IV were parties to the fatal prize-fight in Hackney Marshes,
if it was not, as we have heard stated, actually more lenient than the law intended, may, considering all the circumstances, be re- garded as at least excusable. There was clear evidence that the fatal result was due to the refusal of the deceased to give in, and not to any desire either of his antagonist or of the seconds to prolong the quarrel. Mr. Justice Brett assumed, moreover, that "the stakes" were but a matter of form to commit the two parties to the fight, and not of a magnitude which would have given either the bystanders or the principals any pecuniary motive for prolonging the contest after it had become dangerous to human life. Under these circumstances— and we assume, of course, that Mr. Justice Brett was justi- fied in his view of them—a really severe sentence would have been a mistake. We must take into account the traditions, ideas, and feelings of the class to which Tubbs and his defeated antago- nist, Dulgar, belonged, before we punish seriously conduct which seems to them probably by no means very culpable, even though it has ended more seriously than any of them intended or wished. There is little or no evidence that any of the persons punished were at all more guilty, in their own belief, of the manslaughter of Dulgar, except so far as they knew that the law forbade prize- fights for money, than the boys in the foot-ball match the other day were of the death of the lad who lost his life in it. But while we may very fairly approve of mildness as regards the sentence, and even excuse the extreme mildness actually shown, we alto, gether object to the drift of the comments with which Mr. Justice Brett accompanied the announcement of his "rather bold course." What Mr. Justice Brett virtually said was that while he should always punish severely anything like cowardly or brutal conduct in cases where men quarrel or fight, and while he should always punish sharply also the parties to a prize-fight got up for money, which he considered "brutal and disgraceful," yet that he did not think Judges bound to regard it as "any great sin" that when men quarrel they should fight out that quarrel, if they would only fight fairly, "with their natural weapons, their hands." That coming from a Judge who was at the moment about to inflict a sentence on one of the men who had thus acted, and on his backers, is really tantamount to a very strong approval of the doctrine that it indicates a good and masculine temper not only in boys, but in grown men, to like to settle their quarrels by the "arbitrament," as it is called, — though where the arbitrament is, it is impossible to say,—of the fist ;— that a person who has been in the wrong, for instance, will be all the better for beating his adversary, who has been in the right, black and blue, and that his adversary will be all the better for being so beaten ; or that a person who has been in the right will be all the better for beating his adversary, who has hitherto been in the wrong, black and blue, but who may probably feel in the wrong no longer after he has the rankling sense of a personal disgrace to set against the consciousness of his own injustice. It is true that Mr. Justice Brett did not say that the pugilistic duel was posi- tively a good thing. He said expressly that having quarrelled as they had, "it would have been far better if, upon that quarrel, they had done nothing more,"—in other words, we suppose, had not fought it out. Still, coming as the remark did from a high func- tionary who was judicially bound to punish the offenders, tile language Mr. Justice Brett used was morally equivalent to a very warm apology for the habit of what is called "fighting out" a quarrel, so long as it is done fairly, and within given rules laid down in the main to secure a perfectly equal trial of strength and temper. This apology of Mr. Justice Brett's for the pugilistic duel,— undertaken not as a trial of skill, not as an athletic feat to test the fortitude and the presence of mind and the coolness and the nimbleness and the strength of the combatants, but as a tempered mode of letting off the steam of violent passions, is evidently an apology, for much more than the pugilistic duel,—in principle, at least for the duel with swords, and in a less degree for the duel with pistols, so long as the rules of honour which bind the duellists are scrupulously adhered to. The only real difference between these kinds of duel is a difference in the degree of danger of such a catastrophe as actually occurred in consequence of the offence for which Mr. Justice Brett was passing sentence. In a battle with fists the danger of such a catastrophe is, we suppose, though by no means insignifi- cant, comparatively small. In a battle with swords it is more serious. In a battle with fire-arms it is very serious indeed. But so long as the rules of the duel are fairly kept, it is ex- ceedingly difficult to say that you may run a certain clear chance of being killed yourself or killing your antagonist, without its being "any great sin," but that it is very wicked to engage in a fight in which it is as much as an even chance, or more than an even chance that this will be the result. The evil of the duelling practice seems to us to consist not nearly so much in the danger run, as in the motive which induces men to run that danger. If a man runs exactly the same risk in a game of foot- ball, every one praises his mettle, coolness, and courage. If he does it by jumping into the sea to save a life, a little enthusiasm is not misplaced. The boy who won't mount a horse or play at cricket for fear of a serious accident is, not without justice, despised by his comrades. In the case of a boxing or wrestling- match, not due to