band's stolen goods, in particular that of Boyd Maccormick and Mary Maccormick, his wife, Aberdeen, September 1827. The reason of the rule in the general case is, that the wife is considered as bound, by the humanity of the law, to cherish and protect her husband, and, so far from informing against him, to conceal his delinquencies, and protect him from punishment. The concealment of stolen goods, therefore, which forms the essence of the crime, is in her only the discharge of a domestic duty. In the case, accordingly, of Thomas Mallach and Margaret Rennie, Glasgow, spring 1828, where the husband was charged as thief, and his wife as resetter of the stolen goods, the public prosecutor, with the approbation of the Lord Justice-Clerk Boyle and Lord Moncrieff, departed from the charge against the wife, and the husband alone was convicted and transported.' This being matter of evidence, however, must be pleaded to the jury, and cannot be stated as an objection to the relevancy of a charge of reset against a wife. There is no authority, however, for a similar rule in regard to the husband, who receives the stolen goods of his wife, because she is presumed to have done wrong ex reverentia mariti; but no similar excuse can be pleaded for such criminal acts on his part.

8. The punishment of reset is arbitrary, varying from a few months' imprisonment to transportation; but it is generally made severe where either the property resetted is of great value, repeated previous convictions are proved, or the keeping of an infamous receptacle of thieves and prostitutes is brought to light.

Reset of theft is justly considered as a very serious and most dangerous offence, it being certain that, if there were no resetters, there would be hardly any thieves, and that the greatest encouragement to delinquency of every sort, and especially juvenile depravity in both sexes, arises from the facilities afforded for the disposal of stolen property. At no period, however, was reset punished capitally in our practice; 2 and, in the case of Murdison and Miller, January 1773, the Court expressed an opinion that even repeated reset is only punishable with an ar

1 Unreported.—2 Hume, i. 119.

bitrary pain.1 But that the highest arbitrary pains may be legally inflicted, is not the subject of dispute.2

In judging what punishment should follow a conviction for reset, the Court look chiefly to the value of the articles received, the description of house which it is proved to have been, and the previous character of the pannel. On the first ground, in the case of Alexander Robertson and others, 2d March 1819, where goods to the value of £232 were stolen from a house in Glasgow, and the thieves were sentenced to be executed, the resetters were sentenced to fourteen years' transportation. In like manner, in the case of David Wylie, William Johnston, and Mrs Dunsmure, Glasgow, autumn 1823, where a house in Glasgow had been broken into, and gutted of almost all its contents, during the absence of the owners in the country, transportation for fourteen years was inflicted on the female resetter, who was a person in a superior rank of life to most criminals of that description. Upon the second principle, viz. the infamous character proved against the house where the reset was committed, the Court, in the case of William White, Maria Sinclair, and others, Glasgow, autumn 1823, sentenced the resetters to fourteen years' transportation. They were proved to have kept an infamous house in the Old Wynd, where thieves and prostitutes were constantly harboured, and the double temptation of spirits and women were held out as incitements to youthful depravity; and, on this account, though the articles proved to have been resetted were merely some trifling articles of jewellery, they were sentenced to this severe punishment.5 Upon the same principle, in the case of Campbell and Ross, Aberdeen, autumn 1827, transportation for fourteen years was inflicted on resetters, proved to have kept a house of bad fame for juvenile delinquents. Lastly, on account of repeated acts of reset, either charged and proved at the trial, or substantiated by previous convictions, Robert Stewart and Catherine Stewart, his wife, were, on 8th June 1818, transported for life; and Ann Farrel, Glasgow, April 27. 1825, against whom eight previous convictions were proved, was transported for fourteen years.7

Unless in cases of such aggravation, however, the usual pun

1 Maclaurin, No. 89.-2 Hume, i. 118, 119.—3 Hume, i. 118.—4 Unreport ed. Unreported. Unreported.-7 Unreported.

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ishment for reset is imprisonment, varying for different periods, from one to eighteen months, according to the magnitude of the offence.

Habite and repute a resetter, though once sustained as a relevant charge a century ago,1 is not a legal aggravation in modern practice. So the Court held, after full argument, in the case of Houston Cathie, 27th January 1823,2 which has always been held to have finally settled the point.

