The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-02-06
Half-Hanged People.

due legal process or private animosity
 is no doubt, at present rare situation.
 Science with her marvellous powers,
 with the numberless, commodities that
 enrich human existence, has made half
 hanged persons scarce, or (as dealers say) pretty unique" But the drop
 was not always improved" and, in these times, more than one victim of
 misfortune returned to society after
 having undergone the last penalty of
 the law. In Scotland, at least, a sports
 manlike sentiment spared half-hanged
 Maggie Dickson, though her sentence
 had not really been carried out in ac-
 eordance With the perfect intentions of
 her judge But the stories of the two
 most celebrated half-hanged people are
 more romantic than that of poor Mag 1 gie Dickson. There may even be scep- | tics who decline to accept the following
 narrative, though related by the suffer-
 CT himself, Michael Hamilton, serving l in the Scottish forces of Charles VII. of France:
 In Holy Week, 1429, when Jeanne
 d'Arc was just being examined by a
 congress of divines, Michael Hamilton, with other Scottish gentlemen of the
 sword, was quartered near Clisson, in
 Brittany. The Bretons were in sympa- thy with the English, or, at all events,
 greatly preferred them to the Scots. A
 Breton spy was captured by Hamilton
 and his friends, who at first extracted
 his information doubtless in the usual
 manner), and then hanged him. What they had learned from their prisoner | ;..1 4o time for them to go," and go they
 did, with what feet they had" to em- ploy a pleasing Greek idiom. In the flight, Michael Hamilton, impeded by the weight of his armor, was taken by the peasants Among them was the son of the spy whom the Scots had hanged. Tn a revengeful spirit this youth insisted that Michael should un-
 dergo a penalty unworthy of his blood,
 and be hanged in his turn. "If you
 want a thing we'll done, do it yourself"
 is a maxim on which the son of the spy
 acted. He personally hanged Michael
 Hamilton, and, no doubt, bestowed eve-
 ry attention on the details. Now Mi chael when he saw that he could not es- cape his pursuers, had made VOW of pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Kath- erine of Fierbois, in whose church, as will be remembered, Jeanne d'Arc dis covered strangely the buried sword
 with five crosses on the blade. Now, on the night when Michael was sus pended, voice became audible to the cure of the parish, bidding him go and cut Michael down. The cure thought very little of the matter, but, as the voice would not be quiet, he sent the beadle to inspect Michael. To make sure that the Scot was dead, the beadle made an incision in his little toe. l Blood flowed, Michael moved, and the l beadle fled back to the cure. Collecting l the local clergy, and clad In canonicals, | the cure went to the gibbet and let l down Michael who still breathed, Be holding this, and still revengeful. the 1 son of the slain spy hit Michael on the | ear with sword. None the less, he re- covered, made his pilgrimage to Fier- | bois, and told his tale, which may be | read among the Miracles de Madame | St. Katherine de Fierbois.'
 Curious as was this affair, 1t yields, | in dramatic merit, to story told in | Wesley's Arminian Magazine, and in a | pamphlet A young man., walking to the house of his brother a .yeoman, found the inn at neighboring town | very full He shared the room of a merchant who was openly counting out his money. Having occasion to visit the garden, and also to borrow knife, ! he accepted the loan of a knife from the merchant On returning to his room he found the merchant gone; he went to bed slept rose early, walked to his brothers, and was arrested in the af- ternoon. for murdering the merchant. Tn his pocket was that tradesman's knife, and between blade and handle was a guinea of William and Mary. At the inn the merchants empty bed was stained with blood, and, though the body was nowhere to be found, the young man was condemned for murder and hanged in chains on his brothers farm Here a swain observed that the body moved; 1t was cut down. life was reanimated and the youth fled to sea. Taken by Spaniards in South America, he rose to be warden of the iail, and while in enjoyment of that of- lice recognized, among some English prisoners, the person for whose murder he had suffered. The fact was that the while the youth was absent n the garden, discovered that he was bleeding freely from vein which had been opened that day. He hurried to he surgeon in the dark, was seized by l press gang, served his Britannia Ma esty in a ship of war, was taken by the spaniards, and at last met in. Jail of 1: South America, the very man who had been hanged for murdering him in  Persons who are unable to accept this { egend may prefer that of Michael { Hamilton; or, again, those who beagle ! tt Michael may believe the tale pub ished by Wesley. Both are examples if the very mixed luck which falls to he lot of mortals in this troublesome Saturday Review.