteer of the day? The Crown authorities, at any rate, as we have seen, did not share the opinion expressed by the writers above cited; and from what was said by Mr. Justice Buller, in the case of _George Barrington_ (Mich. 30 Geo. III., reported Term Rep. 499), it appears that Cranstoun, for his concern in the murder of Mr. Blandy, was prosecuted to outlawry, the learned judge observing with reference to the form adopted on that occasion, "It was natural to suppose groat care had been taken in settling it, because some of the most eminent gentlemen in the profession were employed in it." "Alas! the record of her page will tell That one thus madden'd, lov'd, and guilty fell. Who hath not heard of Blandy's fatal fame, Deplor'd her fate, and sorrow'd o'er her shame?" Thus the author of _Henley_: A Poem (Hickman & Stapledon, 1827); and, indeed, the frequent references to the case in the "literary remains" of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries bear witness to the justice of that poetic observation. The inimitable _Letters_ of Horace Walpole contain, as might be expected, more than one mention of this _cause celebre_. Writing on 23rd March, 1752, to Horace Mann, he says, "There are two wretched women that just now are as much talked of [as the two Miss Gunnings], a Miss Jefferies and a Miss Blandy; the one condemned for murdering her uncle, the other her father. Both their stories have horrid circumstances; the first having been debauched by her uncle; the other had so tender a parent, that his whole concern while he was expiring, and knew her for his murderess, was to save her life. It is shocking to think what shambles this country is grown! Seventeen were executed this morning, after having murdered the turnkey on Friday night, and almost forced open Newgate. One is forced to travel, even at noon, as if one was going to battle." And again, on 13th May, "Miss Blandy died with a coolness of courage that is astonishing, and denying the fact, which has made a kind of party in her favour; as if a woman who would not stick at parricide would scruple a lie! We have made a law for immediate execution on conviction of murder: it will appear extraordinary to me if it has any effect; for I can't help believing that the terrible part of death must be the preparation for it." The "law" regarding summary executions to which Walpole refers is the Act already mentioned. To Henry Seymour Conway, on 23rd June, he writes, "Since the two Misses [Blandy and Jefferies] were hanged, and the two Misses [the beautiful Gunnings] were married, there is nothing at all talked of." On 28th August he writes to George Montague, "I have since been with Mr. Conway at Park Place, where I saw the individual Mr. Cooper, a banker, and lord of the manor of Henley, who had those two extraordinary forfeitures from the executions of the Misses Blandy and Jefferies, two fields from the former, and a malthouse from the latter. I had scarce credited the story, and was pleased to hear it confirmed by the very person: though it was not quite so remarkable as it was reported, for both forfeitures were in the same manor." This circumstance is noted in the _Annual Register_ for 1768, in connection with the death of Mr. Cooper, at the age of eighty. From the following references it would appear that the empty old house in Hart Street had acquired a sinister reputation. On 8th November Walpole writes to Conway, "Have the Coopers seen Miss Blandy's ghost, or have they made Mr. Cranston poison a dozen or two more private gentlewomen?"--the allusion being to the deaths of Mrs. Blandy and Mrs. Pocock; and again, on 4th August, 1753, to John Chute. "The town of Henley has been extremely disturbed with an engagement between the ghosts of Miss Blandy and her father, which continued so violent, that some bold persons, to prevent further bloodshed broke in, and found it was two jackasses which had got into the kitchen." [Illustration: Miss Mary Blandy in Oxford Castle Gaol (_From an Engraving in the British Museum_.)] Walpole barely exaggerates the wholesale legal butcheries by which the streets of London were then disgraced. "Many cartloads of our fellow-creatures are once in six weeks carried to slaughter," says Henry Fielding, in his _Enquiry_ (1751); and well has Mr. Whibley described the period as "Newgate's golden age." As for Tyburn Tree, we read in its _Annals_, for example, "1752. July 13. Eleven executed at Tyburn." We can only glance at one or two further instances of the diffusion of "Blandy's fatal fame." None of the varied forms of the _Newgate Calendar_--that criminous _Who's Who?_--fails to accord her suitable if inaccurate notice. With other letter-writers of the time than the genial Horace the case forms a topical subject. James Granger reports to a reverend correspondent that "the principal subject of conversation in these parts is the tragical affair transacted at Henley.... It is supposed, as there is no direct and absolute proof that she was guilty, and her friends are rich and have great interest, that she will escape punishment." To Mrs. Delany, writing the day after the execution, the popular heroine "appeared very guilty by her trial," but we learn that Lady Huntingdon had written a letter to Miss Blandy after her conviction. On 22nd April, 1752, Miss Talbot writes to Mrs. Carter, who thought Mary had been "too severely judged," that "her hardiness in guilt" was shocking to think of. "Let me tell you one fact that young Goosetree, the lawyer, told to the Bishop of Gloucester," she writes, with reference to Miss Blandy's repeated statement that she never believed her father a rich man. "This Goosetree visited her in jail as an old acquaintance. She expressed to him great amazement at her father's being no richer, and said she had no notion but he must have been worth L10,000. Mr. Goosetree prudently told her the less she said about that the better, and she never said it afterwards, but the contrary." Miss Talbot adds that certain letters in Lord Macclesfield's hands "falsify others of her affirmations." By 5th May, 1753, Mrs. Delany writes, "We are now very full of talk about Eliza Canning." As time goes on the tragedy of Henley, though gradually becoming a tradition, is still susceptible of current allusion. John Wilkes, writing from Bath to his daughter on 3rd January, 1779, regarding a lady of their acquaintance who proposed to keep house for a certain doctor, remarks "that he is sure it could not have lasted long, for she would have poisoned him, as Miss Blandy did her father, and forged a will in her own favour"; but Tate Wilkinson, in his _Memoirs_, observes, "Elizabeth Canning, Mary Squires, the gipsy, and Miss Blandy were such universal topics in 1752 that you would have supposed it the business of mankind to talk only of them; yet now, in 1790, ask a young man of twenty-five or thirty a question relative to these extraordinary personages, and he will be puzzled to answer, and will say, 'What mean you by enquiring? I do not understand you,'" So quickly had the "smarts" of the new generation forgotten the "fair Blandy" of their fathers' toasts. To make an end of such quotations, which might indefinitely be multiplied, we shall only refer the reader to Lady Russell's _Three Generations of Fascinating Women_ (London: 1901), for good reading _passim_, and with special reference to her account of the interest taken in the case by Lady Ailesbury of Park Place, who "was related to the instigator of the crime," and, believing in Mary's innocence, used all her influence to obtain a pardon. To Mr. Horace Bleackley's brilliant study of the case we have already in the Preface referred. It may, in closing, be worth while to remind the student of such matters that the year with which we have had so much concern was in other respects an important one in the annals of crime. On 14th May, 1752, the "Red Fox," Glenure, fell by an assassin's bullet in the wood of Lettermore, which fact resulted in the hanging of a guiltless gentleman and, in after years, more happily inspired an immortal tale; while on 1st January, 1753, occurred the disappearance of Elizabeth Canning, that bewildering damsel whose mission it was to baffle her contemporaries and to set at nought the skill of subsequent inquirers. Well, we have learned all that history and tradition has to tell us about Mary Blandy; but what do we really know of that sombre soul that sinned and suffered and passed to its appointed place so long ago? A few "facts," some "circumstances"--which, if we may believe the dictum of Mr. Baron Legge, cannot lie; and yet she remains for us dark and inscrutable as in her portrait, where she sits calmly in her cell, preparing her false _Account_ for the misleading of future generations. Like her French "parallel," Marie-Madeleine de Brinvilliers, like that other Madeleine of Scottish fame, she leaves us but a catalogue of ambiguous acts; her secret is still her own. If only she had been the creature of some great novelist's fancy, how intimately should we then have known all that is hidden from us now; imagine her made visible for us through the exquisite medium of Mr. Henry James's incomparable art--the subtle individual threads all cunningly combined, the pattern wondrously wrought, the colours delicately and exactly shaded, until, in the rich texture of the finished tapestry, the figure of the woman as she lived stood perfectly revealed. Leading Dates In the Blandy Case. 1744. 22 May--Marriage of Cranstoun and Anne Murray. 1745. 19 February--Birth of their daughter. 1746. August--Cranstoun meets Mary Blandy at Lord Mark Kerr's. October--Mrs. Cranstoun takes proceedings in Commissary Court. 1747. August--Second meeting of Cranstoun and Mary. Cranstoun visits the Blandys and stays six months. 1748. January--Cranstoun returns to London. 1 March--Cranstoun's marriage upheld by the Commissary Court. May--Mrs. Blandy's illness at Turville Court. Cranstoun pays a second six-months' visit to the Blandys. December--Cranstoun's regiment "broke" at Southampton. He returns to London. 1749. March--Mrs. Blandy and Mary visit Mr. Sergeant Stevens in Doctors' Commons. 28 September--Mrs. Blandy taken ill after her return home. 30 September--Death of Mrs. Blandy. 1750. August--Cranstoun returns to Henley. Puts powder in Mr. Blandy's tea. October--Cranstoun professes to hear nocturnal music, &c. November--Cranstoun leaves Henley for the last time. 1751. April--Cranstoun writes from Scotland to Mary that he has seen Mrs. Morgan and will send powder with pebbles. June--Powder and pebbles received by Mary, with directions to put the powder in tea. Mr. Blandy becomes unwell. Gunnell and Emmet ill after drinking his tea. 18 July--Cranstoun writes to Mary suggesting she should put the powder in gruel. 4 August--Gunnell makes gruel in pan by Mary's orders. 5 August--Mary seen stirring gruel in pantry. Mr. Blandy taken seriously ill in the night. 6 August--Mr. Norton, the apothecary, called in. Gruel warmed for Mr. Blandy's supper. 7 August--Emmet eats what was left the night before, and is taken ill. Mary orders the remains of the gruel to be warmed. Gunnell and Binfield notice white sediment in pan and lock it up. 8 August--Gunnell and Binfield take pan to Mrs. Mounteney, who delivers it to Mr. Norton. 9 August--Mr. Stevens, of Fawley, arrives and hears suspicions. 10 August--Gunnell tells Mr. Blandy of suspicions. Mary burns papers and packet. Dr. Addington called in. 11 August--Pan and packet given to Dr. Addington. He warns Mary. Her letter to Cranstoun intercepted. 12 August--Last interview between Mary and her father. 13 August--Mr. Blandy worse. Dr. Lewis called in. Mary confined to her room. 14 August--Death of Mr. Blandy. Mary attempts to bribe Harmon and Binfield to effect her escape. 15 August--Flight of Mary. Coroner's inquest. Mary apprehended. 17 August--Mary removed to Oxford Castle. 4 September--Cranstoun escapes to Calais. 1752. 2 March--Grand Jury find a True Bill against Mary Blandy. 3 March--Trial at Oxford Assizes. Prisoner convicted and sentenced to death. 6 March--Execution of Mary Blandy. 