To these classes of
people that excellent ruler unhappily denied--we dare not say his
personal sympathy, but--the official protection which, even through
self-respect, he might have perfunctorily accorded. Bent, however,
on running through the whole gamut of extravagance, Mr. Chapman--by
interpreting official impunity into implying a direct license for the
wildest of his caprices--plunged headlong with ever accelerating
speed, till the deliverance of the Naparimas became the welcome
consequence of his own personal action. On one occasion it was
credibly reported in the Colony that this infatuated dispenser of
British justice actually stretched his official complaisance so far
as to permit a lady not only to be seated near him on the judicial
bench, but also to take a part--loud, boisterous and abusive--in the
legal proceedings of the day. Meanwhile, as the Governor could not
be induced to interfere, things went [109] on from bad to worse, till
one day, as above hinted, the unfortunate magistrate so publicly
committed himself as to be obliged to be borne for temporary refuge
to the Lunatic Asylum, whence he was clandestinely shipped from the
Colony on "six months' leave of absence," never more to resume his
official station.
Pages:
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112