1937-05-04 — Page 22

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH. TUESDAY, MAY

1937.

THESE MEN GAVE US FREEDOM-by GUY RAMSEY

Last week "Savon Good Mon And Trup" convicted à Chi- nese of murder, and the Chief Justico sentenced him to death. they Tho10 sevon men did not lightly reach their decision were there to protect the. liberty of the subject who was on trial. This is the story of the man who made it possible for us to enjoy liberty in the Court-a man who became a 'martyr so that Britons "could" be judged by their fellow-men.

T

the

HAT sheet of printed Within two generations, the iron rule had broken. Stephen, a knight fors- paper, sealed with a worn, was on the throne, und printed stamp, summ. land was a paradise for men who thought with Froissart that "to rob moning you to appear be- and pill is a good life." fore His Majesty's Judge and Justices as a juryman;

That Government form STEPHEN died and whose delivery causes a mild oath of annoyance, a vague wonder whether a friendly doctor could not get you out of the duty;

That. unimpressive which terminates so pom- pously "Whereof fail not, as you will answer the contrary at your peril".

It is, to the seeing eye,

there ascended the throne a man

with a sprig of broom in his casque: Henry Plantagenet, Count of Anjou; n violent, ruthless Frenchman, with a driving energy and an ungovern- able temper;

sanguine, a strong,

"with "Latin: rentless man who saw logle [1]I the perils that beset him.

The

twofold: the perlis

**were feudal system by which the Kings of France had been reduced to the puppets of the baronage; and the

Church, which the Crown became

by

merely the Instrument of the bishops.

An allen king in a strange land,

Henry decided that his defence

against the ambition of the nobles document dyed in the blood of and the avarice of the Church lay in. a martyr and hallowed by the the common people. They, by sheer repentance of a King; an instrument weight of numbers, could click the -over which all England was pt swollen arrogance of the aristo

intelicetuai war; a privilege which,

cracy: by their support he could common men counted the greatest hold at bay the ever-encroaching blessing of their progressive and inronds of the Church. enlightened nge.

a

THE Jury-the trying of

case before "twelve good men and true" selected at random

from the civic centre--dates bacit

Old, courts of the Shire and the Leet and the Manor fallen into disuse in the anarchy of Stephen's reign, were revived. The old," half- forgotten custom of the Jury disinterred from history: men should present to a judge a suspected criminal.

บาง who

TWELVE GOOD MEN AND

Into the shifting, eddying kingdoms Henry, with a stroke of the royal must shed no blood, could not en- that the Saxons strove to build on pen, confirmed the rights of the force the penalty of death. the shores of England. Alfred has courts. He sent through the kingdom been praised for their establishment; men of his own choosing to Teuton tribes, preferring their administer the King's Justlee on the bloodstained myths and trackless King's highway. They travelled on forests to the enlightened ognosticism circuits the word is still in use.

and level roads of Rome, have been revered for their creation.

ΟΣ

THE test whether

1 man

were, or were not, a priest

TRUE

would not yield.” Disputes, quarrels, the King In Council and left for discussions, appents to Rome where Canterbury. The King, in a fury. the only Englishman ever to hold of impatience, dung out words which the offee ant on the Papal throne. till ring in our cars to-day: Is there Test cases of murderer who nohe of the castards eating my bread escaped with the sentence of prayers will rid me of this turbulent priest?"

acrope

to be recited-were balanced by There was the clank of armoured those where priests, falsely accused, feet on the stone floor; the were subjected to the full rigour of of steel in a metal scabbard; the clop a rigorous law.

of hoof-beats on

on a cobbled road. At the Council of Clarendon, a In Canterbury there was the sound compromise was renched. The Pope of Vespers, devoutly sung in

the abandoned Becket's claims In the twilight of winter. Four shinpes throes of his own international hurtled through the dusk. They difficulties. Dut Becket's submission loomed gigantic in the Bat Kentish did not win him favour with the lands, then suddenly were dwarfed King's party At Northampton, he in the shadow of the Cathedral, was called a traitor.

