Free Burke and Hare by Brian Bailey Page B

one hand under the nose, and the other under her chin, under her mouth.’
    ‘He stopped her breath, do you mean?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Did he continue this for any length of time?’
    ‘I could not exactly say the time – ten or fifteen minutes.’
    ‘Did he say anything to you when this was going on?’
    ‘No, he said nothing.’
    ‘Did he then come off her?’
    ‘Yes, he got up off her.’
    ‘Did she appear dead then?’
    ‘Yes, she appeared dead a wee.’
    ‘Did she appear to be quite dead?’
    ‘She was not moving; I could not say whether she was dead or not.’
    ‘What did he do then?’
    ‘He put his hand across her mouth.’
    ‘Did he keep it there for any length of time?’
    ‘He kept it two or three minutes.’
    ‘Did she appear to be quite dead at that time?’
    ‘She was not moving.’
    ‘What was you doing all this time?’
    ‘I was sitting on the chair.’
    Hare said that Burke had stripped the body, doubled it up at the foot of the bed, tying the head to the feet, and covered it with a sheet and straw. Mrs Hare and McDougal had run out into the passage when they heard the first screech. Neither of them had attempted to save the woman. When Burke had covered the body, they had come in again and gone back to bed. Burke left, and in ten minutes came back with Mr Jones.
    ‘Was it not Mr Paterson?’
    ‘It was the doctor’s man.’
    After Hare had answered questions about the porter coming to collect the box and all of them going to Surgeons’ Square and Newington before being paid the £5, Henry Cockburn rose to cross-examine him:
    ‘Mr Hare, how long did you say you have been in Edinburgh?’
    ‘About ten years.’
    ‘What have you been employed at during all that time?’
    ‘Boatman and labourer.’
    ‘You have not been boatman all that time?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘On the canal.’
    ‘Have you been employed in any other way?’
    ‘I had a horse and cart, selling fish.’
    ‘Any other way?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Have you been engaged in supplying bodies to the doctors?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Have you been concerned in supplying the doctors with subjects upon other occasions than that you have mentioned?’
    ‘No – than what I have mentioned.’
    The Lord Advocate rose and objected to this line of questioning. Hare was removed from the court while Mr Cockburn attempted to justify his plot to discredit the witness. He said that he intended to ask Hare not only if he had supplied the doctors on other occasions, but if he had ever been concerned in murders besides this one.
    Lord Meadowbank incautiously declared that the question should not be put before Mr Cockburn had explained why he wished to put it, and Cockburn then launched into an eloquent defence of his line of questioning, saying that he maintained his right to test the credit of the witness ‘on as firm grounds as ever man maintained any proposition’. The witness may be privileged not to answer, he said, but that was no reason not to put the question, because he may choose to answer, and he may answer falsely and thus be contradicted. ‘This is so plain, that the idea of protecting a villainous witness, by not letting any question about his own iniquities be even put to him, humbly appears to us to be absolutely monstrous; and I know no authority for it in the law of Scotland.’ After arguing the point a little further, Mr Cockburn concluded, ‘We are so confident in our opinion of the legality of the question, that we wish it to be put on the record, in order that, if it be rejected, we may find our remedy where we can.’
    Mr Archibald Alison, for the Crown, said that the law of Scotland was different from the law of England in this respect, and quoted venerable authorities for the principle that ‘no one is to be rendered infamous or disgraced by his own testimony’, even though it may aid the defendant.
    The Dean of Faculty supported Mr Cockburn’s arguments and added that the intention was not to disqualify the