BAIL OR JAIL.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 170, 31 July 1874, Page 2

BAIL OR JAIL.

(From the Otago Dai'y Times) Every now and then the optimist, whose constant boast is the prodigious advance towards perfection that has been made by us during the present wonderful century, must feel like a man perched on a rock just awash with the ebbing tide. At times, the waters recede so far that ho leels quite secure and jubilant, but at rare intervals, a billow, larger than ita fellows, sweeps over his place of refuge so alarmingly that he begins to doubt whether the tide has really turned at all. Odd survivals of a not remote period of barbarism every now and then crop up in our Law Courts, showing us, with startling distinctness, how much remains to be done before we can truly lay claim to be a civilised and Christian people. A case occurred lately in a New, Zealand Magistrate's Court that we will narrate, without giving names, as that would scarcely further our object, which is not so much to find fault with the administration of the law in this particular instance, as with the law itself. A husband, disapproving, apparently, of his wife's conduct, endeavored to bring her to a sense of what was due to him by the drastic process of stabbing her twice in the back. His wife at once laid an information against hira, but when the prisoner was brought before tbe Magistrates, she, moved by wo know not what compuncluous visitings, refused to give evidence against him. It may be that the bluutness oi the kn.fe, which inflicted very trifling injuries, may have swayed her; it may be tbat she was conscious of havi.."*exasperated '• her man " lo such a pitch that if the case came before a jury tbey might return a verdict tantamount to " sarve ber right." At any rate, her contumacy was such that she had to be committed to gaol for twentyfour hours — very pfoperly in our opinion — before she could be induced to give evidence. So for all was reasonable enough, for it is clear that ber scruples, after laying the information, jsame all tco late. But now we get to a relic of genuine Saxon savagery. The stabber is committed for trial. A new actor appear on the scene. A daughter, it seems, was eye-witness of the little conjugal difficulty under consideration, and ber evidence was necessary to complete the case against the prisoner. It ia usual, we believe, for witnesses in indictable cases to be bound over upon their own'recognisances to appear before the Supreme Court; but for some reason or other, both mother and daughter are required to give a bond for their appearance at the Supreme Court, which will not sit for some months. The poor creatures are penniless and friendless, not a soul will go bailfor them; so not only the wife, for whom we feel a very modified compassion, but the innocent daughter is lodged in the common gaol, where, at tbis present time of writing, she still lies, a living example of the sins of the fathers being visited on their children. Now we have nothing to say against the conduct of the Magistrates in this case. They, no doubt, merely administered the law as they found it. The blindfold old goddess Justice must, it seems, be satisfied, no matter at what cost to the helpless and the innocent. But surely it would be well worth the while of some of our legislators to try if the bandage cannot be raised a little from her eyes in this and some other particulars. The man who would take up as his specialty the altering and humanising of the laws which bear so hardly upon the friendless and the destitute — laws which, though the force of public opinion usually compels them to be mercifully administered, should no longer be allowed to disgrace the statute books-— would deserve well of his country." 'Let him begin by rendering impossible tho repetition of brutalities that may still be perpetrated under color of enforcing tbe Vagrancy Act Let hira see that so .monstrous an insult be no longer offeredio poverty as the locking up of an unoffending witness merely because the wretched man cannot find a friend to become surety for his appearance. Let him go among the very poor, bear what they say among themselves about these things, and cease to wonder at their want of respect for the law. We can promise such an one the support of every right-thinking man of every class, and, if he cares for it, as ample and as well deserved a meed of popularity as has fallen to the lot of Mr Plimsoll, without the risk of an action for libel.

On Saturday night last, after dark, Bays the Otago Times, a gentleman who hvea a . i eaafi five mUe _ g{Qm lokomauiro, was in tbe township, and wa 3 obliged by business, to stay all night. VMshing to let bis wife know of his intention, and wanting a document that he had left at home/he wrote to her, and tied tbe note round his retriever dog's neck, and sent him off to his home. There were five or six/ witnesses to this, and a good many b_2 were made for or against the return of the dog. In three hours, however, the faithful creature came back to his master with a note from his wife and the desired document, made up in a parcel and tied round his neck. We {Herald) are informed that five or six of the most recent of the immigrants to Auckland are of a most valuable character, they having come provided with sums varying fiom £500 to £800. They are of the class we want iv the colony.