He began by giving a vivid description of the circumstances, of the
murder--of the meeting of the murderer and his victim in Collins
Street East--the cab driving down to St. Kilda--the getting out of
the cab of the murderer after committing the crime--and the
way in which he had secured himself against pursuit.
Having thus enchained the attention of the jury by the graphic manner
in which he described the crime, he pointed out that the evidence
brought forward by the prosecution was purely circumstantial, and that
they had utterly failed to identify the prisoner in the dock with the
man who entered the cab. The supposition that the prisoner and the man
in the light coat were one and the same person, rested solely upon the
evidence of the cabman, Royston, who, although not intoxicated,
was--judging from his own statements, not in a fit state to distinguish
between the man who hailed the cab, and the man who got in. The crime
was committed by means of chloroform; therefore, if the prisoner was
guilty, he must have purchased the chloroform in some shop, or obtained
it from some friends. At all events, the prosecution had not brought
forward a single piece of evidence to show how, and where the
chloroform had been obtained. With regard to the glove belonging to the
murdered man found in the prisoner's pocket, he picked it up off the
ground at the time when he first met Whyte, when the deceased was lying
drunk near the Scotch Church.
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