covered, on all occasions, that idiotic laugh, without cause or motive, which marks the

maniac.

SILAS E. BAKER remarked the same idiotic laugh when the prisoner was at his work, in his cell, and in the chapel.

WILLIAM P. SMITH, a foreman in the prison, remarked his peculiarities, but unfortunately was not then led to their true cause.

THERON R. GREEN, as has been already seen, discovered the same peculiarities, divined their cause, held him irresponsible, and gave an unheeded warning against his enlarge

ment.

The discipline of the prison forbids conversation between convict and convict, and between keepers and prisoners. The iron that had entered the prisoner's soul was necessarily concealed, but DEPUY, and WARDEN, and GREEN, who thought him changed then, as well as SMITH, VAN KUREN, BAKER, and TYLER, who regarded him only as ignorant and obstinate, give conclusive evidence that the ruin of his mind was betrayed in a visible change of his appearance, conduct and character.

The time at length arrived, when the secret could no longer be suppressed. The new chaplain, the Rev. ALONZO WOOD, was in the agent's office when the prisoner was discharged. Two dollars, the usual gratuity, was offered him, and he was asked to sign a receipt. "I ain't going to settle so." For five years, until it became the ruling thought of his life, the idea had been impressed upon his mind, that he had been imprisoned wrongfully, and would, therefore, be entitled to payment on his liberation. This idea was opposed "by the judgment and sense of all mankind." The court that convicted him pronounced him guilty, and spoke the sense and judgment of mankind. But still he remained unconvinced. The keepers who flogged him pronounced his claim unjust and unfounded, and they were exponents of the "sense and judgment of all mankind." But imprisonment, bonds and stripes, could not remove the one inflexible idea. The agents, the keepers, the clerk, the spectators, and even the reverend chaplain, laughed at the simplicity and absurdity of the claim of the discharged convict, when he said, "I've worked five years for the state, and ain't going to settle so." Alas! little did they know that they were deriding the delusion of a maniac. Had they been wise, they would have known that

"So foul a sky clears not without a storm."

The peals of their laughter were the warning voice of human nature for the safety of the family of Van Nest.

Thus closes the second act of the sad drama.

The maniac reaches his home, sinks sullenly to his seat, and

hour after hour relates to JOHN DEPUY the story of his wrongful imprisonment, and of the cruel and inhuman treatment which he had suffered; inquires for the persons who had caused him to be unjustly convicted, learns their names, and goes about drooping, melancholy and sad, dwelling continually upon his wrongs, and studying intensely in his bewildered mind how to obtain redress. Many passed him, marking his altered countenance and carriage, without stopping to inquire the cause. Doctor HERMANCE alone sought an explanation: "I met him about the first of December last; I thought his manner very singular and strange. I inquired the cause. He told me that he had been in the prison for five years, and that he wasn't guilty, and that they wouldn't pay him. I met him afterward in the street, again remarked his peculiarities, and inquired the cause. He answered as before, that he had been in State Prison five years wrongfully, and they wouldn't pay him."

The one idea disturbs him in his dreams and forces him from his bed; he complains that he can make no gain and can't live so; he dances to his own wild music, and encounters imaginary com batants.

He said he'd been to

Time passes on until February. He visits Mrs. Godfrey at her house in Sennett. He enters the house, deaf, and stands mute. "I gave him a chair," says Mrs. Godfrey; "he sat down. I asked which way he was travelling. He wanted to know if that was the place where a woman had a horse stole five years before. I told him it was. He said he had been to prison for stealing the horse, and didn't steal it neither. I told him I knew nothing about that, whether it was he or not. prison for stealing a horse, and didn't steal it, and he wanted a settlement. Johnson, who was there, asked him if he should know the horse if he should see it. 'No.' 'Do you want the horse?' 'No. Are you the man who took me up? Where is the man who kept the tavern across the way and helped to catch me?' 'He is gone.' I asked him if he was hungry. He said he didn't know but he was. I gave him some cakes, and he sat

and ate them."

Here was exhibited at once the wildness of the maniac, and the imbecility of the demented man. His delusion was opposed to "the sense and judgment of all mankind." Mrs. GODFREY and Mr. JOHNSON exposed its fallacy. But still the one idea remained

unconquered and unconquerable. The maniac who came to demand pay for five years' unjust imprisonment was appeased with a morsel of cake.

He was next seen at Mr. Seward's office, a week or ten days days before the murder. He asked if that was a 'squire's office, and said he wanted a warrant. Mr. PARSONS, the clerk, says: "I didn't understand until he had asked once or twice. I asked him what he wanted a warrant for. He said for the man who had been getting him into prison, and he wanted to get damages. I told him the Justices' offices were up street, and he went away.'

Next we find him at the office of LYMAN PAINE, Esq., Justice, on the Saturday preceding the death of Van Nest. Mr. PAINE says: "He opened the door, came in a few feet, and stood nearly a minute with his head down, 8o. He looked up and said: Sir, I want a warrant." 'What for.' He stood a little time, and Sir, I want a warrant.' What do you

then said again:

want a warrant for?"

