text:
Donald (Browning)

"Will you hear my story also,     — Huge Sport, brave adventure in plenty?" The boys were a band from Oxford, The oldest of whom was twenty.

The bothy we held carouse in     Was bright with fire and candle; Tale followed tale like a merry-go-round Whereof Sport turned the handle.

In our eyes and noses — turf-smoke: In our ears a tune from the trivet, Whence "Boiling, boiling," the kettle sang, "And ready for fresh Glenlivet."

So, feat capped feat, with a vengeance: Truths, though, — the lads were loyal: "Grouse, five score brace to the bag!     Deer, ten hours' stalk of the Royal!"

Of boasting, not one bit, boys! Only there seemed to settle Somehow above your curly heads, — Plain through the singing kettle,

Palpable through the cloud, As each new-puffed Havanna Rewarded the teller's well-told tale, This vaunt "To Sport — Hosanna!

"Hunt, fish, shoot,     Would a man fulfil life's duty! Not to the bodily frame alone      Does Sport give strength and beauty,

"But character gains in — courage?     Ay, Sir, and much beside it! You don't sport, more's the pity:      You soon would find, if you tried it,

"Good sportsman means good fellow,     Sound-hearted he, to the centre; Your mealy-mouthed mild milksops      — There's where the rot can enter!

"There's where the dirt will breed.     The shabbiness Sport would banish! Oh no, Sir, no! In your honoured case      All such objections vanish.

"'T is known how hard you studied:     A Double-First — what, the jigger! Give me but half your Latin and Greek,      I'll never again touch trigger!

"Still, tastes are tastes, allow me!     Allow, too, where there's keenness For Sport, there's little likelihood      Of a man's displaying meanness!"

So, put on my mettle, I interposed. "Will you hear my story?" quoth I. "Never mind how long since it happed,     I sat, as we sit, in a bothy;

"With as merry a band of mates, too,     Undergrads all on a level: (One's a Bishop, one's gone to the Bench,      And one's gone — well, to the Devil.)

"When, lo, a scratching and tapping!     In hobbled a ghastly visitor. Listen to just what he told us himself      — No need of our playing inquisitor!"

———

Do you happen to know in Ross-shire Mount. . . Ben. . . but the name scarce matters: Of the naked fact I am sure enough, Though I clothe it in rags and tatters.

You may recognise Ben by description; Behind him — a moor's immenseness; Up goes the middle mount of a range, Fringed with its firs in denseness.

Rimming the edge, its fir-fringe, mind! For an edge there is, though narrow; From end to end of the range, a stripe Of path runs straight as an arrow.

And the mountaineer who takes that path Saves himself miles of journey He has to plod if he crosses the moor Through heather, peat and burnie.

But a mountaineer he needs must be, For, look you, right in the middle Projects bluff Ben — with an end in ich — Why planted there, is a riddle:

Since all Ben's brothers little and big Keep rank, set shoulder to shoulder, And only this burliest out must bulge Till it seems — to the beholder

From down in the gully, — as if Ben's breast, To a sudden spike diminished, Would signify to the boldest foot "All further passage finished!"

Yet the mountaineer who sidles on     And on to the very bending, Discovers, if heart and brain be proof, No necessary ending.

Foot up, foot down, to the turn abrupt Having trod, he, there arriving. Finds — what he took for a point was breadth, A mercy of Nature's contriving.

So, he rounds what, when 'tis reached, proves straight, From one side gains the other: The wee path widens — resume the march, And he foils you, Ben my brother!

But Donald — (that name, I hope, will do) — I wrong him if I call "foiling" The tramp of the callant, whistling the while As blithe as our kettle's boiling.

He had dared the danger from boyhood up, And now, — when perchance was waiting A lass at the brig below, — 'twixt mount And moor would he stand debating?

Moreover this Donald was twenty-five, A glory of bone and muscle: Did a fiend dispute the right of way, Donald would try a tussle.

Lightsomely marched he out of the broad On to the narrow and narrow; A step more, rounding the angular rock, Reached the front straight as an arrow.

He stepped it, safe on the ledge he stood, When — whom found he full-facing? What fellow in courage and wariness too, Had scouted ignoble pacing,

And left low safety to timid mates, And made for the dread dear danger, And gained the height where — who could guess He would meet with a rival ranger?

'Twas a gold-red stag that stood and stared, Gigantic and magnific, By the wonder — ay, and the peril — struck Intelligent and pacific:

For a red deer is no fallow deer Grown cowardly through park-feeding; He batters you like a thunderbolt If you brave his haunts unheeding.

I doubt he could hardly perform volte-face Had valour advised discretion: You may walk on a rope, but to turn on a rope No Blondin makes profession.

Yet Donald must turn, would pride permit, Though pride ill brooks retiring: Each eyed each — mute man, motionless beast — Less fearing than admiring.

These are the moments when quite new sense, To meet some need as novel, Springs up in the brain: it inspired resource: — "Nor advance nor retreat but — grovel!"

And slowly, surely, never a whit Relaxing the steady tension Of eye-stare which binds man to beast, — By an inch and inch declension,

Sank Donald sidewise down and down: Till flat, breast upwards, lying At his six-foot length, no corpse more still, — "If he cross me! The trick's worth trying."

Minutes were an eternity; But a new sense was created In the stag's brain too; he resolves! Slow, sure, With eye-stare unabated,

Feelingly he extends a foot Which tastes the way ere it touches Earth's solid and just escapes man's soft, Nor hold of the same unclutches

Till its fellow foot, light as a feather whisk, Lands itself no less finely: So a mother removes a fly from the face Of her babe asleep supinely.

And now 'tis the haunch and hind foot's turn — That's hard: can the beast quite raise it? Yes, traversing half the prostrate length, His hoof-tip does not graze it.

Just one more lift! But Donald, you see, Was sportsman first, man after: A fancy lightened his caution through, — He well-nigh broke into laughter.

"It were nothing short of a miracle!     Unrivalled, unexampled — All sporting feats with this feat matched      Were down and dead and trampled!"

The last of the legs as tenderly Follows the rest: or never Or now is the time! His knife in reach, And his right-hand loose — how clever!

For this can stab up the stomach's soft, While the left-hand grasps the pastern. A rise on the elbow, and — now's the time Or never: this turn's the last turn!

I shall dare to place myself by God Who scanned — for He does — each feature Of the face thrown up in appeal to Him By the agonizing creature.

Nay, I hear plain words: "Thy gift brings this!" Up he sprang, back he staggered, Over he fell, and with him our friend — At following game no laggard.

Yet he was not dead when they picked next day From the gully's depth the wreck of him; His fall had been stayed by the stag beneath Who cushioned and saved the neck of him.

But the rest of his body — why, doctors said, Whatever could break was broken; Legs, arms, ribs, all of him looked like a toast In a tumbler of port-wine soaken.

"That your life is left you, thank the stag!" Said they when — the slow cure ended — They opened the hospital-door, and thence — Strapped, spliced, main fractures mended,

And minor damage left wisely alone, — Like an old shoe clouted and cobbled, Out — what went in a Goliath well-nigh, — Some half of a David hobbled.

"You must ask an alms from house to house:     Sell the stag's head for a bracket, With its grand twelve tines — I'd buy it myself —      And use the skin for a jacket!"

He was wiser, made both head and hide His win-penny: hands and knees on, Would manage to crawl — poor crab — by the roads In the misty stalking-season.

And if he discovered a bothy like this, Why, harvest was sure: folks listened. He told his tale to the lovers of Sport: Lips twitched, cheeks glowed, eyes glistened.

And when he had come to the close, and spread His spoils for the gazers' wonder, With "Gentlemen, here's the skull of the stag     I was over, thank God, not under!" —

The company broke out in applause; "By Jingo, a lucky cripple! Have a munch of grouse and a hunk of bread.     And a tug, besides, at our tipple!"

And "There's my pay for your pluck!" cried This, "And mine for your jolly story!" Cried That, while T'other — but he was drunk — Hicupped "A trump, a Tory!"

I hope I gave twice as much as the rest; For, as Homer would say, "within grate Though teeth kept tongue," my whole soul growled "Rightly rewarded, — Ingrate!"

title: Donald (Browning)


text: Index:English folk-carols.djvu

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Index:English folk-carols.djvu


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text:
Solomon and Balkis

Solomon King of the Jews and the Queen of Sheba, Balkis, Talk on the ivory throne, and we well may conjecture their talk is Solely of things sublime: why else has she sought Mount Zion, Climbed the six golden steps, and sat betwixt lion and lion?

She proves him with hard questions: before she has reached the middle He smiling supplies the end, straight solves them riddle by riddle; Until, dead-beaten at last, there is left no spirit in her, And thus would she close the game whereof she was first beginner:

"O wisest thou of the wise, world's marvel and well-nigh monster, One crabbed question more to construe or vulgo conster! Who are those, of all mankind, a monarch of perfect wisdom Should open to, when they knock at spheteron do — that's his dome?"

The King makes tart reply: "Whom else but the wise his equals Should he welcome with heart and voice? — since, king though he be, such weak walls Of circumstance — power and pomp — divide souls each from other That whoso proves kingly in craft I needs must acknowledge my brother.

"Come poet, come painter, come sculptor, come builder — whate'er his condition, Is he prime in his art? We are peers! My insight has pierced the partition And hails — for the poem, the picture, the statue, the building — my fellow! Gold's gold though dim in the dust: court-polish soon turns it yellow.

"But tell me in turn, O thou to thy weakling sex superior, That for knowledge hast travelled so far yet seemest no whit the wearier, — Who are those, of all mankind, a queen like thyself, consummate In wisdom, should call to her side with an affable 'Up hither, come, mate!' "

"The Good are my mates — how else? Why doubt it?" the Queen upbridled: "Sure even above the Wise, — or in travel my eyes have idled, — I see the Good stand plain: be they rich, poor, shrewd or simple, If Good they only are. . . . Permit me to drop my wimple!"

