Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 68, No. 421, November 1850

Felip.– Friend Pastrana,
That is a woman's post, and not a man's,
Unless he's wool and water. Let us dare
What fate may bring us, so may we acquire
Perchance eternal blazon and renown.

Pastrana.– No, brother; death sits on the pointed horn.

Felip.– Talk not so fondly; but that well I know
Your lofty spirit and your courage tried,
I'd call it cowardice.

Pastrana.– I give you leave.
Call my resolve by any name you please,
So long as we remain no longer here.

Felip.– And can it be that you, who swallow men,
Now tremble at a beast?

Pastrana.– 'Tis true, indeed.
Wonder at my opinion as you may,
To fight with two men, or with three men, oft
Is valour rather than temerity.
Since courtesy or valour furnish means
Of safety – and much more the cunning art
Taught by Cararvza of the dextrous thrust,
Strait or oblique – the science of revenge.
Then one may say, if one is hardly pressed,
"Sir, my experience shows me, that your worship
Is an epitome of human valour;
So I will never haunt this street again,
Nor speak with Donna Mencia any more.
And if you will accept me as a friend,
My services attend you from this day."
Words soft as these control a gentleman —
Money the robber. If your foe be brave,
He must to greater pride and courage yield.
In short, there's always hope, however fierce
His wrath and keen his passion for revenge,
To soothe the fury of the incensed man,
If he be one whom gold or breeding win.
But when a bull has rent your cloak to shreds,
And bellows at the shoulders of its owner,
In hot pursuit – then try your time – advance,
And whisper in the yelling monster's ear,
"Sir Bull, a gentle bearing sets off valour —
Put some restraint upon your boiling rage.
Indeed, that constant tossing of the head
Can only suit a madman or a fool."
And you will see the fruit of your advice.
Offer your friendship to him, turn your head,
You'll find the light at once shine through your back,
Through two clear holes, each half a yard in length.

But the most popular play of this great writer, and one which is always received with the most rapturous applause, is Gil de las Calzas Verdes, (Gil of the Green Trousers.) A lady has been abandoned by her lover for a rich beauty of Madrid. She calls herself Don Gil – follows him thither, dresses herself in male attire, of which the green trousers are the most conspicuous part – torments him with letters from the convent where he supposes her to be, describing her suffering, her illness, and at last her death; interrupts his remittances, destroys his credit, carries off his mistress, who falls desperately in love with her; thwarts him at every turn; obliges him to believe that he is really haunted by the ghost of her whom he has wronged; and at last causes him to be arrested for her murder. The rage, amazement, confusion, repentance and despair of the faithless lover are portrayed in the most brilliant colours. Do what he will, mean what he will, attempt what he will, Gil of the Green Trousers, though invisible, has been beforehand with him. He goes to his bankers: the check is paid to Don Gil of the Green Trousers. He endeavours to mislead his intended father-in-law: the plot is unravelled by Don Gil of the Green Trousers. He tries to soften his mistress: she raves of nothing but Don Gil of the Green Trousers. As Don Gil is so successful with his green trousers, other suitors of the Madrid lady dress in green trousers, and assume his name in the dark under her window. There are at one time four persons in the street, each calling himself Gil with the Green Trousers. The faithless suitor of the true Gil is one of them. His rival challenges him; but no sooner does the challenged see the fatal garment, than his conscience smites him, and he addresses his furious rival as the ghost of his injured mistress.

"O soul most innocent! by that sweet love
Which once thou cherished for me, and which now
Delights my memory, I charge thee, rest
My punishment, thy rigour, are complete
If haply to disturb my present love,
Thou hast assumed a body here on earth,
And at Madrid calling thyself Don Gil,
In such attire, and bearing such a name,
Dost meditate to wreak revenge on me,

* * * * *

O cease, blest spirit! from thy fierce pursuit."

The other lover, who hears this grotesque invocation, thinks it a mere trick of his rival to escape a duel, and overwhelms him with every epithet of abuse.

