Semi-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1853-18??, 1861-03-27

n CHINESE JUsrIcE.--We copy the following extract
from the Hong Kong correspondent Of the N. Y.
Times of January 16, 1861. It gives an account Of
the treatment of prisoners in the Courts of Justice
in that pagan land, where the light of the Gospel
has shed but few of its amelorating rays
" On recent visit to Canton, under the guidance
of the excellent clergyman of the English Mission,
was taken, among other remarkable places, to the
Chinese prisons and courts of justice. The prisons
cover large areas of ground nclosed by stone walls,
and the interior spaces divided into low, filthy dens
with heavy bamboo wickets, quite like cages for
wild beasts. Hordes of the widest looking demons
were packed in these cages, some with huge square
frames of planks around their necks, so that they
can neither lay stand others with their thumbs
corded tightly together behind the back, their tails
tied to their heels in such position that the poor
tortured wretches forced to kneel on boards of
blunted nails. Others, again, chained so tightly that
their wrists and ankles were eaten away by the
rusty iron to the bare bone, men and women alike,
while in the open courtyard groups more of
menaced creatures stretched half naked the pave
ments, covered with vermin and devoured by dis
ease. In one small pen l saw an old woman of 80
years, who, with troop Of her relatives-some
quite children, but all chained lis the mother of
the famous Tae pae Wang the successful leader of
the rebels at Shanghai. In the Courts were three
or four mandarins attended by scribes, who did
their business with far greater dispatch and with
less abuse, than ever did the Chief Justice Jefres
on the Bloody Assizes. From crowd of pinoned
prisoners one was dragged into the courtroom at
time. A question would be put to him, sometimes
two, but never more than three, when, if the reply
was not satisfactory, which it never apparently,
brawny brute, at quiet motion from the Judge,
would approach the cuprit, and with hard leather
continuance, similar a small fire bellows, he would
deal the most awful blows on the mouth and nose,
until the bones were crushed OF until the prisoner
confessed. This instrument was very properly
named in Celestial language-Jaw Crackers. The
bamboo, likewise, was not forgotten and byway, |
suppose, of some variety to the jaw-breaking mon
otJny, a prisoner would be bent back, neck and
heels like an inverted bow, and whacked in the
most cruel manner over knees and ankles till frac
ture or confession took place, and not unfrequeny
both together So soon as this Tartar justice had
been administered, the wretches merely labeled
by slip of bamboo and dragged from the chamber.
only one horrid looking object die under this
torture, rather just after he had been carried out
in basket and given his keeper the trouble of put
ting the kang yoke around his dying throat All
bore their infections without an audible murmur,
and seemed to be insensble to suffering. Some, |
informed, who had resisted the persuasions of
their judges, assisted by jaw-breakers and knee-cap
crushers, were labeled for decapitation and borne
away; but whether to the cages the execution
ground, they evinced no sign of regret or anxiety"