2 December--Death of Cranstoun. THE TRIAL AT THE ASSIZES HELD AT OXFORD FOR THE COUNTY OF OXFORD. TUESDAY, 3RD MARCH, 1752. _Judges_-- THE HONOURABLE HENEAGE LEGGE, ESQ., AND SIR SYDNEY STAFFORD SMYTHE, KNT., Two of the Barons of His Majesty's Court of Exchequer. _Counsel for the Crown_-- The Honourable Mr. BATHURST. Mr. Serjeant HAYWARD. The Honourable Mr. BARRINGTON. Mr. HAYES. Mr. NARES. Mr. AMBLER. _Counsel for the Prisoner_-- Mr. FORD. Mr. MORTON. Mr. ASTON. The Indictment. On Monday, the 2nd of March, 1752, a bill of indictment was found by the grand inquest for the county of Oxford against Mary Blandy, spinster, for the murder of Francis Blandy, late of the parish of Henley-upon-Thames, in the said county, gentleman. On Tuesday, the 3rd of March, 1752, the Court being met, the prisoner Mary Blandy was set to the bar, when the Court proceeded thus-- CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Mary Blandy, hold up thy hand. [Which she did.] You stand indicted by the name of Mary Blandy, late of the parish of Henley-upon-Thames, in the county of Oxford, spinster, daughter of Francis Blandy, late of the same place, gentleman, deceased, for that you, not having the fear of God before your eyes, but being moved and seduced by the instigation of the devil, and of your malice aforethought, contriving and intending, him the said Francis Blandy, your said late father, in his lifetime, to deprive of his life, and him feloniously to kill and murder on the 10th day of November, in the twenty-third year of the reign of our sovereign lord George the Second, now King of Great Britain, and on divers days and times between the said 10th day of November and the 5th day of August, in the twenty-fifth year of the reign of His said Majesty, with force and arms, at the parish of Henley-upon-Thames aforesaid, in the county aforesaid, did knowingly, wilfully, and feloniously, and of your malice aforethought, mix and mingle certain deadly poison, to wit, white arsenic, in certain tea, which had been at divers times during the time above specified prepared for the use of the said Francis Blandy to be drank by him; you, the said Mary, then and there well knowing that the said tea, with which you did so mix and mingle the said deadly poison as aforesaid, was then and there prepared for the use of the said Francis Blandy, with intent to be then and there administered to him for his drinking the same; and the said tea with which the said poison was so mixed as aforesaid, afterwards, to wit, on the said 10th day of November and on the divers days and times aforesaid, at Henley-upon-Thames aforesaid, was delivered to the said Francis, to be then and there drank by him; and the said Francis Blandy, not knowing the said poison to have been mixed with the said tea, did afterwards, to wit, on the said 10th day of November and on the said divers days and times aforesaid, there drink and swallow several quantities of the said poison so mixed as aforesaid with the said tea; and that you the said Mary Blandy might more speedily kill and murder the said Francis Blandy, you the said Mary Blandy, on the said 5th day of August and at divers other days and times between the said 5th day of August and the 14th day of August, in the twenty-fifth year of the reign of our said sovereign lord George the Second, now King of Great Britain, &c., with force and arms, at the parish of Henley-upon-Thames aforesaid, in the county aforesaid, did knowingly, wilfully, feloniously, and of your malice aforethought, mix and mingle certain deadly poisons, to wit, white arsenic, with certain water gruel, which had been made and prepared for the use of your said then father, the said Francis Blandy, to be drank by him, you the said Mary then and there well knowing that the said water gruel, with which you did so mix and mingle the said deadly poison as aforesaid, was then and there made for the use of the said Francis Blandy, with intent to be then and there administered to him for his drinking the same; and the same water gruel, with which the said poison was so mixed as aforesaid, afterwards, to wit, on the same day and year, at Henley-upon-Thames aforesaid, was delivered to the said Francis, to be then and there drank by him; and the said Francis Blandy, not knowing the said poison to have been mixed with the said water gruel, did afterwards, to wit, on the said 5th day of August and on the next day following, and on divers other days and times afterwards, and before the said 14th day of August, there drink and swallow several quantities of the said poison, so mixed as aforesaid with the said water gruel, and the said Francis Blandy, of the poison aforesaid and by the operation thereof, became sick and greatly distempered in his body, and from the several times aforesaid until the 14th day of the same month of August, in the twenty-fifth year aforesaid, at the parish aforesaid, in the county aforesaid, did languish, on which said 14th day of August, in the twenty-fifth year aforesaid, the said Francis Blandy, at the parish aforesaid, in the county aforesaid, of that poison died; and so you, the said Mary Blandy, him the aforesaid Francis Blandy, at Henley-upon-Thames aforesaid, in manner and form aforesaid, feloniously, wilfully, and of your malice aforethought, did poison, kill, and murder, against the peace of our said lord the King, his crown and dignity. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--How sayest thou, Mary Blandy, art thou guilty of the felony and murder whereof thou standest indicted, or not guilty? PRISONER--Not guilty. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Culprit, how wilt thou be tried? PRISONER--By God and my country. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--God send thee a good deliverance. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Cryer, make a proclamation for silence. CRYER--Oyez, oyez, oyez! My lords the King's justices strictly charge and command all manner of persons to keep silence, upon pain of imprisonment. CRYER--Oyez! You good men, that are impanelled to try between our sovereign lord the King and the prisoner at the bar, answer to your names and save your fines. The jury were called over and appeared. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--You, the prisoner at the bar, these men which were last called and do now appear are those who are to pass between our sovereign lord the King and you upon the trial of your life and death. If therefore you will challenge them, or any of them, you must challenge them as they come to the book to be sworn, before they are sworn; and you shall be heard. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Anthony Woodward. CRYER--Anthony Woodward, look upon the prisoner. You shall well and truly try and true deliverance make between our sovereign lord the King and the prisoner at the bar, whom you shall have in charge, and a true verdict give, according to the evidence. So help you God. And the same oath was administered to the rest (which were sworn), and their names are as follow:-- Anthony Woodward, sworn; Charles Harrison, sworn; Samuel George Glaze, sworn; William Farebrother, sworn; William Haynes, sworn; Thomas Crutch, sworn; Henry Swell, challenged; John Clarke, sworn; William Read, challenged; Harford Dobson, challenged; William Stone, challenged; William Hawkins, sworn; John Hayes, the elder, sworn; Samuel Badger, sworn; Samuel Bradley, sworn; William Brooks, challenged; Joseph Jagger, sworn. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Cryer, count these. Jury--Anthony Woodward, Charles Harrison, Samuel George Glaze, William Farebrother, William Haynes, Thomas Crutch, John Clarke, William Hawkins, John Haynes, sen., Samuel Badger, Samuel Bradley, Joseph Jagger. CRYER--Gentlemen, are ye all sworn? CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Cryer, make proclamation. CRYER--Oyez, oyez, oyez! If any one can inform my lords the King's justices, the King's serjeant, the King's attorney-general, or this inquest now to be taken of any treasons, murders, felonies, or misdemeanours committed or done by the prisoner at the bar let him come forth and he shall be heard, for the prisoner stands now at the bar upon her deliverance; and all persons that are bound by recognisance to give evidence against the prisoner at the bar let them come forth and give their evidence, or they will forfeit their recognisances. CLERK OF THE ARRAIGNS--Mary Blandy, hold up thy hand. Gentlemen of the jury, look upon the prisoner and hearken to her charge. She stands indicted by the name of Mary Blandy, of the parish of Henley-upon-Thames, in the county of Oxford, spinster, daughter of Francis Blandy, late of the same place, gentleman, deceased, for that she not having [as in the indictment before set forth]. Upon this indictment she has been arraigned, and upon her arraignment has pleaded not guilty, and for her trial has put herself upon God and her country, which country you are. Your charge therefore is to inquire whether she be guilty of the felony and murder whereof she stands indicted, or not guilty. If you find her guilty you shall inquire what goods or chattels, lands or tenements she had at the time of the felony committed, or at any time since. If you find her not guilty you shall inquire whether she fled for the same. If you find that she did fly for the same you shall inquire of her goods and chattels as if you had found her guilty. If you find her not guilty, and that she did not fly for the same, say so, and no more; and hear your evidence. The Hon. Mr. Barrington then opened the indictment. After which, [Sidenote: Mr. Bathurst] The Hon. Mr. BATHURST[1] spoke as follows:-- May it please your lordships and you gentlemen of the jury, I am counsel in this case for the King, in whose name and at whose expense this prosecution is carried on against the prisoner at the bar, in order to bring her to justice for a crime of so black a dye that I am not at all surprised at this vast concourse of people collected together to hear and to see the trial and catastrophe of so execrable an offender as she is supposed to be. For, gentlemen, the prisoner at the bar, Miss Mary Blandy, a gentlewoman by birth and education, stands indicted for no less a crime than that of murder, and not only for murder, but for the murder of her own father, and for the murder of a father passionately fond of her, undertaken with the utmost deliberation, carried on with an unvaried continuation of intention, and at last accomplished by a frequent repetition of the baneful dose, administered with her own hands. A crime so shocking in its own nature and so aggravated in all its circumstances as will (if she is proved to be guilty of it) justly render her infamous to the latest posterity, and make our children's children, when they read the horrid tale of this day, blush to think that such an inhuman creature ever had an existence. I need not, gentlemen, paint to you the heinousness of the crime of murder. You have but to consult your own breasts, and you will know it. Has a murder been committed? Who ever beheld the ghastly corpse of the murdered innocent weltering in its blood and did not feel his own blood run slow and cold through all his veins? Has the murderer escaped? With what eagerness do we pursue? With what zeal do we apprehend? With what joy do we bring to justice? And when the dreadful sentence of death is pronounced upon him, everybody hears it with satisfaction, and acknowledges the justice of the divine denunciation that, "By whom man's blood is shed, by man shall his blood be shed." If this, then, is the case of every common murderer, what will be thought of one who has murdered her own father? who has designedly done the greatest of all human injuries to him from whom she received the first and greatest of all human benefits? who has wickedly taken away his life to whom she stands indebted for life? who has deliberately destroyed, in his old age, him by whose care and tenderness she was protected in her helpless infancy? who has impiously shut her ears against the loud voice of nature and of God, which bid her honour her father, and, instead of honouring him, has murdered him? It becomes us, gentlemen, who appear here as counsel for the Crown, shortly