And, in that bashful jerk of her body, she — peace, thou scoffer! — Jostled the King's right-hand stretched courteously help to proffer, And so disclosed a portent: all unaware the Prince eyed The Ring which bore the Name — turned outside now from inside!

The truth-compelling Name! — and at once "I greet the Wise — Oh, Certainly welcome such to my court — with this proviso: The building must be my temple, my person stand forth the statue, The picture my portrait prove, and the poem my praise — you cat, you!"

But Solomon nonplussed? Nay! "Be truthful in turn!" so bade he: "See the Name, obey its hest!" And at once subjoins the lady — "Provided the Good are the young, men strong and tall and proper, Such servants I straightway enlist, — which means . . . " but the blushes stop her.

"Ah, Soul," the Monarch sighed, "that wouldst soar yet ever crawlest, How comes it thou canst discern the greatest yet choose the smallest, Unless because heaven is far, where wings find fit expansion, While creeping on all-fours suits, suffices the earthly mansion?

"Aspire to the Best! But which? There are Bests and Bests so many, With a habitat each for each, earth's Best as much Best as any! On Lebanon roots the cedar — soil lofty, yet stony and sandy — While hyssop, of worth in its way, on the wall grows low but handy.

"Above may the Soul spread wing, spurn body and sense beneath her; Below she must condescend to plodding unbuoyed by æther. In heaven I yearn for knowledge, account all else inanity; On earth I confess an itch for the praise of fools — that's Vanity.

"It is nought, it will go, it can never presume above to trouble me; But here, — why, it toys and tickles and teases, howe'er I redouble me In a doggedest of endeavours to play the indifferent. Therefore, Suppose we resume discourse? Thou hast travelled thus far: but wherefore?

"Solely for Solomon's sake, to see whom earth styles Sagest?" Through her blushes laughed the Queen. "For the sake of a Sage? The gay jest! On high, be communion with Mind — there, Body concerns not Balkis: Down here, — do I make too bold? Sage Solomon, — one fool's small kiss!"

title: Solomon and Balkis


text:
Page:Catholicism in Queensland.djvu/30

 and Hawkesbury. The Sydney "Gazette" of May, 1803, contains a paragraph to the effect that the Roman Catholic congregation assembled for the first time at Sydney on Sunday morning, May 22nd, the officiating priest being the Reverend Father Dixon.

From this happening the position of both Churches became more sharply defined. The Church was hemmed in and harrassed [sic] on every side by restrictive orders and rules, the offsprings of hatred, bigotry, and jealousy, rules and restrictions offensive alike to priest and people. For some years Father Dixon officiated, although constantly exasperated by petty annoyances, until at last, smarting under a sense of gross injustice, humiliated by officialdom, and thwarted in his every effort, his position became unbearable. His allowance for clerical duties was withdrawn, and his rations stopped. This was tantamount to a dismissal, and, sadly recognising that his usefulness was gone, he left the' Colony in 1808. After his departure Father Harold came to Sydney from Norfolk Island to officiate.

"Father Dixon was a man of singular meekness and of a retiring disposition." "He was remarkable for silence and for inoffensive manner." He was of blameless life. His death took place on January 4th, 1840, in his 82nd year.

About this time a regulation was made by Government that the whole of the prison population should attend Divine Service in the Church of England, the penalty for failure so to do was: First offence 25 lashes, second offence 50 lashes, third offence to be sent to a penal settlement. This arbitrary and malicious regulation was vigorously enforced. Such were the moral methods used to enforce the high religious spirit of those in temporal power. The exquisite irony of the Government's action in this regard is impossible of expression in words—comment is useless. In 1809 Father Harold reached the limit of priestly endurance and worn out by continued restrictive interferences returned home.

The Church of England was during all this time enjoying a period of exceeding prosperity, while the Catholic Church persecuted and oppressed sank into desuetude. "The Catholics were denied all help; not an acre of land was allowed

title: Page:Catholicism in Queensland.djvu/30


text:
Cristina and Monaldeschi

Ah, but how each loved each, Marquis! Here's the gallery they trod Both together, he her god, She his idol, — lend your rod, Chamberlain! — ay, there they are — "Quis     Separabit?" — plain those two Touching words come into view, Apposite for me and you!

Since they witness to incessant Love like ours: King Francis, he — Diane the adored one, she — Prototypes of you and me. Everywhere is carved her Crescent With his Salamander-sign — Flame-fed creature: flame benign To itself or, if malign,

Only to the meddling curious, — So, be warned, Sir! Where's my head? How it wanders! What I said Merely meant — the creature, fed Thus on flame, was scarce injurious Save to fools who woke its ire, Thinking fit to play with fire. 'Tis the Crescent you admire?

Then, be Diane! I'll be Francis. Crescents change, — true! — wax and wane. Woman-like: male hearts retain Heat nor, once warm, cool again. So, we figure — such our chance is — I as man and you as. . . What? Take offence? My Love forgot He plays woman, I do not?

I — the woman? See my habit. Ask my people! Anyhow, Be we what we may, one vow Binds us, male or female. Now, — Stand, Sir! Read! "Quis separabit?" Half a mile of pictured way Past these palace-walls to-day Traversed, this I came to say.

You must needs begin to love me; First I hated, then, at best, — Have it so! — I acquiesced; Pure compassion did the rest. From below thus raised above me, Would you, step by step, descend, Pity me, become my friend, Like me, like less, loathe at end?

That's the ladder's round you rose by! That — my own foot kicked away, Having raised you: let it stay, Serve you for retreating? Nay. Close to me you climbed: as close by, Keep your station, though the peak Reached proves somewhat bare and bleak! Woman's strong if man is weak.

Keep here, loving me forever! Love's look, gesture, speech, I claim; Act love, lie love, all the same — Play as earnest were our game! Lonely I stood long: 'twas clever When you climbed, before men's eyes, Spurned the earth and scaled the skies, Gained my peak and grasped your prize.

Here you stood, then, to men's wonder; Here you tire of standing? Kneel! Cure what giddiness you feel, This way! Do your senses reel? Not unlikely! What rolls under? Yawning death in yon abyss Where the waters whirl and hiss Round more frightful peaks than this.

Should my buffet dash you thither. . . .     But be sage! No watery grave Needs await you: seeming brave Kneel on safe, dear timid slave! You surmised, when you climbed hither, Just as easy were retreat Should you tire, conceive unmeet Longer patience at my feet?

Me as standing, you as stooping, — Who arranged for each the pose? Lest men think us friends turned foes, Keep the attitude you chose! Men are used to this same grouping — I and you like statues seen. You and I, no third between, Kneel and stand! That makes the scene.

Mar it — and one buffet. . . Pardon! Needless warmth — wise words in waste! 'Twas prostration that replaced Kneeling, then? A proof of taste. Crouch, not kneel, while I mount guard on     Prostrate love — become no waif, No estray to waves that chafe Disappointed — love's so safe!

Waves that chafe? The idlest fancy! Peaks that scare? I think we know Walls enclose our sculpture: so     Grouped, we pose in Fontainebleau. Up now! Wherefore hesitancy? Arm in arm and cheek by cheek, Laugh with me at waves and peak! Silent still? Why, pictures speak.

See, where Juno strikes Ixion, Primatice speaks plainly! Pooh — Rather, Florentine Le Roux! I've lost head for who is who — So it swims and wanders! Fie on     What still proves me female! Here, By the staircase! — for we near That dark "Gallery of the Deer."

Look me in the eyes once! Steady! Are you faithful now as erst On that eve when we two first Vowed at Avon, blessed and cursed Faith and falsehood? Pale already? Forward! Must my hand compel Entrance — this way? Exit — well. Somehow, somewhere. Who can tell?

What if to the self-same place in     Rustic Avon, at the door Of the village church once more, Where a tombstone paves the floor By that holy-water basin You appealed to — "As, below,     This stone hides its corpse, e'en so      I your secrets hide"? What ho!

Friends, my four! You, Priest, confess him! I have judged the culprit there: Execute my sentence! Care For no mail such cowards wear! Done, Priest? Then, absolve and bless him! Now — you three, stab thick and fast, Deep and deeper! Dead at last? Thanks, friends — Father, thanks! Aghast?

What one word of his confession Would you tell me, though 1 lured With that royal crown abjured Just because its bars immured Love too much? Love burst compression, Fled free, finally confessed All its secrets to that breast Whence. . . let Avon tell the rest!

title: Cristina and Monaldeschi


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Page:English folk-carols.djvu/13

HE term "Carol" is not an easy one to define. The Rev. H. R. Bramley's definition—a kind of popular song appropriated to some special season of the ecclesiastical or natural year—is, perhaps, the best that has been devised; it is, at any rate, wide enough to embrace all the songs in this collection. Formerly there existed carols associated with Easter (e.g. "The Moon shines bright") and other festivals of the Church's year; but the carol of the present day is almost invariably connected with the season of Christmas.

Unhappily, like many another ancient traditional custom, that of Christmas carol singing by parties of men and women in the village streets is gradually disappearing. At one time, and not so very long ago, the number of carols that were sung in this way in different parts of England must have been very large, to judge by the carol broadsheets and chap-books that have been preserved. Hone, too, in his Ancient Mysteries Described (pp. 97–9), quotes the first lines of no less than eighty-nine carols, all of which, he says, were then, i.e. 1822, being annually printed. Several of the carols in Hone's list are included in this collection, viz.—Nos. 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 18 and 19; perhaps also Nos. 2 and 21. Probably all, or very nearly all the words of the carols mentioned by Hone might still be traced; of the tunes, however, to which they were traditionally Rh

title: Page:English folk-carols.djvu/13


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 sung, many, it is feared, have been irretrievably lost. This is not surprising, when it is realized how intimately the Christmas carol is associated in the minds of folk-singers with the custom of house-to-house singing, already referred to. Only a few weeks ago I asked two old men who were singing to me whether they knew a certain carol. One of them said that he did; the other, the elder of the two, shook his head doubtfully. Whereupon the younger singer stood up and, dragging his companion up beside him, said encouragingly: "Stand up, and think you've got snow in your boots, and it'll come to you all right." And it did!

