Judge — February 28, 1885 — page 2: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE JUDGE. THE JUDGE. TERMS TO SUBSCRIBERS. (Derren Stares ap Casapa.) aprance, One copy, one year, or 52 numbers - KO One copy, aix months, or Bnumbere ee 20 One copy, for 13 weet rey Adareas, THE JUDGE PUBLISHING COMPANY, $24, 326 and 328 Pearl St.. CORRBSPONDENTS. SW-ConagaroNDENTS WILL PLEASE TAKE SOTICE THAT THEY eaxp Maa To Twi OFFICE AT THEIR OWS Rink, WHERE STANTS ARE ESCLONED WE WILL RETCRN REJECTED MATTER AN TAR AB TOS: (ERLE, BCT WE DUFTINCTLY REPUDIATR ALL REATONAIRILITY FOR SUCH tm EVERY Case WHERE 4 PRICE {© SOT AFFITED BY THE WRITER, CONTRIBUTIONS WILL BE REGARDED AS ORATCITOC®, ASD 5O SURGE QUEST CLAIM FOR REMUNERATION WILL BE ENTERTAINED. COURTING MISS CONGO. Tue centre of Africa is the centre of a good deal of attraction just now among the potentates of Europe. Uncle Sam, whose distinguished citizen Henry M.Stanley threw so much light on the secrets of the dark con- tinent, not having the colonizing instinct very much developed, looks on as a compar- itively disinterested spectator; but Germany, England, Italy, Portugal, and other nations are wooing the dusky maiden of the deserts most assiduously. It is all a matter of busi- ness, The Congo drains and opens up a vast area of territory containing many natives; these natives have wants which it is the am- bition of civilization tosupply. Civilization is quite prepared to furnish bibles, beads and rum in exchange for ivory, palm oil and gold-dust. The rivalry arises from the com- | mercial industry of a lot of traders, who are all anxious to be first in a new field, and to control it. And so it goes, England’s experience in Africa has not, of late, been of so pleasant a nature as she could wish, Still, the ‘grasping islanders,” as someone calls them, are never content to see any portion of the inhabitable globe occupied by others. Under Bismarck’s influence, Germany has recently developed an astonish- ing penchant for colonization, and poor little | Portugal ciaims that she was the first, and | ought, in common justice, to be allowed some | finger in the pie. | Amongst them all Tue Junce is inclined to let his sympathies go to Miss Congo. | Whichever wins, she is pretty certain to get left, eventually. “Too many lovers puzzle a maid.” THE WHIPPING POST FOR WIFE-BEATERS. Is the civilization of the age, all brutal and -grading formsof punishment are to be dep- recated and it is hard to conceive a more bru- taland degrading punishment than thatof the whipping-post. And yet, for certain classes of crime, it is hard to imagine a more suita- ble penalty. ‘That it is efficacious we know, for it has been tried. After the garotters in England had set the law at defiance, and laughed at all the penalties the law could inflict upon them, Parliament passed a law prescribing the whipping-post for that class of criminals, and in an incredibly short space of time, garotters were no more heard of. And the same plan has worked well in keep- ing down the criminal population in our sister state of Delaware. A law is proposed for this state, to inflict the penalty of the whipping post on wife- beaters. Tue JUpGE pronounces unhesita- tingly in its favor. In the first place, if anyone merits the would abuse his superior strength to ill-treat a woman—the woman of all the world whom it his duty, as it should be his privilege, to cherish and protect. crime is altogether too common—a sure proof that the law does not afford to women the pro- tection that they are entitled to. And, finally, any penalty which, under the exist- ing state of things, can be inflicted on the malefactor, falls at least as heavily on the misused wife as on the brutal husband. What is the use of fining a wife-beater?— It only increases the poverty in which both husband and wife are probably steeped, and the woman will suffer more than the brute. What is the use of sending him to jail? His labor is probably all that the wretched woman has to look to for the support of herself and her children, and ten days on the Island for the bread winner means ten days destitution and beggary for his hapless family. For this reason it isextremely diffi- cult to get the ill-used women to complain of theirhusbands, They will make any excuses, or even perjure themselves, to secure an acquittal. In some cases, perhaps, the un- willingness of the ill-used wife to testify may be attributed to fear, or perhaps—for who knows how much woman’s heart will endure— she actually still loves the brute who misuses her. But if the magistrate were empowered to order a given number of lashes, well laid on, and then send the brute about his business, all this would bedifferent. Tosuch cowards physical pain is the only true punishment, and the man who had once tasted the disci- pline, would be careful not to offend again. Fear, asan element in suppressing testimony, would be eliminated, and so would dread of want, for the man could go to his work without the loss of a day. It is argued that the punishment is brutal and degrading. True; but a man who beats ic ), it is the coward who | In the second place, the | a woman is a being whom no punishment could further brutalize or degrade. The experiment is, at least, well worth a trial, for, so far, our laws have proved insufficient to [cope with and control the savagery of wife-beaters. ROLLER SKATING. Or all the queer manias that ever drove an averagely sensible nation distracted, the roller-skating mania is decidedly the queerest. It is no new thing—this wheeling the human body about on little wooden castors, as if it were a sofa—but it isa new craz A few people ‘‘skated,” as its vota to call it, years ago, but within the last the majority of the population has mounted itself on little whee nd sent up boxwood to famine prices. , Every little town in the country has its skating rink —many of them more than one, and they all find patronage and make money. Now the interesting social problem arises wherein lies the pleasure in roller skatin; The keen enjoyment of skimming through the sharp winter air over the frozen surface of a This pursuit is the very acme of healthy exercise. But to tumble yourself about on little wheels, through the vitiated atmosphere of a crowded hall, amid a clattering din from the tor- mented, dusty floor—if this be pleasure, then welcome purgatory. Yet there must be some attraction in it for some people. Perhaps it lies in the facil ities it offers for flirting. The little wheels, with which the lower surface of the alleged “‘skate” is covered, render the ‘‘skater’s” footing insecure, and young ladies find an advantage in the support of a manly arm. To paraphrase the reason given by a young lady for the enjoyment of the waltz—‘ the skating’s nothing, but the hugging is heav- enly.” These rinks generally contrive to have a few professional ‘‘ mashers ” in atten- dance, who teach the young ladies how to stand erect on the wheeled monstrosities, and even elope with such of them as seem worth it. Already country papers have been more than once called on to chronicle the flight of “ Miss .a daughter of one of our wealthiest citizens, with Professor , the handsome and dashing young instructor at the Columbia Rink.” It is all right, we suppose. If young ladies will frequent the very mixed society of the average skating rink, and if parents will allow them to do so, there is nothing to be said. ‘The “mashing” days of the coachman are over; he is nowhere beside the festive knight of the rollers. The divine accom- plishment of the hour is his—he can preserve his equilibrium on a set of little wooden wheels, and gyrate round a barn without measuring his length on its dusty boards. Beside such talents as these, worth, position, ability and honesty are drugs in the market. But it is not the hearts alone of the fair frequenters of the rinks that are in peril. lake or pond is casily comprehensible. comicbooks.com