to open the history of this whole affair, that you may be better able to attend to and understand the evidence we have to lay before you. And though, in doing this, I will endeavour rather to extenuate than to aggravate, yet I trust I have such a history to open as will shock the ears of all who hear me. Mr. Francis Blandy, the unfortunate deceased, was an attorney at law, who lived at Henley, in this county. A man of character and reputation, he had one only child, a daughter--the darling of his soul, the comfort of his age. He took the utmost care of her education, and had the satisfaction to see his care was not ill-bestowed, for she was genteel, agreeable, sprightly, sensible. His whole thoughts were bent to settle her advantageously in the world. In order to do that he made use of a pious fraud (if I may be allowed the expression), pretending he could give her L10,000 for her fortune. This he did in hopes that some of the neighbouring gentlemen would pay their addresses to her, for out of regard to him she was from her earliest youth received into the best company, and her own behaviour made her afterwards acceptable to them. But how short-sighted is human prudence? What was intended for her promotion, proved his death and her destruction. For, gentlemen, about six years ago, one Captain William Henry Cranstoun, a gentleman then in the army, happened to come to Henley to recruit. He soon got acquainted with the prisoner, and, hearing she was to have L10,000, fell in love--not with her, but with her fortune. Children he had before; married he was at that time, yet, concealing it from her, he insinuated himself into her good graces, and obtained her consent for marriage. The father, who had heard a bad character of him, and who had reason to believe, what was afterwards confirmed, that he was at that very time married, you will easily imagine was averse to the proposal. Upon this Captain Cranstoun and the prisoner determined to remove that obstacle out of their way, and resolved to get as soon as possible into possession of the L10,000 that the poor man had unfortunately said he was worth. In order for this, the captain being at Mr. Blandy's house in August, 1750, they both agreed upon this horrid deed. And that people might be less surprised at Mr. Blandy's death, they began by giving out that they heard music in the house--a certain sign (as Mr. Cranstoun had learned from a wise woman, one Mrs. Morgan, in Scotland) that the father would die in less than twelve months. The captain, too, pretended he was endowed with the gift of second sight, and affirmed that he had seen Mr. Blandy's apparition. This was another certain sign of his death, as she told the servants, to whom she frequently said her father would not live long. Nay, she went farther, and told them he would not live till the October following. When it was she first began to mix poison with his victuals it is impossible for us to ascertain, but probably it was not long after November, 1750, when Mr. Cranstoun left Henley. The effects of the poison were soon perceived. You will hear Dr. Addington, his physician, tell you Mr. Blandy had for many months felt the dreadful effects of it. One of the effects was the teeth dropping out of his head whole from their sockets. Yet what do you think, gentlemen, the daughter did when she perceived it? "She damned him for a toothless old rogue, and wished him at hell." The poor man frequently complained of pains in his bowels, had frequent reachings and sickness; yet, instead of desisting, she wanted more poison to effect her purpose. And Mr. Cranstoun did accordingly in the April following send her a fresh supply; under the pretence of a present of Scotch pebbles, he enclosed a paper of white arsenic. This she frequently administered in his tea; and we shall prove to you that in June, having put some of it into a dish of tea, Mr. Blandy disliking the taste, left half in the cup. Unfortunately, a poor old charwoman (by name Ann Emmet), glad to get a breakfast, drank the remainder, together with a dish or two more out of the pot, and ate what bread and butter had been left. The consequence was that she was taken violently ill with purging and vomiting, and was in imminent danger of her life. The poor woman's daughter came and told Miss Blandy how ill her mother was; she, sorry that the poison was misapplied, said, "Do not let your mother be uneasy, I will send her what is proper for her." And, accordingly, sent her great quantities of sack whey and thin mutton broth, than which no physician could have prescribed better, and thus drenched the poor woman for ten days together, till she grew tired of her medicines, and sent her daughter again to Miss Blandy to beg a little small beer. "No, no small beer," the prisoner said, "that was not proper for her." Most plainly, then, she knew what it was the woman had taken in her father's tea. She knew its effect. She knew the proper antidotes. Having now experienced the strength of the poison, she grew more open and undaunted, was heard to say, "Who would grudge to send an old father to hell for L10,000?" I will make no remark upon such a horrid expression--it needs none. After this she continued to mix the poison with her father's tea as often as she had an opportunity. Soon afterwards Susan Gunnell, another witness we shall call, happened to drink some which her master had left; she was taken ill upon it, and continued so for three weeks. This second accident alarmed the prisoner. She was afraid of being discovered. She found it would not mix well with tea. Accordingly, she wrote to Mr. Cranstoun for further instructions. In answer to it, he bids her "put it into some liquid of a more thickish substance." The father being ill, frequently took water gruel. This was a proper vehicle for the powder. Therefore from this time you will find her always busy about her father's gruel. But lest Susan Gunnell, who had been ill, should eat any of it, she cautioned her particularly against it, saying, "Susan, as you have been so ill, you had better not eat any of your master's water gruel; I have been told water gruel has done me harm, and perhaps it may have the same effect upon you." And lest this caution should not be sufficient, she spoke to Betty Binfield, the other maidservant, and asked her whether Susan ever ate any of her father's gruel, adding, "She had better not, for if she does it may do for her, you may tell her." Evidently, then, she knew what were the effects of the powder she put into her father's gruel; for if it would "do for" the servant, it would "do for" her father. But the time approached beyond which she had foretold her father would not live. It was the middle of July, and the father still living. At this Mr. Cranstoun grows impatient. Upon the 18th of July he writes to her, and, expressing himself in an allegorical manner, which, however, you will easily understand, he says, "I am sorry there are such occasions to clean your pebbles; you must make use of the powder to them by putting it in anything of substance, wherein it will not swim a-top of the water, of which I wrote to you of in one of my last. I am afraid it will be too weak to take off their rust, or at least it will take too long a time."[2] Here he is encouraging her to double the dose; says, he is afraid it will be too weak, and will take up too much time. And, as a further incitement to her to make haste, describes the beauties of Scotland, and tells her that his mother, Lady Cranstoun, had employed workmen to fit up an apartment for her at Lennel House. Soon after the receipt of this letter she followed the advice. And you will accordingly find the dose doubled. Her father grew worse, and, as she herself told the servants, complained of a fireball in his stomach, saying, "He never will be well till he has got rid of it." And yet you will find she herself, fearful lest he should get rid of it, was continually adding fuel to the fire, till it had consumed her father's entrails. Gentlemen, I will not detain you by going through every particular, but bring you to the fatal period. Upon the 3rd of August, being Saturday, Susan Gunnell made a large pan of water gruel for her master. Upon Monday, the 5th, the prisoner will be proved to go into the pantry where it was kept, and, after having, according to Mr. Cranstoun's advice, put in a double dose of the powder, she stirred it about, for a considerable time, in order to make it mix the better. When, fearing she should have been observed, she went immediately into the laundry, to the maids, and told them that "she had been in the pantry, and, after stirring her papa's water gruel, had ate the oatmeal at the bottom," saying that, "if she was ever to take to the eating anything in particular, it would be oatmeal." Strange inconsistence! She who had cautioned the maid against it not above a fortnight before, who had declared that it had been prejudicial to her own health, is on a sudden grown mighty fond of it. But the pretence is easily to be seen through. That afternoon some of the water gruel was taken out of the pan and prepared for her father's supper. She again in the kitchen takes care to stir it sufficiently, looks at the spoon, rubs some between her fingers, and then sends it up to the poor old man her father. He scarce had swallowed it when he was taken violently ill, and continued so all the next day, with a griping, purging, and vomiting. Yet she herself orders a second mess of the same gruel for her father's supper on the Tuesday, and was herself the person who carried it up to her father and administered it to him as nourishment. The poor old man, grown weak with the frequent repetition, had not drank half the mess before he was seized, from head to foot, with the most violent pricking pains, continual reaching and vomiting, and was obliged to go to bed without finishing it. The next morning the poor charwoman, coming again to the house, unfortunately ate the remainder of the gruel, and was instantly affected in so violent a manner that for two hours together it was thought she would have died in Mr. Blandy's house. The prisoner at this time was in bed; but the maid, going up to her room, told her how ill dame Emmet had been, at the same time saying she had ate nothing but the remainder of her father's water gruel. The prisoner's answer was, "Poor woman! I am glad I was not up, I should have been shocked to have seen her"--should have been shocked to have seen the poor charwoman eat what was prepared for her father, but was never shocked at her father's eating it, or at his sufferings! Gentlemen, in the afternoon of the Wednesday, notwithstanding the poor man, her father, had suffered so much for two days together, yet she again endeavours to give him more of the same gruel. "No," says the maid, "it has an odd taste; it is grown stale, I will make fresh." "It is not worth while to make fresh now, it will take you from your ironing; this will do," was the prisoner's answer. However, Susan made fresh, after which wanting the pan to put it in, she went to throw away what was before in it. Upon tilting the pan, she perceived a white powder at the bottom, which she knew could not be oatmeal. She showed it her fellow-servant, when, feeling it, they found it gritty. They then too plainly perceived what it was had made their poor master ill. What was to be done? Susan immediately carried the pan with the gruel and powder in it to Mrs. Mounteney, a neighbour and friend of the deceased. Mrs. Mounteney kept it till it was delivered to the apothecary, the apothecary delivered it to the physician, and he will tell you that upon trying it he found it to be white arsenic. Mr. Blandy continued from day to day to grow worse. At last, upon the Saturday morning, Susan Gunnell, an old honest, maidservant, uneasy to see how her poor master had been treated, went to his bedside, and, in the most prudent and gentlest manner, broke to him what had been the cause of his illness, and the strong ground there was to suspect that his daughter was the occasion of it. The father, with a fondness greater than ever a father felt before, cried out, "Poor love-sick girl! What will not a woman