cuar. 1] THE POWERS OF THE GOVERNOR 137 
antiquity is the fact that the Offences against the Person Act, 
1861, provides for the trial of any person, being a British 
subject, who has been guilty anywhere of manslaughter or 
murder, in England if he is found there. This Act has not 
yet been put successfully in operation against a Colonial 
Governor, but under its predecessor, the Act 33 Henry VIII. 
c. 23, Governor Wall was proceeded against in 1802 for 
having caused the murder of a soldier by excessive flogging 
in the island of Goree; being convicted he was sentenced to 
death and the sentence was actually executed, despite the 
fact that nineteen years had expired since the action, and 
despite the fact that, though the Governor was certainly 
guilty of conduct very inhumane, he had evidently had no 
intention of causing death! Now no Act of Indemnity 
passed by a Colonial Legislature would appear to avail to 
save a man from the consequences of putting a man to 
death or committing manslaughter outside England : if the 
act was murder, it remains murder despite the Act of 
Indemnity. The actual difficulty may be seen if a Governor 
authorizes the proclamation of martial law and the execution 
under that law of some persons takes place and its legality 
is questioned. In the Colony he will be held free from blame 
by the Indemnity Act not merely civilly but criminally ; 
but though the Indemnity Act has avail civilly under the 
principles of private international law,? it will have no effect 
criminally : this is clear, though at first sight absurd, but 
the provision of the Imperial Act was intended to cover the 
cases of duelling abroad, which formerly prevailed. Duelling 
is in many countries, perhaps even in India, not murder, even 
if it is illegal, and therefore the Courts have not adopted the 
doctrine that one country can prevent deeds done in it being 
unlawful in another. Of course, in point of fact the difficulty 
could be got over : the Attorney-General could offer a nolle 
prosequi, or, if he felt unable to do so, the criminal could 
1 98 8t. Tr. 51. Cf. Campbell, Lives of the Chief Justices, iii. 149; Kenny, 
Criminal Law, pp. 127, 410. 
* Phillipsv. Eyre,4Q. B.225; 6Q. B. 1; Dicey, Conflict of Laws,*p. 652 seq. 
3 Cf. opinion of James and Stephen in Forsyth, op. cit., p. 563.