In several parts of England I have found carols which are peculiar to certain villages, by the inhabitants of which they are regarded as private possessions of great value, to be jealously guarded and retained for their own use. These are not traditional or folk-carols but the elementary compositions of simple musicians, very possibly of those who in the old days were members of the Church bands. They are easily distinguished from the popular carol by the formal nature of the music and words, and also by the fact that many of them are written in parts. Some of these compositions are by no means without merit. The melodies, if not inspired, are usually strong and sincere, and, plainly, the expression of genuine feeling. The following example, which may be taken as fairly representative of the type, was noted at Armscote, a small hamlet in Worcestershire.

Deck every hearth with holly green,

Let not a care intrude,

But Christian love and joy be seen

And heartfelt gratitude. Rh

title: Page:English folk-carols.djvu/14


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 For sad indeed had been our case,

Most piteous and forlorn,

No hope for pardon or for grace,

Had Jesus not been born.

My song is done, I must be gone,

I can stay no longer here;

God bless you all, both great and small,

And send you a happy New Year.

This, while it lacks the freshness, the naiveté, and indeed pretty nearly all the typical and characteristic qualities of the folk-carol, is nevertheless quite as good as some, and far better than many of the modern Christmas hymns annually sung in fashionable Churches and Chapels.

There is, perhaps, no branch of folk-music in the creation of which the unconscious art of the peasant is seen to greater advantage than the carol. For his peculiar and most characteristic qualities, mental and emotional, are precisely those which in this case are most needed—his passion for simple, direct statement, his dislike of ornament and of the tricks of circumlocution, his abhorrence of sentimentality, and above all his courage in using, without hesitation, the obvious and commonplace phrase, of words or music, when by its means the required expression can most easily be realized. What cultivated musician would dare to set to such words as "The Virgin Unspotted" the graceful, flowing, 3-time melody given in this collection, even if he had the luck or skill to think of it? What, again, could be more concise in its diction or clearer in its meaning, than the last stanza in "King Herod and the Cock," or more vivid than the following lines in "The New Year's Carol"?—

which will, I venture to think, bear comparison with the parallel stanza of the Easter carol "Ye Sons and Daughters," translated by Neale.

It is just his transparent sincerity, his freedom from affectation, self-consciousness and conventional restrictions, that makes the unlettered Rh

title: Page:English folk-carols.djvu/15


text: English Folk-Carols/The Holly and the Ivy


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 rustic pre-eminently fitted to translate into music and poetry the dramatic incidents of the Christ story. His simplicity disarms criticism; just as his pious, intense, child-like belief in every detail of the Gospel narrative banishes scepticism. Nor did he trouble himself about the place of performance; village Church or village inn—it mattered not. A tune, so long as it expressed his feeling, harmonized with the sense and fitted the metre of the words, served his purpose wherever and whenever it was destined to be sung.

Even when, in later days, his carols suffered from the intrusion of theological doctrine, he somehow managed to avoid the religious emotionalism of the revivalist. Take, for instance, the tune of "The Little Room" given in this collection; note the noble sweep, the severe grandeur of its phrases and compare it with the air to which those words would be set in a mission hymn-book.

The folk-carol defies imitation. A skilled musician, saturated in the literature of his country's folk-music might, conceivably, make a folk-song without betraying himself; but it seems impossible that he could imitate a popular carol and escape detection.

There is, then, every reason why we should do all that is possible, while there is yet time, to collect and publish our traditional carols; for in them we have a unique possession, a national heritage of inestimable worth.

C.J.S.

Dragonfield, Uxbridge,

November, 1911. Rh

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text: Template:Dotted summary row

title: Template:Dotted summary row


text: English Folk-Carols/On Christmas Night

title: English Folk-Carols/On Christmas Night


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I have corrected raw mater ia into raw materia. --Zyephyrus (talk) 23:36, 18 December 2010 (UTC)


text: Page:Women in Love, Lawrence, 1920.djvu/1


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Prinsep, Henry Thoby


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Prinsep, James


text:
User talk:Valerie Surkovaite

— billinghurst  sDrewth  00:26, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

title: User talk:Valerie Surkovaite


text:
User talk:150.199.209.195

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User talk:67.230.207.62

Welcome

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User talk:94.193.35.178

Welcome

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Rh by the aid of the jack-screw and levers, we moved the pinnace, which we had taken care to build on rollers, to the opening; then attaching a strong cable to her head, and fixing the other end to the most solid part of the ship, we easily launched her. It was too late to do any more now, except carefully securing our prize. And we returned to the good mother, to whom, wishing to give her an agreeable surprise, we merely said, that the side of the vessel was blown out with powder; but we were still able to obtain more from it; at which she sighed, aud, in her heart, I have no doubt, wished the vessel, and all it contained, at the bottom of the sea.

We had two days of incessant labour in fitting and loading the pinnace; finally, after putting up our masts, ropes, and sails, we selected a cargo of things our boats could not bring. When all was ready, my boys obtained permission, as a reward for their industry, to salute their mamma, as we entered the bay, by firing our two guns. Fritz was captain, and Ernest and Jack, at his command, put their matches to the guns, and fired. My wife and little boy rushed out in alarm; but our joyful shouts soon re-assured them; and they were ready to welcome us with astonishment and delight. Fritz placed a plank from the pinnace to the shore, and, assisting his mother, she came on board. They gave her a new salute, and christened the vessel The Elizabeth, after her.

My wife praised our skill and perseverance, but begged we would not suppose that Francis and she had been idle during our long absence. We moored the little fleet safely to the shore, and


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110 her up the river to the cascade, where we saw a neat garden laid out in beds and walks. "This is our work," said she; "the soil here, being chiefly composed of decayed leaves, is light and easy to dig. There I have my potatoes; there manioc roots: these are sown with peas, beans and lentils; in this row of beds are sown lettuces, radishes, cabbages, and other European vegetables. I have reserved one part for sugar-canes; on the high ground I have transplanted pine-apples, and sown melons. Finally, round every bed, I have sown a border of maize, that the high, bushy stems may protect the young plants from the sun."

I was delighted with the result of the labour and industry of a delicate female and a child, and could scarcely believe it was accomplished in so short a time.

"I must confess I had no great hope of success at first," said my wife, "and this made me averse to speaking of it. Afterwards, when I suspected you had a secret, I determined to have one, too, and give you a surprise."

After again applauding these useful labours, we returned to discharge our cargo; and as we went, my good Elizabeth, still full of horticultural plans, reminded me of the young fruit-trees we had brought from the vessel. I promised to look after them next day, and to establish my orchard near her kitchen-garden.

We unloaded our vessels; placed on the sledge all that might be useful at Falcon’s Nest; and, arranging the rest under the tent, fixed our pinnace to the shore, by means of the anchor and a cord fastened to a heavy stone; and at length set


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Rh out to Falcon’s Nest, where we arrived soon, to the great comfort of my wife, who dreaded the burning plain at Tent House.

our return to Falcon’s Nest, I requested my sons to continue their exercises in gymnastics. I wished to develope all the vigour and energy that nature had given them; and which, in our situation, were especially necessary. I added to archery, racing, leaping, wrestling, and climbing trees, either by the trunks, or by a rope suspended from the branches, as sailors climb. I next taught them to use the lasso, a powerful weapon, by aid of which the people of South America capture savage animals. I fixed two balls of lead to the ends of a cord about a fathom in length. The Patagonians, I told them, used this weapon with wonderful dexterity. Having no leaden balls, they attach a heavy stone to each end of a cord about thirty yards long. If they wish to capture an animal, they hurl one of the stones at it with singular address. By the peculiar art with which the ball is thrown, the rope makes a turn or two round the neck of the animal, which remains entangled, without the power of escaping. In order to show the power of this weapon, I took aim at the trunk of a tree which they pointed out. My throw was quite successful. The end of the rope passed two or three times round the trunk of the tree, and remained firmly fixed to it. If the tree had been the neck of a tiger, I should have


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112 been absolute master of it. This experiment decided them all to learn the use of the lasso. Fritz was soon skilful in throwing it, and I encouraged the rest to persevere in acquiring the same facility, as the weapon might be invaluable to us when our ammunition failed.

The next morning I saw, on looking out, that the sea was too much agitated for any expedition in the boats; I therefore turned to some home employments. We looked over our stores for winter provision. My wife showed me a cask of ortolans she had preserved in butter, and a quantity of loaves of cassava bread, carefully prepared. She pointed out, that the pigeons had built in the tree, and were sitting on their eggs. We then looked over the young fruit-trees brought from Europe, and my sons and I immediately laid out a piece of ground, and planted them.

The day passed in these employments; and as we had lived only on potatoes, cassava bread, and milk for this day, we determined to go off next morning in pursuit of game to recruit our larder. At dawn of day we all started, including little Francis and his mother, who wished to take this opportunity of seeing a little more of the country. My sons and I took our arms, I harnessed the ass to the sledge which contained our provision for the day, and was destined to bring back the products of the chase. Turk, accoutred in his coat of mail, formed the advanced guard; my sons followed with their guns; then came my wife with Francis leading the ass; and at a little distance I closed the procession, with Master Knips mounted on the patient Flora.

We crossed Flamingo Marsh, and there my


text:
Williams v. Price

CHRIS RAND EYSTER (Argued), Pittsburgh, PA. Counsel for Appellant.

TIMOTHY F. McCUNE (Argued), Butler County District Attorney's Office, Butler, PA. Counsel for Appellee.

