printed hand-bills of extracts from the United States Revised Statutes on the subject of admiralty offences, containing, among others, the section on which the indictment in this case is based. He was cross-examined at great length, to show that he had sought by extortion of threats and promises of exemption from prosecution, to obtain confessions and money for goods from other parties implicated. He substantially claimed he had told all parties the same as he had this defendant. Other testimony was introduced for the purpose of corroborating this confession and the witnesses who testified to it. The defendant himself testified that he made no such confessions, but told Bennett he got the goods out of the river. He said that on the night of the wreck, being informed of it, he went to the river, near which he lived, and with one Darnell and others went out in a skiff and captured some hogsheads of meat, which they divided between them; that subsequently he got some millinery goods, spices, and pepper, of no considerable value; that next day he took from the river the articles of furniture mentioned in the indictment, and others, which Darnell took for his share and that he carried them home. The bureau being without drawers and all apart from soaking, and the lounge torn and dilapidated, and being of no value to him, he carried them back and threw them into the river. He did this because they were, he thought, worthless. A few days after the goods were captured from the river, he reported to the officers in charge of the boat, and one of them came to his house and they divided the meat, the defendant, by agreement, retaining his share for saving it. The officer gave him the millinery and spices, but nothing was said about the furniture. Bennett, however, afterwards made him pay $94 for the property, and promised him that should be the last of it. He paid for the goods to Bennett because he was afraid of him, and afraid he would kill him. Being asked if he intended to steal this property or to destroy it, the defendant-the objection to the testimony being overruled-said he did not; that he did not know any one had any interest in it or right to it, and he did not intend to do wrong, and that as soon as he found the goods were claimed he reported them. There was conflict of proof as to the fact of his reporting this furniture. The government endeavored to show that he concealed it, and some meat not reported by him, but he insisted that while he did not at first report the furniture, the officer could have seen it at his house when he got the meat, and he subsequently did report the furniture, and what he had done with it. He stated, on the subject of the confessions, that he told Bennett what he did, and paid him for the goods on his promise that

"that should be the end of it." He was induced to make the settlement in the belief that he would have no more trouble in court or elsewhere about it. He was afraid Bennett might kill him.

The court overruled a motion to exclude the confessions; a motion to compel the district attorney to elect on which of the counts of the indictment he would try the defendant, excluding the others; and a motion to instruct the jury to find a verdict for the defendant. After argument, the court, HAMMOND, D. J., charged the jury as follows upon the construction of the statute:

"The object of this statute, and others in the same chapter, is to protect all persons and property engaged in the commerce of the United States, or within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the United States, from all manner of spoliation and violence, or rapine and plunder. It is a matter peculiarly within the jurisdiction of the United States, and the necessity for such statutes is obvious. Whether such persons and property are likewise within the protection of the common or statutory laws of the several states, against the same or analogous crimes, it is not necessary to inquire; but many of the offences found in this chapter, made for the protection of vessels and property pertaining to them, are unknown to the laws of this state, or to the general common law of England or America. The offence defined in this section, like all others against the United States, is purely statutory, and we are not administering the common or state statutory law of larceny, but a statute of the United States defining the statutory crime of 'plundering, stealing, or destroying any money, goods, merchandise, or other effects from or belonging to any vessel in distress, or wrecked, lost, stranded, or cast away upon the sea, or in any other place within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the United States.' There are two other offences declared in this same section, with which we now have no concern; but the one contained in words I have quoted is a single and distinct offence, with which we are now dealing in the trial of this defendant. It is not, as has been supposed in argument, and as has been probably thought by the pleader who drew this indictment, a statute defining several offences, namely: One of plundering from a vessel wrecked or in distress; another, of plundering goods belonging to a vessel so situated; another, of stealing goods from such vessel; another, of stealing goods belonging to her; and still others, of destroying goods either from or belonging to the vessel. The whole first clause of the section describes a single offence, and it might well have been so charged in the language of the statute, pure and simple; the indictment containing, of course, the necessary jurisdictional averments as to the condition and location of the vessel. We are authorized to treat the indictment as if it had been so framed, and I charge you, therefore, that if the defendant has either plundered, stolen, or destroyed the goods mentioned in this indictment from a vessel wrecked or in distress, in any place within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the United States, he is guilty under this section, without reference to the separation of the allegations into the several counts as we find them in the indictment. Nor is it at all material whether the goods were taken from off the wreck itself,

