The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-19

learned concerning him.
 Neither the inquest nor the pfelimina-
 ry examna tions were public, for Japa-
 nese justice is based largely on the
 French plan, and proceeds about its
 task with a mystery and secrecy that
 make an Anglo-Saxon uncomfortable. | The mise au secret of the French law is
 adopted the prisoner Is visited by the public prosecutor who comes alone
 into his cell, asks innumerable ques- tions and does his best to entrap him l into making admissions. Indeed 1t is | still an open question whether physical 1 terror is not occasionally employed to extort confessions of crime. One very l ugly case of the kind came to light a l few months ago, and it may not be a wholly singular experience.
 | Thus is the acte d'accusation pre- pared. It S usually very elaborate | document, setting forth the whole de- | tails of the charge in fine and grandilo- quent language. The procurator de- 1 scribes the scene as if he had witnessed | it, and deals with the gory passages in 1 a style that the auahor of a shilling shocker might well envy. This work of art is launched at the prisoner at the opening of his trial, and the president of the court takes it as the basis of his | examination.
 | And now as to the court and the 1 bench. The Yokohama Chipo Saiban- 1 sho (dlstrict ccurD is a big modern l building of brick, one of the best of is
 kind in the empire, and, of course in- measurably superior to most courts in l the provinces. It Is arranged in Euro- 1 pean style. In the criminal section is the counterpart of the dock, the barrs- i ter's table and the judges bench, all as l they might be in an English court, But, at the same time, there Is the usu- al Japanese air of forlorn untidiness about everything. Incomparably neat
 and tasteful In ter native architecture their native dFess and their native gar dens, the Japanese are hopeless when they do things a IEuropeenne. In this fine, large building, for example, floors are filthy. walfs are seribbled over with foolish and dirty nonsense, gendarmes
 and police smoke cigarettes in the cor-
 riders and throw flag ends everywhere, and one even sees, the barristers' table garnished with a row of teapots!
 The court consists of three judges,
 and the pro1urator and the clerk Of the
 court occupy seats beside them. Their
 lordships are all comparatively young
 men, and apparently as able and intel
 ligent as can be expected of officials
 who fulfill grave judicial functions at
 salaries of from one hundred and fifty
 to two hundred pounds a year. They
 wear gowns much like those of English
 barristers, but instead of the horsehair
 wig the head is crowned by black
 cowl, something like that of a Catholic
 priest,
 Almost the whole of the examination
 is in the hands of the president. The
 bar has a very subordinate part. Bar
 risters limit themselves to suggesting questions and making applications; they
 do not themselves examine witnesses all questions are put through the pre-
 siding judge. The propriety of any query the latter may think fit to put is apparently never questioned, the Jap anese barrister apearing to be very much less pugnacious and much more overawed by the court than his British confrere Less time is probably wasted than in an English court, but there is no question as to which system is the more fair to the prisoner.
 Lastly, the judgment itself is curi- osity. If this case be any criterion the president of the court is at least as anxious as the procurator to exxibit his literary powers The sentence on this American citizen--he was condemned to be hanged--occupied realms of Japa- otar 4A, ffe, fpo .I,,ti ti1,, would run into six columns of the | Times. The advice of the English | judge, who said to youngster col league, Give your conclusions, my | dear fellow but never your reasons" is | totally disr egarded by the Japanese off, | ficial, whose judgment" Is practically | one long argument, with the purpose | of proving the correctness of the deci- sion. It is marked with very fine writ ing. The accused in this case was a sailor, and the weapon he used is de- scribed as being "wielded by an arm that for thirty years had wrested with the angry wave" The scene of the murder was hit off in this word pie ture: Bones splintered, pieces of flesh flying about, brains scattered red blood yelling forth, long hdir5 driftins on the sory stream" The prisoner had suffered disappoint- ment of some selfish expectations, and he is described as being plunged from the airy heights of hope into the dismal depths Of grim despair" What Cam berwell penny-a-liner could compare with this judicial paragfaphist?
 One peculiar feature of this judgment has not received the attention 1t de- serves. The judge remarked that of the three murders the most serious was that of the young American; that there were eXtenua ting circumstances in the case of the two Japansee girls, and hat if they only had been in question Justice would have been satisfied with l sentence of penal servitude This is peculiarly Japanses. No English judge