QUEER PUNISHMENTS

Evening Star, Issue 19235, 28 April 1926, Page 12

QUEER PUNISHMENTS

AH AMERICAN METHOD FITTING IKE GRISfiE A RUDE ASD G'Rlil METHOD. Yet another queer punishment has lately been recorded, in the shape ol the sentence of an Ohio judge, who lias ordered a banker convicted of negligently losing control of his car, which wrecked two other cars and a bouse, to servo a tenn as an anatomical model in the class rooms of the School of l.'hysiology of Lite University of Toledo. In more than one instance during the past year or two’American magistrates have ordered criminally careless motorists to be confronted for various periods, ranging from minutes to hours, with the bodies of their victims. It is a rude and grim method of giving tlie offender a lesson which lie will never forget, and savors rather of the Tt Ages, or of the East, than of oiv i '** .on as we'know it. Asia a.is the best of all claims to be regarded as the homo of novel and dramatic punishments. Until recently, at any rate, the Emir of Bokhara used to have the spurious stock in trade of a counterfeiter of coinage smelted down and publicly ladled down his throat. There were very Jew counterfeiters in Bokhara. Smoking used to be strictly prohibited there, in the streets or at public gatherings. The lot of the offender was to have his face blackened—the local complexion is cafe nu l.iit—and to bo led round the city, after a flogging, on a donkey placarded with the story of his crime and punishment. Bokharan doctors, convicted by their peers of not showing enough alacrity to cure a lucrative patient and get him out and about again, were apt to be beheaded. Did any indulge in pigeon racing on holy days, the birds were slain and tied round his neck; and he was whipped and sent round the bazaar quaimer on a police came! to advertise his shame.

The Babylonians had some appropriate punishments, many of which have come to light through the researches of i rofessor Dclaporte. Drowning, for example, was the recognised penalty ior a publican who sold drinks above the legal price. Even Ouoort’s “ humane .Mikado ” could hardly hotter this. If a jerry-built house fell down and killed the householder the architect was “ for it.” The State executed him. if lie was not to be found his son was executed. Those must have been anxious days for architects’ progeny. Among thoTchukch.ecs if Xorth-east Siberia the iainily feud, which is apt to ho followed by a long leries of ‘‘blood revenges,” hattlo-dore-and-shnttki-cocking to and fro h'>. nveen two families after a murder, is )ftcn avoided by the iainily oi tne murderer giving up a man to spend the rest of his life as a slave in tiio family

of the victim. Another of their punishments is reserved for the next world. They heliovo that before the spirit of a dead man reaches heaven lie has to walk through the Country of Dogs, where dog spirits will set upon him if ho has ill-tnsatcd dogs on earth; otherwise they trot along, fawning on him, and wagging their tails. A jolly idea.

The only country in which executions arc the concern of a professional body, into wiioso ranks promising recruits arc steadily received in considerable numbers, is China. It is really a dual trade. Even as a British chimneysweep has to combine his calling with carpet-beating to tide him over the summer, the Chinese executioner has to be, in addition, a good practical torturer. Torture was officially abolished some years ago, but it is still extensively used. It sots a good example, say the mandarins and provincial governors. Breaking on the rack and similar pleasantries are more or less the humdrum daily round. _ It is among such elaborate ceremonies os ling hai, or cutting up alive, that the scope for the true artist is found. This is the punishment for murdering a parent, or three persons in one family, or for the wife who kills her husband. Bolero the abolition of the Manchn dynasty it was the penalty also for persons who wrote or spoke against the Emperor. The decapitated heads of malefactors are still hung up in wicker bird cages at the side of a well-fre-quented highway. Cencral Chang has been reported to have treated Ids dead enemy Kuo and his wife to this indignity. After that one cannot view as excessively harsh the novel punishment meted out in the Middle West of America to a. woman convicted of malicious slander. Accompanied bv a policeman she had to take a walk through town every day for a fortnight, accosting and apologising to any of her victims who might bo encountered.