SUPREME COURT OF THE CANAL ZONE.

CANAL ZONE versus HOUSTON.
No. 119. Argued August 27, 1913. Decided September 13, 1913.
MURDER. INFORMATION.
An information for murder in the second degree is proper if it negatives all the essential ingredients of murder in the first degree. MURDER. ALLEGATION OF PLACE OF DEATH. The place of death of the deceased is not an essential averment in an information for murder.
Appeal from the Circuit Court of the Third Judicial Circuit; Hon. Thomas E. Brown, Jr., Judge.
The facts appear in the opinion.
Hinckley and Ganson, W. C. Todd and W. H. Carrington, for appellant. Charles R. Williams, for appellee.
GUDGER, C. J. Information was duly filed against the defendant charging him with murder in the second degree and he was tried at the May term of the Circuit Court of the Third Judicial Circuit, convicted, sentenced, and appealed. The facts adduced at the trial were few and not seriously contested. The Government introduced testimony to show that the defendant approached the deceased in the road in front of the Y. M. C. A., and that there were some words between them; that all of a sudden a shot was fired, one of the men falling down to the ground, the other standing. The person who fired the shot was the defendant and the person who fell wounded was Harry Stern. Harry Stern was making no effort at attack upon the defendant at the time the shot was fired, had no weapon in his hand and none was found on his body immediately after. The deceased was taken from Gatun to Colon Hospital and there lingered three days and died. The death of the deceased was proved by the physicians and others who knew him in his life and who saw and recognized him after his death. It was also clearly shown that he died from the effects of the wound he received at the hands of the defendant. The alleged confession of the defendant was offered in evidence.
The Government rested and the defendant took the stand and gave his testimony, as follows:
On the morning of February 8, last, when he went to make a fire in the stove, he found an envelope and in it pieces of a letter torn up evidently intended to

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