By the English common law, reset of theft was only a misdemeanour; but by several statutes, now consolidated by the 7th and 8th Geo. IV. c. 29, receivers of stolen goods were declared accessaries after the fact, and may be either prosecuted as such, or for a substantive felony. The cases chiefly valuable decided under the old statutes, are those which distinguish between the cases of an accessary to the theft and a resetter. Thus, where some seamen employed in conveying barilla in a boat stowed part of it under some ropes, and the prisoner assisted in conveying the barilla thus separated from the rest, after it had been detached, into another boat, for the purpose of carrying it off; and it was objected that this was accession after the fact, or reset only, the Court held that the prisoner was art and part in the original offence. But where the goods have been so completely taken away from the premises, or actual possession of the owner, that their farther removal could not be deemed a continuation of the original taking, the party concerned in such farther removal was held by the Twelve Judges to be a resetter only.5 But where a man committed a larceny in the room of a house, and threw a bundle containing the stolen goods out of a window to an accomplice, who was waiting below, it was held by the same authority that the accomplice was a principal, and should have been convicted as such.6

8

It was unanimously held by all the Judges, that an indictment for reset was good, though it did not state who was the principal thief;7 but where the thief was known, it was thought he should have been named in the indictment. The principal felon, though not convicted or pardoned, is a competent witJohn and Elizabeth Bell, June 1736, Hume, i. 118.-2 Hume, i. 118.— 3 Russell, ii. 253.-4 East. ii. 767; Russell, ii. 255.-5 King's Case, Russell, ii. 256.-6 Owen's Case, Russell, ii. 257.- Thomas's Case, East. ii. 781; Russell, ii. 257.- Russell, ii. 258.

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ness against the receiver', but it is competent for the receiver to controvert the guilt of the principal, and even to open up a conviction of him for theft, though it be presumptive evidence that all was right by shewing that the offence in him, of which - he was convicted, did not amount to felony, or the peculiar felony with which he was charged.2

CHAPTER XI.

OF POST-OFFICE OFFENCES.

THE peculiar importance of preserving letters sent by the public Post-Office from being either detained, mislaid, or opened, and, still more, from having their contents abstracted, has led to the formation of a separate code for all persons in this department, and also to the passing of a number of statutes, imposing penalties of extraordinary severity upon all persons whatever guilty of robbing the mail, or in any way interfering with the safe transmission of letters. The consideration of these statutes, and of the cases adjudged therein, forms an important part of modern criminal jurisprudence.

The embezzlement and stealing of letters, or their contents, by persons employed in the public Post-office, is the subject of the 5th Geo. III. c. 25, 7th Geo. III. c. 50, and 42d Geo. III. c. 81. § 1; but it is unnecessary to refer particularly to these statutes, because they are all now consolidated into the 52d Geo. III. c. 143, which forms the ruling statute on the subject.

1. It is a capital crime for any persons employed in the public post-office, to secrete, embezzle, or destroy any letter containing money, or any voucher or security for money, or to steal such contents, or any part of them, from such letter.

By 52d Geo. III. c. 143, § 2, it is enacted, "That if any deputy, clerk, agent, letter-carrier, post-boy or rider, or any

1 Harlam's Case, Leach, i. 418; Russell, ii. 259.-2 Foster, 365; Smith's Case, Leach, 288.

other officer or person whatsoever, employed by, or under the Post-Office of Great Britain, in receiving, stamping, sorting, charging, carrying, conveying, or delivering letters or packets, or in any other business relating to the said office, shall secrete, embezzle, or destroy any letter or packet, or bag or mail of letters, with which he or she shall have been intrusted, in consequence of such employment, or which shall in any other manner have come to his or her hands or possession, while so employed, containing the whole, or any part or parts of any banknote, bank post-bill, bill of exchange, exchequer bill, South Sea and East India bond, dividend warrant either of the bank, South Sea, or East India bond, or any other company, society, or corporation, navy, or victualling, or transport bill, ordnance debenture, seaman's ticket, state-lottery ticket or certificate, bank receipt for payment on any loan, note of assignment of stock in the funds, letter of attorney for receiving dividends or annuities, or for selling stock in the funds, or belonging to any company, society, or corporation, American provincial bill of credit, goldsmith's or banker's letter of credit, or note for or relating to the payment of money, or other bond or warrant, draft, bill, or promissory note whatsoever, for the payment of money; or shall steal and take out of any letter or packet with which he or she shall have been so intrusted, or which shall have so come to his or her hands or possession; the whole or any part or parts of any such bank-note, bank postbill, bill of exchange, exchequer-bill, South Sea or East India bond, dividend warrant either of the bank, South Sea, East India, or any other company, society, or corporation, navy, or victualling, or transport bill, ordnance debenture, seaman's ticket, state-lottery ticket or certificate, bank-receipt for payment of any loan, note of assignment of stock in the funds, letter of attorney for receiving annuities or dividends, or for selling stock in the funds, or belonging to any company, society, or corporation, American provincial bill of credit, goldsmith's or banker's letter of credit, or note for or relating to the payment of money, or other bond or warrant, draft, bill, or promissory note whatsoever for the payment of money: every person so offending, being thereof lawfully convicted, shall be adjudged guilty of felony, and suffer death as a felon, without benefit of clergy."

The fourth section of the statute, regarding accession to any

1 § 2.