Before: ALITO and McKEE, Circuit Judges, and SCHWARZER, District Judge.

title: Williams v. Price


text: Talk:Williams v. Price

title: Talk:Williams v. Price


text:
Williams v. Price/Opinion of the Court

[p225] OPINION OF THE COURT

ALITO, Circuit Judge:

This is an appeal from a District Court order denying a petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed by Ronald A. Williams. Williams, who is serving a term of life imprisonment in Pennsylvania for first-degree murder, argues that his right to an impartial jury was abridged because the state courts refused in post-trial proceedings to admit certain evidence of racial bias on the part of members of the jury. Williams sought to introduce this evidence to show, among other things, that jurors lied during voir dire when they denied racial prejudice. The state courts refused to consider the evidence at issue based on the well-established evidence rule that generally bars juror testimony for the purpose of impeaching a verdict (the "no impeachment" rule). We hold that the state courts' refusal to receive some but not all of this evidence violated Williams's clearly established constitutional rights, and we therefore vacate the decision of the District Court and remand for an evidentiary hearing at which Williams will have the opportunity to introduce the improperly excluded evidence and to attempt to prove that a juror lied during voir dire.

I.
On August 5, 1984, at about 10:15 p.m., Archie Bradley stepped off a city bus outside a truck depot maintained by his employer, Nor-Sub Trucking, in Cranberry, Pennsylvania. Minutes later, witnesses heard five gunshots nearby. One witness also saw the triggerman standing over Bradley's body and holding a gun. Immediately before the witnesses contacted police, a patrolling traffic officer observed a suspicious car leaving the Nor-Sub parking lot. He noted the license plate and initiated a pursuit that escalated in intensity. The driver of the fleeing car threw various objects out the window, striking the police car with one of them, and succeeded in eluding the officer, but the car overturned on an embankment. Police discovered it abandoned. Retracing the route of the car chase, police recovered a Mac-10 firearm, a silencer, and an ammunition cartridge, and the police matched the gun forensically to the object that had struck the police cruiser. A search of the vehicle yielded more guns and ammunition, as well as a slip of paper on which was written "Nor-Sub 10:15."

In the early-morning hours of August 6, Williams telephoned Jewel Hayes, an intimate acquaintance, explaining that he was stranded somewhere and needed a ride. Hayes agreed, but when she could not find the designated pick-up location, she asked a police officer for directions. Police traced the phone call and arrested Williams and his brother Raymond. The eyewitness to the shooting identified Williams as the gunman. A 911 caller who claimed to have witnessed the vehicle leaving [p226] the crime scene initially described the car as blue and its driver as white, but this witness later decided that the car was gray and the driver was black. The witness eventually identified Williams, who is African American, as the driver. Both parties in their briefs refer to other inculpatory and exculpatory evidence, but none of it has a bearing on this appeal.

During voir dire proceedings in the Williamses' 1985 trial, the trial court asked two questions regarding racial bias:

Do you personally believe that blacks as a group are more likely to commit crimes of a violent nature involving firearms?

Can you listen to and judge the testimony of a black person in the same fashion as the testimony of a white person, giving each its deserved credibility? All the jurors who were selected to serve answered "no" to the first question and "yes" to the second. The jury convicted both Williams and his brother and sentenced them to death.

Shortly after the verdicts were returned, Williams's attorney filed post-trial motions. Among other things, he sought a new trial on the ground that the jury had received and had been influenced by information not introduced in court. In support of this motion, Williams's attorney submitted the affidavit of juror Judith Montgomery. Montgomery, who died in 1996, stated that "prior to the deliberation process as to Ronald Alfred Williams' sentencing," another juror had told the entire jury that, according to information received from an alternate, Ronald Williams had committed two murders, that Raymond Williams was wanted for two other murders, and that, "if this jury did not give the death penalty, (regarding Raymond Williams) another [jury] would." App. 8a.

On February 11, 1985, the trial judge held an evidentiary hearing on these allegations. Raymond Williams and his attorney were present at the hearing, but neither Ronald Williams nor his lawyer was there. At the beginning of the hearing, the judge stated that "a juror may not impeach his or her own verdict" but that there is "a narrow exception . . . allowing post-trial testimony of extraneous influences which might have affected the jury during their deliberation." App. 46a-47a. Montgomery, the other jurors, and a reporter for a local newspaper who had overheard a conversation among the jurors then testified. This testimony revealed that, after the guilt-phase verdict but before the penalty-phase verdict, half of the jurors had heard that Ronald Williams was wanted on other murder charges. See Commonwealth v. Williams, 514 Pa. 62, 522 A.2d 1058, 1066 (Pa. 1987) (direct appeal of Raymond Williams). The trial judge nevertheless refused the request for a new trial because he was satisfied by the testimony of the jurors that they had not been influenced by this information in imposing sentences of death. See id. On appeal, however, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court vacated the death sentences imposed on both brothers and remanded for the imposition of sentences of life imprisonment. Id. at 1067; Commonwealth v. Williams, 522 Pa. 287, 561 A.2d 714, 719 (Pa. 1989) (direct appeal of Ronald Williams). The state supreme court concluded that prejudicial extraneous information had tainted the death verdicts, but the court saw no need to disturb the guilty verdicts since the testimony at the post-trial hearing had established conclusively that none of the jurors had heard the objectionable information until after the guilty verdicts had been returned. 522 A.2d at 1065-68 & n.5; 522 Pa. 297, 561 A.2d 719. [p227]

In 1994, Ronald Williams, represented by new counsel, filed a state Post-Conviction Relief Act ("PCRA") petition in which he contended that members of the jury had lied during voir dire when they answered the questions about racial prejudice. In support of this motion, Williams relied on a new affidavit by Montgomery and another affidavit by Jewel Hayes, who had testified at trial.

Montgomery's affidavit stated:

"When I was Juror No. 9 in the trial of Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vs. Ronald Williams and Raymond Williams . . . I was called 'a nigger lover' and other derogatory names by other members of the jury. Remarks were made to me such as 'I hope your daughter marries one of them' . . . . The jurors were given information by an alternate juror who was told by [the] Sheriff . . . that the 'men were wanted in other states and if we don't get them another state would' and 'that Raymond [Williams, Appellant's brother and co-defendant] was going to die anyway as he shot and crippled a man for life in Michigan. The man lived and was able and willing to testify against Raymond, so his black ass was cooked anyway.'"

App. 6a.

Hayes's affidavit averred:

"Subsequent to the proceedings in this case . . . I ran into Juror Number Two (2) in the lobby of the Courthouse. . . . Upon seeing me he stated 'All niggers do is cause trouble' I am not sure whether this was stated directly to me but it was stated for my benefit and loudly enough for me to hear and to get a rise out of me. During our confrontation he also stated 'I should go back where I came from.'"

App. 7a.

On July 18, 1995, the court held an evidentiary hearing on this issue. Prior to the receipt of testimony, the court ruled that evidence of what went on "in the courtroom, or in the jury room" would not be admitted but that evidence of any extraneous information that might have affected the guilty verdict would be received. App. 90a. Montgomery again testified, and she reaffirmed that the information about the other murder charges against Williams had not been received until after the guilty verdict was returned. Id. at 48a-57a. Hayes was not called as a witness.

The PCRA Court denied Williams's petition. Stating that Williams had argued that racial slurs had allegedly been uttered by jurors "during jury deliberations," the Court wrote that "it is firmly established that after a verdict is recorded and the jury discharged, a juror may not impeach the verdict by his or her own testimony." App. 52a. The Court added that, while there is an exception to this rule for "extraneous influences on the jury deliberation [p228] process," the alleged slurs were not extraneous and thus did not fall within the exception. Id. The Court did not explain why it did not consider Hayes's evidence.

On appeal to the Superior Court, Williams argued that his federal constitutional right to an impartial jury had been abridged by the PCRA Court's refusal to consider the evidence in the Montgomery and Hayes affidavits for the purpose of determining whether jurors had lied during voir dire. See Amend. App. 40a-43a. Since the PCRA Court had refused to consider this evidence due to the "no impeachment" rule, the clear implication of Williams's argument was either that this rule did not apply when evidence was offered to prove that a juror lied during voir dire or that under these circumstances the rule had to give way to his constitutional right to an impartial jury. However, the discussion in Williams's brief did not spell out either of these arguments, and the Superior Court affirmed based on the PCRA Court's analysis. Commonwealth v. Williams, 455 Pa. Super. 699, 688 A.2d 1231 (1996).

Williams filed a petition for allocatur that raised the issue now before us in virtually the same words as his Superior Court brief, Amend. App. at 95a-98a, but the Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied review. Commonwealth v. Williams, 548 Pa. 680, 699 A.2d 735 (Pa. 1997).

Williams then filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. A Magistrate Judge issued a report and recommendation concluding that the petition should be denied. At the outset of her discussion of the pertinent issue, the Magistrate Judge noted that Williams had "submitted affidavits of one juror [i.e., Montgomery] and one trial witness [i.e., Hayes], R & R at 33, but the Magistrate Judge made no further reference to Hayes. Indeed, the Magistrate Judge later stated that "the state courts refused to consider [Williams's] proposed submission of affidavits by two jurors" based on the "no impeachment" rule, and the Magistrate Judge concluded that Williams had not "demonstrated that the state courts' actions were 'contrary to' Tanner [v. United States, 483 U.S. 107, 97 L. Ed. 2d 90, 107 S.C.t. 2739 (1987) and other relevant Supreme Court cases, which do not permit the type of post-verdict jury impeachment testimony [Williams sought] to introduce." R & R at 34-35 (emphasis added). The District Court adopted the Report and Recommendation without elaboration, and this appeal followed. A panel of our court granted a certificate of appealability on the following questions:

"Was Williams denied due process in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment or a fair trial or impartial jury in violation of the Sixth Amendment because (1) jurors were disingenuous on voir dire in answering questions about racial bias; or (2) [is this] a rare case which is an exception to the 'no-impeachment rule'? See United States v. Henley, 238 F.3d 1111 (9th Cir. 2001); Shillcutt v. Gagnon, 827 F.2d 1155 (7th Cir. 1987)."

