Justifiable Homicide

This is a remedial age, an age of keys for all manner of locks; so he
cannot be said to ask too much who seeks for exact information as to
how a young man ought, in justice to himself and to society, to deal
with his relations. During his minority he has lain entirely at their
mercy: has been their butt, their martyr, their drudge, their corpus
vile. Possessing all the sinews of war, this stiff-necked tribe has
consistently refused to ''part'': even for the provision of those
luxuries so much more necessary than necessities. Its members have
crammed their victim full of precepts, rules of conduct, moral maxims,
and most miscellaneous counsel: all which he intuitively suspected at
the time, and has ascertained by subsequent experience, to be utterly
worthless. Now, when their hour has come, when the tocsin has sounded
at last, and the Gaul is at the gate, they still appear to think that
the old condition of things is to go on; unconscious, apparently, of
atonement due, of retribution to be exacted, of wrongs to be avenged
and of insults to be wiped away!

Over the north-west frontier, where the writ of the English Raj runs
not, the artless Afghan is happy in a code that fully provides for
relatives who neglect or misunderstand their obligations. An Afghan it
was who found himself compelled to reprove an uncle with an
unfortunate habit of squandering the family estate. An excellent
relative, this uncle, in all other respects. As a liar, he had few
equals; he robbed with taste and discretion; and his murders were all
imbued with true artistic feeling. He might have lived to a green old
age of spotless respectability but for his one little failing. As it
was, justice had to be done, ruat cælum: and so it came about that one
day the nephew issued forth to correct him with a matchlock. The
innocent old man was cultivating his paternal acres; so the nephew was
able, unperceived, to get a steady sight on him. His finger was on the
trigger, when suddenly there slipped into his mind the divine precept:
''Allah is merciful!'' He lowered his piece, and remained for a little
plunged in thought; meanwhile the unconscious uncle hoed his paddy.
Then with a happy smile he took aim once more, for there also occurred
to him the precept equally divine: ''But Allah is also just.'' With an
easy conscience he let fly, and behold! there was an uncle the more in
Paradise.

It was probably some little affair of a similar quality that
constrained a recruit in a regiment stationed at Peshawur to apply for
leave of absence: in order to attend to family matters of importance.
The Colonel knew it was small use refusing the leave, as in that case
his recruit would promptly desert; so he could only ask, how long was
the