The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-09-03

fence, although the circumstances are carefully considered and the sentence IS mitigated in proportions; but the curi- ous effect of relationship IS shoWn m the following case: A son. trying to prevent a lunatic brother from beating
 his father, accidentally killed the lat ter. The lunatic suffered the lingering death" (slicing to pieces) and the other
 decapitation subject to His Majesty's pleasure Guns kept handy for bur
 glars may lead to trouble, Lii Yung Ching mistok his father for night robber and shot him; result, decapita- ton.
 Suicides have given rise to most curl , ous complications. A man sent his Wlfe (manlike) to dun an elder brother for a debt. The work was thoroughly done; failing with tears and torrential abuse, she passed on to beating her head against the wall and charging him with
 doing it, thence to smashing his best
 china and strangling his children. Thereafter entered friends of the broth CT, who continued the process by cook ing and eating his goldfish and wash Ing them down with his solitary jar of wine Whereat the debtor went forth and hanged himself and the brother,
 being held responsible, was sentenced to strangulation. The wife escaped
 with a fine, but the friends paid two
 hundred blows apiece for their i'm promptu meal.
 A thief who hid under lady's couch to avoid pursuit so frightened the oc- cupant that she promptly killed herself, t,.,1y, ,tfsSA ffl fFta
 three years The lady. as reward for her nobility of mind, received post humorous tablet. If wife assists her
 husband to cut his throat the law will
 send her after him without delay; and the unwary scion who is even hood
 winked into helping the dread mother
 in-law to end her days will incur the extreme penalty of slicing to pieces. "A life for life" is a stern principle in Chinese law, and if a father murders
 whole family his innocent chi'dre0 may
 have to suffer. Tn grave cases of trea- son male relations are either decapita- ted or mutilated to prevent continuance of the family.
 It is interesting to learn that biting to | death and burying alive are py no ireans the worst forms of murder; m 1 fact. one solicitous husband who cheer- fully buried his wife alive at her re- | quest because she suffered so win l corns-no doubt an aggravated con- plaint among elestials-recelved very mild sentence. Even Celestial Bluebeard who drove three wives to Su- | icide burnt fourth with red hot irons, | and cut a steak from a fifth to eat with | his wine was legally only liable to strangulation subject to revision so a special decree had to be issued for his | immediate decapitation. Why not SIC | ing to pieces, we wonder
 A good deal depends upon the Kind or weapon used A sharp instrument IS
 worse than ten-pound club, but eye | outscooping," as Aeschylus terms it, takes precedence of either. To butt | your enemy on the nose is an assault l only, but 1t may involve pambooins ana | a years hard labor.
 Punishments to fit the crimes are very | carefully arranged and classified The | severest capital punishment is slcing | to pieces and extinction of the ramlly l It is called lingering death but Tn re- alty the third fourth cut is made fa- | tai. The punishment is really aimed at | the offenders existence in the spirit | world. In common with all Orienrals, | the Chinese believe that they inhabit an ethereal body after death, and that | this tenement can be injured by a sharp i instrument. Hence the ehopping up or | the physical body so injures the doppel- | eanger that he is unreeogniZable even | iG q subtle ra- 1 finament our criminal law has not yet | attained to. The offender does not es- | cape his posthumous disgrace py com
 hitting suicide; his corpse is sliced up | just the same. When merciful broth
 or buried a matricide alive to eVade the
 penaItv. the court had him dug up ana l sliced.
 | The feelings of departed spirits are l also considered Mrs. Wang slew Vlr- | tuous son who expressed his d1sapproV-
 al of her improper tastes. Clearly the
 son could not wish his mother to pc hanged, and so, out of respect for ms
 feelings. sine was merely sent to Tartar | slavery
 If Is further believed that the depart
 ed spirits subsist on the aroma Of wine | and pork offered by the sorrowing rela- | lives. Hence, in order to stamp out a | very pernicious entity, not only is the body sliced, but the relations, whose 1 duty 1t is to sustain the spirits lire
 with these offerings. are executed or II | under age, emasculated.
 AS a torture the only legal instru- | ments are q kind of boot and a hn-
 ger screw; their use is strictly regula-
 ted. Some illegal tortures are occasion | ally used as deterrents in cases or ex- | ceptional atrocity.
 In spite of the evils of the "responsi- ble" system. the complications and in- | justices caused by fine distinctions, re- lationship, etc., and some undoubted | abeurdities, there is much to admire in
 the system as a whole.
 | MT Alabaster declares that the code | Is infinitely more exact and Satlsfac-
 tory than our own system, and very Tar l from being the barbarous, cruel abom- | inatlon 1t is generally supposed to be- | it is inherently consistent, and capital | sentences are in the majority of cases | committed by the process Of revision de- l scribed. The cases quoted will certain 1 ly not convey the impression of even | handed justice, but some of the worst | in the book have purposely been select | ed. It is in the very effort to combine 1 law and justice that the immense num- Der of distinctions are drawn which, in many cases. defeat the end in view. It is in the broad results, however, that
 the value of a system is proved, and T. tad