A.
Our standard of review in this case is governed by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). Under this provision, federal habeas relief may not be awarded as to any claim that a state court has adjudicated on the merits "unless the adjudication of the claim . . . resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States." 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), (d)(1) (2002) (emphasis added). "Clearly [p229] established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court," id., "refers to the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of [the Supreme] Court's decisions as of the time of the relevant state-court decision." Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412, 146 L. Ed. 2d 389, 120 S.C.t. 1495 (2000). A decision is "contrary to" a Supreme Court holding if the state court "contradicts the governing law set forth in [the Supreme Court's] cases" or if the state court "confronts a set of facts that are materially indistinguishable from a decision of [the Supreme] Court and nevertheless arrives at a [different] result." Id. at 405-06. A decision "involves an unreasonable application" of clearly established federal law if the state court "identifies the correct governing legal rule from [the Supreme] Court's cases but unreasonably applies it to the facts of the particular . . . case" or if the state court "unreasonably extends a legal principle from [Supreme Court] precedent to a new context where it should not apply or unreasonably refuses to extend that principle to a new context where it should apply." Id. at 407. We review de novo the District Court's application of section 2254(d). See Banks v. Horn, 271 F.3d 527, 531 (3d Cir. 2001).

B.
Williams points to McDonough Power Equipment, Inc. v. Greenwood, 464 U.S. 548, 78 L. Ed. 2d 663, 104 S.C.t. 845 (1984) ("McDonough"), as the Supreme Court precedent that the state courts contradicted or unreasonably applied. In McDonough, the losing parties in a civil trial in federal court argued that they were entitled to a new trial on the ground that a juror had failed to disclose material information in response to a question asked during voir dire. The Supreme Court held that in order "to obtain a new trial in such a situation, a party must first demonstrate that a juror failed to answer honestly a material question on voir dire, and then further show that a correct response would have provided a valid basis for a challenge for cause." Id. at 556.

Although McDonough was a federal civil case, a state court decision failing to apply this same rule in a criminal prosecution would represent an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). The McDonough Court based its decision on the following principle:

"One touchstone of a fair trial is an impartial trier -- 'a jury capable and willing to decide the case solely on the evidence before it.' Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. 209, 217, 71 L. Ed. 2d 78, 102 S.C.t. 940 (1982)."

McDonough, 464 U.S. at 554. Smith, the precedent on which McDonough relied, was a habeas case in which a state prisoner claimed that he was denied due process because of juror bias. Accordingly, to hold that the right recognized in McDonough is not available to a defendant in a state criminal case would be an "unreasonable refusal to extend that principle to a new context where it should apply." Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. at 407; see Jones v. Cooper, 311 F.3d 306, 310 (4th Cir. 2002); but see Montoya v. Scott, 65 F.3d 405, 418-19 (5th Cir. 1995) (reserving decision on question).

McDonough, however, did not decide the issues raised in this appeal. McDonough addressed the right of a party to obtain a new trial upon making a particular showing, not the admissibility of evidence to make that showing. As far as the admissibility of evidence is concerned, the most that may fairly be taken from McDonough is that a state may not adopt evidence rules that entirely frustrate the ability of objecting parties to make the [p230] showing specified in that case. ''Cf. Smith'', 455 U.S. at 215 ("This Court has long held that the remedy for allegations of juror partiality is a hearing in which the defendant has the opportunity to prove actual bias.") No further limitations on the power of a state to fashion its own evidence rules may reasonably be extracted from McDonough alone. Certainly McDonough cannot be read as "clearly establishing" constitutional limits on state "no impeachment" rules.

C.
The Supreme Court decision that best addresses the interplay between a defendant's constitutional right to offer evidence of juror misconduct and the traditional "no impeachment" rule is Tanner v. United States, 483 U.S. 107, 116-17, 97 L. Ed. 2d 90, 107 S.C.t. 2739 (1987). In Tanner, the defendants argued that the trial judge had erred in refusing to conduct an evidentiary hearing at which jurors would be allowed to testify about alcohol and drug use by jurors during the trial. The defendants maintained that this testimony was not barred by Federal Rule of Evidence 606(b), which codifies the "no impeachment" rule. In addition, the defendants contended that, even if the testimony was prohibited by Rule 606(b), the trial judge's refusal to receive the evidence violated their constitutional right to a competent jury. 483 U.S. at 116-17.

The Supreme Court disagreed. After holding that the testimony at issue was barred by Rule 606(b), the Court also rejected the defendants' constitutional argument, noting that the "no impeachment" rule is supported by "long-recognized and very substantial concerns." Id. at 126-27. Tanner strongly suggests that the exclusion of evidence of juror misconduct pursuant to the traditional "no impeachment" rule is constitutional because of the important purposes that the rule has long been recognized as serving. But of course Tanner does not necessarily mean that the converse is true, i.e., that it is necessarily unconstitutional for a state to adopt a version of the "no impeachment" rule that bars more testimony than does the traditional rule. In such a case, a court would have to look beyond Tanner in order to determine whether this expanded rule violated the Constitution or fell within the states' broad power to fashion the rules of evidence applicable in their own courts. See Duckworth v. Owen, 452 U.S. 951, 952, 69 L. Ed. 2d 963, 101 S.C.t. 3096 (1981) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari).

D.
Just how far beyond the traditional rule a jurisdiction could go without violating [p231] the Constitution is an unsettled question. The principal Supreme Court cases striking down exclusionary state evidence rules involve situations bearing little resemblance to those of the present case. In Washington v. Texas, 388 U.S. 14, 23, 18 L. Ed. 2d 1019, 87 S.C.t. 1920 (1967), a state rule prohibited a co-participant in a crime from testifying for the defense. The Court stated that the Constitution is offended "by arbitrary rules that prevent whole categories of defense witnesses from testifying on the basis of a priori categories that presume them unworthy of belief." Id. at 22. The Court added that, because the rule at issue permitted a coparticipant to testify if the witness was called by the prosecution or had previously been acquitted of the crime, the rule could not "even be defended on the ground that it rationally set[] apart a group of persons who are particularly likely to commit perjury." Id.

In Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284, 302, 35 L. Ed. 2d 297, 93 S.C.t. 1038 (1973), a murder defendant was precluded from bringing to the jury's attention the fact that another man, McDonald, had confessed to the murder in the presence of three witnesses. At trial, the defendant called McDonald to the stand, but McDonald denied committing the murder, and the defendant was not permitted to cross-examine him about the confession because state law prohibited a party from impeaching the party's own witness. Id. at 295. The defendant then attempted to question the three witnesses about the confession, but this evidence was ruled to be inadmissible hearsay because the state did not recognize an exception for declarations against penal, as opposed to, pecuniary interest. Id. at 299. Noting that the state had not even attempted to "defend" or "explain [the] underlying rationale" of the rule prohibiting a party from impeaching the party's own witnesses, id. at 297, the Supreme Court concluded that this rule, combined with the "mechanistic[]" application of the hearsay rule, had deprived the defendant of a fair trial "under the facts and circumstances" of the case. Id. at 302-03.

In Crane v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 683, 690, 90 L. Ed. 2d 636, 106 S.C.t. 2142 (1986), a murder defendant's confession was found before trial to have been voluntary and thus admissible. At trial, the defendant wanted to convince the jury that the confession was unreliable due to the circumstances under which it was given, but this evidence was ruled inadmissible. Id. at 685-86. The Supreme Court held that the defendant's conviction had to be reversed, observing that neither the state supreme court nor the prosecution had "advanced any rational justification for the wholesale exclusion of this body of potentially exculpatory evidence." Id. at 691.

In Rock v. Arkansas, 483 U.S. 44, 55, 97 L. Ed. 2d 37, 107 S.C.t. 2704 (1987), a homicide defendant underwent hypnosis to refresh her memory. Because state law excluded all hypnotically refreshed testimony, the defendant was not allowed to testify to any facts that she had not reported prior to the hypnosis. Observing that "restrictions of a defendant's right to testify may not be arbitrary or disproportionate to the purposes they are designed to serve," id. at 56, the Court held that the defendant's right had been abridged because no specific determination had been made that the excluded testimony was unreliable. Id. at 61-62. The Court noted that the state court's ruling had deprived the defendant of the testimony of the only witness present at the scene and had infringed the defendant's interest in testifying in her own behalf, id. at 57, [p232] "an interest that [the Court] deemed particularly significant." United States v. Scheffer, 523 U.S. 303, 315, 140 L. Ed. 2d 413, 118 S.C.t. 1261 (1998).

None of these cases clearly establishes just how far a jurisdiction may go in excluding evidence of juror misconduct. The only principle applicable to the present case that these cases may be viewed as clearly establishing is that a state evidence rule may not severely restrict a defendant's right to put on a defense if the rule is entirely without any reasonable justification.

III.
The "no impeachment" rule has been traced to a decision by England's Lord Mansfield, Vaise v. Delaval, 99 Eng. Rep. 944 (K.B. 1785), and the rule once carried the appellation "Mansfield's rule." According to Wigmore, "with the prestige of the great Chief Justice, [this rule] soon prevailed in England, and its authority came to receive in the United States an adherence almost unquestioned." JOHN HENRY WIGMORE, EVIDENCE IN TRIALS AT COMMON LAW § 2352 at 697 (McNaughton rev. 1961).

