20
Notices of Japan, No. V.
JAN.
either case, the prisoner is reported to have died of disease; and being presumed guiltless, because unconvicted, the body is delivered to the family for interment, and the concomitant evils of conviction are avoided.
The criminal, who, not having thus eluded or forestalled his fate, is sentenced to death, is bound with cords, set upon a horse, and thus led to the place of execu- tion-an open field without the town,-his crime being published both by word of mouth and by a flag. Upon his way thither, any person who pleases may give him refreshment-a permission seldom made use of. Upon reaching the appointed spot, the judges, with their assistants, take their places, surrounded by the insig- nia of their office, and with unsheathed weapons. The prisoner here receives from the executioner a cup of sake, with some of its regular accompaniments, as dried or salted fish, roots, mushrooms, fruit, or pastry; and this he is allowed to share with his friends. He is then seated upon a straw mat, between two heaps of sand, and his head is struck off with a sword. The severed head is set up upon a stake, to which is affixed a placard, announcing the crime that had incurred such punishment. It is thus exposed for three days, after which the relations are allowed to bury as much of the corpse as the birds of prey have left.
L
This is the description given by the Dutch writers of an execution, and doubt. less is what they have witnessed at Nagasaki. But a conjecture may be hazard- ed, that the forms are those practiced only towards criminals of the lower orders founded upon what was said in a former paper of the mode of putting high-born offenders to death; and perhaps a second, not improbable, conjecture might be added to wit, that however precise are the laws of Japan, much is left to the plea- sure of the judge, in relation to the mode of inflicting the immutable doom. But whatever be thought of the ideas here thrown out, it is very clear that both of these are the merciful forms of execution, as we elsewhere learn that prisoners are fre- quently and publicly tortured to death, and that the excellence of the executioner is measured by the number of wounds--sixteen is said to be the maximum-that he can inflict without causing death.* Upon these occasions, it is reported that the
young
nobles habitually lend the executioner their swords, as a trial of the edge and temper of a new blade. It is further asserted, that they take great delight in witnessing executions, especially such as are enhanced by torture. One species of torture, in which a shirt of reeds, the criminal's only garment, is set on fire, is considered so superlatively entertaining from the sufferer's contortions, that it has acquired the name of the death-dance.'t
While speaking of executions, it should be said that, in the Annals of the Sio- gouns, the abdomen-ripping is spoken of as a mode of punishment commanded by the monarch. This statement, though at variance with every other upon this subject, derives a character of authenticity from the book's Japanese origin. Yet, when it is considered that the nominal translator, Titsingh, was very little ac- quainted with Japanese; that his translation was, in fact, made by native inter- preters with their imperfect knowledge of Dutch; that the scientific philologist, Klaproth, finds the opperhoofd's other translations full of blunders; and, finally, that the work was first published long after Titsingh's death in a French version; the probability may be suspected of an imperial hint to a great personage, that he would do well and wisely to perform the hara-kiri, being converted into a com- mand.
* Titsingh.
+ Meylan.