The daily Alaskan., 1917-01-09
DEATH BY BOILING
The Way POiSOnerS Pared In the
 Old Days In England.
TORTURE FOR MINOR CRIMES.

t s.- MutiIation Used to Be Favorite Form
 of Punishment, and the slandersr's
 Tongue Was Puekod out-Tho Pen.
 alty For High Treason.
 vT CT lE "Es4tt--t
 In these merciful days, when a man who publishes libel on the king es- capes with few months lmprlson- ment, 1t seems scarcely credible that as late as 1870 the punishment ordain- ed by the law for high treason was that the offender should be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution and there should be hanged by the neck until he was dead; that then his head should be severed from his body, that his body be divided into four quarters and that his head and quarters be at the disposal of the crown.
 And this was by no means the worst fate that might befall criminal in the so called good old days" as one John Roose, a cook of Henry WILLS day, found to his cost. Roose was convict ed of the heinous crime of putting pol son in the broth intended for the fami- ly of no less reverend a parsonage than the bishop of Rochester. For such crime hanging, drawing and quarter ing was too merclful punishment "Something lingering, with boiling oil" or at least water, was decided to be the punishment that best fitted the crime and with this object special act Of parliament was passed ordaining boil ing alive as the punishment for this felony. John RoOse expiated his sins in a cauldron of hot water, and few years later, in 1542, one Margaret Davy met the same fate at Smithfeld.
 So gravely was the crime Of poison ing regarded in these days of old that, 1t Is recorded, a Scotsman, one Thomas Belle, and his son were banished for life for administering poison to cou- pie of noisy hens belonging to q neigh bor.
 These were Indeed days when the man of violent temper or criminal tendencies must operate warily. If by any evil chance he came to blows and drew blood within the precincts of the kings palace he was Inevitably con demned to lose his right hand, and statute of Henry VIII. regulated the whole grewsome ceremony, with all its functionaries, from the surgeon who was to amputate the offending mem Der. to the individual who used the searing irons, the yeOman of the scul- lery who made the irons red hot at his fire and the sergeant of the cellar who was provided with pot of red wine to give the same party after his hand Is so stricken of and the stump scared"
 Mutllation was fayorite form of punishment in those good old days, following, no doubt, the Scriptural pen alty, ''an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" Thus the slanderer's tongue was pulled out, so that he could at least utter islander no more, and he who destroyed the sight Of one eyed man lost both his own eyes.
 By the Coventry act ln the time of Charles II. any person who should ma iciously put out the eye, slit tue nose or disable any limb of another with In. tent to maim or dIsfgure him was to pay for the wrong with his life. By another act the man who fought with weapons in a church had one of his ears cut off, If he had already lost both ears, as many a malefactor had, be was branded n the cheek with the letter "F." -.' ~N
 By an act of Queen Elizabeth's reign the forger was condemned to stand in the pillory, to have his ears cut oh by the common hangman. bis nostrils slit up and scared and to be imprisoned for life, and by statute of James l. an unfortunate bankrupt was nailed by an ear to the pillory for two hours, and then his ear was cut of.
 If an enterprislng farmer were fool lsh enough to send any Of his live sheep out of the country he paid a terrible price for hls rashness, for bis goods were forfeited, he was sont to jail for twelve months, and on recoV' ering his liberty his left hand was cut off in a public market and nailed up there as warning against the danger of illicit exports. If he offended sec ond time he paid for hls daring with bis life. If he set covetous eyes on a neighbor's sheep and annexed one Of them be was unceremonIously hanged by the neck until he was dead. h. deed, thousands of unfortunates paid with their lives for thefts much more insignificant.
 Burning alive was. of course, com mon punishment for witchcraft for many a century, down to a couple Of hundred years ago, and many of the victims who were accused of "selling their souls to the devil'', were children under ten years of age.
 In 1726 Edward Burnworth, high wayman, refusing to plead, was loaded with boards and weights. For more than an hour he bore mass of metal weighing nearly four hundredweight