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ORRIN DE WOLF. 555

to be merely a question of fact. It is the duty of the Court
to instruct the jury in all pointa relating to the law and evi-
dence, and to determine what evidence is admissible; while
it becomes the duty of the jury to make application of that
evidence in secordance with the principles of truth and jus-
band The question is, therefore, one of complicated law and

The prisoner at the bar, gentlemen, is charged with the
wilful murder of Wm. Stiles. In order that you may under-
stand the nature of the offense, it is necessary that you
should understand that this erime is the highest known in
this commonwealth, While there exist various species of
homicide, you will perceive we are not called here to discuss
at large the principles of homicide, Sometimes the fact of a
homicide is beyond all reasonable doubt, but at others, diffl-
eult questions may arise, whether the act was justiflable or
otherwise. In this case, however, the question is whether
the defendant took the life of the victim or not. T£ so, it
must have -been a malicious homicide; therefore, if the charge
is sostained at all, if the death of Stiles was occasioned by
strangulation more or lesa violent, it must have been from a
wilful and malicious design, Whatever else may have been
the motive, there is no part of the defense which shows any
justification. If thia fact is proved, its character is beyond
all doubt. It bears all the characteristics of malicious homi-
cide. Whether the motive may have been the possession of
the wife, or the property of the deceased, or whatever else,
the law regards it as an unjustifiable homicide. Wherever
there is premeditation, a preconceived design, a previous
threat, or an expression of malice, the only presumption can
be that the homicide is malicious. If this act, then, was com-
mitted aa charged in the indictment, it was an act of homi-
cide unjustifiable and malicious, and falls under the de-
nomination of murder.

. Gentlemen, has a homicide been committed? If the life of
the deceased was taken or destroyed by the hand of another,

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