The play ends by the marriage of Don Gil with her fickle suitor. We are almost ashamed to add, that this was the favourite play of Ferdinand VII., and was ordered for him on all solemn occasions by the municipality of Madrid. Without the refinement of Calderon or Lope de Vega, Molina surpasses both in his verve and gaiety. His satire is unlimited; it spares neither the authorities of earth, nor the ministers of heaven – nay, it does not even spare the great national amusement. Epigram after epigram is poured out upon every object that attracts his notice; his brilliant and sparkling wit is inexhaustible; and his "malice" as boundless as it is subtle. Of all French writers, it has been said, by a very competent judge, that he resembles Beaumarchais most closely; and however strange it may seem, that the Spanish monk of the seventeenth century should bear so close an analogy to the Parisian bel esprit of the eighteenth, the remark is undoubtedly correct. We have dwelt more especially on this writer, because he is not well known in Europe, and because even Mr Ticknor, in his accurate and valuable work on Spanish literature – a work we hail both for what it proves, and for what it makes us expect, with the greatest delight – has failed to do him complete justice. Shack seems to us to have appreciated him more justly in his excellent and useful dissertation. But our limits are exhausted for the present.

MODERN STATE TRIALS.[2 - Modern State Trials: Revised and Illustrated, with Essays and Notes. By William C. Townsend, Esq., M.A., Q.C., Recorder of Macclesfield. In 2 vols. 8vo. Longman & Co. 1850.]

PART II

Impelled by motives which we own to be with difficulty effectively justifiable, and which we must resolve into an overmastering anxiety to behold how doomed human nature can confront terror-inspiring circumstances, felt sufficient to palsy one's own soul, we found ourselves, on Sunday morning, the 5th of July 1840, in the front seat of the stranger's gallery in the Chapel of Newgate, in order to hear the condemned sermon preached to Benjamin Courvoisier, and witness the demeanour of one who was to be publicly strangled on the ensuing morning, and in the ensuing evening buried within the precincts of the prison. Callous must he have been who could witness the scene of that morning without being profoundly affected. It was the house of God; and yet, (with reverence be the allusion made,) in one sense, alas! a den of thieves– of outcasts from society; whose laws they had, or were charged with having, disregarded and openly violated. Some were there under the pressure of violent suspicion – amounting to a moral, soon to pass into a legal, certainty – of various kinds and degrees of guilt: others bore the blighting brand of established crime, and were suffering, or about to suffer, its penalty. With what feelings would they enter the house of Him who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity – to Whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from Whom no secrets are hid! Would any of that guilty throng take their places there, brutally ignorant, indifferent, reckless, or desperate? Would their polluted souls be swelling with ill-suppressed feelings of impiety and blasphemy? Would any approach with broken and contrite spirits, having been shaken, by the stern hand of offended human law alone, out of a life's lethargy and insensibility? How would the holy accents of warning, of expostulation, of mercy, of dread denunciation, sound in the ears of those who were presently to fill that dismal chapel – dismal, only from its locality, and the character of its occupants? With what feelings would one enter – the death-doomed – for whom, and for whom alone, was reserved that solitary, central, ominous black bench? who was so terribly far advanced in his passage from a human tribunal to that of the dread Eternal! – on whose brow already faintly glistened the dread twilight between here and hereafter, – the black night of time breaking before the dawning of an eternal day!

They come! Yonder gallery, curtained off, is filling with the female prisoners; no sounds audible but their rustling dresses, and perhaps a half-choked sigh or sob. It is well, poor souls! that you are hidden from the public gaze – from the rude eye of your male comrades in crime! They are now entering below, silent and orderly, the eye of the governor upon them, as they are led by burly turnkeys and inspectors to their appropriate places, classed as untried and convicted – the latter according to their respective kinds and degree of punishment. All, at length, are seated. What an assemblage! Almost all clad in prison costume; many with sullen, determined countenances – others with harassed features and downcast look – one or two exhibiting unequivocally an air of insolent and reckless defiance – but all conscious of the stern surveillance under which they sate. Alas, those boys! some already, others about to be, condemned – all gazing, terror-struck, at the black seat in the centre!

