A Hangman's Diary (Philip Allan, 10s. 6d.) is the record
kept by the chief executioner of Nuremberg iii the sixteenth century of all the executions he conducted during his term of office. The Diary is, in its way, unique, but in the translation from the German the style has lost all trace of mediaeval atmosphere. The prisoners' hideous and repellent crimes (none of which are confined to the Middle Ages) are described in detail and the methods of the executions, which would be interesting and instructive, are scarcely touched upon. Here and there we come upon some naive touches. " When they [the condemned] were being led out the Margrave's wife wanted to see the poor sinners as they passed and saw her own husband among them, whom she embraced and kissed, for she had not known her husband had been arrested nor that he was a fellow of that sort." The third part of the Diary entitled " Minor Bodily Punish- ments " brings us into closer touch with the sixteenth century and its sometimes comical brutality, but the best of the book is the introductions by Mr. Calvert and Mr. Kneller.
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