his time had come. The seal thus set to the fate of his acquaintance was a severe shock to poor Ts'èng. His tongue refused to speak, and he durst not look on the face of the condemned man. But Lung was quite unmoved. "You see," he said, addressing Ts'èng, "my race is run, and I only hope that if ever you should be in a like position, you may be enabled to face the future with the same composure that I do, and to place as sure a faith in the loving tenderness of the Great Mother of us all, as that which now supports me." Ts'èng was too much overcome to utter a word, but wrung his friend's hands, and with weeping eyes watched him led off to be questioned by the judge before being borne to the execution-ground. This event cast a gloom over the prison for the rest of the day; and the approach of night, even though it entailed a retreat into the close and fetid atmosphere of the cell, was a relief to all. The next morning, immediately after breakfast, the jailer paid another visit to the courtyard and summoned Ts'èng to appear before the magistrate. The contrast between his last interview with his judge and the present occasion, covered Ts'èng with shame and remorse. As he entered the judgment-hall he scarcely ventured to lift his eyes to his former host, who was seated behind a large table covered with red cloth, attended by secretaries, interpreters, and turnkeys. He thought it just possible that when the magistrate recognised him he would pay him some consideration. But these hopes were rudely dispelled when two of the executioners, who stood at the foot of the dais, taking him by the arms, forced him on his knees. At the VOL. CXXXVII.-NO. DCCCXXXI. same moment, at a signal from the magistrate, one of the secretaries read out the accusation, in which he was charged with having murdered a wandering pedlar, named Ting." "Are you guilty of this charge, or not guilty?" asked the magistrate, in a cold, clear voice. 66 "Not guilty, your Excellency," said Ts'èng, vaguely hoping that his denial would be sufficient. "Call the witnesses," said the magistrate; and to Ts'èng's horror, at a sign from the secretary, Tan stepped forward and fell on his knees. "Now tell us what you know of this matter," said the magistrate, Thus adjured, Tan told the whole story from beginning to end, and though he laid great stress on the pressure Ts'èng had put upon him to induce him to help to bury the body, he, on the whole, made his statement plainly and truthfully. Still Ts'èng thought it possible that, if no other evidence was produced, his word would be taken against his servant's,-at all events, the only answer that occurred to his confused mind was a flat denial. "The whole story, your Excellency, is a lie from beginning to end," he said, "and is invented by this man out of spite, in consequence of my having had occasion to flog him for a gross falsehood and breach of trust." The confident manner in which Ts'èng made this uncompromising assertion, evidently produced a favourable effect on the magistrate, who, turning to Tan, asked "Have you any evidence of the truth of your story?" "Well, your Excellency, I can show you where we buried the body, and where it is at this moment, if it has not been removed." At these words Ts'èng, who felt the ground slipping from under I him, trembled all over, and would have fallen forward had not a turnkey supported him on his knees. These signs of trepidation were not unmarked by the magistrate, who ordered two policemen to go with Tan to exhume the body, and directed Ts'èng in the meantime to stand on one side. So completely had his nerves now forsaken him, however, that to stand was impossible, and he was therefore allowed to sit huddled up against an angle in the wall at the side of the court. Here he suffered all the mental tortures to which weak and cowardly natures are susceptible. Shame, remorse, and anger all tortured him in turns, and dominating all was the abject terror which possessed him. The knowledge that he was completely in the power of others over whom he had not the slightest influence or control; that he was alone without a single friend to whom to turn for advice or help; that he was guilty of the crime laid to his charge; and that death at the hand of the executioner would in all probability be his fate,-was an instrument which plagued him with such intensity, that it almost bereft him of reason. Rocking himself to and fro, and moaning piteously, he sat the very picture of misery. Other cases were called on and disposed of, but he heard not a word, and was only recalled to consciousness by being dragged once again into the courtyard, and put on his knees before the tribunal. He knew that this meant that Tan had returned, and he instinctively felt that the body of the murdered man was close beside him, but he durst not look round. Almost lifeless, he