meditated and contrived murder; some, of beguiling virgins with the broken seals of perjury; some, making the wars their bulwark, that have before gor'd the gentle bosom of peace, with pillage and robbery. Now, if these men have defeated the law, and outrun native punishment, though they can outstrip men, they have no wings to fly from God: war is his beadle, war is his vengeance; so that here men are punished, for before-breach of the kings laws, is now the kings quarrel where they fear'd the death, they have borne life away; and where they would be safe, they perish: Then if they die unprovided, no more is the king guilty of their damnation, than he was before guilty of those impieties, for which they are now visited. Every subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own."1

The reasoning of the King here is in strict accordance with the relation of king and subject, as viewed at the common law and the rule of law, which made the principal liable for the acts of the agent, performed in pursuance of an express authority, or within the general scope of his powers, as agent, was held not to apply to the relation of king and subject. Instead of the rule respondeat superior, (let the principal answer) when it came to king and subject the rule was rather respondere non sovereign, for the king was not under the authority of man, but of God and the law, or, as the maxim puts it, “Rex non debet esse sub homine, sed Deo et lege."s

The Poet makes the king give the underlying reason for the rule of law, which shaped itself into the maxim quoted, better, perhaps than half the lawyers of his period

1 Henry V, Act IV, Scene I.

Coke, 4' Inst. 114.

'Broom's Legal Maxims (3' London ed.) 46, 111; Bracton, 5.

But as the King reasons, penal responsibility, in the law, is always personal, and the obligation to respond or answer for an act never applies in the absence of a commission of the act, in person, or unless it was committed by someone standing in the place of the person sought to be held liable therefor,

could have done, and the reasoning to shift the responsibility for a war that he had brought on, from his own. shoulders to the vengeance of the Divine Economy, is in keeping with the religious training which prompted the charge of an attribute even beneath that of the beasts of the field-for these even, cherish no such thing as vengeance-to the Almighty, in order, no doubt, to shift the blame from other shoulders, on which it ought to lie.

Sec. 262. Bearing testimony.—

"Flu.

I hope your majesty is pear me testimony, and witness, and avouchments, that this is the glove of Alencon, that your majesty is give me, in your conscience now."

Bearing testimony is to make a statement, as a witness, under oath or affirmation, to a given state of facts. This is the meaning of the word as used here, and the speaker calls upon the king to corroborate him, or bear witness, that the glove he had was the glove given him by the king.

Sec. 263. Martial law.

"Flu.

An please your majesty, let his neck answer for it, if there is any martial law in the 'orld."3 "Martial law" is that military rule or authority, which exists in time of war, and is recognized by the laws of war, as to persons within the scope of active military operations, in so far as it may be necessary, in order to fully carry on the purposes or objects of the war.* Martial law,

1 Henry V, Act IV, Scene VIII.

Bacon, Abr., Evidence, (A); 1 Greenleaf, Evid., secs. 98, 328. Henry V, Act IV, Scene VIII.

1 Kent's Comm. 377; DeHart Mil. Law, 13-17; O'Brien, Mil. Law, 26, 30; Tyler, Courts Martial, 11, 27, 58, 62, 105.

Basset said to Vernon, in 1' Henry VI, after being struck by the latter: "Bas. Villain, thou know'st the law of arms is such, That, who so draws a sword, 'tis prese: t death

Or else this blow should broach thy dearest blood."

(Act III, Scene IV.)

in time of war, supersedes and abrogates the civil law, as to those engaged in the war, hence the appeal was properly made here to "martial law," for the punishment of an offender who was engaged in the war himself. It extends to the camp and its environs and to near field and other operations of war and has its basis in actual necessity and the chief military officer is the person who enforces such rules, so the King, in this instance, was the proper authority to ask the punishment of Pistol from.

CHAPTER XXI.

"FIRST PART OF KING HENRY THE SIXTH."

"Reig. Salisbury is a desperate homicide;
He fighteth as one weary of his life.

The other lords, like lions wanting food,
Do rush upon us as their hungry prey."1

Homicide is the destruction of the life of a human being, either by himself, or by the act, procurement or culpable omission of another. When the death is caused by the intentional act of the deceased himself, the offender is called felo de se and when the death is caused by another it is either justifiable, excusable, or felonious, according to the facts connected with the killing.

To constitute the crime of homicide the person killed must have been entitled to live, and in legal contemplation a soldier of the enemy, in time of war, has no right to his life, but may be killed by the enemy in battle, without the one killing him, being guilty of a homicide. So the

11' Henry VI, Act I, Scene II.

21 Hawkins, Pl. Cr. sec. 2; 2 Bishop, Cr. Law, sec. 538.

1 Hawkins, Pl. Cr. Ch. 8.

2 Bishop, Cr. Law, supra.

killing of the soldiers of France, by the soldiers of England did not amount to a legal homicide, and the speaker in this verse was technically wrong, in so applying this name to lord Salisbury.

Sec. 265. Distraining property.—

"Glo.

nor king

Here's Beaufort, that regards nor God

Hath here distrain'd the Tower to his use."1

Distress, at common law, was the taking of a chattel, or other personal property, out of the possession of the owner, into the custody of the party injured, to procure satisfaction for the wrong done. It was resorted to for the purpose of enforcing payment of rent, taxes or other duties, as well as to exact damages for the trespasses of cattle. The remedy is of great antiquity and is said to have dated back to the Gothic nations of Europe, since the Roman Empire and English statutes made various amendments to the remedy since the days of Magna Charta.s

As the remedy by distress was virtually a taking of the law into the hands of the landlord, or other person entitled

Blackstone's definition of homicide, as the "killing of any human creature," is not in strict accordance with the law as presented by other writers, as it leaves out of the definition of the crime that the killing must have been done by another human being. 4 Bl. Comm. 177; 1 Hawkins, Pl. Cr. sec. 2. Repulsing Richard's suit, Lady Anne tells him, in King Richard III: "Anne: If I thought that, I tell thee, homicide, These nails should rend that beauty from my cheeks." (Act I, Scene II.)

Referring to King Richard, in his talk to his troops before the battle Richmond said: "Richm. . . . For what is he they follow? truly, gentlemen, a bloody tyrant and a homicide." (Act V, Scene III.)

1 Henry VI, Act I, Scene III.

22 Bl. Comm. 6.

Bacon, Abr. Distress; 4 Dane, Abr., 126; Taylor's Land. and Ten., sec. 566; Coke, Litt. 317.