Several different forms of the rule were common in this country, but in general a distinction was drawn between, on the one hand, mistakes and misconduct by the jury during deliberations and, on the other hand, improper outside influences. See CHRISTOPHER B. MUELLER & LAIRD C. KIRKPATRICK, FEDERAL EVIDENCE § 247 at 53-54 (2d ed. 1994). In Mattox v. United States, 146 U.S. 140, 149, 36 L. Ed. 917, 13 S.C.t. 50 (1892), the Supreme Court stated that a " 'a juryman may testify to any facts bearing upon the question of the existence of any extraneous influence, although not as to how far that influence operated upon his mind' " or as to "the motives and influences which affected [the jury's] decision." See also McDonald v. Pless, 238 U.S. 264, 269, 59 L. Ed. 1300, 35 S.C.t. 783 (1915) ("The losing party cannot, in order to secure a new trial, use the testimony of jurors to impeach their verdict."); Hyde v. United States, 225 U.S. 347, 56 L. Ed. 1114, 32 S.C.t. 793 (1912).

Rule 606(b) of the Federal Rules of Evidence codifies this approach. It provides:

"Upon an inquiry into the validity of a verdict . . ., a juror may not testify as to any matter or statement occurring during the course of the jury's deliberations or to the effect of anything upon that or any other juror's mind or emotions . . . except that a juror may testify on the question whether extraneous prejudicial information was improperly brought to the jury's attention."

FED. R. EVID. 606(b).

Pennsylvania has long followed a similar rule. Under the governing cases at the time of Williams's trial, a juror was precluded from invalidating or impeaching a verdict by the juror's own testimony, e.g., Commonwealth v. Patrick, 416 Pa. 437, 206 A.2d 295, 297 (Pa. 1965) (collecting cases), unless the juror alleged that an external factor had improperly influenced the verdict. E.g., Commonwealth v. Boden, 337 Pa. Super. 108, 486 A.2d 504, 506 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1984). The Pennsylvania Rules of Evidence now provide for the same policy in language nearly identical to the federal rule's. Compare PA. R. EVID. 606(b) with FED. R. EVID. 606(b). See PA. R. EVID. 606(b) cmt. (characterizing FED. R. EVID. 606(b) and PA. R. EVID. 606(b) as "consistent with [existing] Pennsylvania law"). The Supreme Court in McDonald explained the importance of the public-policy concerns that underlie the "no impeachment" rule:

"Let it once be established that verdicts solemnly made and publicly returned into court can be attacked and set aside [p233] on the testimony of those who took part in their publication and all verdicts could be, and many would be, followed by an inquiry in the hope of discovering something which might invalidate the finding. Jurors would be harassed and beset by the defeated party in an effort to secure from them evidence of facts which might establish misconduct sufficient to set aside a verdict. If evidence thus secured could be thus used, the result would be to make what was intended to be a private deliberation, the constant subject of public investigation -- to the destruction of all frankness and freedom of discussion and conference."

238 U.S. at 267-68. In Tanner, 483 U.S. at 120-21, the Court added:

"Allegation of juror misconduct, incompetency, or inattentiveness, raised for the first time days, weeks, or months after the verdict, seriously disrupt the finality of process. . . . Moreover, full and frank discussion in the jury room, jurors' willingness to return an unpopular verdict, and the community's trust in a system that relies on the decisions of laypeople would all be undermined by a barrage of postverdict scrutiny of juror conduct."

A.
With this background in mind, we turn first to the affidavit of Jewel Hayes. As noted, Hayes stated in her affidavit that she had encountered a juror in the lobby of the courthouse after the trial had ended and that the juror had stated that " 'all niggers do is cause trouble' " and that Hayes "should go back [to] where [she] came from." Hayes was not a juror, and although the habeas respondent (hereinafter "the Commonwealth") suggests that Hayes's evidence concerned the "internal workings" of the jury, Appellee's Br. at 18, this is plainly not correct. The incident that Hayes recounted occurred after the trial ended and in a public place; no other jurors were alleged to have been present at the time; and the offensive remarks did not concern discussions among the jurors or anything that any other juror had purportedly said or done.

No rational justification for the exclusion of this testimony was provided by the state courts or the District Court, and none has been offered in this appeal. Hayes's testimony does not fall within the original version of the "no impeachment" rule. See Vaise, 99 Eng. Rep. at 944 ("The Court cannot receive such an affidavit from any of the jurymen themselves . . . but in every such case the Court must derive their knowledge from some other source: such as from some person having seen the transaction through a window, or by some such other means."). Nor does Hayes's testimony fall within the version of the "no impeachment" rule adopted for use in Pennsylvania or the federal courts. See Commonwealth v. Greevy, 271 Pa. 95, 114 A. 511, 512 (Pa. 1921) ("Public policy forbids the examination of jurors, as to the reasons for their verdict") (emphasis added); Cluggage v. Swan, 4 Binn. 150, 159 (Pa. 1811) (Yeates, J.) (stating that "the testimony of jurors ought not to be admitted to invalidate their verdicts") (emphasis added); PA. R. EVID. 606(b); FED. R. EVID. 606(b). Although Williams relied on Hayes's affidavit in the PCRA Court, the Superior Court, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, and the District Court, none of these courts explained why Hayes's evidence was inadmissible.

In defending the state courts' treatment of this issue, the Commonwealth notes without elaboration that Williams "did not present Jewell [sic] Hayes' live [p234] testimony at the July 18, 1995 hearing," Appellee's Br. at 7, but we cannot affirm the decision of the District Court on this ground. When a federal constitutional claim is rejected without explanation, we must presume that the decision was not based on a state procedural rule. Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 734-35, 115 L. Ed. 2d 640, 111 S.C.t. 2546 (1991). If the state courts had refused to consider the evidence in Hayes's affidavit on the ground that the defense failed to produce her live testimony at the PCRA hearing, we would have to determine whether this was an adequate and independent state ground that precluded our consideration of the merits of the federal constitutional claim. But the state courts made no mention of any such procedural bar, and we must therefore proceed on the assumption that Williams's federal constitutional claim, insofar as it was based on Hayes's evidence, was rejected on the merits.

Finally, the Commonwealth's brief argues that Hayes's evidence did not show that the juror in question lied during voir dire. Appellee's Br. at 15. We would be presented with a different question in this appeal if the state courts had made a factual finding that Hayes's testimony was not credible or that the juror in question, despite the comment recounted by Hayes, had answered the pertinent voir dire questions truthfully. In either of those circumstances, we would be compelled to decide whether the state courts' findings were "unreasonable" in light of the state court record. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2). But the state courts made no such findings. Because they did not do so and also made no mention of a state procedural bar, we must assume that the state courts ruled either that Hayes's testimony was inadmissible or was insufficient, even if believed, to warrant relief. Either holding would represent an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law. On the facts presented to us, the failure to receive and consider Hayes's testimony for the purpose of determining whether a juror lied during voir dire cannot be sustained under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1).

V.
We now consider Montgomery's evidence. Montgomery made two allegations. First, she testified that, after the guilty verdicts were returned but before the jury sentenced the Williams brothers to death, the jurors were told by an alternate that Ronald Williams had been convicted of two other offenses and that his brother was wanted in two other states. Second, she stated in her second affidavit that, "when [she] was Juror No. 9," other jurors made [p235] remarks that suggested acute racial bias. App. 6a. We discuss each allegation separately.

A.
With respect to the first allegation -- regarding the jury's receipt of extraneous information after the guilty verdict was returned -- we see no ground for holding that Williams is entitled to relief beyond that already awarded by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. There is no dispute that Montgomery's testimony about outside information received by the jury falls within the "no impeachment" rule's exception. Indeed, the Court of Common Pleas twice permitted Montgomery to testify about such "extraneous" influence, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court agreed that this testimony was admissible. See Williams, 561 A.2d at 719; Williams, 522 A.2d at 1067-68. However, because the jurors first received this information "at the sentencing phase," the state supreme court held that the proper remedy was not a new trial but a reduction of the sentence to one of life imprisonment. Williams, 561 A.2d at 719; Williams, 522 A.2d at 1067 (citing 42 Pa. Cons. St. § 9711(h)). We see no basis for holding that anything more is required by the federal Constitution.

B.
1. We thus come to Montgomery's allegation that jurors made racially biased remarks at some point during the trial. Williams first contends the state courts were obligated to consider Montgomery's testimony about these remarks because the "no impeachment" rule simply does not apply when a defendant seeks to introduce evidence to support "a claim of juror misconduct committed during voir dire," Appellant's Br. at 19, but this argument is plainly too broad. If it were correct, a party could call jury members to testify about statements made during actual jury deliberations so long as the purpose for introducing the evidence was to show that a juror had lied during voir dire. However, both the Federal and the Pennsylvania Rules of Evidence categorically bar juror testimony "as to any matter or statement occurring during the course of the jury's deliberations" even if the testimony is not offered to explore the jury's decision-making process in reaching the verdict. Indeed, Rule 606(b) was amended during the legislative process precisely to make it clear that the Rule means what its plain terms state in this regard. See Tanner, 483 U.S. at 122-25. Although the question now before us is not whether Montgomery's testimony was prohibited by Federal Rule 606(b) (since Rule 606(b) did not govern the state proceedings) or by the Pennsylvania version of the "no impeachment" rule (since the enforcement of a state rule is a matter for the state courts), the Supreme Court's decision in Tanner implies that the Constitution does not require the admission of evidence that falls within Rule 606(b)'s prohibition. See id. at 127. And in any event, Tanner surely defeats any argument that it is "clearly established" in Supreme Court jurisprudence that the Constitution mandates the admission of such evidence. Thus, if the juror statements [p236] to which Montgomery referred occurred during jury deliberations, the state courts did not violate "clearly established Federal law" in refusing to consider those statements.

2. But what if the statements were not made during jury deliberations? As noted, Montgomery's second affidavit did not pin down exactly when or where the alleged statements were made, stating only that they took place "when I was Juror No. 9 in the trial of Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vs. Ronald Williams and Raymond Williams." Suggesting that the comments did not occur during the deliberations, Williams contends that the "no impeachment" rule does not apply to statements made by jurors "before deliberations began and outside the jury room," Appellant's Br. at 20, but this broad argument is wrong. In Tanner, the Court held that the "no impeachment" rule barred testimony about juror alcohol and drug use during the trial. 483 U.S. at 116-26. The Court did not accept Justice Marshall's argument in dissent that the rule did not apply to juror conduct that occurred during the trial itself and not during the deliberations, id. at 138, 140 (Marshall, J., dissenting), and the Court rejected "a rigid distinction based only on whether the event took place inside or outside the jury room." Id. at 117.