knelt waiting for the first words, which seemed as though they were never to be uttered. At last they came. "Have you brought the body?" "We have, your Excellency," answered Tan, "and here it is; we put it into this coffin as it has been dead for some time; shall we open it?" "Wait," said the magistrate, who was evidently anxious to avoid that operation if possible, and turning to Ts'èng, he asked, "Do you still deny your guilt?" "No," replied Ts'eng, who had now lost all hope; "but I did not mean to kill him, it was an accident, indeed it was. Oh, have mercy on me," cried the wretched man, "and spare my life! Punish me in any way, but oh, let me live!" "Your pitiable cries for mercy,' said the magistrate, "only make your conduct worse. You had no compassion on the man you murdered and who now lies there in evidence against you, and I shall therefore have none on you. sentence you——' I At this moment a sound of voices and a rush of persons were heard at the other end of the courtyard. The magistrate paused and looked up, prepared to inflict the bastinado on the intruders, but their appearance warned him that something unusual had happened. Golden-lilies led the van, and falling on her knees before the magistrate, cried— "Spare him, spare him, your Excellency! it is all a mistake. Ting is not dead, but is here." At the sound of Golden-lilies' voice, Ts'èng awoke from the trance into which he had fallen at the magistrate's rebuke, and turned his lack-lustre eyes upon his wife. Her eager look gave him confidence, and following the direction of her outstretched finger, he beheld the old pedlar on his knees. But he was still too dazed to grasp the situation. Meanwhile Golden- lilies' volubility was unchecked. "Ask him, your Excellency, and he will tell you he is the man; that the ferryman told a wicked lie; and that far from having been killed, he has not suffered the slightest inconvenience from his fall." "But your husband has confessed that he murdered him," said the magistrate. "The ferryman told him he had, and he believed him; but it was not true," urged Golden-lilies; "and just when I thought that the darkest hour of my life had come, when all hope of seeing my husband again alive seemed vanishing, who should knock at our door but the pedlar himself. With out waiting to hear his explanation, I have brought him with me; and now do let my husband go." "Not so fast," said the magistrate. "I must first satisfy myself that this is Ting, and then I must inquire who that dead man yonder is, or rather was. Call Tan." At this invocation Tan took up his former position on his knees; but in the interval since his last appearance he had lost confidence, and the turn events had taken did not, he saw, clearly reflect so brightly on his prospects as they did on Ts'eng's. He felt that he was compromised, though he could not understand all, and was not quite sure how the magistrate would, on review, regard his conduct. "Do you recognise that man?" asked the magistrate, pointing at Ting. "Yes, your Excellency; he is Ting the pedlar, or his ghost." "But in your evidence you charged your master with murdering Ting, and you swore that you buried him ; and in support of your assertions you produce a body which is not Ting's, since Ting is here. How do you explain this?" "All I can say, your Excellency, is, that my master ordered me to bury Ting; and Lai, the ferryman, told me that the man I buried was Ting." "Arrest Lai and bring him before me at once," said the magistrate to a police - runner; "and meanwhile I will hear the pedlar's evidence. Bring him forward. Who are you ?" "My contemptible surname, your Excellency, is Ting, and my personal name is Heavenly Brightness.' "Tell me what you know of this matter. 6 "After leaving the house of his honour Ts'èng," said Ting," "I got into Lai's ferry boat to cross the lake. On the way over I told him the story of the fracas at his honour's door, and showed him the silk which had been given me. He took a fancy to the pattern on it, and bought it from me, as well as the basket in which I carried it. Nothing else happened until just as we got to the other shore, when we saw the corpse of a man floating in the water. As I walked away from the shore I turned round and saw Lai rowing towards the body. I reached home the same evening and remained there until to-day, when I called at his honour's house. On showing myself at the door I was, to my surprise, hurried off here, and now I kneel in your Excellency's presence." At this juncture Lai entered. The last few weeks' dissipation had not improved his appearance, and his ill-concealed terror at his present predicament added a ghastly paleness to his bleared and sallow complexion. "How is this," said the magistrate, "that you have charged an innocent man with murder, and have palmed off on him the body of some one else