The
occasion of the paragraph doesn't matter. The man eulogised was Mr.
Justice Park--Sir James Allan Park, a highly successful barrister, who
was judge from 1816 to his death in 1838. "As judge, though not eminent,
he was sound, fair and sensible, a little irascible, but highly
esteemed." He was also the author of a religious work. And that is all
the particular Liar who wrote his biography in the D.N.B. can tell us
about him.
It was the newspaper paragraph which reminded me that I had written
about this same judge, giving my estimate of his character in my book,
_A Shepherd's Life_, also that I was _thinking_ about Park, the sound
and fair and sensible judge, when I wrote "An Old Thorn." Here then,
with apologies to the reader for quoting from my own book, I reproduce
what I wrote in 1905.
"From these memories of the old villagers I turn to the newspapers of
the day to make a few citations.
"The law as it was did not distinguish between a case of the kind just
related, of the starving, sorely-tempted Shergold, and that of the
systematic thief: sheep-stealing was a capital offence and the man must
be hanged, unless recommended to mercy, and we know what was meant by
'mercy' in those days.
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