| OCR Text |
Show CIGARS AND TOBACCO. Two men were sentenced in the Criminal Court, yesterday, one for beating his wife and the other for stealing cigars. The wife-beater's crime was measured by a sentence of three months and that of the cigar-stealer by fifteen months, indicating that cigars are just five times more valuable than wives. Perhaps in these particular cases, the cigars were unusually good and the wife unusually bad, and it would not, therefore, be altogether safe for husbands, generally to indulge in the habit of assault and battery, unless they are prepared to prove that their wives are of a very inferior grade, or for the tobacconist to rely upon heavy sentences as a protection to any but the best Havanas. Even then he must be sure that the case is tried before a judge who knows the difference. A recent case in England opened up a line of defense which, had the precedent been sooner through of, might have saved many a cigar thief from jail. In this case, the judicial action turned, not upon the cigar stealing, but upon selling cigars without a license. An old man was charged with selling tobacco in the shape of cigars without a license. The defense was that cigars were not mentioned by the act of Parliament under which the charge was made, tobacco only being named, and that, in the point of fact, the cigars in question contained no tobacco whatever, being manufactured solely from cabbage leaves and hay, no offense was committed. The magistrate thereupon discharged the prisoner. It will be observed that in this case the defense was peculiarly strong; as strong as the cigars, themselves. The deal boldly alleged that there was no tobacco in them, at all. But even if the American dealer, in revenue cases, or the American thief, in larceny cases, were to admit the presence of some tobacco in the article sold or stolen, it is evident that the plea in mitigation of sentence or abatement of tax would depend upon his ability to show how little real tobacco was involved in the transaction. The Court might take cognizance of a theft, even if it were only of cabbage leaves and hay; but it would naturally send the culprit, not to jail, but to a reformatory where genuine tobacco alone was used, and where he might learn to discriminate between the real and the bogus articles. The British trader was a bold man to own up to the total absence of tobacco from his cigars. Few American dealers would display equal courage. Although the ability of American intellects and morals in evading the tax-collector has reached some very high developments, very few tobacconists would go to such lengths of confession. And in the matter of cigar stealing, the average thief is so accustomed to bad cigars that he probably does not know whether they contain tobacco or only cabbage and hay. It is evident that his safety lies, if anywhere, in stealing the cheapest article he can lay his hands on, as it gives him the best chance either of squashing his indictment on the grounds of improper description, or claiming the clemency of the court on the ground that he was doing public service by putting so much bogus tobacco out of the way. <br><br> Phil. Bulletin. |
