"Can't get you a fresh 'un before this day week, sir," replied the man. "You see, sir, it is my mother-in-law. She only died last night. She will be buried on Thursday. We'll have her up the same night, and she'll be ready next morning for you."
And then he related how the body-snatchers went to Bow Cemetery, then almost out in the country, and "resurrected" the poor woman, stripped her of her shroud (to take which was felony), put her in a light cart, and drove off with her. On either side of the Bow road at that time were fields; it was very dark and lonely. When half-way towards their destination they feared they were closely pursued, and to avoid a capture they cast the body out into the ditch, and made off with all haste. Next morning there was a report of a horrible murder. An inquest followed, and an open verdict was returned, name and cause of death unknown.
Close by the hospital there dwelt an aged man with his daughter in genteel poverty, a learned and serious person, who seemed to have known better days. His conversation was charming, and his society was much sought after, but seldom accorded. He kept himself apart from his neighbours, and held no more intercourse with them than was necessary for the amenities of life. But he was on good terms with the St. Bernard's staff, often strolled through the dissecting-room and the museum, and was generally present in the operating theatre when anything of special interest was "on the table."
There was considerable mystery about this man, Dr. Robert Day by name; but the hospital people knew his antecedents, and thought much the more of him on account of them. Indeed, most medical folk considered him a hero and a martyr of science, though nobody took the least trouble to help him in any more substantial way. Many years ago Dr. Robert Day had been professor of anatomy at a great school of medicine. He was an author of celebrity, and his works were text books in the hands of all the students. He had been implicated in the Burke and Hare scandal, had been proved to have availed himself of the services of these murderers to procure him subjects for dissection at his school of anatomy. The murderers having been detected in their horrible business, and having met their fate, the attention of the populace was forcibly directed to Dr. Robert Day and his dealings with the criminals. Had he been caught when the attack was made on his residence, he would have speedily been lynched. As it was, his house was wrecked, his furniture destroyed, his costly library set on fire, and he had to fly the town to escape personal violence. He was long in hiding, a ruined man, subsisting as a medical coach under an assumed name, till after some years, when the storm had passed over, and the new Anatomy Act had set the popular mind at rest, he was able to declare himself amongst his professional brethren, but they were always shy of him, and, though in private they let him see they thought none the worse of him for his complicity in "subject" getting, it was impossible to put him forward, or do him any very material service. They could not be hard on him. They had all profited by his research; all had learned their anatomy more or less from his books. It was little to them how he came by his knowledge. His more fortunate brethren in the kindred sciences now do not scruple to use methods to obtain their objects which, if fully laid bare to the inspection of the lay and ignorant public, would perhaps be considered only slightly less objectionable. But then the lay public is so unreasonable. They demand to be cured instantly of all the ailments that afflict them, and object to give up their mothers, their children, or their friends, and indeed even their cats and dogs, on whose living bodies the necessary experiments can be duly tried. This is naturally irritating to the scientific mind; it feels it is expected to make bricks without straw; and the straw, in the shape of clinical and physiological material, must be had somehow, so they protest.