Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/209

Rh another; but it provokes it. In this very day, in this nineteenth century, this iniquitous Penal Code has dared to assert itself in a court of justice, and declare its legal right to blast forever the fair fame of a Catholic maiden for the alleged crime of "seducing a faithful Protestant subject to marry her." This bigoted law, the 1 9th George II., was actually brought forward as a legal protection to bigamy; as a defence for sacrilege in God's holy temple, as a means of heaping disgrace on a family of high standing and unblemished repute. This law was, in fact, appealed to in the Yelverton case. The Statute Book was brought forth and read over, pondered over, argued over and cursed over. The pages were turned and smoothed out of their place before the frowning eye of the lord chief justice, himself a Catholic. They were thumped upon by the triumphant counsel who upheld the majesty of the law. He asked but the law for his noble client—his pious Protestant client. He was entitled to it and demanded it. He did not heed the chorus of hisses and groans by which this piece of legal justice was received by his hearers—it was the law! Fortunately, the intended victim was not an Irish maiden, but a free-born English woman, with, perhaps, something of the English bull-dog nature lurking behind what Mr. Dickens has described as "the baby-like face of the Cenci." She was ready to fight for her right and her honor; and so the "faithful Protestant subject" was put to proof, and found wanting. The marriage was declared legal and valid: there was nothing to bar the sacred rights of those "whom God had joined together," except proving that the man was a professing Protestant—it needed to be of the Established Church forsooth—the religion of the State; otherwise he could not be a licensed bigamist. Henceforth, from 1862, this hoary old Statute Book hid its execrated head in the back cellar or coal-hole until dragged forth by a House of Commons' committee, who are sitting upon it now, once for all, to destroy it completely. New marriage laws will be framed, in which the whole kingdom will, it is hoped, participate alike.

There is some hesitation about Scotland, however, which, having the simplest and easiest marriage law, will probably refuse to change. Scotchmen are so determinedly Scotch, that it is very difficult to make them bate one jot of their nationality. It would appear that their principle of marriage is the most moral and natural of all; but the practice of proving it is the most awkward and round-about. The law language is worse than Greek to most people. As a consequence, Scotland has the reputation of being more litigious than any other nation. It adheres to the old Roman and Common Law, which makes marriage a "consensual contract," "consensus faciat nuptias." This consent may be exchanged in various ways; in the presence of a magistrate, of a minister of Kirk, of friends or relatives, of any stranger, or even without the