The chaplain enters the desk immediately under the pulpit, which, attached to the blank wall, faces the communion-table. He, also, casts an ominous glance at the black bench before him, in the centre of the floor, to which all faces are directed, amidst moody and troubled silence. At length a door on the left is heard being unbolted; a turnkey enters, followed by the great criminal – one whose name was ringing in the ears of the public – one on whom every eye is instantly fixed with sickening intensity. It is Courvoisier – the monster who, a few weeks before, had barbarously murdered his sleeping lord! – He was led to his seat, a glass of water being placed near him, in case of his faintness, and on one side of him sate a turnkey. Courvoisier knelt down; and then, a prayer-book having been given him, (which he held in an untrembling hand,) took his seat, not far from the reading-desk, covering his eyes for a few moments with his left hand. His demeanour was signally calm and self-possessed, and his motions were deliberate. He was a man about twenty-four years of age. His countenance wore such an expression of pensive good-nature and docility, as rendered it a consolatory reflection that he had unequivocally and spontaneously confessed the fiendish act of which the law had pronounced him guilty, and for which, under holy sanctions, it was on the morrow to take away his life.[3 - How must the following verses in the Psalms of the day have effected him, if the wretched being were not too bewildered to appreciate them! – "Turn thee unto me, and have mercy upon me, for I am desolate and in misery. The sorrows of my heart are enlarged; O bring thou me out of my troubles. Look upon my adversity and misery, and forgive me all my sins." – Ps. xxv. 15, 16, 17. "O shut not up my soul with the sinners, nor my life with the blood-thirsty." – Ps. xxvi. 9. If the murderer's heart did not thrill when these last words were read out by the chaplain, with fearful distinctness, it must have been the only one that did not.] Yes – there he sate, where we had seen sitting, also, his blood-stained predecessor Greenacre; and, moreover, Fauntleroy the forger; also a young banker's clerk – a widowed mother's sole support, her only child – for forging a trifling check. Alas, alas! how he wept during the whole service! – but how calmly he behaved the next morning on the gallows!

After gazing long and earnestly on the central figure in the gloomy picture, our eyes were casually attracted by a very different one, – that of a youth sitting on the steps of the altar, as though he had been a privileged spectator. We regarded him as a friend of some subordinate functionary of the gaol. He seemed a silly, vulgar, little dandy, who had put on his very best clothes for the occasion. He looked about eighteen or nineteen years old, and was of slender figure, and a little under the average height. His hair was full and curly – displayed in a very affected style. He wore a sort of second-hand blue surtout with velvet collar, a black satin stock, a light figured waistcoat, and light slate-coloured trousers – the latter a trifle too short, and strained down by a pair of elongated straps, so as to reach as nearly as possible to the brightly-polished boots. Beside him was a hat, of which he seemed very careful, and smoothed it round delicately, once or twice, with his hand. His eyes were quick, and inquisitive; and he seemed to share the interest with which others contemplated Courvoisier. Several times, during the service, his fingers passed jauntily through his hair, as if to dispose it effectively round his temples. A prayer-book was handed to him, to which he seemed tolerably attentive; but during the sermon he was evidently more occupied with his dress than the exciting and instructive topics of the chaplain – frequently pulling off and putting on his gloves, and arranging different portions of his dress, as though he feared they did not sit upon him sufficiently becomingly. When, however, the chaplain addressed himself personally, and with fearful solemnity, to the murderer before him, the young occupant of the altar-steps was roused into attention, and he listened a few minutes – his eyes fixed now on the preacher, then on the condemned. When the service was over, Courvoisier (whose demeanour had been throughout most satisfactory – solemn, composed, and reverent) was beckoned out to the door through which he had entered, and he obeyed, walking with complete self-possession. – We had looked our last on him! – "Do you see that young fellow on the altar-steps? – do you know who he is?" said a gentleman who approached us for the purpose. "No; he seems a vulgar little puppy," we exclaimed, "whoever he may be." "It is Oxford, who shot at the Queen, and is to be tried this week!" was the reply; and while we turned round to gaze at him, he was in the act of quitting the chapel, holding his hat very carefully, and gazing towards the gallery with an expression of cheerful inquisitiveness. Had it occurred to him that, in all human probability, a week or two would behold him an occupant of the black bench just quitted by the murderer?

