The Governor blew his light blue smoke into the lighter blue air and watched it rising.
"Deemster Taubman seems to think that a prisoner who has wilfully taken life is necessarily a murderer. That is wrong, Sir."
"Wrong?"
"Quite wrong. It is established by the laws of this and every civilised country that it is the reason of man which makes him accountable for his action and the absence of reason acquits him of the crime."
"And is there any ground for thinking that this girl was not responsible?" said the Governor.
"Every ground, Sir. No woman in her position ever was or can be responsible."
"No? .... Gardener, don't you think those tulips...."
"That's why the law of England," continued Stowell, "has ceased to look upon infanticide as a crime punishable by death. In some foreign countries it is not looked upon as a crime at all. The woman who kills her child within five days after its birth is thought to be suffering from temporary mania and therefore not guilty of murder. Besides...."
"Besides—what?"
Stowell breathed heavily and then said,