But while we reject Williams's argument that location is dispositive, we recognize that a narrower argument could be made in support of the admission of the particular testimony in dispute here. Specifically, if the other jurors' alleged comments did not occur during deliberations and if Montgomery's testimony about those comments were received for the limited purpose of showing that jurors lied during voir dire, it could be argued that her testimony must be allowed by Rule 606(b) because it would not concern either (1) "any matter or statement occurring during the course of the jury's deliberations" or (2) "the effect of anything" upon any juror's decision-making or mental processes in connection with reaching the verdict.

Nevertheless, while we appreciate this argument, we cannot say that "clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States" requires a state to admit such testimony. A state could reasonably believe that such testimony would implicate "the mental processes whereby the jurors arrived at their verdict." Commonwealth v. Zlatovich, 440 Pa. 388, 269 A.2d 469, 473 (Pa. 1970). After all, important voir dire questions typically focus on matters that may well affect juror's decision-making processes and, therefore, allowing a juror to testify for the purpose of showing that another juror lied during voir dire may not be viewed as much different from permitting an inquiry into the decision-making process itself. In [p237] addition, allowing such juror testimony may be thought to create the potential for the very sort of problems that the "no impeachment" rule is designed to prevent, including in particular the post-trial harassment of jurors in the hope that one will recount a remark by a fellow juror that can be construed as evidence that this juror lied during voir dire.

We emphasize that we do not hold that testimony of the type at issue is inadmissible under Rule 606(b) or any other particular version of the "no impeachment" rule. We express no view on those questions. We hold only that the exclusion of such testimony is not irrational and does not contravene or represent an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law.

C.
Williams's final argument is that Montgomery's testimony should not have been excluded because evidence of racial bias on the part of jurors should be excepted from the "no impeachment" rule. In making this argument, Williams relies chiefly on United States v. Henley, 238 F.3d 1111 (9th Cir. 2001), where a juror allegedly made racist remarks while carpooling to and from the trial. See id. at 1113. The actual holding in Henley did not concern racial bias. In dictum, however, the court stated that "a powerful case can be made that [the 'no impeachment' rule] is wholly inapplicable to racial bias because, as the Supreme Court has explained, '[a] juror may testify concerning any mental bias in matters unrelated to the specific issues that the juror was called upon to decide. . . .' " 238 F.3d at 1120 (citing Rushen v. Spain, 464 U.S. 114, 121 n.5, 78 L. Ed. 2d 267, 104 S.C.t. 453 (1983)). Williams urges us to follow Henley's suggestion and hold that the "no impeachment" rule does not apply to Montgomery's testimony because it concerns racial bias on the part of jurors.

There are multiple problems with Williams's argument. First, this argument was never squarely presented to the state courts. While the state courts were certainly aware of the allegation that racist statements had been made by jurors, and while Williams argued that testimony about the statements should have been received, Williams never argued that juror statements evidencing racial bias fall outside the "no impeachment" rule. Indeed, as previously noted, Williams's state-court briefs made little if any effort to grapple with the "no impeachment" rule. Thus, it appears that Williams's current argument is procedurally defaulted. See PA. CONS. STAT. ANN. § 9545(b).

Second, even if we reach the merits of Williams's argument, our limited standard of review under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) precludes relief. Under that provision, "clearly established Federal law" "refers to the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of [the Supreme] Court's decisions as of the time of the relevant state-court decision." Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. at 412. The discussion in Henley on which Williams relies is dictum in a Court of Appeals opinion that came well after the state-court decisions in Williams's PCRA appeal.

Nor does the Supreme Court's decision in Rushen, which Henley cited, provide a basis for habeas relief in this case. The statement in Rushen on which the Ninth Circuit relied was also dictum and [p238] arose in a different context. In Rushen, the Supreme Court considered and rejected the argument that a bizarre development during a long criminal trial had resulted in a violation of a defendant's right to an impartial jury. The defendant was tried in state court for murder and other crimes stemming from a prison escape, and during voir dire potential jurors were asked whether they had any experiences with violent crime. Rushen, 464 U.S. at 115. Juror Patricia Fagan answered that she had not, but during the trial there was testimony about an informant named Pratt, and Fagan then recalled for the first time that several years earlier Pratt had been convicted of killing a woman who had been one of Fagan's childhood friends. Id. at 115-16. Fagan promptly spoke ex parte with the trial judge, who assured her that she could continue to serve so long as the incident did not taint her objectivity. Id. at 116. She promised that it would not. Id. The parties did not learn of Fagan's private colloquy with the judge until after the trial had concluded and the jury had found the defendant guilty. Id.

In a hearing on a defense motion for a new trial, Fagan testified that her recollection of the murder of her friend had not affected her impartiality. Id. at 116, 120-21. She also testified that she had told other jurors that she personally knew Pratt's murder victim. Id. at 116. The highest state court to consider the issue found that Fagan's conversation with the judge during the trial was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt because the jury's deliberations as a whole were unbiased. Id. at 117. However, a federal District Court granted a writ of habeas corpus, and the Court of Appeals affirmed on the ground that an unrecorded ex parte communication between a trial judge and juror can never be harmless. Id. In a per curiam opinion, the Supreme Court reversed, holding that the state courts' findings that the jury deliberations were not biased were entitled to deference and were adequately supported by the record. Id. at 120-21.

The statement cited by the Ninth Circuit appears in a footnote concerning the post-trial hearing at which Fagan testified. In the text of its opinion, the Supreme Court wrote: "Juror Fagan never willfully concealed her association with [the murder of her friend], and she repeatedly testified that, upon recollection, the incident did not affect her impartiality." Id. In a footnote at the end of this sentence, the Court added:

"A juror may testify concerning any mental bias in matters unrelated to the specific issues that the juror was called upon to decide and whether extraneous prejudicial information was improperly brought to the juror's attention. But a juror generally cannot testify about the mental process by which the verdict was arrived."

Id. at 121 n.5 (internal citations omitted).

We understand this passage to mean that, although the "no impeachment" rule barred Fagan from testifying as to whether her recollection of the murder of her friend played any role in "the mental process by which the verdict was arrived," that rule did preclude her from testifying as to whether she was impartial (whether she harbored a "mental bias in [a] matter[] unrelated to the specific issue" in the case) and whether extraneous information (her recollection of the murder) was brought to the attention of the other jurors. These statements, which merely restated well-settled law, fall well short of clearly establishing the rule of constitutional law on which Williams's argument [p239] here must rest, namely, that a criminal defendant has a federal constitutional right to introduce juror testimony to prove racial bias on the part of jurors irrespective of any restrictions imposed by the "no impeachment" rule.

A leading evidence treatise states that the application of Federal Rule of Evidence 606(b) to evidence of racial bias on the part of jurors is "problematic." 3 MUELLER & KIRKPATRICK, supra, § 248 at 69. The treatise goes on to say that "arguably the rule bars juror testimony or statements on such points" but that "conceivably such proof could be called outside influence." Id.

Our role in this case, however, is not to interpret Rule 606(b) or any other version of the "no impeachment" rule but merely to determine whether the state courts contravened or unreasonably applied "clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court." Neither Rushen nor any other Supreme Court decision clearly establishes that it is unconstitutional for a state to apply a "no impeachment" rule that does not contain an exception for juror testimony about racial bias on the part of jurors. Accordingly, Williams's argument must be rejected.

VI.
For the reasons set out above, we vacate the order of the District Court and remand for an evidentiary hearing at which Williams has the opportunity to make the showing mandated by McDonough.

title: Williams v. Price/Opinion of the Court


text: Portal talk:International Catalogue of Scientific Literature


text:
Author:Catherine Crowe

Works

 * Aristodemus: A Tragedy (1838)
 * Adventures of Susan Hopley; or, Circumstantial Evidence (1841)
 * Adventures of Susan Hopley (Volume 1)
 * Men and Women; or, Manorial Rights (1843), 3 volumes
 * The Story of Lilly Dawson (1847)
 * Pippie's Warning; or, Mind Your Temper (1848)
 * The Night-side of Nature; or, Ghosts and Ghost-seers (1848)
 * Light and Darkness; or, Mysteries of Life (1850)
 * The Adventures of a Beauty (1852), 3 volumes
 * The Cruel Kindness: A Romantic Play, in Five Acts (1853)
 * Linny Lockwood: A Novel (1854)
 * Ghosts and Family Legends: A Volume for Christmas (1859)
 * "The Herberts of Elfdale" in Once a Week, Series 1, III (1860)
 * The Story of Arthur Hunter and His First Shilling, with Other Tales (1861)
 * The Adventures of a Monkey: An Interesting Narrative (1862)

title: Author:Catherine Crowe


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Hanging indents
I think that the fact these poems were printed with hanging indents after each line was a stylistic decision - there appears to be more than enough room on the right hand margin to continue without using them, but the author chose not to.

As such, wouldn't it make sense to add hanging indents so that the Wikisource version is more faithful to the source material? --Snarfherder (talk) 04:12, 19 December 2010 (UTC)


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 AND THE

ENGLISH MONASTERIES


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just appreciation of the great social and religious revolution of the sixteenth century is possible without some knowledge of the causes which produced it. "The history of the Reformation in England," writes Lord Macaulay, "is full of strange problems." That the nation, at the bidding of the sovereign and in furtherance of his whims, should acquiesce in the rejection of papal supremacy over the Church, should substitute the doctrine of the spiritual headship of the king, and should tolerate the national upheaval and disregard of the rights of property implied in the dissolution of monasteries and confiscation of their lands and goods, are "problems" to be solved only by an acquaintance with the events preceding and accompanying them.

