Thomas Neill, a murderer of unusual depravity, who had poisoned
at least four girls in London with the object of making their deaths bases for blackmailing, was on Friday week found guilty of murdering one of them, and condemned to death. He has, it is reported, confessed to some of the London murders, and to many others of the same kind com- mitted in Canada. He, in fact, made a trade of murder. We never remember a criminal for whom so little pity was felt, or who was allowed, even by philanthropists, to be so com- pletely outside the pale of human sympathy. The single question raised is, whether he is sane ; but the only argument for his insanity is that he selected the men he tried to black- mail with a kind of fatuity. His notion, however, evidently was that any one with money and character would pay rather than face the annoyances generated by an accusation. We have said enough elsewhere of his probable motives.