do for the man she loves? But who do you think gave her the powder?" She answered, "She could not tell, unless it was sent by Mr. Cranstoun." "I believe so too," says the master, "for I remember he has talked learnedly of poisons. I always thought there was mischief in those cursed Scotch pebbles." Soon afterwards he got up and came to breakfast in his parlour, where his daughter and Mr. Littleton, his clerk, then were. A dish of tea, in the usual manner, was ready poured out for him. He just tasted it and said, "This tea has a bad taste," looked at the cup, then looked hard at his daughter. She was, for the first time, shocked, burst into tears, and ran out of the room. The poor father, more shocked than the daughter, poured the tea into the cat's basin, and went to the window to recover himself. She soon came again into the room. Mr. Littleton said, "Madam, I fear your father is very ill, for he has flung away his tea." Upon this news she trembled, and the tears again stood in her eyes. She again withdraws. Soon afterwards the father came into the kitchen, and, addressing himself to her, said, "Molly, I had like to have been poisoned twenty years ago, and now I find I shall die by poison at last." This was warning sufficient. She immediately went upstairs, brought down Mr. Cranstoun's letters, together with the remainder of the poison, and threw them (as she thought unobserved) into the fire. Thinking she had now cleared herself from the suspicious appearances of poison, her spirits mend, "she thanked God that she was much better, and said her mind was more at ease than it had been." Alas! how often does that which we fondly imagine will save us become our destruction? So it was in the present instance. For providentially, though the letters were destroyed, the paper with the poison in it was not burnt. One of the maids having immediately flung some fresh coals upon the fire, Miss Blandy went well satisfied out of the room. Upon her going out, Susan Gunnell said to her fellow-servants, "I saw Miss Blandy throw some papers in the fire, let us see whether we can discover what they were." They removed the coals, and found a paper with white powder in it, wrote upon, in Mr. Cranstoun's hands, "Powder to clean the pebbles."[3] This powder they preserved, and the doctor will tell you that it was white arsenic, the same which had been found in the pan of gruel. Having now (as she imagined) concealed her own being concerned, you will find her the next day endeavouring to prevent her lover from being discovered. Mr. Blandy of Kingston having come the night before to see her father, on Sunday morning she sent Mr. Littleton with him to church; while they were there she sat down and wrote this letter to her beloved Cranstoun-- Dear Willy,--My father is so bad, that I have only time to tell you, that if you do not hear from me soon again, don't be frightened. I am better myself. Lest any accident should happen to your letters, take care what you write. My sincere compliments. I am ever yours. "My father is so bad." Who had made him so? Yet does she say she was sorry for it? No; she knew her father was then dying by that powder that he had sent her, yet could acquaint him she was herself better. Under those circumstances could caution him to take care what he wrote, lest his letters should be discovered! What can speak more strongly their mutual guilt? This letter she sealed with no less than five wafers. When Mr. Littleton came from church she privately gave it to him, desiring it might be directed as usual, and put into the post. Mr. Littleton was at that time too well apprised of this black transaction to obey her commands. He opened the letter, took a copy of it. Upon further recollection, carried the original to the father, who bid him open and read it. He did so. What do you think, gentlemen, was all the poor old man said upon this discovery? He only again dropped these words, "Poor love-sick girl! What will not a woman do for the man she loves?" Upon the Monday morning, after having been kept for two days without seeing her father, by the order of the physicians, her conscience, or rather fear, began to trouble her; she told the maid she should go distracted if she did not see her father, and sent a message to beg to see him. Accordingly she was admitted. The conversation between them was this--"Papa, how do you do?" "My dear, I am very ill." She immediately fell upon her knees and said, "Dear sir, banish me where you will; do with me what you please, so you do but pardon and forgive me. And as to Mr. Cranstoun, I never will see, write, or speak to him again." He answered, "I do forgive you, but you should, my dear, have considered that I was your own father." Upon this the prisoner said, "Sir, as to your illness I am innocent." Susan Gunnell, who was present, interrupted her at this expression, and told her she was astonished to hear her say she was innocent, when they had the poison to produce against her that she had put into her father's water gruel, and had preserved the paper she had thrown into the fire. The father, whose love and tenderness for his daughter exceeded expression, could not bear to hear her thus accused; therefore, turning himself in his bed, cried out, "Oh that villain! that hath eat of the best, and drank of the best my house could afford, to take away my life and ruin my daughter!" Upon hearing this the daughter ran to the other side of the bed to him; upon which he added, "My dear, you must hate that man, you must hate the very ground he treads on." Struck with this, the prisoner said, "Dear sir, your kindness towards me is worse than swords to my heart. I must down upon my knees and beg you not to curse me." Hear the father's answer, a father then dying by poison given by her hand--"I curse thee, my dear! No, I bless you, and will pray to God to bless you, and to amend your life"; then added, "So do, my dear, go out of the room lest you should say anything to accuse yourself." Was ever such tenderness from a parent to a child! She was prudent enough to follow his advice, and went out of the room without speaking. His kindness was swords to her heart for near half an hour. Going downstairs she met Betty Binfield, and, whilst she was thus affected, owned to her she had put some powder into her father's gruel, and that Susan and she, for their honesty to their master, deserved half her fortune. Gentlemen, not to tire you with the particulars of every day, upon Wednesday, in the afternoon, the father died. Upon his death the prisoner, finding herself discovered, endeavoured to persuade the manservant to go off with her; but he was too honest to be tempted by a reward to assist her in going off, though she told him it would be L500 in his way. That night she refused to go to bed. Not out of grief for her father's death, for you will be told by the maid who sat up with her that she never during the whole night showed the least sorrow, compassion, or remorse upon his account. But in the middle of the night she proposed to get a post-chaise in order to go to London, and offered the maid twenty-five guineas to go with her. "A post-chaise! and go to London! God forbid, madam, I should do such a thing." The prisoner, finding the maid not proper for her purpose, immediately put a smile upon her face--"I was only joking." Only joking! Good God! would she now have it thought she was only joking? Her father just dead by poison: she suspected of having poisoned him; accused of being a parricide; and would she have it thought she was capable of joking? When I see the assistance she now has (and I am glad to see she has the assistance of three as able gentlemen as any in the profession) I am sure she will not be now advised to say she was then joking. But it will appear very plainly to you, gentlemen, that she was not joking, for the next morning she dressed herself in a proper habit for a journey, and, while the people put to take care of her were absent, stole out of the house and went over Henley Bridge. But the mob, who had heard of what she had done, followed her so close that she was forced to take shelter in a little alehouse, the Angel. Mr. Fisher, a gentleman who was afterwards one of the jury upon the coroner's inquisition, came there, and prevailed with her (or in other words forced her) to return home. Upon her return, the inquest sitting, she sends for Mr. Fisher into another room and said, "Dear Mr. Fisher, what do you think they will do with me? Will they send me to Oxford gaol?" "Madam," said he, "I am afraid it will go hard with you. But if you have any of Mr. Cranstoun's letters, and produce them, they may be of some service to you." Upon hearing this she cried out, "Dear Mr. Fisher, what have I done? I had letters that would have hanged that villain, but I have burnt them. My honour to that villain has brought me to my destruction." And she spoke the truth. This, gentlemen, is in substance the history of this black affair. But, my lords, though this is the history in order of time, yet it is not the order in which we shall lay the evidence before your lordships and the jury. It will be proper for us to begin by establishing the fact that Mr. Francis Blandy did die of poison. When the physicians have proved that, we will then proceed to show that he died of the poison put into the water gruel on the 5th of August. After this we will call witnesses who from a number of circumstances, as well as from her own confession, will prove she put it into her father's water gruel, knowing it was for her father, and knowing it to be poison. Having done this, we will conclude with a piece of evidence which I forgot to mention before, and that is the conversation between her and Mr. Lane at the Angel. Mr. Lane and his wife happening to be walking at that time, finding a mob about the door, stepped into the alehouse to see the prisoner. The moment she saw a gentleman, though it was one she did not know, she accosted him, "Sir, you appear to be a gentleman; for heaven's sake, what will become of me?" "Madam!" said he, "you will be sent to Oxford gaol; you will there be tried for your life. If you are innocent, you will be acquitted; if you are guilty, you will suffer death." The prisoner upon hearing this stamped with her foot, and said, "Oh! that damned villain!" Then pausing, "But why do I blame him? I am most blame myself, for I gave it, and I knew the consequence." If she knew the consequence, I am sure there are none of you gentlemen but who will think she deserves to suffer the consequence. And let me here observe how evidently the hand of Providence has interposed to bring her to this day's trial that she may suffer the consequence. For what but the hand of Providence could have preserved the paper thrown by her into the fire, and have snatched it unburnt from the devouring flame! Good God! how wonderful are all Thy ways, and how miraculously hast Thou preserved this paper to be this day produced in evidence against the prisoner in order that she may suffer the punishment due to her crime, and be a dreadful example to all others who may be tempted in like manner to offend Thy divine majesty! Let me add that, next to Providence, the public are obliged to the two noble lords[4] whose indefatigable diligence in inquiring into this hidden work of darkness has enabled us to lay before you upon this occasion the clearest and strongest proof that such a dark transaction will admit of. For poisoning is done in secret and alone. It is not like other murders, neither can it be proved with equal perspicuity. However, the evidence we have in this case is as clear and direct as possible, and if it comes up to what I have opened to you I make no doubt but you will do that justice to your country which the oath you have taken requires of you. [Sidenote: Mr. Serjeant Hayward] Mr. SERJEANT HAYWARD--May it please your lordships and you gentlemen of the jury, I likewise am appointed to assist the Crown on this occasion, but His Majesty's learned counsel having laid before you so faithful a narrative of this dismal transaction, it seems almost unnecessary for me to take up any more of your time in repeating anything that has been before