He stood a minute, started, and came up

close to me, and spoke very loud: Sir, I want a warrant. I am very deaf, and can't hear very well.' I asked him in a louder voice what he wanted a warrant for. For a man who put me to State Prison.' What is your name?' William Freeman; and I want a warrant for the man who put me to prison.' I said: 'If you've been to prison, you have undoubtedly been tried for some offence.' 'I have; it was for stealing a horse, but I didn't steal it. I've been there five years.' I asked who he wanted a warrant for. He told some name-I think it was Mr. Doty." [You will remember, gentlemen, that Mr. Doty, Mr. Hall, and Mrs. Godfrey, all of Sennett, and Jack Furman, of this town, were the witnesses against him.] "I told him if he wanted a warrant, it must be for perjury-he must give me the facts and I would see. He stood two or three minutes and then said: Sir, I want a warrant.' I asked further information. He stood a little while longer, took out a quarter of a dollar, threw it on the table, and said: 'I demand a warrant-appeared in a passion, and soon after went out. He returned in the afternoon, said he would have a warrant, and gave the names of Mr. Doty and Mrs. Godfrey."

6

Mr. PAINE saw, in all this, evidence of stupidity, ignorance, and malice, only, but not of insanity. But, gentlemen, if he could have looked back to the origin of the prisoner's infatuation, and

forward to the dreadful catastrophe on the shore of the Owasco Lake, as we now see it, who can doubt that he would then have pronounced the prisoner a maniac, and have granted, not the warrant he asked, but an order for his commitment to the County Jail, or to the Lunatic Asylum?

Denied the process, to which he thought himself entitled, he proceeded a day or two later to the office of JAMES H. BOSTWICK, Esq., another justice. "I saw him," says this witness, "a day or two before the murder. He came, and said he wanted a warrant. I asked for whom. He replied: 'for those that got me to prison. I was sent wrongfully. I want pay.' I asked him who the persons were. He mentioned a widow and two men. He mentioned Mrs. Godfrey as the widow woman, Jack Furman and David W. Simpson as the two men." (Simpson was the constable by whom he was arrested the second time for stealing the horse.) Mr. BOSTWICK declined issuing the warrant, and informed him there was no remedy, and again expounded to him the "sense and judgment of all mankind," in opposition to his delusion.

According to the testimony of JOHN DEPUY, the prisoner was agitated by alternate hope and despair in regard to his redress. At one time he told DEPUY, that he'd got it all fixed, and wanted him to go down to the justice's office and see that he was paid. right. At another, he told DEPUY that the "Squires wouldn't do nothing about it; that he could get no warrant, nor pay, and he couldn't live so."

Then it was that the one idea completely overthrew what remained of mind, conscience, and reason. If you believe HERSEY, Freeman, about a week before the murder, showed him several butcher knives, told him he meant to kill Depuy, his brother-in-law, for trivial reasons, which he assigned, and said that he had found the folks that put him in prison, and meant to kill them. HERSEY says: "I asked him who they were. He said, they were Mr. Van Nest, and said no more about them. He didn't say where they lived, and nothing about any other man, woman, or widow." This witness admits that he suppressed this fact on the preliminary examination.

If you reject this testimony, then there is no evidence that he ever had any forethought of slaying Van Nest. If you receive it, it proves the complete subversion of his understanding; for John G. Van Nest, and all the persons slain, resided not in Sennett, nor

in Auburn, but four miles south of the latter place, and eight miles from the house of Mrs. Godfrey. The prisoner, within a week before the crime, named to the magistrates every person who was concerned in his previous conviction. We have shown that neither John G. Van Nest, nor any of his family or kindred, nor any person connected with him, was, or could have been, a party, a magistrate, a witness, a constable, a sheriff, a grand juror, attorney, petit juror, or judge, in that prosecution, or ever knew or heard of the prosecution, or ever heard or knew that any such larceny had been committed, or that such a being as the prisoner existed. Mrs. GODFREY and the witnesses on the former occasion, became known to the remaining family and relatives of Van Nest, here in court, for the first time, during these trials.

You will remember that Erskine's test of a delusion that takes away responsibility is that the criminal act must be the immediate, unqualified offspring of the delusion. I shall now proceed to show, that such is the fact in the present case.

The first witness to whom the prisoner spoke concerning the deeds which he had committed was GEORGE B. PARKER. This was at Phenix, Oswego county, immediately after his arrest, within twenty hours after the perpetration of the crime. "I pushed very hard for the reasons," says the witness, "what he had against Van Nest. 'I suppose you know I've been in State Prison five years,' he replied. 'I was put there innocently, I've been whipped and knocked and abused, and made deaf, and there won't any body pay me for it."" VANDERHEYDEN arrived soon afterwards. He "I called the prisoner aside, and said to him: Now we're alone, and you may as well tell me how you came to commit this.' He says to me: You know there is no law for me.' I asked him what he meant by that no law!' He said, 'THEY OUGHT to PAY ME.

says:

ETHAN A. WARDEN followed him into his cell in the jail, and asked him, "When you started from home what did you go up there for? I must go.' Why must you go? 'I must begin my work.' What made you do it? 'They brought me up so." Who brought you up so? 'The State.' They didn't tell you to kill, did they? Don't know-won't pay me.' Did you know these folks before you went to prison? 'No.' Was you there a few days before to get work? Yes.' Did they say anything to offend you or make you angry? 'No.' What made you kill them; what did you do it for? 'I must begin my work.' Didn't