A correspondent of the Telegraph, apparently a clergyman of the
Church of England, says that he does not know "a more worthy creature " than Calcraft the hangman. He is a shoemaker by trade, worships in the writer's church, has a venerable appearance, and -" fulfils all the relations of domestic and social life in a kindly and affectionate manner." His "only crime is that he is the minister -of justice." If all that is true, which we question, though the here- ditary executioners of Paris are believed to have been decent people, it is all the more reason, as the Telegraph observes, for abolishing the office which degrades such a man till he is obliged to hide himself from the world. It is said that the Americans have invented a self-acting gallows, but we greatly prefer our own pro- posal,—death by military execution. Is there no truth in the popular belief that Calcraft is compelled to perform his office under terror of an old conviction ?
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