The police, however, were incompetent and the legal advisers of Dr.Bannerman hardly less so, and a woman only has had the wit to see that a gross injustice has been done.

The true facts I will now lay before you." Mayfield's broad face had reddened with indignation; but now his curiosity drove out every other emotion, and he leaned forward with the rest of us to hear the old man's story.
"In the first place, I must tell you that both Dr.Bannerman and myself were engaged at the time in an investigation upon the nature and properties of the vegetable alkaloids, and especially of aconitine.

We hoped for the very greatest results from this drug, and we were both equally enthusiastic in our research.

Especially, we had reason to believe that it might have a most successful action in the case of a certain rare but deadly disease, into the nature of which I need not enter.

Reasoning by analogy, we were convinced that we had a certain cure for this particular ailment.
"Our investigation, however, was somewhat hampered by the fact that the condition in question is rare out of tropical countries, and that in our hospital wards we had not, at that time, any example of it.