AN ABSURD LAW.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1557, 16 September 1886, Page 3

AN ABSURD LAW.

Some public recognition ought to be ■fforried t'> an event which took place at ■Prahran on Monday (says the Melbourne Argue of the 25'h Aug.). A malefaclnr (if the name of Johu Peregrine, n grocer and general dealer, was fined £2 7s for th» ciime of Belling " email quantities of te* and poap " to a customer after 7 o'clock p.m. This, we believe, is the frs' instance of a crime of this particular sort having met with r. tribution in any civilised c immunity. A medal, of some inexpensive substince, might be struck to cemmpnioriite thin epoch-miking < vent. The fine imposed upon John Peregrine, of Prahran, tfcnches, at nil events, a lesson of humility. Moderns are apt to scoff at their ancestors who believed in witchcraft, and pawed statutes ti der which innocent people were dragged through horse-ponds, tortured, and burnt. Nothing done to John Hopkins and his witcbfindeis in the 17th century, under ll.e Witchcraft Regulation Acts of Elizabeth and James t, was more iivquitious or idiotic than the punishment of n Victorian tradesman in the nineteenth c ntury for selling +ea and soap to a customer at the h"ur which suited the customer's, convenience and necessities. The Chinese are reported to suffer under many barbarous and eccentric laws and regulations, but no traveller has recorded an instance of an innocent Ghinise shopkeeper being maltreated by the lowil mandarin as the Prahran grocwr wbs maltreated. Possibly the high-spirited and liberty-loving Chinese people would not patiently endure such senseless tyranny, Are there any public-spirited people- who will subscribe to a fund for the payment of these abominable fines 1