Attempting to set fire to houses, crops, etc., is a distinct crime from arson (q.v.), or the actual destruction of property by fire. By 9 and 10 Vict. c. 5, it is enacted, that if any one shall attempt to set fire to a house, etc., with such intent that the offense, if committed; would be felony, and liable to be transported for life, he may be transported for 15 years (now penal servitude), or imprisoned for two years. The attempt to burn growing crops of corn, etc., is a felony by 7 and 8 Geo. 1V. c. 30, and punishable by transportation for seven years, or by imprisonment. These offenses are also misde meanors at common law. By 24 and 25 Vict. c. 97, s. 8, the attempt to set buildings on fire is punishable by penal servitude for fourteen years, or imprisonment for two years; if a male under 16, to be whipped.
In Scotland, an attempt to commit willful fire-raising is an offense at common law. It is not necessary to constitute this offense that the fire should have consumed any part of the building, etc. Furniture—as a mattress—partly consumed, a lighted peat thrust under a stack without !felting it, are sufficient to warrant a conviction. Inciting others to commit fire-raising is an indictable offense; and, in some old cases, persons have been punished for the mere threats to commit the offense, without being guilty of any overt act.
The English act 9 and 10 Vict. c. 25, declares that whoever shall maliciously, by the explosion of gunpowder or other explosive substance, destroy or damage any dwelling house in which there is any person at the time, is guilty of felony, and shall be sub jected to transportation for life, or not less than 15 years, or to an imprisonment not exceeding three years. Blowing up a building with intent to murder, and thereby
endangering life, or casting upon any person any explosive or corrosive fluid whereby grievous bodily harm is occasioned him, and similar offenses, are declared subject to the same punishment. Attempting any of these offenses subjects the perpetrator to a minor punishment. The manufacturing or having in possession any explosive substance, or dangerous or noxious thing, or any machine or instrument for the purpose of com miting any of the above offenses, is a misdemeanor, liable to imprisonment not exceed ing two years. Male offenders under 18 years of age, convicted under the act, may be whipped.
a vessel, usually an old one, filled with combustibles, sent in among a hostile squadron, and there fired, in the hope of destroying some of the ships, or at least of producing great confusion. Livy mentions the use of such by the Ilhodians, B.C. 190; but among the first occasions in modern times when they are known to have been employed, were by the Dutch in the Scheldt during the war of independence in the Netherlands, and, shortly after, by the English in 1588, against the Spanish armada. The Chinese tried them against the British fleet before Canton in 1857, but unsuccess fully. The service of navigating one of these ships into the midst of an enemy, there firing it, and then attempting to escape, is always fraught with great risk of failure and /disaster.