2 APRIL 1864, Page 2

The Indian Legislative Council has passed a bill to substitute

flogging with a rattan in cases of second conviction for almost all short sentences. The arguments for the change are various, the strongest being the excessive demoralization produced on the young by an Indian gaol, the absence of disgrace attaching to imprison- ment, and the great risk to life, the mortality rising as high as /twenty per cent. The argument which seems to have weighed with the Legislature, however, was the great cost of imprisonment. It seems certain that in India flogging deters when imprisonment does not, but that argument would justify torture.