Show LESE MAJESTE IN ENGLAND Using of a Postage Stamp Upside Down Punishable hable in Great Great Britain Many people blissfully imagine that lese lose majeste that is insulting royalty is a cIme peculiar to foreign countries and unknown in free and happy Britain That however is 15 where they the make a mistake There are all alt sorts of pains and penal penalties penalties ties tips on the statute book relative to pe peculiar peculiar peculiar culiar British forms of iese lese majeste Many Ian of them have fallen into oblivion or abeyance owning to one cause or an another another another other but they could still be enforced if it those In high places place claimed all ail they are strictly entitled to It is for instance technically a pun punishable offense to stick a penny penn stamp starn on a letter upside down Doing so is to insult the king through his effigy and anda a few centuries ago supposing penny stamps to have been then invented might easily have landed the offender in prison on a charge of seeking to bring ridicule on the sovereign or to express ss I contempt for tor his Ma authority by causing his picture to stand star on Its head Also it is a punishable offense to deface defice d ce cea a coin of the realm bearing the royal ro al im image image image age and then deliberately put it into cir circulation circulation Ir again a ain Any private Individual who audaciously hoisted the royal roal standard over his dwell dwelling dwellIng dwelling ing would get Into serious trouble HP lie would be bo peremptorily ordered to take it down and nd abjectly apologize and if he escaped a heavy fine Cine would have to thank His forbearance for Cor his good goodluck goodluck goodluck luck The royal standard Is the emblem embum of the kings regal authority to be b dis displayed displayed played only where he is pres present present present ent and for a subject to hoist It is nom nominally nominally equivalent to high treason Tile The Union Jack as the flag of the nation is a different thing altogether and can be dis displayed displayed played by anybody It is popularly supposed in this coun country try a man can get up tip and say sa whatever he likes about the sovereign with impunity impunity ity It This is true only within strictly de defined d fined limits A Socialist orator can pub publicly denounce the theoretical e evils eils ils of Institutions and announce a decided preference for tor a republic and no nobody nobody nobody body can touch him But if he once began to speak insult insultingly or slightingly of the king kins person personally personally ally he would be at once run nm In or ef of effectually Effectually suppressed by the nearest po Pl policeman To strike the king would according to the strict letter of ot the law render the I assailant liable to the death penalty no matter how trifling the blow was in real reality reality I ity It I Lieutenant Pape who is usually reck rek reckoned rt among those who the life lift of oC the late Queen Victoria could not nt nc hate hare actually contemplated ted murder He lIe had no lethal weapon In his possession at atthe atthe atthe the time of oC the outrage but he struck Her Majesty across the face with his rid ipg stick This was sufficient to bring him within the shadow of oC the scaffold He was condemned to death and would I have llave been hanged had his sentence not been commuted It is lese less majeste to bring the kings uniform into contempt Members of oC the theatrical th theatrical companies who have appeared on n the stage as comic characters attired in discarded military or naval uniforms have hart occasionally occasional been unpleasantly reminded of this tact fact Careful stage managers out themselves on the safe sate side by seeing that no uniform whether to be worn by b the hero villain or low comedian of the piece is an exact copy cop of ot the real uni uniform uniform form Corm of any branch of His forces p |