Yes! that was Edward Oxford, the little caitiff, first of a small and ignominious series of similar ones, who had, on the preceding 9th of June, twice deliberately fired at his young Queen, as she was driving, in fancied security, with her consort, up Constitution Hill, and on each occasion apparently with ball! The following was his own free-and-easy account of the matter, on being examined before the Privy Council: —

"A great many witnesses against me. Some say I shot with my left, others with my right. They vary as to the distance. After I had fired the first pistol, Prince Albert got up, as if he would jump out of the coach, and sate down again, as if he thought better of it. Then I fired the second pistol. This is all I shall say at present."

    (Signed) "Edward Oxford."

In the case of this young miscreant, (for it is difficult to speak of him temperately,) however, was, within four days' time, to be resolved a problem of unspeakable difficulty and moment, by such means as the law of the country could command, – viz., responsibility or irresponsibility for criminal acts, according to the state of mind existing at the time of committing them. It is needless to affirm that this is a question of public, permanent, universal interest; one in which every individual, young or old, may become personally concerned; one which no humane jurist, practical or speculative, can approach without lively anxiety; one worthy of frequent and deep consideration by every one concerned in the administration of criminal justice. To punish an individual utterly unconscious of the difference between right and wrong at the time of committing the alleged crime, shocks one's sense of natural justice, and confounds all the principles on which it can be administered by man. How can we hang a maniac who, in a paroxysm of madness, kills the keeper who was endeavouring to soothe or to restrain him? Or one who shoots another whom, under the veritable and sole influence of delusion, he believed to be in the act of killing him, and that he was therefore acting solely in self-defence? These are plain cases, as stated; but still they require, of course, very clear proof of the facts from which the law is to deduce a perfect irresponsibility for his acts. The subject is one environed with immense practical difficulties, which are often unexpectedly visible in applying apparently clear and correct principles to simple combinations of fact. The most sagacious judges, the most conscientious juries, have grievously miscarried in such cases; some sending persons to the scaffold under circumstances far weaker than those held by others demonstrative of irresponsibility, and, consequently, demanding an acquittal. Many painful and dreadful cases might be cited; but two shall suffice. In the year 1837, an industrious, affectionate, poverty-stricken father strangled his four children, avowedly to prevent their being turned into the streets. They all slept in one room. Having strangled two, he left the room; but, after meditating for some time, came to the conclusion that he might as well be hanged for killing all four; on which he returned, and strangled the other two – having shaken hands with them before he did it! He then quitted the house, and went to a neighbour's, to whom he did not mention what he had done; but on being apprehended the next day, and taken before the coroner, he confessed the above facts. No witness had ever observed a trace of insanity about him. The physician to a lunatic asylum offered to prove that the prisoner's grandmother and sister had been under his care, the latter for entertaining a desire to destroy herself and her children – evidence which the judge rejected; and under his direction the jury convicted, and he passed sentence of death on the prisoner.[4 - He was subsequently respited, owing to the zealous interference of some medical men, who succeeded in satisfying the Secretary of State of the prisoner's insanity. See Taylor's Medical Jurisprudence, p. 792.] In the year 1845, a young servant girl, quiet and docile, having taken a knife from the kitchen, on some trivial pretence, went up to the room where her master's child lay, and killed it. She then went downstairs, and told the horrifying fact to her master. She was quite conscious of the crime she had committed, and showed much anxiety to know whether she would be hanged or transported. There was not the slightest tittle of evidence that she had been labouring under any delusion; yet she was acquitted on the ground of insanity![5 - Ibid. p. 803-4.] Can anything be more grievously unsatisfactory than such a state of things as this, in the administration of the criminal justice of the country? One of the causes which conduced to such results was the too ready deference paid to speculative medical men, professing to have made disordered intellects their peculiar study, and who came forward, from time to time, confidently and authoritatively pronouncing that such and such circumstances indicated unequivocally the existence of "insanity," of "moral insanity," at the time of the act committed. Nay, they would sit in court, listening to a detail of facts, from which they would then enter the witness-box, and authoritatively declare their opinion that, if such were the facts, the prisoner was insane, and therefore irresponsible, when the act in question was committed! Many held that the mere absence of assignable motive indicated such insanity! and many, that the mere committal of the particular act should be so regarded! Notions more dangerous and monstrous cannot be conceived. Well might the late Mr. Baron Gurney declare, "that the defence of insanity had lately grown to a fearful height, and the security of the public required that it should be watched."