Becket marched into the court. bearing his cross before him, in his own hands. ""Traitor," cried one of the King's men, "Traltor!" Becket. turned on him. "If I were a night,

to

CLINK of bridles, tramp of mall-shod feet, shouts

of

my sword should answer you?" lie, echoing, in the silent. vaulting rose to fanatic courage and appealed God's house. A yell of "Traitor." from the King direct to Rome. A stern rebuke, The Archbishop's From England to Paris, from Paris voice soaring again into his devotions. Rome spread the discussion. Aguin that scrape of steel In a metal Becket hurled excommunications sheath. from abroad. He agreed to submit His back to the altar, Becket faced to the King's decialôns, but insisted the knights. "Sacrilege." .One that the phrase "Saving Ute Honour thrust forward and clutched him by of my Order" should be added to the arm. The priest who hud the form of the submission-which nutelied cloak from a King famed absolutely nullified. It.

info, human wrath and thrust him aside. Then the superhumun anger of the fanatie seized upon him. He opened his mouth to launch the thunderbolt of excommuniention. THE French King, always There was an upraised arm, the glint glad of an excuse to of steel in the altar candles, a shout, thwart his cousin of England, with a groan,

drew his support The Pope proved Four men strode heavily from the a broken reed. But Becket refused cathedral; their armoured feet sound- to be daunted. Standing alone, he Ing dully on the stones. recanted his submission and declared trickle of blood snaked down the Council of Clarendon and its altar steps.

compromise null and void.

Becket, knowing that if he were

in England he would lose not only

his life but his cause, remained in

A

little

the

France. In his absence Henry HENRY knelt in the Cathe

decided to

to ensure the succession.

1

dral, stripped of his

Woo

n

was fit for promotion. The See of The Angevins should not fall as fell magnificence. Friors scourged him Canterbury

of civil the humblest in the kingdom felf vacant. Henry the Normans, In a welter appointed to it "our well-beloved war. The kingdom should not again punishing the mightiest. Pligrims

Canterbury, where Thomas, surnamed a Becket." Becket wallow in a bath of anarchie blood, thronged to refused the honour.

He would crown as his successor positive, epidemic of miraculous healing broke out at the tomb of the His excuse; he was but a deacon; Richard, his eldest son,

head- healing how should he take precedence of strong, lusty, handsome youth, with murdered primate. the Lords Bishops of the Realm? his heart vowed to the grim goddess Two hundred years later, Geoffrey The only test employed between

Chaucer made songs of such a pll- two disputants, the

Thomas д Ruthless French logic made short grimmage,

Becket bishop was in a cleft stick; if he did was marked out for promotion. Falsely: for esquent juslice had little Innocence or que only test of the lay in the fact whether or no he hold. 13e became his secretary. He His reason: that he knew on Arch- of war,

priest-none but "learned clerks" by battle,, when

With the coronation' of Henry, the King's will be fell under the dis- work of the Primate's absence. If beatified and canonised. He, morn part in the brutality of primeval by ordeal: ordeal of a criminal, was cold read: If he could, he was

could read. If not he was entitled Becket was Prussia where the jaw was always man stoked the justlee of his claim to no "benent of clergy"the right only Secretary of State a despotic Pope's will he risked the disfavour duty at the Coronation, then

made Chancellor: the pleasure of Rome; if he did the Cantuar were not present to do his than St. George, was Britain's trus

Ebor patron saint. to the strong. And Alfred, holding on his swordsmanship, ordeal by

But though, at should do it. Roger Ebor, Archbl-

Beckel's death, be tried by the Courts Christion. to be his shield against the Danes, had Are, when a a man staked his

mediaeval king required. With his of the King. inno-

document was change in allegiance came a If a dispute arose, a

The King insisted-and Becket shop of York, was summoned and set Henry withdrew his claims; though change on the healing quality of his neither the ime nor the force to cene

He Was enthroned as the dladem on the boyish head. And the common people, in common with impose from his precarious throne in flesh. Again the royal pen scratched; put before the accused. If he could in character. Becket became the yielded. Winchester the rule of the King's and the jury were made fudges of read it he was absolved from sub- King's friend, even, socially, his Primate of All England--and, with Henry the Lawgiver was legally in all Christendom, worshipped Becket wrong: the rite of Coronation and abhored the King; though the All major business was con- that swift reversal of allegiance the Justice upon a clan-ridden, thanc fact, of right and wrong, of inno- jection to the King's Court. The rival.

Church emerged technically triump- ridden land.

cence and gullt. Only the purely upshot was that the rich, who could ducted by the Chanceller. When the that characterised him-a reversal was the right of Canterbury.

or not to be condemned пя hypocrisy

The Pope, free for a moment of hant from the dispute, yet since that The

penalty read, were given light sentences by King was in Normandy or Maine or he became at once the fanatie of embarrassments with an anti-Pope, day, and from that crime, Britain came to us in almost its legal question what jury

the the Courts Christian, and the poor, Anjou or Touraine, Becket was present form from a crime: the crime should be imposed was left to

with the Emperor, and with the has possessed a system of law and who could not, were

State, the Church. of murder; to which was added the itinerent judge.

given heavy virtually at the head of the

ceaseless friction of Guelph and equal justice between King and sub- He was wealthy; His clothing was crime of sacrilege. It is not the But no priest might be judged by sentences by the King's Courts.

