LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1765, 16 October 1879, Page 3

LITERATURE.

STEPHEN HATTON. A crowd, composed mainly of fisherfolk, whose rough faces and bands matched their coarse weather-stained garments, hung abont the shut door of the old Town-hall of Drinkwater. The occasion that had brought these people together was apparently grave enough to keep them silent, for none of the jokes, half words, and persiflage castomary when a considerable number of men and women well known to each other are met together, flew about, and, save the occasional cry of a petulant child, not a sound broke the stillness. There wan something remarkable in the breathless, absorbed attitude of this crowd ; it listened, it looked —other emotions it seemed to have none —and it was plain that the dull gray walls facing them contained the object of their anxiety, for their eyes were fixed upon the building as though they would by sheer force of will behold the scene that was being enacted within. A man was being tried for'his life. The court was small, and so densely packed with human beings, that, though the time of the year was winter, the air was almost suffocating in its closeness. They were gathered together, these people, by the strange fascination that makes the sight of a fellowman being tried for his lite the moat unnatural, piteous, moving sight God’s earth can afford. At some period or other of this trial each spectator puts himself in the place of the accused, has in one lightning moment realised his desperate position, has tasted of his exceeding bitterness, felt his heart-sick desolation has said to himself, almost in Banyan’s words, ‘ There stand I but for the grace of God !’—has discovered how dearly he loves his life (valueless as it has often appeared to him) how precious and a beautiful a thing it is, and how blessed is he in that his treasure is not menaced. He has said to himself: ’ And yonder man until now was even as T, bred in the same life and customs, hungry and glad, sick and sorry as I was, in all things human, and now be stands there, cut off from his kind—alone ! He is strong with life, lusty with health, yet he is doomed to die, not naturally or gradually, but suddenly, violently, of set purpose, thrust out of life like any beast of the field, who but fulfils his fate when the life is harshly dashed from the body 1’ The langour of waiting has passed away ; so baa the quiver and stir of expectation that thrilled the Court as with one pulse when the jurymen retired one by one to their places with downcast look that gave little promise of a merciful message. The usual question had been put to them, the answer dropped into the eager ear of the multitude, and it has floated out through the dark, stagnant air to those who wait without. There is no longer anything to be feared or hoped, and the tense muscles relax, the hard-set, eager eyes soften, short quick exclamations break forth on every side, until the Judge’s voice, clear and'cold, rises above and silences them all. * Prisoner at the bar, have'you any reason to give why sentence should not be passed upon you ?’ And the answer follows the question without a moment of hesitation. ’None, save that I am innocent of the crime of which I stand accused.’ It is an honest, manly, pleasant voice that replies. If you did net know who was speaking, yon would say it proceeded from a broad cheat, a bold heart, and a fearless conscience. Knowing the man to be a murderer, you feel instinctively indignant that he should dare use such a tone, borrowing the ways of men who do not bear on their right hands the mark of Cain. Let us look at him as he stands there with a ray of wintry sunlight falling across his face, and wandering over his homely fisherman’s garb. He appears to be abont thirty years old, and is broad-shouldered and big. In his rugged face there is little beauty, only an honest, faithful, tender spirit seems to look out of his gray eyes, and in his month and chin there Is no dogged hardness or painful attempt at firmness, but a calm, steadfast endurance, baffling and hard to read—hardest of all to those who have known and loved him in the past, for they deem him a good man lost by one terrible crime, and could forgive him better if he appeared bowed down by shame and remorse, —and the tide of pity that was setting in so strongly toward him a minute ago (for was be not as good as a dead man, and would he not soon be past both praise and blame ?) tnrns backwards and dies as the asset tion of innocence falls from his lips. Bah! It is enough to make one smile—a lie or two more or less during the trial did not much signify; a man being tried for his life is justified in doing and saying a good deal; but to tell a stupid lie like that, when the verdict has been given and the sentence all but passed, it is senseless—it is degrading himself uselessly j and those who look upon him begin to identify themselves less with his crime, and hng themselves more complacently on their own unmolested security, and his words go by like the idle breath of a summer wind at eventide. ‘ And may God have mercy on your soul ?’ It is all over; the play is played out; justice has gained her ends, and may be supposed to sit smiling at her success, the doors stand wide open, the Judge and jury have risen, everybody is going away, even he is going; see, the gaoler stands almost at his elbow, and touches his arm, not roughly, rather as though his crime and approaching end invested him with a certain greatness. But hark ! whose voice is this that fills the Uonrt, making the Judge to turn back, and arresting the footsteps of the departing crowd ? It is the voice of the prisoner, who speaks against precedent, against rule, stretching out his scarred, rough hands entreatingly to the wavering, hesitating crowd—‘Men, fellow-men, with whom I ha’ tolled an’ labored an’ sorrowed an’ joyed, with whom I ha’ stood good times an’ bad times, whose hands I ha’ taken, out of whose cup and platter I ha’ ate and drank, ye believe that! ha’done this thing ? As I was when I came among ye, a bit o’ a lad wi’ neither father or mother, so am I this day ; as my hands were then, so are they this day—clean ; an’ upon my soul no heavier sin lies than may have lain on y onr’n when you were young and hot blooded and heedless. Lads, do ye know I am telling ye the truth ? Could I have so vile a heart an’ hid it so well from ye all these years? Ye know how I loved the lad, an’ how he loved me, until just at the last. An’ though we were both angered that night by the river, an’ blows were struck, there was no thought of murder in my heart any more than there was in his. When he comes back, as he will come back when I am gone out o’ your sight for ever, ye will know that Stephen Hatton was no taker o’ life, only a poor, sinful man, whom luck ran dead against him from the very beginning. You will know it then, friends, but you will not tell me that ye believe it now. I shall not be able to hear ye then, not if you all come an’ shouted it to me wi’ all your strength. I can hear you to-day before I go my ways, so will ye not say it to me now, frens ?’ The voice that had begun so fearlessly here broke and died away, as his eyes, wandering beseechingly over the crowd, met nothing but averted looks and downcast faces, and a great bitterness and darkness fell on his own as ho turned slowly away. ‘ Not one,’ he murmured— ‘ not one !’ but paused as a woman’s voice cleft its way to him from the remotest part of the Court— ‘ Stephen —I know —I believe I’ He turned his head towards the corner from which the voice issued, and a quick glance overspread his countenance. * Dinah,’ he said to himself, below his breath —‘Dinah.’ Then ho turned and went out with a stop as firm and vigorous as that of the man who walked by his side. The door of the town-hall stood open, the waiting crowd looked and listened no longer ; it had broken up into knots and groups of busy, eager talkers, who discussed the verdict garrulously ; for out of hundreds there assembled there were but few whose sorrow for the late Stephen Hatton was so deep as not to permit them to lift their voice loudly over the same. In all, not more than half a dozen crept away home with flagging steps and aching hearts, and of that half dozen only one believed in him or counted as truth the words ho had spoken five minutes ago. • Sentenced o’ Tuesday, hanged o’ Monday week! Ah 1 ’tis quick work,’ said an old sailor, who stood in the midst of about a dozen people In the market place. * Stephen oughtn’t to be hanged till the body’s found,’ said another .with decision.

I ‘ ’Twould he strange if it bad been, said & man in the dress of a pilot, ' seeing whatu river onr’n is, an’ how it runs into the sea. D’ye remember, Matthew, last winter, bow that same river swept away the miller’s house —ay, an’ the miller an’ his good wife as well —an' their bodies was never sighted from that day to this ?’ *We all mind that,’ said a withered old woman who rested on a stick; ‘ but the river don’t play such tricks every day, and no one sate Steve do it. Seeiu’s believin’, I say.’| never saw the corn a growin’, did you, Mother Lisa ?' asked a young fisherman ; ‘ but you’ve seen the grain put in, haven’t yon, Mother Lisa? No one saw kill Maurice, but wo know’d well enough how he hated ’on, an’ why ; an’ the last time Maurice were viewed alive, he were quarrelling with Steve like mad by the riverside, an’ though Steve came back safe and sound, the other didn't, * P’raps not, but Stere didn’t kill ’an for all that,' muttered Lisa. * Who raved more lives on this coast than any other man for fifty miles round ?’ she cried, with a fiery ring in her quavering old voice * Who dared an’ did while other men looked and hesitated?—who was as good a frien’ to the women as he was ccmrade to the men ? Stephen —Stephen !’ (To he continued.')