The Portland daily press., 1898-01-19
TO PUNISH sC0LDs.
The Dueking Stool is Still Available
In Some States.


In Law Latin There Was No Word For
| Male Common scold-Woman indicted
| Tn .yersev Citv In 1890 90 comon
| e
ecoiu'
| Not onlv ia the common sooId st;u with.
.r,;o,,- 80 IT,.
~ '-io p,- -ou0' e.no
fio's anu i..'oA ,HS 'lr-i4 10y "a 'he WIZ.
mage, but IL Is hela ona5 ehe aucklng stool
is yet means OF punishment should
some appreciative Pennsylvania Judge
have the nerve to decree renewal of it's
nse Fine and imprisonment ara the
modern refuge against the shrewish. No
i,,doa ,vonId care tn return to tho old
Says for the gossips might wonder over
HE yonoa, hatred and the public might
think he was Getting personal.
II IL likely that few people know that
| tho dnoking stool was once emploved in
Pittsburg II ia held that women had
more oronnds for scolding in pioneer DAYS
than now and hence the stool sbonId
aaai,, be hrongbt into reouisition.
The English settlers brought to the
11nited States the dncking stool as an i'm
| nlon,ont,o f rnnish,nent AZ thew imnorted
f f common law At Plymouth. whence
the niIgrims sailed. can be seen TODAY the
old ducking stools. Even in 1908 a woman
Voc duol-ed there THE Puritans brought
ovor the comnoon sco1d law. and If was
odonted in New Jersey and Delaware In
1890 the GRAND inrv Of Jersey CITY indicted
Mrs Mary Brady as common scold. II
was fopnd to he there. as here. still an
indictahle offense. and that the duekinp
stool was vet available as a means of MN.
ishment. mot having been specifically
abolished by the revised statutes.
The stool was used in Virginia. for
Rishon Meade. in his cold Churches.
Ministers and Families In Virginia. u
writes of ducking scolds from vessel in
the James river. From the Old Dominion
tbe practice of thus treating scolds reached
pittsburg. IT would be DEPRESSING to re-
reat the history of the establishments of
courts in this city by Virginia. which be-
gan Feb. 81 i775. On the second day of
that court. the birthday of George Wash
inoton. then but az. the sheriff was order
ed In emnlov workmen to build a duckinr
stool aft the confluence of the Ohio with
the Mononeabela.
Bv patient delying one can dig ND much
curious information about the ducking
stool All1sions to 1T reour in English
chronicles ali through the sixteenth. sew
enteenth and eighteenth centuries. Scold
ing women in these olden times were
deemed offenders AGAINST the nublio peace.
Rlackstone in his HCommentariesn treats
of tbe common scold in his chapter on
"Publio Wrongs.n After discussing Of
lenses Of grayer degree his prelude is ssTo
descend nexs to offenses whose punish
ment il short of death.n These offenses
are sucb he saws "as annoy the whole
community in general. and not merely
come particular portion. and therefore are
indictable. not actionable, as it would be
unreasonable to multiply suits by giving
every man separate right of action for
what lamnif1es him in common only with
the rest of his fellow subjects" IT.
Then the great iurist treats of six classes
of nuhlic nuisanoes and concludes: "Last-
| ". a common scold, communis rixatrix
| for our law Latin confines it to the fem
fnine gender), is a public nuisance to her
neighporhood. She may be indicted, and
| if convicted placed in certain engine Of
correction. called the trebucket. castipa-
tory or cucking STOOL which in the Saxon
language is said to signify the scold stool,
| though now it is frequently corrupted into
ducking stool because the residue of tine
| Judgment Is THAI WQoQ -SD0 Is SO ptdC6I
therein she shall be plunged in water for
her punishment"
Blackstone was better jurist than ety.
moloeist. There was in even as early as
the fifteenth century the punishment of
sitting in the cuoking stool for using short
.ro;,,hts eoIlino nod ale and scoldinp hit
-: g s;oerr,o,o r,1oo.d II, f,o,,t
~ was O 0ia1l " ussio 49," -,
% LIZ 49, a,,d +ba 5,Icl,;ne, stooi
S " v,,no o o,,u
r., III, ~ ls1,revalS T., 4rg,andr in ZION
| Mission writes: 1.-THE way of Furnishing
ecoldino, women ia nleasant enough. They
fasten an armchair to the end of two
beams 10 OF Is feet long and parallel to
each other, SO that these two pieces of
wood with their two ends embrace the
chair, which hangs between them upon a
sort of axle, by which means it plays free
| ly and always remains In the natural hor-
izontal position in which the chair should
be, that person may sit conveniently
| in it, whether you raise 1t Or let 1t down.
| They set up a post on the bank OF a pond
or river, and over this post they lay, al
most in euuilibriuIn, the two pieces of