New-York tribune., 1870-12-19

"a pleader of the Zillah court hurried peon'
"with a two-anna piece, for cocoa-nut' Inc
Execution was delayed, and two cocoa-huts
were shortly brought but the owner returned
the money. lie would not take pay Tor
"drink for the poor man." The picture OF the
silent, sorrowful group, the stretch OF desola'e
beach. the solemn sea, the anxious messengers
hurrying to crafty the victim in his last fancy
offers a strange contrast to the seething,
drunken swearing crowd which assemblies
throughout this Christian country Wheh-
ever that most popular OF raree shows, "a
hanging, is offered to them for their deiecta-
ton. Pokote, however, appears to have Deen
no more able to reconcile the mercilcss nat OF
man with the infinite mercy OF God which was
preached to him than are any OF our own
victims on the drop. He listened attentlyely
TO the reading of the warrant, and when asked
if he had anything to say, replied: Il under
"stand that il the sentence, and it must be
"obeyed have nothing to say. What did
"was mistake in my life. | never meant to
"kill any man." He then assembled the steps
leading to the gallows, and, hating little,
said 81 do not meet with mercy here. But
"tbere is q ThambOoran beyond with whom
"there is mercy. This is great mistake In
"my life.n All through the time that the rope
was adjusting he was repeatedly crying out, as
if in prayer, Rama Ramaw and his last
word was Rama. The Malabar hangman is,
it appears, as great bmgler as his American
confreres, and the usual horrible butchery OF
breaking the rope and keeping the poor wretch
in torture followed. But the heather specta-
tors are not Injured to it by custom as we are,
and the whole Nar nation revolted against
repetition of the brutality.
We refer to this story because the introduc-
ton OF any so-called civilized custom into
foreign country is good time to test its zeal
human or Christian quality. With the back
ground of appalled, heathenism behind it to
throw it into relief, this hanging of Pokote has
the effect upon us of a novelty, as the sight
of our own face might have, beheld in a
neighbours looking glass. At this especial time,
too, with the great festival of Christs birth
ready to dawn upon us, there is natural in
clnation to subject national customs as well as
individual acts to its pure, benefcent light,
and to see if the gallows stands in 1t with less
black shadow than the slaves whip and mana
cles, from which we have SO lately freed our
selves. If Christianity means anything to q
nation, it means deeper wisdom, more hui
man charity brought into the world, which was
to take the place alike of bloody Jewish laws
and pagan brutalties, and by disclosing the
universal brotherhood of man and developing
in each the divine element in him, no matter
how obscured, raise the whole social structure
TO nights unknown before. But what does
Christian law do in this matter Of hanging in
Malabar in New-YOrkf
We assert boldly that the class brought up
on trial for their lives are nine times out OF ten
men for whose crimes there is in The very
structure of society the greatest palliation OF
circumstances and to whom society should
show the longest patience and most strenuous
effort at reform. The murderer is seldom ed
ucated usually belongs to the class who have
inherited drunkenness, uncontrolled passion,
and the habit of vicious living for genera
tons. The "mistake" he makes when he takes
life is not so culpable in reality, under the cir
cumstances, as the dishonest selfish life Of
the man who, fair in the worlds eye, proba-
bly,. reads his sentence of death to him. What
man is there Of us who, looking at the long
account between his soul and God, does not
see these mistakes" on his part fatal as
death itself, which Infinite mercy passed by in
sileucei In Gods rule, the deeper the sin the
more time is given for repentance. But for
the mistake of Pokote and his like, Christian
society has not the mercy Of day. 1t shuts
its eyes to its own guilt in the matter, and,
like the bull who knows nothing better to do
with the wounded member of the herd than
to gore him to DEATH 1t can find no other cure
for its diseased patients than to throttle them
IL. l., IL L.
mercios of Christian hell. Let us hope, with
poor Pokote that "beyond there is One with
"whom is mercy" for them and for him.
DEEDS OF DARKNESS