said; and, indeed, my own inclinations would lead me to cast a veil over the guilty scene--a scene so black and so horrid that if my duty did not call me to it I could rather wish it might be for ever concealed from human eyes. But as we are now making inquisition for blood it is absolutely necessary for me to make some observations upon that chain of circumstances that attended this bloody contrivance and detested murder. [Illustration: Captain Cranstoun and Miss Blandy (_From an Engraving in the British Museum_.)] Experience has taught us that in many cases a single fact may be supported by false testimony, but where it is attended with a train of circumstances that cannot be invented (had they never happened), such a fact will always be made out to the satisfaction of a jury by the concurring assistance of circumstantial evidence. Because circumstances that tally one with another are above human contrivance. And especially such as naturally arise in their order from the first contrivance of a scheme to the fatal execution of it. Having suggested this much, I shall now proceed to lay before you those sort of circumstances that seem to me to arise through this whole affair, and leave it to your judgment whether they do not amount to too convincing a proof that the prisoner at the bar has knowingly been the cause of her own father's death, for upon the prisoner's knowledge of what she did will depend her fate. Of all kinds of murders that by poison is the most dreadful, as it takes a man unguarded, and gives him no opportunity to defend himself, much more so when administered by the hand of a child, whom one could least suspect, and from whom one might naturally look for assistance and comfort. Could a father entertain any suspicion of a child to whom, under God, he had been the second cause of life? No, sure, and yet this is the case now before you. The unfortunate deceased has received his death by poison, and that undoubtedly administered by the hand of his own--his only--his beloved child. Spare me, gentlemen, to pay the tribute of one tear to the memory of a person with whom I was most intimately acquainted, and to the excellency of whose disposition and integrity of heart I can safely bear faithful testimony. Oh! were he now living, and to see his daughter there, the severest tortures that poison could give would be nothing to what he would suffer from such a sight. And since the bitterest agonies must at this time surround the heart of the prisoner if she does but think of what a father she has lost, I can readily join with her in her severest afflictions upon this occasion, and shall never blame myself for weeping with those that weep, nor can I make the least question but my learned assistants in this prosecution will with me rejoice likewise, if the prisoner, by making her innocence appear, shall upon the conclusion of this inquiry find occasion to rejoice. But, alas! too strong I fear will the charge against her be proved, too convincing are the circumstances that attend it. What those are, and what may be collected from them, is my next business to offer to your consideration. But before I enter thereupon I must beg leave to address myself to this numerous and crowded assembly, whom curiosity hath led hither to hear the event of this solemn trial, hoping that whatever may be the consequence of it to the prisoner her present melancholy situation may turn to our advantage, and reduce our minds to seriousness and attention. Solemn, indeed, I may well call it as being a tribunal truly awful, for this method of trial before two of His Majesty's learned judges has scarce ever been known upon a circuit; judges of undoubted virtue, integrity, and learning, who undergo this laborious and important work, not only for the sake of bringing guilt to punishment, but to guard and protect innocence whenever it appears. But you, young gentleman of this University, I particularly beg your attention, earnestly beseeching you to guard against the first approaches of and temptations to vice. See here the dreadful consequences of disobedience to a parent. Who could have thought that Miss Blandy, a young lady virtuously brought up, distinguished for her good behaviour and prudent conduct in life, till her unfortunate acquaintance with the wicked Cranstoun, should ever be brought to a trial for her life, and that for the most desperate and bloodiest kind of murder, committed by her own hand, upon her own father? Had she listened to his admonitions this calamity never had befallen her. Learn hence the dreadful consequences of disobedience to parents; and know also that the same mischief in all probability may happen to such who obstinately disregard, neglect, and despise the advice of those persons who have the charge and care of their education; of governors likewise, and of magistrates, and of all others who are put in authority over them. Let this fix in your mind the excellent maxim of the good physician, "Venienti occurrite morbo." Let us defend ourselves against the first temptations to sin, and guard our innocence as we would our lives; for if once we yield, though but a little, in whose power is it to say, hitherto will I go, and no further? And now, gentlemen of the jury, those observations I had before mentioned, I shall attempt to lay before you in order to assist you in making a true judgment of the matter committed to your charge. The author and contriver of this bloody affair is not at present here. I sincerely wish that he was, because we should be able to convince him that such crimes as his cannot escape unpunished. The unhappy prisoner, ruined and undone by the treacherous flattery and pernicious advice of that abandoned, insidious, and execrable wretch, who had found means of introducing himself into her father's family, and whilst there, by false pretences of love, gained the affection of his only daughter and child. Love! did I call it? It deserves not the name; if it was love of anything it was of the L10,000 supposed to be the young lady's fortune. Could a man that had a wife of his own, and children, be really in love with another woman? Such a thing cannot be supposed, and therefore I beg leave to call it avarice and lust only; but be it what it will, the life of the father becomes an obstacle to the criminal proceedings that were intended and designed to be carried on between them, and therefore he must be removed before that imaginary state of felicity could be obtained according to their projected scheme. Mark how the destruction of this poor man is ushered into the world--apparitions, noises, voices, music, reported to be heard from time to time in the deceased's house. Even his days are numbered out, and his own child limits the space of his life but till the following month of October. What could be the meaning of this, but to prepare the world for a death that was predetermined? Who could limit the days of a man's life but a person who knew what was intended to be done towards the shortening of it? In order to bring this about Cranstoun sends presents of pebbles, as also a powder to clean them, and this powder, gentlemen, you will find is the dreadful poison that accomplished this abominable scheme. From time to time mention is made of the pebbles, but not a syllable of the powder. Why not of the one as well as of the other, if there had not been a mystery concealed in it? Preparation is made for an experiment of its power before Cranstoun's departure. He mixes the deadly draught, but the prisoner's conscience, not yet hardened, forced her to turn away her eyes, and she durst not venture to behold the cup prepared that was to send the father into another world. Soon after this Cranstoun quits the family (having, no question, left instructions how to proceed further in completing the scheme he had laid for taking off the old man), and this you'll find by letters under his own hand, that the powder, whatever it was, must not be mixed in too thin a liquid, because it might be discovered, and therefore water gruel is thought fitter for the purpose. By the frequent mixtures that were made upon these occasions the unfortunate servant and charwoman accidentally drank part of the deadly composition. When complaint is made of their sickness, how does the prisoner behave? Does she not administer to them with as much art and skill as a physician could? Does she not prescribe proper liquids and draughts to absorb and take off the edge of the corroding poison? If she knew not what it was how could she administer so successfully to prevent the fatal consequences of it both in the maid and the charwoman? During this transaction the unhappy father finds himself afflicted with torturing pains immediately after receiving the composition from his daughter. Is there any care taken of him? Any physician sent for to attend him? Any healing draughts prepared to quiet the racks and tortures that he inwardly felt? None at all that I can find. He is left to take care of himself, and undergo those miseries that his own child had brought upon him, and yet had not the heart to give him any assistance. What could this proceed from, but guilty only? Would not an innocent child have made the strictest inquiry how her own father came to be out of order? Would she not have sought the world over for advice and assistance? But instead of that you hear the bitterest expressions proceed from her, expressions sufficient to shock human nature. They have been all mentioned already by my learned leader, and I will not again repeat them. Observe, as things come nearer the crisis, whether her behaviour towards her father carries any better appearance. When it began to be suspected that Mr. Blandy's disorder was owing to poison, and strongly, from circumstances, that the prisoner was privy to it, the poor man, now too far gone, being informed that there was great reason to suspect his own child, what expressions does he make use of? No harsher than in the gentlest method saying, "Poor love-sick girl! I always thought there was mischief in those Scotch pebbles. Oh, that damned villain Cranstoun, that has ate of the best and drank of the best my house afforded, to serve me thus and ruin my poor love-sick girl!" An incontestable proof that he knew the cause of his disorder and the authors of it. The report spread about the house of the father's suspicions soon alarmed the prisoner; what does she do upon this occasion? Can any other interpretation be put upon her actions than that they proceeded from a manifest intention to conceal her guilt? Why is the paper of powder thrown into the fire? From whence, as my learned leader most elegantly observes, it is miraculously preserved. What occasion for concealment had she not been conscious of something that was wrong? If she had not known what had been in the paper, for what purpose was it committed to the flames? And what really was contained in that paper will appear to you to be deadly poison. The long-wished-for and fatal hour at last arrives, and but a little before a letter is sent by the prisoner to Cranstoun that her father was extremely ill, begging him to be cautious what he writes, lest any accident should happen to his letters. Do the circumstances, the language, or the time of writing this letter leave any room to suppose the prisoner could be innocent? They seem to me rather to be the fullest proof of her knowing what she had done. What accidents could befall Cranstoun's letters? Why is he to take care what he writes, if nothing but the effects of innocency were to be contained in those letters? In a very short time after this the strength of the poison carries the father out of the world. Do but hear how the prisoner behaved thereupon. The father's corpse was not yet cold when she makes application to the footman, with a temptation of large sums of money as a reward, if he would go off with her; but the fidelity and virtue of the servant was proof against the temptation even of four or five hundred pounds. The next proposal is to the maid to procure a chaise, with the offer of a reward for so doing, and to go along with her to London; but this project likewise failed, through the honesty of the servant. The