commutation to transportation; and when sentenced to transportation, may obtain commutation to corporal punishment while

remission of the latter may be procured on payment of a fine (as in the case of an official). Further, when sentenced to transportation, unless the offence be in itself infamous, a graduate may claim exemption from branding (H. A. H. L. vol. XI. p. 38).

Priests (v. Religion) do not receive any on the contrary, they are

consideration

Whenever an Emperor celebrates his jubilee, or his marriage, or the attainment of his seventieth or eightieth year, or, in short, whenever an excuse can be found, he publishes an Act of Grace.

Acts of Grace are either ordinary or extraordinary, and the effect differs in either

case. An extraordinary Act of Grace

extends to all save the very worst offenders, and its effect is not only to cause the remission of the punishment, but also to cause the entire cancellation of the offence thus a thief

pardoned under such an Act is dealt with as for a first offence if he offend again. An ordinary Act of Grace and General Gaol Delivery 清理度獄恩旨 extends to a more limited class of offences, and only remits or commutes the punishment: the stigma remains, and the relapsed offender has his former offence considered in his sentence (H. A. H. L. vol. XVII. p. 42) the penalty due to his present offence being increased a degree (H. A. H. L. Í II).

The effect of an Act of Grace is, however, a difficult subject, and it is well to speak under correction, for not only does it appear that high official after high official has failed to master the mystery, but the rulings of the Board, in dealing, not only with cases of relapsed offenders, but with features affecting these enactments generally, do not seem to have been always consistent one with another.

The Board, however, admits that Acts of Grace and their interpretation proceed on no fixed principle they are extraordinary measures administered to suit the circumstances of the

occasion 隨時變通並非一成不易(H. A. H. L. vol. XVII. p. 59). As one judge declares, the subject is full of peculiarity.

It may, at all events, be stated with tolerable accuracy that, to give a striking example, an ordinary offender considered worthy of death, and so sentenced, may, under an extraordinary Act of Grace, escape without a stigma and at once, while, under ordinary Acts of Grace, such an offender may reasonably hope that his punishment will be reduced degree after degree, until he finds himself a free man though with the stigma of his offence upon him.

Generally speaking, any Act of Grace will extend to offenders at any period, before trial, on trial, after conviction, on their way to punishment (e. g. transportation), on and after arrival there. When the offender is in hiding at the time, he cannot plead the Act, though he can if no charge has been laid,

and his criminality is subsequently discovered (H. A. H. L. II). Special provision is Í also sometimes made that offenders of seventy years of age or over, or who have behaved well for three years since conviction, shall, unless their offence come within the Ten Felonies + , receive a free pardon.

It follows also, naturally, that where the principal, sentenced capitally, receives a pardon, the accessories, who have been sentenced to penal servitude, shall also be released.

Where capital offences have been commuted to transportation for life, an Act of Grace allowing redemption of the latter penalty by fine only applies to cases of long standing, and the fine is to be the equivalent of the penalty to which the offender was originally sentenced.

The Ten Felonies are generally excepted from the benefit of an Act of Grace, and, in the early days of the dynasty at least, offences against martial law and the harbouring of deserters also. The various Acts, however, differ in the offences covered by them. Thus, in that

published on the accession of Chia Ch'ing, in addition to the offences above mentioned, forty-seven capital offences were, in effect, excepted from the operation of the Act, although but forty-three were specified therein. As, therefore, the offences specified would not complete the catalogue of crime, it was further laid down in the Act, that unspecified offences of similar nature should be dealt with under one or other of the categories specified in the list, and were to be considered as if originally embraced within the meaning of such similar and specified categories. The principle followed in this Act is evident enough; namely, that ordinary offences, for which no special ground for severity existed, should be excused; that the more serious offences, which it would be dangerous to excuse, should be punished; and that the spirit of the Act might be followed, and not its mere letter, provision was made that unenumerated offences might be dealt Iwith on their merits.

The following lists show what offences have been excused under Acts of Grace, either on