The Express.
London, England, 1858-05-26 00:00:00

A SYRIAN COURT OF JUSTICE.

To an Englishman, brought up in the faith of
horsehair and bombazeen, there is always something
very unsatisfactory in the appearance of a foreign
Court of Justice. The essence of the customary para-
phernalia which are supposed to aid in inspiring re-
spect for the law, creates in his mind a strong. mis-
giving that the genuine, unadulterated article II not
to be tad at that shop. There is no crier shouting
" Oyes" in bad French, and " Silunse" in worse Eng-
lish; no crimson or blue bags; no array of law calf;
no rows of little grey pigtails bobbing at the occi-
puts of the pleaders; and, above all, rarely any ade-
quate substitute for the grave and bespectacled Judge
on the Bench. Wide, however, as the variations in ex-
ternal appearance and modes of procedure on the con-
tinent of Europe are from our own, it is in an Eastern
Court of Justice that an Englishman's ideas of pro-
priety are altogether demolished, and that a belief
that the proceedings are a mere guessing at right
and wrong is irresistibly forced upon him.
A few days ago I paid a visit to the Criminal Tri-
bunal here—the Old Bailey of Beyrcrat. This temple
of Themis is in the Seraglio, the official residence of
the Puha, and our road thither lay through a dirty,
narrow, and unsavoury street, very emblematical of
the course of Justice in the East, dark, tortuous, and
following no direct line. In the oourt-yard of the
Seraglio a dilapidated staircase gave access to the
ante-room of the Court, and here walked, sat, smoked,
and gordpped the prisoners, their friends, their
accusers, their guards, and the attendants and
hengerron of the Members of the Tribunal. The
earthen floor was covered with pools of water ;
on a charcoal fire in one corner stood the inevitable
coffee pot, and in another was a collection of swords,
nargbiles, muskets, pipe sticks, and similiu. acces-
sories. In the oeotre of one of the sides a doorway,
covered by a curtain, gave access to the court itself,
a room as unlike our notions of what such a place
ought to be as can be imagined. When we entered,
the members rose with true Eastern politeness, and
made us the @them, and the President having invited
me to take a seat on the divan by his side, some
short compliments pared, and the oar in hand pro-
ceeded. Presently pipes were brought us, and we
again exchanged salaams; the same ceremony was
gone through with the coffee, and then we had time
to attend to the case in hand and examine the
locality. The room in which we sat, and the ante-
room, appeared to comprise the whole space devoted
to the " Law Courts" The contents of the ante-room
we had already wondered at, but the fittings of the
Court itself were in perfect keeping with them. It
was a tolerably lofty apartment, with win-
dows on three sides, decorated with wisps of
muslin by way of curtains, and garnished on thou
sides with divans, extending one-half of the length
of the room ; another divan, with a back to it, reach-
ing half way across the apartment, leaving a pas-
eage-way of about six feet in width. On this cross
divan est the secretary of the Tribunal—an old gen-
tleman who was busy copying papers and refresh-
ing himself from time to tints by thrusting his
turban on one side and clawing his scalp vigorously
with his very dirty fingers. On the other three
divans sat the members of the Tribunal, who were
both judge and jury, and advocates for the prisoner
and the crown to boot—that is, when they did sit,
for a very liberal amount of locomotion seemed no-
wise to interfere with the discharge of their judicial
functions; and an absence of half an hour or so made
no difference in their power of deciding on the ease
which they had heard more or less completely.
The Court, within the space enclosed by the
divans, was matted. Without that privileged space
the mud floor appeared, and there stood the prisoner
and the witnesses. Shortly after our arrival the
President, after roundly taking to teak • prevaricat-
ing culprit, got up from his seat of honour in the
corner and went outside the "bar." After perform-
ing his ablutions he established himself on • little
prayer carpet, and went through his prayers,
a as coolly as though thre le
prisoner or witnesses ander examination. The
page' done he returned to his seat, all et es Mpg
-lad saluting him as though he had just eatiald ea
mess, a fresh pipe was brought him, sewed pep of
soiree were distributed, and all this time the sere
was going on, and another scribe was busily writiag
down the evidence. Luckily, the Arable is smelt
=t language—you can put a vast deal ii
compass • but as it is very difficult to
direct reply from an Arab the evidence is ,
voluminous notwithstanding, and unless the
has a =resin importance the), do not al .1. r
themselves to take much of it down. The
takes no notes, all that is done by one Ettla. . 4
tarries, who sit crow-legged like all the
the paper on the palms of their hands, eat ethiriisir
it by the aid of a reed pen with that admirable =s-
tation - - Arabic
' to be

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