The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-04-24
THE FEMALE SICKLES.
From the A. Y. World.

THE FEMALE SICKLES.
From the NJ Y. World.
Our Californian advices on Saturday an
nounced that the hideous comedy which has
been for days past enacting in San Fran
cisco court of justice would probably reach
its denouement on that day. The drop-scene,
which, according to old-fashioned notions of
this kind of performance, should end the bad
eventful history, will of course be lacking.
Our arena of adultery and assassination would
cease to be amusing if its portals were de-
formed with the ugly shadow of the gallows.
We have as keen passion as the ancient Ro-
mans had for the sports n the circus; but our
sympathies are less viriN$han theirs, and we
sbudder at the shedding of blood by the
unromantic hands of the public executioner.
So certain have our audiences now become
of the temper of our juries, that after the ex-
euisite delights of the evidence and the slim
ulating collisions of the counsel are over
nobody cares to wait for the dull formality
of verdict which can no longer be made
even the basis of a bet. The spectators, like
Messalina ''rather jaded than satiated," "
begin to drop out of the courtroom before
the nose of the Judge has bugled the pre-
liminary note of his charge, just as we see
uncivil people slip on their great coats and
hustle down the aisles of a theatre while the
opulent uncle from India is in the very act of
pounds upon his long-lost niece. A few old
stagers, grown rheumy and sentimental with
years, may linger among the ladies to choke
with emotion when the defendants senior
lawyer fondly clasps his rescued client to
his manly breast ere he resigns her with
sob to the chaste embrace of the presiding
judge.
But, as telegram informs us is true of
this case, the body of the public lose their
interest in the trial as soon as the forensic
fight is over. To-morrow's sun, it is fully
expected in San Francisco, will see the
'lovely and interesting" murderess of Mr..
Crittenden set free once more to sweep with
regal step the sounding corridors of hotels,
and entrance with flashing eyes the quarter
decks of Mississippi steamers. Fortunately
for the life insurance companies, the number
of woman born with predisposition to enjoy
the promiscuous use of pistols and the
refined excitements of life in the felons dock
is comparatively limited. We may reason
ably hope that not great many more middle
aged gentlemen of tangled social relations
will be shot in the midst of their families as
result of Mrs. Fairs acquittal than would
have come to such an end had that lady been
hanged, as ladies of her tastes and temper
used to be by our ancient English fore
fathers, or drowned, after the more decorous
fashion of the still more ancient Jutes.
But since our reliance In this regard must
clearly be upon the light of nature in the
hearts of average women, rather than upon
statutes and courts of justice, would it not,
perhaps, be as well to abrogate altogether
these said useless statutes and to close these
worse than useless courts Of Justice Since it
is agreed on all hands that the only practical
effect of trials for murder in this country is
to establish gratuitous and overwhelming
rivalry with the legitimate drama, do we MT
owe it to the regular professors of the his
tIlonic art to relieve them of so unfair COM
petition? What possible chance would Mr.
Forrest, or Mr.. Booth, for example, have
had of attracting an audience in Washington
while the estimable MIR. Sickles was crowding
the courthouse? What living queen of ira
gedy could have paid her expenses in San
Francisco during the height of Mrs. Fairs
recent unparalleled success?
IL is possible that some of our readers may
demur to this view of the latest San Francisco
sensation. There are, we believe, even in
this enlightened age and country, persons 50
fossiized by tradition as to hold that murder
is a criminal and reprehensible, not lyrical
and enthralling act. But surely such persons
must put their hands upon their mouths aud
be dumb In the presence of the parallel which
has just passed beneath our pen No
two poems, no two pictures, no two plays
can be more alike than the deed which in
mortalized Mr.. Sickles and that which is now
about to immortalize Mrs. Fair. There are
differences of detail, to be sure, in the acts,
as of sex in the actors. But the grand re-
semblances swallow up the petty Emergencies
In both cases the alleged impulse to the murder
was the saddeH ecognition of fact long per-
fectly familiar to the murderer. In both
cases the unprsmeditated deed was done with
weapon carefully prepared to that end. In
both cases the circumstances of the assassina-
tion were admirably arranged to heighten
with all the thrilling power of contrast its
horror and its renown. The friend of Mr.
Sickles fell by his hand in the public streets,
within sight of his home and amid the sacred
stiffness Of Sabbath day. Thelover of Mrs
Fair feA by her hand on public ferry-boat,
surrouoded by his children and seated by his
wife. The slayer of MIR. Key has been re-
waIded by the admiration of his conntry-
commissioned to defend har in war at home