THE WEEK.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 30, 3 February 1877, Page 2

THE WEEK.

When the news firat reached ua that a man named Woodgate, residing in an out-of-the-way ' nook in Queen Charlotte's Sound had besn guilty of knocking out the brains of bis offspriug as soon as they were boro, we held np our hands in pious horror and, acting on , the impulse of the moment, exclaimed, Away with him, such a brute should not be suffered to live. On reflection, however, this tone of natural indignation lost somewhat of its severity, and we began to ask ourselves whether the crime was not the result of an actual disability to discern between what was right and what wrong. It appears that for years he and his companions had been leading the life of savages, uncontrolled by any of the softening influences of civilization. In incest they could see nothing reprehensible; the murder of the infants who were born to him. and his paramour, he does not appear to have considered criminal. Judged according to his lights, tbey were nuisances that should be got rid of ac soon as possible. He, if the words attributed to him by those who seem to have been almost as deeply steeped in guilt as himself, was an unfeeling brute in human form, ignorant, cruel, and heartless. Such was the character of the man who, ou fche strength of the command "Whoso sheddeth man's blood by man shall hia blood be shed," was condemned to die at Pieton. Many doubted his guilt, many more thought that what purported to be his words, related as they

(For continuation of Newt see fourth page)

SQGO

(Continued from Second Page.)

were second-hand by one who, morally and socially was as guilty as himself, did not constitute evidence sufficiently strong to justify the passing of tbe extreme sentence of the law upon him. But the judges of the land; thought differently, and, this being a Christian and a civilised community, it was deemed necessary tbat the Law, clothed in all the majesty with which we love to invest it, should step in, and hand the criminal over to be dealt with in another world, nothing that we could devise here being considered a sufficient punishment for a crime so heinous as that of which he had been found guilty. Apd how was this terrible sentence carried into execution ? A wretched bangle was made, owing to which the condemned criminal was compelled to pass through a lingering death. He, if the evidence adduced at his trial was correct, was merciful to his victims as compared with our treatment of him.. He inflicted an instantaneous death npon them ; we, acting under the cloak of the law, kept bim a prisoner in the dark valley of the shadow of death for four and twenty hours, and when we finally despatched him to his eternal doom, how did we do it ? The majority of those who peruse these lines will have read the newspaper report of tbe execution, and have learned how, amidst the laughing, chaffing, badinage, and mockery of his executioner, the nnbappy man was launched into eternity. Oh, you who ere consistently opposed to capital punishment, hold up your heads and rejoice, for in all your cata-, logue of arguments against that which you hold to be wrong, none has yet appeared stronger than that which has been furnished by tbe Woodgate ! tragedy ! The word " tragedy "is equally applicable to tbe crime and its punishment, the difference between tbem being that the one was illegal, the other, legal, that which was unlawful being of the two the more merciful. I am glad that the Yacht Cup difficulty has been so satisfactorily settled, for there were members of the Committee who, I believe, were worrying themselves to death over it, co that when the Cup with the golden treasure it contsioed was presented to the winner, and two-thirds of that treasure were re-presented to the Committee, and a considerable proportion of the remaining third was expended upon the cham psgne that flowed so bountifully into tbe Cup, aod thence through the lips of the Committeemen and others, who were present on the occasion, making glad their hearts, as the generousßoderer should do— when all this occurred, I say, it was a. relief to all who were concerned, and everybody felt that under the circumstances exactly the right thing had been done. It was so i different a scene to that in ! Court wben the solicitor for the plaintiff said that the defence was based upon petty grounds, and he for the defendant retaliated by remarking that the attitude taken up by the other side was pettier still, and then a game of " Hunt the slipper " — as we used to call it in the far away days when I was a child—was played on a big scale, and Mr F. said he was sure the Cup was under the Treasurer, and Mr P. declared it wasn't, and Mr F. asserted that if it was not there the Secretary must be sitting upon it, and Mr P. in reply said that it wasn't exactly there but that the whole lot of the Committee were sitting upon it, and so it went on until the R.M. had to hold up his lantern, nnder (he rays of which it was disclosed. All the difficulties by which the case was surrounded appeared very great, if not insurmountable, in Court, but when looked back upon under the influence of a dozen of champagne, and with the glitter of twenty golden sovereigns gleaming upon them it it was wonderful how minute became their proportions. I The Press and the boy element of Nelson are so often at variance that it is quite a pleasure to find an occasion arise when the latter sends up a representative to be praised instead oi blamed as was the case the other day when young David Whiting was presented with a. well earned token of appreciation of his bravery in attempting to save tb,_ life of a fellow-creature The boys Of Nelson will Bee now tbat, if unworthy actions meet with severe censure, in the' Press and public they will always find those who are glad to | extol, and ready to reward, acts of courage or generosity. While on this subject I may say say that it appears to ma that while any little laches on the part of youngsters create a howl of indignation at once, and give rise to a general outcry that larrikinism must be put down with a strong hand, ' blameworthy acts when committed by their elders are suffered to pass by almost unnoticed. For instance, a great deal has been said outside about that piece of stupidity which resulted in destroying the appearance oi tbe hillside in the Botanical Reserve, and all sorts of hard things are said about the boys who started the fire. But while so much is made of such a trifle, we hear little or nothing of that unsportsmanlike proceeding near Colliogwood Bridge, wben grown men, who ought to have known better, indulged in tbe manly pastime of blowing up wiih dynamite, and slaughtering wholesale, the trout with which the river has been stocked at the cost of bo much money, trouble, and anxiety. If boys had been tbe guilty parties instead of men what a huilaballo tbere would have been, and how often would the word larrikinism have been made use of to characterise their despicable conduct, ,:,^;l- ...._, ■ F.