[6 - Rex v Reynolds. Taylor's Med. Jurisp. p. 801.] There are two Trials contained in Mr Townsend's first volume, which afford memorable illustrations of the difficulty with which these questions are encountered in our courts of justice. They are those of Oxford, for shooting at the Queen, and of M'Naughten for the murder of Mr Drummond, the private secretary of the late Sir Robert Peel. In both cases there were acquittals, on the alleged ground of insanity; and we take leave to intimate that, in our opinion, there should have been convictions in both. The escape of the cold-blooded murderer, M'Naughten, who deliberately shot his unsuspecting victim in the back, horrified and disgusted the public. "It had not been anticipated," says Mr Townsend, "and created a deep feeling in the public mind, that there was some unaccountable defect in our criminal law. People of good sense appeared panic-stricken, by this new danger, from venturing into the London streets; and called upon the legislature to discover some preservative against the attacks of insane passengers in public thoroughfares."[7 - Vol. i. p. 320.] Indignation was loudly expressed in Parliament. In the House of Commons, an honourable Irish baronet moved for leave to bring in a bill to abolish the plea of insanity in cases of murder, except where it could be proved that the person accused was publicly known and reputed to be a maniac; and he asked the House to suspend the standing orders to accelerate the progress of his bill. His motion, however, found no seconder. A similar casualty had befallen Mr Windham, in 1800, who, in the course of a debate which ensued in bringing in a bill to meet such cases as that of Hadfield, (who had just been acquitted, on the ground of insanity, from the charge of firing at George III.,) suggested that an offender, even if insane, should be subjected to some sort of punishment, for the sake of example! On the same evening in which the attempt of Sir Valentine Blake was made in the House of Commons, the matter was discussed anxiously in the House of Lords, by Lords Lyndhurst, Brougham, Cottenham, Campbell, and Denman. Lord Campbell expressed the general feeling of the House, when he said – "There may be great difficulty in convicting persons who are not in a state of mind to be responsible for their actions; but it is monstrous to think that society should be exposed to the dreadful dangers to which it is at present liable, from persons in that state of mind going at large."[8 - Townsend, vol. i. p. 46.] At length, on the suggestion of the Lord Chancellor, (Lord Lyndhurst,) it was agreed that the judges should be called upon to declare the true state of the criminal law on this momentous subject; and five questions were carefully framed for that purpose, and submitted to them for grave consideration. The following are these questions and answers – both of which, as containing a solemn and authoritative enunciation of the law of the land, we shall present to our readers, whom we request to give them a careful perusal, before proceeding to read what we have to offer on the two trials above alluded to. We are the more anxious that they should do so, because of the recent very remarkable case of Pate, who struck her Majesty with a cane last summer; and whose case was dealt with in strict conformity with the rules which follow: —

Question I. – "What is the law respecting alleged crimes committed by persons afflicted with insane delusion, in respect of one or more particular subjects, or persons: – as for instance, where, at the time of the commission of the alleged crime, the accused knew he was acting contrary to law, but did the act complained of, with a view, under the influence of insane delusion, of redressing or revenging some supposed grievance or injury, or of producing some public benefit?"

Answer. – "Assuming that your lordships' inquiries are confined to those persons who labour under such partial delusions only, and are not in other respects insane, we are of opinion, that, notwithstanding the party did the act complained of with a view, under the influence of insane delusion, of redressing or revenging some supposed grievance or injury, or of producing some public benefit, he is nevertheless punishable according to the nature of the crime committed, if he knew, at the time of committing such crime, that he was acting contrary to law; by which expression we understand your Lordship to mean the law of the land."

Questions II. and III. (1.) – "What are the proper questions to be submitted to the jury, when a person alleged to be afflicted with insane delusion, respecting one or more particular subjects or persons, is charged with the commission of a crime (murder, for example) and insanity is set up as a defence?"