next morning, in the absence of Edward Herne (the guard that was set over her), she makes her escape from her father's house, and, dressed as if going to take a journey, walked down the street; but the mob was soon aware of her, and forced her to take shelter in a public-house over the bridge. Do these proceedings look as if they were the effects of innocence? Far otherwise, I am afraid. Would an innocent person have quitted a deceased parent's house at a time when she was most wanting to make proper and decent preparations for his funeral? Would an innocent person, at such a time as this, offer money for assistance to make an escape? I think not; and I wish she may find a satisfactory cause to assign for such amazing behaviour. Let us put innocence and guilt in the scale together, and observe to which side the prisoner's actions are most applicable. Innocence, celestial virgin, always has her guard about her; she dares look the frowns, the resentments, and the persecutions of the world in the face; is able to stand the test of the strictest inquiry; and the more we behold her, still the more shall we be in love with her charms. But it is not so with guilt. The baneful fiend makes use of unjustifiable means to conceal her wicked designs and prevent discovery. Artifice and cunning are her supporters, bribery and corruption the defenders of her cause; she flies before the face of law and justice, and shuns the probation of a candid and impartial inquiry. Upon the whole matter, you, gentlemen, are to judge; and judge as favourably as you can for the prisoner. If this were not sufficient to convince us of the prisoner's guilt, I think the last transaction of all will leave not the least room to doubt. When in discourse with persons that came to her at the house where she had taken shelter, what but self-conviction could have drawn such expressions from her? In her discourse with Mr. Fisher about Cranstoun you will find she declared she had letters and papers that would have hanged that villain; and, again, says, "My honour, Mr. Fisher, to that villain has brought me to destruction"; and, again, in her inquiry of Mr. Lane, what they would do with her, she bursts out into this bitter exclamation, "Oh, that damned villain!" Then after a short pause, "But why should I blame him? I am more to blame than he is, for I gave it him." How could she be to blame for giving it if she knew not what it was? And, as it is said, went yet farther, and declared, "That she knew the consequence." If she did know it, she must expect to suffer the consequence of it too. Thus, gentlemen, have I endeavoured to lay before you some observations upon this transaction, and I hope you will think them not unworthy of your consideration. I trust I have said nothing that relates to the fact that is not in my instructions; should it be otherwise, I assure you it was not with design. And whatever is not supported by legal evidence you will totally disregard. If any other interpretation than what I have offered can be put upon these several transactions, and the circumstances attending them, I doubt not but you will always incline on the merciful side where there is room for so doing. We shall now proceed to call our evidence. The other gentlemen, of counsel for the King, were Mr. Hayes, Mr. Wares, and Mr. Ambler. The counsel for the prisoner were Mr. Ford, Mr. Morton, and Mr. Aston.[5] Evidence for the Prosecution. [Sidenote: Dr. Addington] Dr. ANTHONY ADDINGTON[6] examined--I attended Mr. Blandy in his last illness. When were you called to him the first time?--On Saturday evening, August the 10th. In what condition did you find him?--He was in bed, and told me that, after drinking some gruel on Monday night, August the 5th, he had perceived an extraordinary grittiness in his mouth, attended with a very painful burning and pricking in his tongue, throat, stomach, and bowels, and with sickness and gripings, which symptoms had been relieved by fits of vomiting and purging. Were those fits owing to any physic he had taken or to the gruel?--Not to any physic; they came on very soon after drinking the gruel. Had he taken no physic that day?--No. Did he make any further complaints?--He said that, after drinking more gruel on Tuesday night, August the 6th, he had felt the grittiness in his mouth again, and that the burning and pricking in his tongue, throat, stomach, and bowels had returned with double violence, and had been aggravated by a prodigious swelling of his belly, and exquisite pains and prickings in every external as well as internal part of his body, which prickings he compared to an infinite number of needles darting into him all at once. How soon after drinking the gruel?--Almost immediately. He told me likewise that at the same time he had had cold sweats, hiccup, extreme restlessness and anxiety, but that then, viz., on Saturday night, August the 10th, having had a great many stools, and some bloody ones, he was pretty easy everywhere, except in his mouth, lips, nose, eyes, and fundament, and except some transient gripings in his bowels. I asked him to what he imputed those uneasy sensations in his mouth, lips, nose, and eyes? He said, to the fumes of something that he had taken in his gruel on Monday night, August the 5th, and Tuesday night, August the 6th. On inspection I found his tongue swelled and his throat slightly inflamed and excoriated. His lips, especially the upper one, were dry and rough, and had angry pimples on them. The inside of his nostrils was in the same condition. His eyes were a little bloodshot. Besides these appearances, I observed that he had a low, trembling, intermitting pulse; a difficult, unequal respiration; a yellowish complexion; a difficulty in the utterance of his words; and an inability of swallowing even a teaspoonful of the thinnest liquor at a time. As I suspected that these appearances and symptoms were the effect of poison, I asked Miss Blandy whether Mr. Blandy had lately given offence to either of his servants or clients, or any other person? She answered, "That he was at peace with all the world, and that all the world was at peace with him." I then asked her whether he had ever been subject to complaints of this kind before? She said that he had often been subject to the colic and heartburn, and that she supposed this was only a fit of that sort, and would soon go off, as usual. I told Mr. Blandy that I asked these questions because I suspected that by some means or other he had taken poison. He replied, "It might be so," or in words to that effect; but Miss Blandy said, "It was impossible." On Sunday morning, August the 11th, he seemed much relieved; his pulse, breath, complexion, and power of swallowing were greatly mended. He had had several stools in the night without any blood in them. The complaints which he had made of his mouth, lips, nose, and eyes were lessened; but he said the pain in his fundament continued, and that he still felt some pinchings in his bowels. On viewing his fundament, I found it almost surrounded with gleety excoriations and ulcers. About eight o'clock that morning I took my leave of him; but before I quitted his room Miss Blandy desired I would visit him again the next day. When I got downstairs one of the maids put a paper into my hands, which she said Miss Blandy had thrown into the kitchen fire. Several holes were burnt in the paper, but not a letter of the superscription was effaced. The superscription was "The powder to clean the pebbles with." What is the maid's name that gave you that paper?--I cannot recollect which of the maids it was that gave it me. I opened the paper very carefully, and found in it a whiteish powder, like white arsenic in taste, but slightly discoloured by a little burnt paper mixed with it. I cannot swear this powder was arsenic, or any other poison, because the quantity was too small to make any experiment with that could be depended on. What do you really suspect it to be?--I really suspect it to be white arsenic. Please to proceed, sir.--As soon as the maid had left me, Mr. Norton, the apothecary, produced a powder that, he said, had been found at the bottom of that mess of gruel, which, as was supposed, had poisoned Mr. Blandy. He gave me some of this powder, and I examined it at my leisure, and believed it to be white arsenic. On Monday morning, August the 12th, I found Mr. Blandy much worse than I had left him the day before. His complexion was very bad, his pulse intermitted, and he breathed and swallowed with great difficulty. He complained more of his fundament than he had done before. His bowels were still in pain. I now desired that another physician might be called in, as I apprehended Mr. Blandy to be in the utmost danger, and that this affair might come before a Court of judicature. Dr. Lewis was then sent for from Oxford. I stayed with Mr. Blandy all this day. I asked him more than once whether he really thought he had taken poison? He answered each time that he believed he had. I asked him whether he thought he had taken poison often? He answered in the affirmative. His reasons for thinking so were because some of his teeth had decayed much faster than was natural, and because he had frequently for some months past, especially after his daughter had received a present of Scotch pebbles from Mr. Cranstoun, been affected with very violent and unaccountable prickings and heats in his tongue and throat, and with almost intolerable burnings and pains in his stomach and bowels, which used to go off in vomitings and purgings. I asked him whom he suspected to be the giver of the poison? The tears stood in his eyes, yet he forced a smile, and said--"A poor love-sick girl--I forgive her--I always thought there was mischief in those cursed Scotch pebbles." Dr. Lewis came about eight o'clock in the evening. Before he came Mr. Blandy's complexion, pulse, breath, and faculty of swallowing were much better again; but he complained more of pain in his fundament. This evening Miss Blandy was confined to her chamber, a guard was placed over her, and her keys, papers, and all instruments wherewith she could hurt either herself or any other person were taken from her. How came that?--I proposed it to Dr. Lewis, and we both thought it proper, because we had great reason to suspect her as the author of Mr. Blandy's illness, and because this suspicion was not yet publicly known, and therefore no magistrate had Dr. Addington taken any notice of her. Please to go on, Dr. Addington, with your account of Mr. Blandy. On Tuesday morning, August the 13th, we found him worse again, His countenance, pulse, breath, and power of swallowing were extremely bad. He was excessively weak. His hands trembled. Both they and his face were cold and clammy. The pain was entirely gone from his bowels, but not from his fundament. He was now and then a little delirious. He had frequently a short cough and a very extraordinary elevation of his chest in fetching his breath, on which occasions an ulcerous matter generally issued from his fundament. Yet in his sensible intervals he was cheerful and jocose; he said, "he was like a person bit by a mad dog; for that he should be glad to drink, but could not swallow." About noon this day his speech faltered more and more. He was sometimes very restless, at others very sleepy. His face was quite ghastly. This night was a terrible one. On Wednesday morning, August the 14th, he recovered his senses for an hour or more. He told me he would make his will in two or three days; but he soon grew delirious again, and sinking every moment, died about two o'clock in the afternoon. Upon the whole, did you then think, from the symptoms you have described and the observations you made, that Mr. Blandy died by poison?--Indeed I did. And is it your present opinion?--It is; and I have never had the least occasion to alter it. His case was so particular, that he had not a symptom of any consequence but what other persons have had who have taken white arsenic, and after death had no appearance in his body but what other persons have had who have been destroyed by white arsenic.[7] When was his body opened?--On Thursday, in the afternoon, August the 15th. What appeared on opening it?