The testimony of the uncle was also decisively corroborative of that of the preceding witness, as to the absence from Port of Spain of L. B. during the days embraced in the defence. The alibi was therefore unquestionably made out, especially as none of the police witnesses would venture to swear to having actually seen L. B. at the brawl. The magistrate had no alternative but that of acquiescing in the proof of her innocence; so he dismissed the charge against the accused, who stood down from among the rest, radiant with satisfaction. The other defendants were duly [97] convicted, and sentenced to a term of imprisonment with hard labour. All this was quite correct; but here comes matter for consideration with regard to the immaculate dispensation of justice as vaunted so confidently by Mr. Froude.
On receiving their sentence the women all stood down from the dock, to be escorted to prison, except "Lady," who, by the way, had preserved a rigid silence, while some of the other defendants had voluntarily and, it may be added, generously protested that L. B. was not present on the occasion of this particular row. "Lady," whether out of affection or from a less respectable motive, cried out to the stipendiary justice. "But, sir, it ain't fair. How is it every time that L. B. and me come up before you, you either fine or send up the two of us together, and to-day you are sending me up alone?" Moved either by the logic or the pathos of this objurgation, the magistrate, turning towards L. B., who had lingered after her narrow escape to watch the issue of the proceedings, thus addressed her:—"L. B., upon second thoughts I order you to the same term of hard labour at the Royal Gaol with the [98] others." The poor girl, having neither money nor friends intelligent enough to interfere on her behalf, had to submit, and she underwent the whole of this iniquitous sentence.
The last typical case that we shall give illustrates the singular application by this more than singular judge of the legal maxim caveat emptor. A free coolie possessed of a donkey resolved to utilize the animal in carting grass to the market. He therefore called on another coolie living at some distance from him, whom he knew to own two carts, a small donkey-cart and an ordinary cart for mule or horse. He proposed the purchase of the smaller cart, stating his reason for wishing to have it. The donkey-cart was then shown to the intending purchaser, who, along with two Creole witnesses brought by him to make out and attest the receipt on the occasion, found some of the iron fittings defective, and drew the vendor's attention thereto. He, on his side, engaged, on receiving the amount agreed to for the cart, to send it off to the blacksmith for immediate repairs, to be delivered to the purchaser next morning at the latest. On this understanding the purchase money was paid down, and the [99] receipt, specifying that the sum therein mentioned was for a donkey-cart, passed from the vendor to the purchaser of the little vehicle. Next day at about noon the man went with his donkey for the cart. Arrived there, his countryman had the larger of the two carts brought out, and in pretended innocence said to the purchaser of the donkey-cart, "Here is your cart." On this a warm dispute arose, which was not abated by the presence and protests of the two witnesses of the day before, who had hastily been summoned by the victim to bear out his contention that it was the donkey-cart and not the larger cart which had been examined, bargained for, purchased, and promised to be delivered, the day before.
The matter, on account of the sturdiness of the rascal's denials, had to be referred to a court of law. The complainant engaged an able solicitor, who laid the case before Mr. Mayne in all its transparent simplicity and strength. The defendant, although he had, and as a matter of fact could have, no means of invalidating the evidence of the two witnesses, and above all of his receipt with his signature, relied upon the fact that the cart which he [100] offered was much larger than the one the complainant had actually bought, and that therefore complainant would be the gainer by the transaction. Incredible as it may sound, this view of the case commended itself to the magistrate, who adopted it in giving his judgment against the complainant. In vain did the solicitor protest that all the facts of the case were centred in the desire and intention of the prosecutor to have specifically a donkey-cart, which was abundantly proved by everything that had come out in the proceedings. In vain also was his endeavour to show that a man having only a donkey would be hopelessly embarrassed by having a cart for it which was entirely intended for animals of much larger size. The magistrate solemnly reiterated his decision, and wound up by saying that the victim had lost his case through disregard of the legal maxim caveat emptor—let the purchaser be careful. The rascally defendant thus gained his case, and left the court in defiant triumph.
The four preceding cases are thoroughly significant of the original method in which thousands of cases were decided by this model magistrate, to the great detriment, pecuniary, [101] social, and moral, during more than ten years, of between 60,000 and 70,000 of the population within the circle of his judicial authority. What shall we think, therefore, of the fairness of Mr. Froude or his informants, who, prompt and eager in imputing unworthy motives to gentlemen with characters above reproach, have yet been so silent with regard to the flagrant and frequent abuses of more than one of their countrymen by whom the honour and fair fame of their nation were for years draggled in the mire, and whose misdeeds were the theme of every tongue and thousands of newspaper-articles in the West Indian Colonies?
MR. ARTHUR CHILD, S.J.P.