from out the water, or while cast away upon the shore. From the moment of the wreck, or commencement of the distress, until restored to their rightful owner, the goods are within the protection of this statute, into whosesoever hands they come with knowledge that they belong to the wrecked or distressed vessel. Nor is the smallness of their value at all material. Whether by efflux of time, the length of distance to which they have been carried by the current or otherwise, or the conduct of the owners of the goods in abandoning them, they ever cease to be protected by this statute, we need not inquire, because, under the circumstances of their case, as shown by the proof, there was no such lapse of time, distance from the wreck, or abandonment as would protect the defendant. We are not authorized by the use of the word 'steal' in this section, nor other words used in describing this offence, to import into this statute from the common or statutory laws of England or the state the elements of the crime of larceny of goods upon land as known to those laws. No specific intent is necessary to constitute this offence, and any intent is unlawful and sufficient for the guilt of the offender, except that alone of tak ing the goods for the purpose of restoring them to the master or other officer of the unfortunate vessel, or to their ultimate rightful owner. If a person near the wreck does not intend to restore the goods, or intends to make any other use of them than preserving them for the master or owner of the vessel, or owner of the goods, he must let them alone or he violates this statute. Nor is the time when the unlawful intent is conceived material. If the accused takes the goods with the lawful intent to preserve and restore them, and afterwards yields to the temptation of avarice or cupidity, and converts or destroys them, he violates this statute.

"Again, the manner of taking is wholly immaterial, whether by open force or stealth, or otherwise. The words of this statute are sweeping and comprehensive. They include all unlawful taking, whether on the facts the crime at common law would be piracy, robbery, larceny simple, mixed, or compound, malicious mischief, or what not; and includes such taking as would, under statutory offences, be called embezzlement, criminal or fraudulent breach of trust. To illustrate: At common law, if you give your goods to the master of a vessel to be carried as freight, and he appropriates or converts or destroys the whole cargo or package, he is not guilty of larceny, but only a breach of trust; but if he breaks the package and takes a part, he is guilty of larceny. Now, we have no such refinement in this statute, and, if the vessel be wrecked or in distress at the time of the taking, the master would be guilty, if not of stealing, certainly of plundering, and would be caught by this statute in a crime, as he should be. This statute is not, gentlemen of the jury, a dead letter, as has been said by counsel; nor does ignorance of it at all excuse the crime. The act of taking for your own use, or to destroy or otherwise despoil the owner of goods that are wrecked, either from the wreck or afloat, is in itself morally wrong, and it must so occur to every man whose sensibilities are not blunted by avarice, and that it is against common right to do it. It may not be against common law, but every man should expect to find some law in some statute somewhere to punish it. Unfortunately, human experience teaches us that when a disaster occurs by fire, wreck, flood, or storm, and the property of the victims is left unprotected by the ordinary care and

possession of the owner, there seems to arise an irresistible temptation to appropriate it in the minds of men bent on plunder for the love of it, and often even where the man would scorn to be caught in the odious crime of stealing from his neighbor. They do not look upon it as stealing, and perhaps it is not; but it is plundering, and it is just that offence this statute punishes when committed of goods that are wrecked. Now, I do not hesitate to say that where a man, under the influence of excitement and sudden temptation, yields to this impulse of taking for himself what seems lost, and is not a professional wrecker and plunderer, he deserves consideration in the matter of mitigating the punishment prescribed by this statute, but it in no sense excuses the crime or authorizes acquittal at your hands. If the law imposed on you the duty of fixing the punishment, I should tell you to consider whether such mitigating circumstance existed in this case; but it does not, and you have nothing to do with it. It is a matter for the court, whose discretion is unlimited by the statute, to consider those facts, if any there be, which mitigate the punishment.

