The up - country native who murdered Mr. Justice Norman at Calcutta,
was tried there on the 26th, convicted after a trial of only two hours, and sentenced to be executed that day fortnight. It is said that no further discovery has been made as to the motive of the crime or the murderer's connection with the criminals who have been commiting similar crimes in the Punjaub; but there can be no real doubt that all these crimes are symptoms of an exceedingly disturbed and excit- able state of national feeling in parts of the country, as well as of not a little active combination. The remarkable verses of which we published a translation in the Spectator• of the 16th September, under the heading " Indian Discontent," tally exactly in spirit with the temper shown in all these murders :—
" The tax used to be on the land; then it fell on water, and oh, mother what will the end be?
Thus thinking, the wind flew away in terror, saying, 'By and by,.they wilt seize me too by tho hair of the head.' "
Sporadic murders of the governing class are not unnatural expressions of such feeling among a people who do not value life.
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