end, are placed models of certain huts,
frequently referred to in illustration of the case.
Near the same end, and within reach of the
witness, is a little square table, on which to place
whatever else may be produced. As we look up
the central table, we perceive a small table where,
in full uniform, sits the prisoner, between the
two lawyers, who advise him. On the left is
the stationer's show table of despatch boxes and
papers, at which sits in full uniform the
Judge-Advocate, or official prosecutor, with a lawyer
in civilian costume. Between him and us is
the bare little table that suffices for the work
of the official short-hand reporter. Finally
and particularly, at the other end of the room,
at a little table to the right of the President and
behind him, is the table of the Deputy
Judge-Advocate, whom I find employed in reading
questions to the witness. The light and airy
effect of the room, the bright uniforms in little
groups detached from the great central cluster,
and the generally pleasant aspect of the officers
employed in uncongenial work, contents the eye.
But the understanding is not so well satisfied.

The good-natured-looking officer at the little
table behind the right elbow of the President,
has a list of written questions which the
prisoner is putting to the witness. They cannot
be put directly by the prisoner. They
must go the official round. A question is slowly
and officially read. The witness begins to
reply, and tells something about what is called
the chick. He has named chick, and there he
must stop till the official questioner has deliberately
copied down his answer as far as the
word chick, then it is indicated to him that he
may go on, and he proceeds, "which completely
obstructs the——"  There he is checked; and,
during a pause of five minutes the good-humoured
military official carefully writes all that down.
When it is all recorded in the best official
caligraphy, the witness is suffered to go on, and he
completes his answer by adding the word
"vision."

Presently it occurs to the prisoner's lawyers
to offer some sort of impediment to some
part of the inquiry. They never speak audibly,
but they are always making themselves
heard. The prisoner rises with a bit of paper in
his hand, and slowly and bogglingly reads from
it what has been written down for him to say,
and what is delivered thus, reads to the public
in the newspaper report like shrewd spontaneous
suggestions. Each objection is followed
by a pause—sometimes a long pause. The
court seems again and again to have been hit in
the wind and to have collapsed till it gets breath
again. But this is only apparent; the
court-martial is only twiddling its official thumbs
while the prosecution produces in neat small
text its answer to, or comment upon, the
objection raised. This is then read aloud, and causes
a fresh stoppage, and so the weary business
drags its slow length along; looking like the
dullest conceivable rehearsal of a law scene by
military amateurs, who have bad parts and detest
them, and cannot get through ten lines of them
without breaking down in spite of the prompter.
At lunch-time the President intimates that the
court will retire for half an hour to consider a
point raised by the prisoner.

In ordinary cases a general court-martial
consists of thirteen officers, including the President;
no field-officer may be tried by any officer under
the degree of captain, and, if possible, he is not
to have any officer of lower rank than his own
sitting in judgment on him. The greater proportion
of officers of high rank the wiser and more
respectable the court is theoretically supposed
to be. An officer of commissariat, of engineers,
or of artillery, should have three or four officers
of commissariat, of engineers, or of artillery,
upon the court.

The trial is usually conducted by the Deputy
Judge-Advocate-General, the witnesses for
prosecution and those of which the prisoner has
given in a list having been summoned by the
Judge-Advocate. The Judge-Advocate-General
is appointed by letters patent under the Great
Seal; the Judge-Advocate is appointed by
commission under the sign manual. Without an
officiating Judge-Advocate, duly appointed, no
general court-martial is legal; and a grave offender
once escaped his sentence because the officer who
served at his trial as Judge-Advocate, had not
been duly appointed.

Court-martials pretend to a right to forbid
newspaper reports of their proceedings while
they remain open, and at Lieutenant Perry's first
trial the President of the court-martial talked
about contempt of court, while the Deputy
Judge-Advocate said that the "offending party"
was liable to be proceeded against under the
Mutiny Act. He found it so written in his
"Simmons." Judiciously, however, they
refused to take any information that might have
brought their claim of secresy to test. The
Times, which like other London papers gave
daily reports, added to the observation made by
the court-martial, its own note within brackets.
"The court is open. Not a tittle of evidence
can be received with closed doors; and no
reporter who knew his duty would consider
himself bound by an order which the court had no
right to make, and no power to enforce." The
Aldershott court-martial has made no attempt
to renew the illegal claim made by its famous
predecessor, and has practically recognised in the
most liberal manner the presence of the public
ear at its deliberations.

When a court-martial first meets, the prisoner
may object to be tried by any of its members.
If the President be challenged, the court has
power only to argue with the prisoner. If he
persist in his objection, the court must adjourn
and report to the authority by which it was
convened. If the challenge of an ordinary member
of the court be allowed, his place can be at once
filled by an officer in waiting. The Judge-Advocate
should be the prosecutor. His duty is
official, and he is exempt by his office from the
odium that would attach to the personal prosecution
of one officer by another. It is only at a
general court-martial, and not always then,