--I committed the appearances to writing, and should be glad to read them, if the Court will give me leave. [Then the doctor, on leave given by the Court, read as follows:--] "Mr. Blandy's back and the hinder part of his arms, thighs, and legs were livid. That fat which lay on the muscles of his belly was of a loose texture, inclining to a state of fluidity. The muscles of his belly were very pale and flaccid. The cawl was yellower than is natural, and the side next the stomach and intestines looked brownish. The heart was variegated with purple spots. There was no water in the pericardium. The lungs resembled bladders half filled with air, and blotted in some places with pale, but in most with black, ink. The liver and spleen were much discoloured; the former looked as if it had been boiled, but that part of it which covered the stomach was particularly dark. A stone was found in the gall bladder. The bile was very fluid and of a dirty yellow colour, inclining to red. The kidneys were all over stained with livid spots. The stomach and bowels were inflated, and appeared before any incision was made into them as if they had been pinched, and extravasated blood had stagnated between their membranes. They contained nothing, as far as we examined, but a slimy bloody froth. Their coats were remarkably smooth, thin, and flabby. The wrinkles of the stomach were totally obliterated. The internal coat of the stomach and duodenum, especially about the orifices of the former, was prodigiously inflamed and excoriated. The redness of the white of the eye in a violent inflammation of that part, or rather the white of the eye just brushed and bleeding with the beards of barley, may serve to give some idea how this coat had been wounded. There was no schirrus in any gland of the abdomen, no adhesion of the lungs to the pleura, nor indeed the least trace of a natural decay in any part whatever." [Sidenote: Dr. Lewis] Dr. WILLIAM LEWIS[8] examined--Did you, Dr. Lewis, observe that Mr. Blandy had the symptoms which Dr. Addington has mentioned?--I did. Did you observe that there were the same appearances on opening his body which Dr. Addington has described?--I observed and remember them all, except the spots on his heart. Is it your real opinion that those symptoms and those appearances were owing to poison?--Yes. And that he died of poison?--Absolutely. [Sidenote: Dr. Addington] Dr. ADDINGTON, cross-examined--Did you first intimate to Mr. Blandy, or he to you, that he had been poisoned?--He first intimated it to me. Did you ask him whether he was certain that he had been poisoned by the gruel that he took on Monday night, August the 5th, and on Tuesday night, August the 6th?--I do not recollect that I did. Are you sure that he said he was disordered after drinking the gruel on Monday night, the 5th of August?--Yes. Did you over ask him why he drank more gruel on Tuesday night, August the 6th?--I believe I did not. When did you make experiments on the powder delivered to you by Mr. Norton?--I made some the next day; but many more some time afterwards. How long afterwards?--I cannot just say; it might be a month or more. How often had you powder given you?--Twice. Did you make experiments with both parcels?--Yes; but I gave the greatest part of the first to Mr. King, an experienced chemist in Reading, and desired that he would examine it, which he did, and he told me that it was white arsenic. The second parcel was used in trials made by myself. Who had the second parcel in keeping till you tried it?--I had it, and kept it either in my pocket or under lock and key. Did you never show it to anybody?--Yes, to several persons; but trusted nobody with it out of my sight. Why do you believe it to be white arsenic?--For the following reasons:--(1) This powder has a milky whiteness; so has white arsenic. (2) This is gritty and almost insipid; so is white arsenic. (3) Part of it swims on the surface of cold water, like a pale sulphurous film, but the greatest part sinks to the bottom, and remains there undissolved; the same is true of white arsenic. (4) This thrown on red-hot iron does not flame, but rises entirely in thick white fumes, which have the stench of garlic, and cover cold iron held just over them with white flowers; white arsenic does the same. (5) I boiled 10 grains of this powder in 4 ounces of clean water, and then, passing the decoction through a filter, divided it into five equal parts, which were put into as many glasses--into one glass I poured a few drops of spirit of sal ammoniac, into another some of the lixivium of tartar, into the third some strong spirit of vitriol, into the fourth some spirit of salt, and into the last some syrup of violets. The spirit of sal ammoniac threw down a few particles of pale sediment. The lixivium of tartar gave a white cloud, which hung a little above the middle of the glass. The spirits of vitriol and salt made a considerable precipitation of lightish coloured substance, which, in the former hardened into glittering crystals, sticking to the sides and bottom of the glass. Syrup of violets produced a beautiful pale green tincture. Having washed the sauce pan, funnel, and glasses used in the foregoing experiments very clean, and provided a fresh filter, I boiled 10 grains of white arsenic, bought of Mr. Wilcock, druggist in Reading, in 4 ounces of clean water, and, filtering and dividing it into five equal parts, proceeded with them just as I had done with the former decoctions. There was an exact similitude between the experiments made on the two decoctions. They corresponded so nicely in each trial that I declare I never saw any two things in Nature more alike the decoction made with the powder found in Mr. Blandy's gruel and that made with white arsenic. From these experiments, and others which I am ready to produce if desired, I believe that powder to be white arsenic. Did any person make these experiments with you?--No, but Mr. Wilcock, the druggist, was present while I made them; and he weighed both the powder and the white arsenic. When did Mr. Blandy first take medicines by your order?--As soon as he could swallow, on Saturday night, the 10th August. Before that time he was under the care of Mr. Norton. [Sidenote: B. Norton] BENJAMIN NORTON, examined--I live at Henley; I remember being sent for to Mrs. Mounteney's, in Henley, on Thursday, the 8th August, in order to show me the powder. There was with her Susan Gunnell, the servant maid. She brought in a pan. I looked at it and endeavoured to take it out that I might give a better account of it, for as it lay it was not possible to see what it was; then I laid it on white paper and delivered it to Mrs. Mounteney to take care of till it dried. She kept it till Sunday morning, then I had it to show to Dr. Addington. I saw the doctor try it once at my house upon a red-hot poker, upon which I did imagine it was of the arsenic kind. Did you attend the deceased while he was ill?--I did. I went on the 6th of August. He told me he was ill, as he imagined, of a fit of the colic. He complained of a violent pain in his stomach, attended with great reachings, and swelled, and a great purging. I carried him physic, which he took on the Wednesday morning; he was then better. On the Thursday morning, as I was going, I met the maid. She told me he was not up, so I went about twelve. He was then with a client in the study. He told me the physic had done him a great deal of service, and desired more. I sent him some to take on Friday morning; I was not with him after Thursday.[9] Had you used to attend him?--I had for several years. The last illness he had before was in July, 1750. I used to attend him. Did you ever hear Miss Blandy talk of music?--I did. She said she had heard it in the house, and she feared something would happen in the family. She did not say anything particular, because I made very light of it. Did she say anything of apparitions?--She said Mr. Cranstoun saw her father's apparition one night. How long before his death was it that she talked about music?--It might be about three or four months before. Was the powder you delivered to Dr. Addington the self-same powder you received of Mrs. Mounteney?--It was the very same; it had not been out of my custody. Should you know it again?--I have some of the same now in my pocket. [He produces a paper sealed up with the Earl of Macclesfield's and Lord Cadogan's seals upon it.] This is some of the same that I delivered to Dr. Addington. Cross-examined--Who sent for you to the house?--I cannot tell that. When you came, did you see Miss Blandy?--I did. She and Mr. Blandy were both together. What conversation had you then?--I asked Mr. Blandy whether or no he had eaten anything that he thought disagreed with him? Miss Blandy made answer, and said her papa had had nothing that she knew of except some peas on the Saturday night before. Did you hear anything of water gruel?--I knew nothing of that till it was brought to me. Had you any suspicion of poison then?--I had not, nor Mr. Blandy had not mentioned anything of being poisoned by having taken water gruel. What did Miss Blandy say to you?--She desired me to be careful of her father in his illness. Did she show any dislike to his having physic?--No, none at all. She desired, when I saw any danger, I would let her know it, that she might have the advice of a physician. When was this?--This was on Saturday, the 10th. When he grew worse, did she advise a physician might be called in?--Yes, she did, after I said he was worse. She then begged that Dr. Addington might be sent for. Mr. Blandy was for deferring it till next day, but when I came down she asked if I thought him in danger. I said, "He is," then she said, "Though he seems to be against it, I will send for a doctor directly," and sent away a man unknown to him. Was he for delaying?--He was, till the next morning. How had she behaved to him in any other illness of her father's?--I never saw but at such times she behaved with true affection and regard. Had she used to be much with him?--She used to be backwards and forwards with him in the room. Did you give any intimation to Miss Blandy after the powder was tried?--I did not, but went up to acquaint her uncle. He was so affected he could not come down to apprise Mr. Blandy of it. When did she first know that you knew of it?--I never knew she knew of it till the Monday. How came you to suspect that at the bottom of the pan to be poison?--I found it very gritty, and had no smell. When I went down and saw the old washerwoman, that she had tasted of the water gruel and was affected with the same symptoms as Mr. Blandy, I then suspected he was poisoned, and said I was afraid Mr. Blandy had had foul play; but I did not tell either him or Miss Blandy so, because I found by the maid that Miss Blandy was suspected. Whom did you suspect might do it?--I had suspicion it was Miss Blandy. KING'S COUNSEL--When was Dr. Addington sent for?--On the Saturday night. [Sidenote: Mrs. Mary Mounteney] Mrs. MARY MOUNTENEY[10] examined--Susan Gunnell brought a pan to my house on the 8th of August with water gruel in it and powder at the bottom, and desired me to look at it. I sent for Mr. Norton. He took the powder out on a piece of white paper which I gave him. He delivered the same powder to me, and I took care of it and locked it up. Cross-examined--Did you ever see any behaviour of Miss Blandy otherwise than that of an affectionate daughter?--I never did. She was always dutiful to her father, as far as I saw, when her father was present. To whom did you first mention that this powder was put into the paper?--To the best of my remembrance, I never made mention of it to anybody till Mr. Norton fetched it away, which was on the 11th of August, the Sunday morning after, to be shown to Dr. Addington. Between the time of its being brought to your house and the time it was fetched away, were you ever at Mr. Blandy's house?--No, I was not in that time, but was there on Sunday in the afternoon. Had you not showed it at any other place during that time?--I had not, sir. Did you, on the Sunday, in the afternoon, mention it to Mr. or Miss Blandy?