"If a vessel be wrecked, or in distress, and goods afloat, I do not say it is the duty of any one to rescue them for the owner in any other sense than it is his duty to help all who are in peril of life or property; but it is his right, and in our admiralty and maritime law the service is always rewarded by salvage. With a lawful purpose, therefore, this defendant had a right to rescue the goods, if afloat, and no presumption is against him from the mere act of taking them while so afloat. But, if you find he took them from the wreck itself, inasmuch as that was not abandoned or deserted, but under the control and in the possession of those who had the right of possession, the defendant had no right to go upon it to rescue goods, even to save them; and there would be a presumption of wrongful intent from the mere taking itself, unless it were explained to be for some rightful purpose. The lawful purpose with which he might rescue them is to keep them for restoration to the owner upon payment of his salvage dues, or, in default of agreement as to that, to libel them in the proper court by delivering them to the court for a settlement of the salvage claim. Taking them with any other intent is unlawful, and a violation of this statute. The intent must be proved by the acts of the accused; and where he is a competent witness, as here, he may, I think, speak to his intent and say for himself what it was. But if he testifies to an intent that is inconsistent with his acts, he is unworthy of belief as to that intent. He may explain his acts, and show how they are consistent with what he says his intent was, but the explanation must satisfactorily show the consistency. A man cannot appropriate the goods of another to his own use and say he intended no wrong thereby, if he knows they did not belong to him, but to a vessel wrecked or in distress. He has no fair color of right or title to goods belonging to a vessel so situated; and, if he knows them to so belong, he cannot appropriate them to his own use or destroy them without guilt under this statute, no matter what he may have thought as to his right to so appropriate them. The essential elements of the offence are:

(1) A vessel wrecked or in distress, and within the admiralty or maritime jurisdiction of the United States; and as to this there is no dispute. (2) Taking goods either from or belonging to this vessel with a knowledge that

they so belong, and an intent to appropriate, convert, or destroy them by some other use than that of restoring them to the vessel or the owners, entertained either at the time of the taking or subsequently formed and carried out by such unlawful use.'

"If, therefore, you find from the proof that the defendant took the goods mentioned from the City of Vicksburgh, either from off the wreck itself, or while afloat or cast away upon the shore, with an intent to appropriate or destroy them, and that he did so appropriate or destroy them, he is guilty under this statute, and you cannot avoid saying so. If, however, you believe that he took the goods with an intent to preserve them and restore them to the owner, either without salvage for saving them or with it, he is not guilty. If his intention was to claim salvage, he might lawfully keep the goods until that claim was adjusted by agreement or decree of court, but no other intent than this could be lawful under this statute."

The court gave the following instruction asked by the government: "The district attorney, on behalf of the United States, asks the court to instruct the jury that, under the third count of the indictment herein, if they believe from the testimony that the defendant threw into the Mississippi river the goods named in this count, and that they belonged to the steam-boat City of Vicksburgh, he is guilty of a destruction of such goods."

And also the following asked by the defendant:

"If the jury believe that the defendant rescued the property in question from the river, and afterwards, believing or supposing that said property was not worth preservation, threw it again into the river for the sole reason that he thought it not worth preservation, and not for the purpose of depriving the owners of it, then you will not be authorized to convict him of this offence because of throwing them into the river."

"If the proof shows that the defendant took goods belonging to the steamer Vicksburgh which had floated from the wreck, the court charges the jury that such taking was prima facie lawful; that every person has a legal right to save goods which belong to a wreck, and are derelict; and, when he does take goods under such circumstances, no presumption of guilt can arise from such taking per se; on the contrary, without more, the fair presumption is that the taking was with a proper motive."

The court read to the jury a charge asked by the defendant on the subject of confessions as the law on that subject, taken in connection with what the court said to them on the same subject. The defendant's request is as follows:

"A confession of the defendant has been detailed by the witness Bennett, in which he admits going upon said steamer after her wreck, and taking the articles mentioned in the indictment from her texas. The court charges you with reference to verbal confessions-and the one detailed by Bennett is of this character-that they are regarded with suspicion by the law: First, because of the liability the person repeating them is under to mistake the party confessing as to what he actually did say, or to repeat accurately what he