Circumstances combined to collect in the political and social atmosphere of England in the time of Henry VIII elements fraught with dangerous and destructive power against the Church. In the first place, it would seem to be certain that the country had not fully recovered from that terrible visitation, known as the "Black Death," which devastated Europe in the middle of the fourteenth century. Although a hundred and fifty years had elapsed before


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 Henry VIII mounted the throne, so great had been the ravages of the scourge, and so unsettled had been the interval, that the nation was still suffering from the effects of the great sickness.

To the Church the scourge of 1349 must have been especially disastrous. Apart from the poverty and distress occasioned by the unoccupied lands and the consequent diminution of tithes, the sudden removal of the great majority of the clergy must have broken the continuity of the best traditions of ecclesiastical usage and teaching. The monastic houses also suffered, not only in the destruction of their chief source of income by the depreciated value of their lands and the want of cultivation consequent upon the impossibility of finding labourers in place of the tenants swept off by the pestilence, but more than all by reason of the great diminution of their numbers, which rendered the proper performance of their religious duties, and the diligent discharge of their obligations as regards monastic discipline, difficult, and often almost impossible.

The long and bitter feud between the Houses of York and Lancaster must likewise be regarded as an important element in the chain of events which rendered possible the political and social changes of Henry's reign. The insecurity and instability of well-nigh half a century, as well as the ferocity of that contest, must have stamped a peculiar character upon the men of the early Tudor period. When Henry VIII succeeded his father, every man of thirty must have had within his own personal recollection some knowledge of the terrible war, whilst his parents must have lived through the whole of it.

The obvious result of a knowledge of the danger and troubles of this long civil war, whether derived from personal experience or the relation of parents, was a willingness to hazard everything rather than recur to such a period of distress and bloodshed. Periods of revolution inspire peculiar prudence, and protracted war a determination at all costs to cling "to peace and pursue it." Hence the population generally throughout England in the days of Henry had


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 been rendered by circumstances long-suffering, and ready to endure the dictates of his whims and desires rather than to imperil their peace by resistance.

Another indirect and still more important effect of the conflict of the "Roses" upon the times of the Tudors was the destruction of the power of the nobility. The civil war completed the work begun by the pestilences of the fourteenth century, and finally broke the power of the great nobles. The "Black Death," by altering the conditions of land tenure, and thus depriving the territorial lords of their hold upon the service and lives of their retainers, gradually sapped the strength of the ancient nobility, whilst the war swept away all the pride and flower of the great noble families. It was the deliberate policy of Warwick, the "King-maker," to cut off the chiefs of the opposite party, and thus to the aristocracy especially the war was fatal. "The indirect and silent operation of these conflicts," writes Mr. Brewer, "was much more remarkable. It reft into fragments the confederated ranks of a powerful territorial aristocracy, which had hitherto bid defiance to the king, however popular, however energetic."

When Henry VIII. succeeded, although every sign of growing power was eagerly watched and speedily and effectually checked, there was little that the crown had to fear from the hitherto powerful nobility. Thus the position and authority of the Tudor monarchs was altogether different from that of their predecessors, and the Royal Supremacy passed from a theory into a fact.

As a consequence, the stability which the traditions and prudent counsels of the ancient nobility gave to the ship of state was gone, when it was most needed to weather the rising storm of revolutionary ideas. The new peers, who were created in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to take the place of the old aristocracy, had no sympathy either by birth or inclination with the best traditions of the past. Nor was the age favourable to the production of high-minded and fearless counsellors so much as to the growth of men of quick and active talents.


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4 The Tudor policy of government created also the "official," who was by nature restless and discontented. Working for the most inadequate of salaries, such a man was ever on the look-out for some lucky chance of supplementing his pay. Success and worldly prosperity depended on his being able to attract to himself the notice of his royal master. "It was his interest to compete for extraordinary grants in return for his work." One with the other they strove who should best work their way into his favour by anticipating his wishes, satisfying his whims, and pandering to his desires, "their promotion being wholly dependent on his good-will."

As a result of the inadequate salaries, the administration of the law appears, with honourable exceptions, to have been partial and corrupt. Complaints were frequent against the lawyers of the period. Suits were kept on from year to year unless money was forthcoming to induce the authorities to make an end of the litigation. It even passed into a proverb that "the law was ended as a man was friended," and contemporary writers declaim against the mischief which men suffered "from the facility with which an accusation could be lodged against an innocent person."

The same contemporary authority speaks of the miserable state of those who were unfortunate enough to be thrown into prison. There, he says, they "are lodged like hogs and fed like dogs." Moreover they were allowed to lie in these wretched prison-houses for years without any trial, and if they had no money were left to starve. If they, or their friends, could afford to pay for their food, they were allowed in some prisons to "pay for themselves four times as much as at any best inn." By all means, says Brinklow, "if a man offend the law let him have the law," but "to imprison a man and starve him is murder."

In the midst of the throes of a great social crisis much depended upon the Church. There can be little doubt that the clergy of the time were ill-fitted to cope with the forces


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Rh of revolution, to calm the restless spirit of the age, or resist the rising tide of novelties. Their very character was in itself out of joint with the times. In the days when might was right, and force of arms the ruling power of the world, the occupation of peace, to which the clergy were bound by their sacred calling, naturally roused hostile and violent opposition from the party rising into power. The bishops were, with some honourable exceptions, mere court officials pensioned out of ecclesiastical revenues. Holding their high offices by royal favour rather than on account of special aptitude to look after the spiritual welfare of their dioceses, they appear, perhaps not unnaturally, to have had little heart in their work.

Too often, also, the bishop of an important see would be occupied in the management of the secular affairs of state. Perhaps, even, he was paid for these services by the emoluments of his ecclesiastical office. To the king all looked for hope of reward, and to royalty all clung as long as there remained any prospect of success. The Church had few favours to give except at the wish and by the hands of the king. "Even cardinal's hats were bestowed only on royal recommendation." The episcopal see was, moreover, not infrequently looked upon as a property conferred for political services and out of which the most, in a temporal point of view, was to be made.

The practice followed in more than one instance of rewarding foreigners by nominating them to vacant sees and benefices in return for services rendered, or as an inducement to help on some royal scheme, was also most obviously detrimental to the well-being of the Church. At one time the three bishoprics of Salisbury, Worcester, and Llandaff were all held in this way, by those whose only interest in the dioceses appears to have been the fees they obtained out of them. The bishop of Worcester lived and died in Rome, and his predecessor and successor in the see were also foreigners.

No less detrimental to the well-being of the Church in England at this time was the crying abuse and scandal of pluralities. Some priests were proved to have as many as ten or twelve benefices, and very possibly resident on none,


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6 while there were "plenty of learned men in the universities " for whom no preferment could be found. Cardinal Wolsey himself set the example. He held not only a plurality of livings, but was bishop of more than one see, whilst he farmed others. He also obtained the abbey of St. Albans in commendam. Although the Parliament of 1529 especially legislated against this abuse, the exceptions were so numerous as to make the Act ridiculous and nugatory. At this time also benefices were bestowed upon youths of good family, who had sufficient influence to secure these preferments. Thus, for example, Reginald Pole, the future cardinal, when only seventeen was nominated to the prebendal stall of Roscombe, and two years later to Gatcombe Secunda, both in the Salisbury diocese. At eighteen he received the deanery of Wimborne Minster.

The non-residence of bishops in their dioceses was a fruitful source of evil. The episcopal functions were very generally relegated to suffragans, who, instead of being assistants, became practically substitutes for their principals in all the spiritual work of a diocese. Not unfrequently these suffragans were bishops of Irish sees, who resided in England to the neglect of their own cure, and undertook the supervision of more than one diocese. Upon such auxiliaries rectories or other ecclesiastical preferments were bestowed in lieu of payment for their services, and these in turn were left to the care of ill-paid curates.

The occupation of the bishops in affairs of state, besides its disastrous effect on the clergy, had another result. By it a jealous opposition to ecclesiastics was created in the minds of the new nobility. The lay lords and hungry officials not unnaturally looked with dislike upon this employment of ecclesiastics in secular concerns. The occupation of clerics in all the intrigues of party politics, and in the wiles of foreign and domestic diplomacy, conduced to keep them out of coveted preferment. Hence when occasion offered they did not need much inducement to turn against the clergy and enable Henry to carry out his coercive legislation against the Church.

This state of affairs was doubtlessly reflected in the


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Rh orders of England. The events of the previous century and a half must necessarily have done much to lower the tone of the religious houses and rob them of their primitive fervour. Before they could recover from the effects of the great plagues of the fourteenth century the civil disturbances of the fifteenth century intensified the evils from which they were suffering, and became to them "specially disastrous."

The financial state of the monasteries at the commencement of the sixteenth century was undoubtedly deplorable. Although many of them were possessed of considerable estates, which in itself was regarded as a matter of reproach, they were yet suffering from acute poverty. Denuded of their tenants, the monastic lands became neglected and unproductive. "Debt with no chance of redemption weighed heavily upon all." Claims, however, upon their charity, and the exactions of royal and other founders, increased rather than diminished, till the burden was more than the crippled resources of the religious could bear. The State papers of Henry VIII's reign contain abundant proof of the increasing demands made by king and courtier upon monastery and convent. Farm after farm, manor after manor, benefice after benefice, office after office were yielded up, in compliance with requests that were in reality commands. Pensions in ever-increasing numbers were charged on monastic lands at the asking of those it was impossible to refuse. "In some cases," writes Mr. Brewer, "the abbots were bound to give endowments to scholars of the king's nomination or provide them with competent benefices; pensions and corrodies were granted under the privy seal to yeomen ushers of the wardrobe and the chamber, to clerks of the kitchen sewers, secretaries and gentlemen of the chapel royal; and these were strictly enforced, whatever might be the other encumbrances of the house."

The royal munificence was liberally exercised in grants of pensions and perquisites when others had to satisfy the