We now take San Fernando, the next most important magisterial district after Port of Spain. At the time of Mr. Froude's visit, and for some time before, the duties of the magistracy there were discharged by Mr. Arthur Child, an "English barrister" who, of course, had possessed the requisite qualification of being hopelessly briefless. For the ideal justice which Mr. Froude would have Britons believe is meted out to the weaker classes by their fellow-countrymen [102] in the West Indies, we may refer the reader to the conduct of the above-named functionary on the memorable occasion of the slaughter of the coolies under Governor Freeling, in October, 1884. Mr. Child, as Stipendiary justice, had the duty of reading the Riot Act to the immigrants, who were marching in procession to the town of San Fernando, contrary, indeed, to the Government proclamation which had forbidden it; and he it was who gave the order to "fire," which resulted fatally to many of the unfortunate devotees of Hosein. This mandate and its lethal consequences anticipated by some minutes the similar but far more death-dealing action of the Chief of Police, who was stationed at another post in the vicinity of San Fernando. The day after the shooting down of a total of more than one hundred immigrants, the protecting action of this magistrate towards the weaker folk under his jurisdiction had a striking exemplification, to which Mr. Froude is hereby made welcome. Of course there was a general cry of horror throughout the Colony, and especially in the San Fernando district, at the fatal outcome of the proclamation, which had mentioned only "fine" and "imprisonment," [103] but not Death, as the penalty of disregarding its prohibitions. For nearly forty years, namely from their very first arrival in the Colony, the East Indian immigrants had, according to specific agreement with the Government, invariably been allowed the privilege of celebrating their annual feast of Hosein, by walking in procession with their Pagodas through the public roads and streets of the island, without prohibition or hindrance of any kind from the authorities, save and except in cases where rival estate pagodas were in danger of getting into collision on the question of precedence. On such occasions the police, who always attended the processions, usually gave the lead to the pagodas of the labourers of estates according to their seniority as immigrants.
In no case up to 1884, after thirty odd years' inauguration in the Colony, was the Hosein festival ever pretended to be any cause of danger, actual or prospective, to any town or building. On the contrary, business grew brisker and solidly improved at the approach of the commemoration, owing to the very considerable sale of parti-coloured paper, velvet, calico, and similar articles used in the construction [104] of the pagodas. Governor Freeling, however, was, it may be presumed, compelled to see danger in an institution which had had nearly forty years' trial, without a single accident happening to warrant any sudden interposition of the Government tending to its suppression. At all events, the only action taken in 1884, in prospect of their usual festival, was to notify the immigrants by proclamation, and, it is said, also through authorized agents, that the details of their fête were not to be conducted in the usual manner; and that their appearance with pagodas in any public road or any town, without special license from some competent local authority, would entail the penalty of so many pounds fine, or imprisonment for so many months with hard labour. The immigrants, to whom this unexpected change on the part of the authorities was utterly incomprehensible, both petitioned and sent deputations to the Governor, offering guarantees for the, if possible, more secure celebration of the Hosein, and praying His Excellency to cancel the prohibition as to the use of the roads, inasmuch as it interfered with the essential part of their religious rite, which was the "drowning," or casting into [105] the sea, of the pagodas. Having utterly failed in their efforts with the Governor, the coolies resolved to carry out their religious duty according to prescriptive forms, accepting, at the same time, the responsibility in the way of fine or imprisonment which they would thus inevitably incur. A rumour was also current at the time that, pursuant to this resolution, the head men of the various plantations had authorized a general subscription amongst their countrymen, for meeting the contingency of fines in the police courts. All these things were the current talk of the population of San Fernando, in which town the leading immigrants, free as well as indentured, had begun to raise funds for this purpose.
All that the public, therefore, expected would have resulted from the intended infringement of the Proclamation was an enormous influx of money in the shape of fines into the Colonial Treasury; as no one doubted the extreme facility which existed for ascertaining exactly, in the case of persons registered and indentured to specific plantations, the names and abodes of at least the chief offenders against the proclamation. Accordingly, on the [106] occurrence of the bloody catastrophe related above, every one felt that the mere persistence in marching all unarmed towards the town, without actually attempting to force their way into it, was exorbitantly visited upon the coolies by a violent death or a life-long mutilation. This sentiment few were at any pains to conceal; but as the poorer and more ignorant classes can be handled with greater impunity than those who are intelligent and have the means of self-defence, Mr. Justice Child, the very day after the tragedy, and without waiting for the pro formâ official inquiry into the tragedy in which he bore so conspicuous a part, actually caused to be arrested, sat to try and sent to hard labour, persons whom the police, in obedience to his positive injunctions, had reported to him as having condemned the shooting down of the immigrants! Those who were arrested and thus summarily punished had, of course, no means of self-protection; and as the case is typical of others, as illustrative of "justice-made law" applied to "subject races" in a British colony, Mr. Froude is free to accept it, or not, in corroboration of his unqualified panegyrics.
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