Chibelline in Italy, rallied to jeet, Church and sinner, man and were They

There WOS another point: only blessing to come from a tainted the King's

the splendid. His feasts rivalled those

the Becket's support. Becket crossed, the man, that was the envy and is source.

Courts document was always the same, the of the King

Chunnel. He made his protest to pattern of the world. The Normans came bringing to Christian-the ecclesiastical courts, lables, scratched with priestly pen England a stern, rude, cruel justice. which, as constituted by men who on legal parchment, were known by heart by every villein in the land,

dwindled to bread and water caten All nobles claimed "bencht of elergy" as a matter of course.

DURING their close associa- in an unwarmed room from

tion, only one quarrel is boards; his fur coat shrivelled to Many a man who could not read, recorded: a quarrel that was half a hair shirt. The King who had und whose only contact with the jest, but which might have showed made him became for him an enemy: priesthood was during Confession, Henry what manner of man he had robbing Holy Mother Church of her would claim benefit of clergy and chosen. King and Chancellor rode holy dues trying to seize for him laboriously spell out as proof the together through the driving snow, self the rights of her holy bishops; syllables he knew by role.

Henry, with the violent physical striving to subject the gentle priests Henry, his mind full of a level humour of the Ume, pointed to a bf Christ, men who shed no blood, to justice, which should endear him to beggar cowering in the wind, "You the bloody jurisdiction of the Royal his people and safeguard his throne, are a priest: give your cloak to him, Courts. resented this 100 in the law

M

17

Court. .amenable only to the

OUR BRITISH CROSSWORDS

ACROSS

but not for the man who ut the chassis (hyphen 4

Seuttish county,

10 Gentle reminder for an angler. 11. What the jury have often done

for a plaintil.

12 Roman historian.

15 It's not an extra man to help on side of the field, but it's in ..one

in accordance with regulations.

16 The real gist of this adjective

is in the middle.

17 Topic that always interests a

King

20 To go for one is not to attack

onc.

22 Something unpleasant in pro-

Hress.

23" for the of a vanished

hand." (Tennyson),

24 South Sea Islanda,

27 Buck up!

20 The author

of "Poler Pan"

nearly runs through an ob struction.

20 Has endless drying possibilities

(two, words, 6 and 5).

DOWN

1- Graduate an article for a sea-

side pursuit.

2 Sort of the to attract.

3 Part of the house.

4 More than touch with a sharp

heart and black guards to start

it.

6 You can read this document

from finish to start.

18

A great Elizabethon.

7 For paving (hyphen, 3 and 5).

9 of the breed of the Dog Star?

(two words, and 7),

13 Quick-to respond to an SOS.

14 Scope here, but it takes nearly

a dozen to do it.

10 He's not in the habit of signing

the visitors book.

10 Give a beating, but there doesn'

seem

it.

to be much weight behind

20 Plunder except an obsolete

trumpet.

21 At the beginning.

25 In red it is badly slanged.

20 This bird can't be as much as

Ave shillings.

Yesterday's Solution

(T DISCREPANOYN RAAMENNNESAM C ENMES HED REECH O OMP HUL BDB N] OWED GIVEN IT I.B NUR SNL 8 IE SUTAG TITANIC

1

TVENEGRU ROOKERY RAIN TI [UTI BAE_PA

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were

Thomas!"

IS palace shrank HIS monastic cell; his feast

to

15

Not, punishment but forgiveness:

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and strove to it. He chose as Becket stretched out his hand and that was the burthen of his cry-Not-sident. Ilus-frequent.salling and their unique atorer privileges.alk/w.you.to. tils advisers men who had

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but no great gifts of birth. quality iwitched the rich fur from the King's escape but justice was the slogan of the people; men who, being, poor, Sire. It is richer and warmer than For years throughout the middle would do the King's will from self- mine." The King was thunderstruck of the twelfth century the fight went Interest. Notable Among them was at the personal affront as much as on. Test case after test case was one deacon, secretary to the Arch- that to his position. But you are held. The King retracted and de- bishop of Canterbury; an ambitious, a priest."

the that, if raanded brilliant son of a

of a London

merchant,

Becket looked at the King levelly, clerks" were subject to Courls already promoted and carmarked "Is

Majesty not also a Christian, if they were found guilty, for further advancement: a man Christian?" French logic appre- they should be handed over for sen- with a faculty for identifying him- ciated the, turn of the phrase. The tence to the Royal Court. self with whatever, master he served. King rode shivering home, swearing Two hundred years later, the In-Pres. Coolidge His name was Thomas a Becket. that his Chancellor was the cleverest quisition adopted the Angevin idea Pres. Wilson First he served the Archbishop of rogue in Christendom. Such a man of handing over convicted heretics Pres. Hoover

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