The San Francisco call., 1896-12-13

CURIOUS PUNIsHMENTs OF BYGoNE
DAYS-By Alice Morse Earle. Chicago: Herbert
= stone & Co. For sale in this city by William
Doxey, Palace Hotel Price 81 So
The scope of this book is indicated by its
title. 1t describes the ways and means adopted
by our great-grandfathers for the punishment
of offenses against the law, at the same time
making the recipient of such correction an
example that others might "fear and be
ashamed of breakinge out in like wicked
nesse."
In these pages we find described such gentle
correctiyes as the ducking-s tool, the pillory
the whipping post, and brands and gags The
first of these it appears, was applied to those
good old colonial DANES who possessed the
character of scolds graphic description of
a ducking in Virginia is given by one Thomas
Hartley, 1t is supposed to have been written
TO Governor Endicott of Massachusetts, in
1854. We quote:
"The day afore yesterday at two of ye clock
in We afternoon I saw this punishment given
to one Betsey, wife of John Tucker, who by We
violence of her tongue has made his house and
ye neighborhood uncom Portable. She was
taken 10 We pond near where am soiourning
by y officer who was joined by ye Magistrate
and ye Minister, Mr.. Cotton, who had fire.
quenty admonisned her, and a large number
OF people. They had a machine for ye pur-
pose; vt belongs to ye Parish, and which
was so told had been so used three times this
Summer. 1t is a platform with small roll
ers or wheels and two upright posts between
which works a Lever by a Rope fastened TO
its shorter or heavier end. At ye end of ye
longer arm is fixed a stool upon which sd
Betsey was fastened by cords, her gown tied
fast around her feete. The Machine was then
moved up to ye edge of ye pond and ye Rope
was slackened by ye officer and ye woman was
allowed to go down under ye water for ye
space of half minute. Betsey had stout
stomach and would not yield until she had
allowed herself to be ducked several times.
At length she cried piteously, LET me gol let
me gol BY Gods help Pl sin no morep Then
they drew back ye Machine, united ye Ropes
and let her walk home in her wetted clothes
q hopefully penitent woman"
The luckless author who chanced to offend
the powers that were Jared 10 better in his way
than did the unfortunate Betsey of the history
before quoted. Since the days of Greece and
Rome the woes of the writer have been many.
We learn that in the days of Augustus no less
than 10000 volumes were seized and con-
sumed. Later, by order of Diocletian, the
Bible fed the flames, and in England numer-
Gus works were publicly burned by the COM
mon hangman. Millions books were among
those condemned. We read that CDR Leigh
ton, who wrote 'Zions Plea Against Prelacy,'
paid dearly for calling the Queen q Daughter
of Heth' and Episcopacy 'Satanical.' He was
degraded from the ministry, pilloried,
branded, whipped; his eGr was cut off, his
nostril slit; he was fined $4,000 and Ian
guished eleven years in prison, only TO be told
on his tardy release, with the irony OF fate,
that his mutilation and Imprisonment had
been Illegal" Such facts rather tend to lessen
our admiration for the good old way of doing
things. 1t is, however, pleasing to note that
occasionally a pilloried publisher received
some solace from the crowd. One Williams,
who was set in the pillory in 1865 for repub-
fishing the ''North Briton," was treated with
marks of consideration and kindness, He
held sprig of laurel in his hand as he stood
and purse OF 200 guineas for his benef. was
collected in the crowd"
Here is another ludierous instance which we
take from the chapter on "Punishments of
Authors and Books: 1--WE learn from the
Connecticut Gazette that offending publi-
cation was sentenced to be publickly whipt, &C.
cording to Moses Law, with forty stripes save
one, and then burned" What possible end
the whipping of book may have served his
tory saith not EMANUEL ELIAS.