as that of the man you said he had murdered?" Seeing that circumstances were against him Lai was silent. "Now listen," said the magistrate; "you, Lai, are the principal culprit in this affair. You brought an unjust accusation against an innocent man, and by means of it extorted money from him. For these crimes I sentence you to receive a hundred blows with the large bamboo, and to be transported into Mongolia for five years. Because you, Tan, having connived at the concealment of what you believed to be a murder, charged your master with the murder out of a spirit of revenge, I sentence you to receive fifty blows on the mouth, and fifty blows with the large bamboo. And as to you, Ts'èng, though your conduct has been bad in attempting to conceal what you believed to be your crime, and in bribing others to silence, yet, in consideration of your imprisonment and of what you have gone through, I acquit you." Never were more life-giving words uttered than those addressed by the magistrate to Ts'èng. Their effect was visible upon him physically; he seemed to grow in bulk under their gracious influence, and his face reverted from the pallor of death to the colour of life. "May your Excellency live for ever," said he, as he kotowed before his judge, who, however, had left the judgment-seat before he had completed his nine prostrations. As the magistrate turned away from the hall, he met Mr Tso, who had come to call upon him. "So our friend Ts'èng has got off, I see," said his visitor. Yes," said the magistrate, "but I have quite come round to your estimate of his character. He is a poor creature. I sent a much finer fellow to the executionground yesterday." SIR ALEXANDER GRANT. THE year 1884 will probably be regarded by the writer who in after-years takes up the Story of the University of Edinburgh' as the most memorable and impressive year in the annals of that institution. It is hardly too much to say that it was in that year that the University first became fully conscious that it had a history, and that teachers and students fully realised that the work on which they were engaged was connected by continuous development with that which had been carried on in or near the same place for three centuries. The numbers attending the University, which had been rapidly increasing for several previous years, in that year reached a maximum never previously attained. The year was further memorable for the completion of the new buildings, by which Edinburgh has been provided with a school of science and medicine superior to any in Britain, and second to very few in Europe. And while these results would be dwelt on, as marking the highest point in material prosperity which the University had attained, the great tercentenary celebration of last April might well stimulate the imagination of the writer, and claim to be described with the rich colouring of historic art. But he would probably feel that the true significance of that event is best expressed in the words spoken by the Principal in his address to the students at the opening of the present session. "When we think," he said, "of the unanimous response, of the most cordial and the most respectful character, which our invitations received from all the great foreign schools; when we think of that notable assemblage of delegates the greatest inter-academic and international gathering that has ever been seen-marshalled in their varied costumes within the Parliament House; when we think of those hundred addresses jointly burgh is held in high esteem, that testifying that the University of Edinthe names of its great men are widely known, and that it is considered to have had a glorious past; and when we recall the eloquent words of so many gifted orators, who from various tions of sympathy and of praise to points of view brought their contribudecorate the occasion,feel that no university in the history of civilisation has ever been so highly honoured as ours."1 -we cannot but And if the writer has the sympathetic discernment through which the characters of men can be read in their writings, he will see that the feeling of pride which prompted these words is entirely impersonal; and if he turns to the actual records of the celebration, he will find that the man to whose imagination, practical sagacity, and affection for his University the conception and realisation of the idea are almost entirely due, did not regard it as an occasion for personal display, but, while performing admirably every duty imposed by his position, kept himself in the background, and left it to the distinguished guests of the University to speak to the assembled graduates and students. 1 Address to the Students of the University of Edinburgh, by Sir Alexander Grant, Bart., Principal of the University of Edinburgh, &c., &c., delivered on 28th October 1884. W. Blackwood & Sons. |