a quarrel and not played for money, but engaged in simply as a trial of endurance, strength, and skill, an accidentally fatal result would not brand the person who was so unfortunate as to be the cause of it with the least breath of guilt or crime, though he might be thought guilty of a want of due care. It appears to us that it is only when the trial of strength takes place to gratify the passions excited in a quarrel, that the whole thing becomes utterly indefensible and culpable. Ignominious as fighting for money is, and dangerous as it is,—because the motive is apt to be so strong that it will lead to a prolonging of the fight beyond what is safe for the health and life of the parties concerned,—we should think a poor man who fought a desperate prize-fight for a great prize, whether pecuniary or in reputation, much less culpable than one who fought to gratify the passion• created by a quarrel. For in the former case, the motive, though low, is not bad. No one says a rope-dancer acts an evil part who endangers his life to gain a livelihood. And though the prize-fighter endangers his adversary's health and life as well as his own, yet that may be said to be more or less his adversary's affair, since all he has to take care of is that no thoroughly bad motive enters into his own share in the matter. Now there is nothing intrinsically worse in endangering your life by exposure to a scientific blow, than in endangering your life by exposure to a terrible fall. The true evil of the ordinary prize- fight is rather in the strong motives with which it provides bystanders,—men whose sole interest is the interest which comes from betting, —for promoting these sanguinary struggles, and for making them the foundation of a brutal career, instead of an occasional trial of strength and mettle. It is the accessories much more than the issues of an ordinary prize-fight which are so bad,—the atmosphere of vulgar boastfulness, of bullying, of betting, of coarse physical excitement which it promotes,— and not the mere resolve of two combatants to try to the utmost their skill and endurance against each other. But it seems to us that when it comes to "fighting out a quarrel," it is not the accessories, but the very essence of the thing that is utterly bad. The moment the passion of vindictiveness is excited, the battle which a true man, to say nothing of a true Christian, should fight is with that passion, and not with the man who stirs it in him. The worst use in the world to put personal animosity to is a fight. No doubt there are cases, especially amongst the young, whose quarrels often arise more from the want of mutual respect and con- sideration than from any real malice, where a fight inspires mutual respect, and clears away the tendency to contempt or indifference which caused the quarrel. But that is hardly a case which can arise amongst grown men. We hardly ever heard of two duellists who were the better friends for having shot at each other, or of two grown men who had fought out a quarrel with their fists who were the better friends for having broken each others' ribs, or even for merely having given, each other super- ficial bruises. Quarrels in mature life hardly ever grow merely out of the mutual false measurement of men's qualities and courage by each other ; and where they do, that is not the age at which the mistake can be remedied by a fight. The only effect of fighting in wrath is to increase that wrath, and it was very pro- bably due to the bitterness out of which the quarrel arose that the defeated man in this case would not give in soon enough to save his life. Had the fight been a mere struggle of skill and strength, there would hardly have been enough motive for a man seriously weakened and injured to carry on the struggle to the bitter end. Most likely Dulgar's death was due to the personal resentment which rendered it intolerable to him to admit himself beaten, in which case he owed his death directly to that practice of "fighting out quarrels," for which Mr. Justice Brett seems to feel so much tenderness.
Our Judges should be more careful, not simply to do justice, but to use their deservedly high moral influence in a wholesome manner. In this ease it will go forth to the Tubbses, Slaters, and other frequenters of these matches, that Mr. Justice Brett thinks it "no great sin" to fight out your quarrels fairly with a man's natural weapons, his hands, and if so then, surely, it is no great sin either to fight them out with those other "natural weapons," the legs. The Lancashire kickers will certainly be much com- forted by that unfortunate phrase of Mr. Justice Brett's, about "natural weapons." It seems to us a very serious sin to use either natural or artificial weapons,—and the difference between the two is merely one of degree,—for the sake of gratify- ing a personal animosity. It excites and fosters that animosity, renders it far more difficult to exercise the judgment properly in relation to the proper limits of the contest engaged in, and doubt- less causes many a blow to be given in a spirit very much more like that of the murderer than it is at all pleasant to contemplate in cases where the end is fatal. We do not at all mean to charge either foul play or wish for foul play. But the spirit of murder is consistent with the observance of all the rules of honourable battle, and Mr. Justice Brett did something to encourage instead of to restrain a practice which is both dangerous, and but too likely to lead to grave guilt, inward if not outward, when he virtually encouraged Englishmen in their bad habit of embittering their quarrels by fighting them out. Starving them out is the true policy. Fighting out quarrels means feeding the anger which caused them with fresh oiL
Previous page