--No, not to either of them. [Sidenote: S. Gunnell] SUSANNAH GUNNELL, examined--I carried the water gruel in a pan to Mrs. Mounteney's house. Whose use was it made for?--It was made for Mr. Blandy's use, on the Sunday seven-night before his death. Who made it?--I made it. Where did you put it after you had made it?--I put it into the common pantry, where all the family used to go. Did you observe any particular person busy about there afterwards?--No, nobody; Miss Blandy told me on the Monday she had been in the pantry (I did not see her) stirring her father's water gruel, and eating the oatmeal out of the bottom of it. What time of the Monday was this?--This was some time about the middle of the day. Did Mr. Blandy take any of that water gruel?--I gave him a half-pint mug of it on Monday evening for him to take before he went to bed. Did you observe anybody meddle with that half-pint mug afterwards?--I saw Miss Blandy take the teaspoon that was in the mug and stir the water gruel, and after put her finger to the spoon, and then rubbed her fingers. Did Mr. Blandy drink any of that water gruel?--Mr. Blandy drank some of it, and on the Tuesday morning, when he came downstairs, he did not come through the kitchen as usual, but went the back way into his study. Did you see him come down?--I did not. When was the first time you saw him that day?--It was betwixt nine and ten. Miss Blandy and he were together; he was not well, and going to lie down on the bed. Did you see him in the evening?--In the evening Robert Harman came to me as I was coming downstairs and told me I must warm some water gruel, for my master was in haste for supper. Did you warm some?--I warmed some of that out of the pan, of which he had some the night before, and Miss Blandy carried it to him into the parlour. Did he drink it?--I believe he did; there seemed to be about half of it left the next morning. How did he seem to be after?--I met him soon after he had ate the water gruel going upstairs to bed. I lighted him up. As soon as he was got into the room he called for a basin to reach; he seemed to be very sick by his reaching a considerable time. How was he next morning?--About six o'clock I went up the next morning to carry him his physic. He said he had had a pretty good night, and was much better. Had he reached much overnight?--He had, for the basin was half-full, which I left clean overnight. Was any order given you to give him any more water gruel?--On the Wednesday Miss Blandy came into the kitchen and said, "Susan, as your master has taken physic, he may want more water gruel, and, as there is some in the house, you need not make fresh, as you are ironing." I told her it was stale, if there was enough, and it would not hinder much to make fresh; so I made fresh accordingly, and I went into the pantry to put some in for my master's dinner. Then I brought out the pan (the evening before I thought it had an odd taste), so I was willing to taste it again to see if I was mistaken or not. I put it to my mouth and drank some, and, taking it from my mouth, I observed some whiteness at the bottom. What did you do upon that?--I went immediately to the kitchen and told Betty Binfield there was a white settlement, and I did not remember I ever had seen oatmeal so white before. Betty said, "Let me see it." I carried it to her. She said, "What oatmeal is this? I think it looks as white as flour." We both took the pan and turned it about, and strictly observed it, and concluded it could be nothing but oatmeal. I then took it out of doors into the light and saw it plainer; then I put my finger to it and found it gritty at the bottom of the pan. I then recollected I had heard say poison was white and gritty, which made me afraid it was poison. What did you do with the pan?--I carried it back again and set it down on the dresser in the kitchen; it stood there a short time, then I locked it up in the closet, and on the Thursday morning carried it to Mrs. Mounteney, and Mr. Norton came there and saw it. Do you remember Miss Blandy saying anything to you about eating her papa's water gruel?--About six weeks before his death I went into the parlour. Miss Blandy said, "Susan, what is the matter with you? You do not look well." I said, "I do not know what is the matter; I am not well, but I do not know what is the matter." She said, "What have you ate or drank?" upon which I said, "Nothing more than the rest of the family." She said, "Susan, have you eaten any water gruel? for I am told water gruel hurts me, and it may hurt you." I said, "It cannot affect me, madam, for I have not eaten any." What was it Betty Binfield[11] said to you about water gruel?--Betty Binfield said Miss Blandy asked if I had eaten any of her papa's water gruel, saying, if I did, I might do for myself, a person of my age. What time was this?--I cannot say whether it was just after or just before the time she had spoken to me herself. On the Wednesday morning, as I was coming downstairs from giving my master his physic, I met Elizabeth Binfield with the water gruel in a basin which he had left. I said to the charwoman, Ann Emmet, "Dame, you used to be fond of water gruel; here is a very fine mess my master left last night, and I believe it will do you good." The woman soon sat down on a bench in the kitchen and ate some of it, I cannot say all. [Illustration: Miss Mary Blandy (_From an Engraving by B. Cole, after a Drawing for which she sat in Oxford Castle_.)] How was she afterwards?--She said the house smelt of physic, and everything tasted of physic; she went out, I believe into the wash-house, to reach, before she could finish it. Did you follow her?--No, I did not; but about twenty minutes or half an hour after that I went to the necessary house and found her there vomiting and reaching, and, as she said, purging. How long did she abide there?--She was there an hour and a half, during which time I went divers times to her. At first I carried her some surfeit water; she then desired to have some fair water. The next time I went to see how she did she said she was no better. I desired her to come indoors, hoping she would be better by the fire. She said she was not able to come in. I said I would lead her in. I did, and set her down in a chair by the fire. She was vomiting and reaching continually. She sat there about half an hour, or something more, during which time she grew much worse, and I thought her to be in a fit or seized with death. Did you acquaint Miss Blandy with the illness and symptoms of this poor woman?--I told Miss Blandy when I went into the room to dress her, about nine o'clock, that Dame (the name we used to call her by) had been very ill that morning; that she had complained that the smell of her master's physic had made her sick; and that she had eaten nothing but a little of her master's water gruel which he had left last night, which could not hurt her. What did she say to that?--She said she was very glad she was not below stairs, for she would have been shocked to have seen her poor Dame so ill. As you have lived servant in the house, how did you observe Miss Blandy behave towards her father, and in what manner did she use to talk of him, three or four months before his death?--Sometimes she would talk very affectionately, and sometimes but middling. What do you mean by "middling"?--Sometimes she would say he was an old villain for using an only child in such a manner. Did she wish him to live?--Sometimes she wished for him long life, sometimes for his death. When she wished for his death, in what manner did she express herself?--She often said she was very awkward, and that if he was dead she would go to Scotland and live with Lady Cranstoun. Did she ever say how long she thought her father might live?--Sometimes she would say, for his constitution, he might live these twenty years; sometimes she would say he looked ill and poorly. Do you remember when Dr. Addington was sent for on the Saturday?--I do. Had Miss Blandy used to go into her father's room after that time?--She did as often as she pleased till Sunday night; then Mr. Norton took Miss Blandy downstairs and desired me not to let anybody go into the room except myself to wait on him. Did she come in afterwards?--She came into the room on Monday morning, soon after Mr. Norton came in, or with him. I went in about ten o'clock again. What conversation passed between Miss Blandy and her father?--She fell down on her knees, and said to him, "Banish me, or send me to any remote part of the world; do what you please, so you forgive me; and as to Mr. Cranstoun, I will never see him, speak to him, nor write to him more so long as I live, so you will forgive me." What answer did he make?--He said, "I forgive thee, my dear, and I hope God will forgive thee; but thee shouldst have considered better than to have attempted anything against thy father; thee shouldst have considered I was thy own father." What said she to this?--She answered, "Sir, as for your illness, I am entirely innocent." I said, "Madam, I believe you must not say you are entirely innocent, for the powder that was taken out of the water gruel, and the paper of powder that was taken out of the fire, are now in such hands that they must be publicly produced." I told her I believed I had one dose prepared for my master in a dish of tea about six weeks ago. Did you tell her this before her father?--I did. What answer did she make?--She said, "I have put no powder into tea. I have put powder into water gruel, and if you are injured I am entirely innocent, for it was given me with another intent." What said Mr. Blandy to this?--My master turned himself in his bed and said to her, "Oh, such a villain! come to my house, ate of the best, and drank of the best that my house could afford, to take away my life and ruin my daughter." What else passed?--He said, "Oh, my dear! Thee must hate that man, thee must hate the ground he treads on, thee canst not help it." The daughter said "Oh, sir, your tenderness towards me is like a sword to my heart; every word you say is like swords piercing my heart--much worse than if you were to be ever so angry. I must down on my knees and beg you will not curse me." What said the father?--He said, "I curse thee! my dear, how couldst thou think I could curse thee? No, I bless thee, and hope God will bless thee and amend thy life;" and said further, "Do, my dear, go out of my room, say no more, lest thou shouldst say anything to thy own prejudice; go to thy uncle Stevens, take him for thy friend; poor man! I am sorry for him." Upon this she directly went out of the room. Give an account of the paper you mentioned to her, how it was found?--On the Saturday before my master died I was in the kitchen. Miss Blandy had wrote a direction on a letter to go to her uncle Stevens. Going to the fire to dry it, I saw her put a paper into the fire, or two papers, I cannot say whether. I went to the fire and saw her stir it down with a stick. Elizabeth Binfield then put on fresh coals, which I believe kept the paper from being consumed. Soon after Miss Blandy had put it in she left the kitchen; I said to Elizabeth Binfield, "Betty, Miss Blandy has been burning something"; she asked, "Where?" I pointed to the grate and said, "At that corner"; upon which Betty Binfield moved a coal and took from thence a paper. I stood by and saw her. She gave it into my hand; it was a small piece of paper, with some writing on it, folded up about 3 inches long. The writing was, "The powder to clean the pebbles," to the best of my remembrance. Did you read it?--I did not, Elizabeth Binfield read it to me. [Produced in Court, part of it burnt, scaled up with the Earl of Macclesfield and Lord Cadogan's seals.] This is the paper, I believe, by the look of it; but I did not see it unfolded. I delivered it into Elizabeth Binfield's hand on Saturday night between eleven and twelve o'clock. From the time it was taken out of the fire it had not been out of my pocket, or anything done to it, from that time till I gave it her. I went into my master's room about seven o'clock in the morning to carry him something to drink. When he had drank it, I said,
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