The Massachusetts Spy, And Worcester County Advertiser

From the Saratoga Sentinel

THE IMPULSE OF NATURE.

Not long since, a constable with two assistants proceeded to the house of a countryman in France in the execution of a warrant. They had commenced an inventory of the defendant's property, and were very industriously engaged in selecting the most valuable articles for the satisfaction of their demand, when they perceived at a distance upon the plain the countryman driving off his cow towards a neighboring wood. The constable sent his assistants in pursuit of the peasant; they soon overtook him, and after an unequal contest of a few minutes the poor countryman, insulted and deprived of his only means of support, saw himself a prisoner and his family reduced to want. He now gave himself up to the agony of despair, he wept aloud, and in the bitterness of his grief and in all the unlettered eloquence of rustic simplicity he implored the ministers of the law to look with compassion upon the suffering condition of his household and not render them the objects of immediate beggary. But the officers were deaf to his entreaties and seizing him by the collar were proceeding in triumph to his house with their prisoner and his property. During these transactions, the son of the countryman was returning from his labor in the field. He was deaf and dumb, of a vigorous, athletic frame, and about 20 years of age. His eye fell upon the group, and he recognized the appearance of his father, he saw him struggling in the grasp of the assistant constable, and beheld him, upon whom he had been accustomed to look with all the filial tenderness of a son, collared and abused by a stranger. The spectacle excited his indignation and his fury, and arming himself with the first thing that fell in his way, he advanced with a hoarse and savage cry to the astonished group, and with the first blow levelled with the ground the man who had struck his father. He then seized the other by the throat and held him so firmly that his eyes started from their sockets, his legs trembled and he fell upon his knees. The constable himself had no sooner come up to the assistance of his companions than the enraged mute payed him off in the same way.

The father and son, however, were finally overcome, and were arraigned before a legal tribunal, accused of an assault and battery upon the officers of justice, and opposition to their authority.

The poor deaf mute knew nothing of the power of a judge, the province of a jury, the formalities of a court of justice, and the long rigmarole of "whereases and wherefores," "saids and aforesaids," in the indictments. It was in vain that the Judge pointed out to him the rigor and severity of the law, and explained the reasons which would compel the court to extend its arm, for the protection and safety of its ministers in the execution of their office. His conscience was at ease, and he felt proud of having discharged his duty towards the author of his being. He contemplated with admiration the retinue of the court, the spacious hall which he had never before seen, and the immense concourse of spectators with which he was surrounded. He thought it was "passing strange" that he should be detained so long and that his conduct so natural should excite so much attention, but he supposed the assembly collected together to applaud his filial and generous conduct, and that all the paraphernalia of the court room were preparations for the celebrations of his triumph. He looked around him with the most placid tranquility and satisfaction. But in a moment his eye flashed with fire and on his countenance sat the vengeance of a demon, for he saw among the crowd the thieves of his father's property. The feelings of the court, however, were enlisted in his favor, and the jury thought he ought not to be punished for the violation of a law he had never known, and pronounced towards both, a triumphant acquittal.