refused,
saying that there was nothing to do but what the nurses were doing, and
that they had seen her quite as weak before. The parents were urged by
others to give up the fight by sending the nurses away, but they refused
on the ground that want of food had nothing to do with the symptoms, and
that she would not eat whether the nurses were there or not.

Ann Jones subsequently testified before the coroner: "Before one and two
o'clock on Thursday afternoon (Dec. 16), she kept talking to herself. I
could not understand whether she was speaking Welsh or English. Up to
that time I could understand her. She pointed her fingers at some books;
I gave her one, but she took no notice of it; she was not able to read
it. _Both parents were then told the girl was dying._"

Repeatedly they were begged to withdraw the nurses, and again and again
they refused, saying there was no occasion--that she had often been in
that way, that it was not from want of food, etc. The girl became weaker
and weaker; low, muttering delirium ensued, and on the 17th of December,
1869, at about half-past three o'clock, P.M., the "Welsh Fasting Girl"
died, actually starved to death, in the middle of the nineteenth century
and in one of the most Christian and civilized countries of the world!

But this was not the end. Public opinion was much excited both against
those who had sanctioned and conducted what appeared to have been a
senseless and cruel experiment, and against the father and mother who
had wilfully and persistently refused to allow food to be given to the
dying child. A coroner's inquest was held, and the coroner appears to
have made a very satisfactory charge to the jury after the rendition of
the testimony. He said there could be no doubt of the child having died
of starvation, and that the responsibility rested with the father, who
had knowingly and designedly failed to cause his child to take food. The
mother was not responsible unless it could be shown that she had been
given food for the child by the father, and had withheld it from her. It
was marvellous, he said, how the father could have made out such a
story--such a hideous mass of nonsense, as he had under oath attempted
to impose on the jury.

The jury deliberated for a quarter of an hour, and then returned a
verdict of "Died from starvation, caused by negligence to induce the
child to take food on the part of the father;" which constituted
manslaughter.

Evan Jacob was ther