The daily morning journal and courier., 1894-12-25

eigners resident in China, who fre- quentiy read Of such punishm1nts. but seldom witness them or hear them de- scribed. l have been so fortunate as to fall in with a distinguished Euro pean who witnessed the legal slaugh- ter Of q number Of criminals in Pes king, The account he has given me of what he saw Is so unlike the popular idea Of ths methods of justice here that I have written down the substance of it.
 "The official on duty on the morn- ing of which speak. having reached the mat shed. clad in all the glory Of c mandarn's dress-button, necklace. breast-cloth and a1i-ordered the men brought before him one by one. The law says that fin such cases the con- demned men shall admit thetr guilt. and ask that punishment be no longer deferred. Like almost all good law and almost all good logic in China, this regulation Is turned into mere ceremo- ny and prctehce. The prisoners neith- CT say nor do anything, but q man who stands behind each one pushes him over. bumps his head on the ground and says. Vow This word, or one with that sound, means, I want and the presiding mandarin un- derstands 1t to have been uttered by the prisoner. and to mean. T want to be punished While the official ticks off the mans name upon the list be- fore him. the man is pressed down upon the ground, and a red cross is painted on his neck. This is done in order that the right head may be fitted upon the right body afterwards, if proof of the mans death Is required for official entry.
 "The prisoner thus painted Is pulled away to the execution ground. where the headsman is heating his swords in great caldron of hot water. The swords are rather more like knives than swords. Each Is a yard in length, half an inch thick at the edge, and an inch and half or two inches thick at the back. If you should weld together nine or ten os our heaviest axes. one laid beyond the other. you would make something like one of these knives. The victim is laid upon his belly and face, and his legs are tied together. A long piece of whip-cord Is looped under the mans jaw and tied into his pigtail So much of it's free end Is left that two men go off with 1t to a dis tance and pull on 1t with all their might, while a third one sits on the condemned mans back. The execu- tioner seizes a knife and stands over the victim, whose neck is seen to pull out-and out-and out. The knife falls, the head is severed, and frequently the men who are pulling the whip-cord fall backward and roll half over, like tum- blers in a circus. The executtoner picks up the head and holdsit towards the mandarin, who looks at 1t careless ly and calmly, and makes mark upon the tally list in front of him. l was less stolid than he, especially when, happening to glance at one of the heads, I saw it open its mouth just as it was held up to the mandarin's view. It was then placed beside the body, and the next felon was brought out and treated in the same way.
 1.-TWO or three prisoners were to be strangled on this occasion, and though I went away twice, from sheer inabili- ty to witness their execution, was urged back by friend who accompa- nied me, and thus I saw enough to be able to describe that mode of punish ment also. The executioner tied a short bit of whip-cord around each mans throat, and then putting a stick of wood in the slack of the cord at the back of the neck. turned the stick and frightened the cord until it was evident that 1t could not be made tighter. For some reason he immediately loosened the cord Gin each case, others said), and then frightened it again and fastened it.. The victims made no sound. but a culver passed over their bodies, and their fingers were seen to curl in as if their fists were being clinched. That was alL The mandarin sent clerk to check off the names of these victims, and thus the law was vindicated, or avenged"