The Press. — London, England, 1854-07-15 00:00:00

- y 658 THE FIRST LIEUTENANT of the ill-fated Tiger, Mr. Alfred Royer, has returned to London, and reported himself at the Admiralty, having been exchanged. Several of the other officers are reported to be in St. Petersburg, where they are enjoying themselves exceedingly, though prisoners. They are allowed seats at the opera, and carriages to go about in. Mr. Sullivan, the naval instructor of the Tiger, and who is at Odessa, has been ill with fever and ague, but not dangerously. Accounts received yesterday (Friday) state that all the officers of the vessel have been exchanged and released. SOME ADMIRALTY OFFICIALS have visited South ampton to inquire into the causes of the filling up of the mouth of the Itchen River, by which its naviga tion is impeded. THE first public sale of captured Russian cargoes since the commencement of hostilities took place on Tuesday at Garraway's. There was an immense attendance of brokers on the occasion, and the sale was conducted by Mr. Sim, on behalf of the Admi ralty. Eleven cargoes were sold, chiefly consisting of salt. The gross proceeds realised were 3,9031. 14s. 6d. THE LAST FLOWER SHOW of the season took place at Chiswick on Saturday last. It attracted a large number of fashionable visitors, notwithstanding the threatening state of the weather and the almost proverbial ill luck which has attended these fetes of late years. Fortunately the rain kept away, and the company were able to enjoy the pleasures afforded them without interruption, except such as was effected by the authorities of the Horticultural Society with the view of providing for the expected visit from the Queen. For this purpose the flower-tents were kept cleared, and the visitors barricaded off from various walks and other points of attraction for several hours. Her Majesty came at length, late in the afternoon, and left at half• past seven. M. JULLIEN arrived in England on Monday from New York, by the Arabia, New Orleans steam. boat. A quantity of books, maps, dm., has arrived in this country, sent as a present from the Dutch Govern• ment to the Society of Arts. The Lords of the Treasury have given directions for their admission free of customs dut►es. THE COMPLETE BLOCKADE OF THE BALTIC la an nounced in a supplement to the Gazette issued on Wednesday. The blockade was established by the com bined fleets on June 20, and comprises " the whole of the ports in the Gulf of Finland to the eastward of Helsingfors and Sveaborg, on the Finland shore, and all intermediate roads, havens, and creeks, to Cape Lubovki, in lat. 60 deg. 5 min. north, and long. 29 deg. 56 min. east. From Cape Lubovki the line of blockade crosses to Tolboukin Light, immediately off Cmnstadt, then across southward to off the town of Borki, in the provinei of St. Petersburg. Westward, the line extends from Borki to Karavalda Island, thence to Kolgenpia Point, which includes the Bight of Koporia, then the River Narva, and the whole coast of Esthonia and adjacent islands to Ekholm Light, situated in lat. 59 deg. 43 min. north, and long. 25 deg. 48 min. east." Pill anb Volta. THE first meeting for proof of debts and choice of trade assignees under the extensive failure of Daniel Mitchell Davidson and Cosmo William Gordon, of Mincing•lane and Upper Thames street, colonial brokers and metal agents, and of West Ham-lane, distillers, took place at the Bankruptcy Court on Saturday last. From the statement prepared by the accountants it appears that the bankrupts' unsecured debts are about 30,0001., liabilities on bills payable 80,9201., ou bills receivable 92,7051., and on account of Thomas Webb, from whom the bankrupts pur chased the Ham distillery in September last, about 8,0001. The total liability exceeds 200,0001. Proofs to the amount of about 19,5001. were admitted, and trade assignees were appointed. THE VALIDITY OF THE LATE DUCHESS OF MAN CHESTER'S WILL, which a jury had affirmed some time since after a protracted investigation, has been argued at great length before Vice-Chancellor Sir W. P. Wood, upon a motion designed to obtain autho rity for a new trial. The arguments upon the issue now in question extended over six days, and on Mon day last judgment was given by the Vice-Chancellor. In pronouncing his decision, his honour disem barrassed the ease of every allegation set forth in tho original bill attributing fraud to the defendant, that being, as lie believed, entirely displaced and dis proved on the part of the Duke of Manchester. In the course of an elaborate judgment, of which the condensed report fills several columns in the daily journals, the Vice Chancellor then stated the question at issue : What WAS the capacity of this lady to make the will? It car• tinily was as nice and difficult anti delicate a caseto decide u he ever remembers t to have occurred. The q uestion of law was one of some nicety, but the question of fact was of much greater. The real question of fact he took to be this—not whether, according to the very exaggerated statement of the bill, the lady was in a state of acute mania, or, as was said in some ruts, unconscious; THE PRESS. but whether or not—it being confessedly clear that the lady was neither in a state of mania nor in a state of unoonsciousness -- she was in that capacity of mind that he could be satisfied on these facts, and, under all the circumituumes, that the will is de. finitely established in such a manner as that this court can ulti. mately decree that it should be carried into execution? lie was sorry to say that he could not come to the conclusion that he was so satisfied. He said he was sorry, as he could not conoeiveauy very great degree of benefit that could result to the parties from the further litigation of this painful matter. But the question was one that the parties hail a right to have tried. The really delicate question was this—that as it was certainly proved that the duchess was in a state of mind incapacitating her from axe. outing any instrument up to the 11th of October, and, according to some witnesses, to the 17th, whether between the 17th and the 28th this lady was in a different state of mind? Between those dates she was in a very different state of mind—a state which to his mind caused him a considerable degree of doubt, which he wished to have solved by the intervention of a jury, directing their minds fairly, and in au unembarrassed manner, to this particular subject. Upon further analysing the case, and tracing the bearings of the issue which had, on the former oc casion, been presented to the jury for decision, his honour carne to the conclusion that the above-stated points, which, in his opinion, comprised the real pro blems to be solved, were not placed before the jury with sufficient fulness and precision to warrant him in accepting their verdict as final. With their find ing, so far as it went, he fully concurred, but he did not think that it included all the points, or even the principal points, upon which the main question of " capacity " in the testatrix depended. The judg ment is accordingly to the effect that a new trial must be granted. AN ORPHAN GIRL, named Stephens, was taken from the Liskeard workhouse and employed as a servant in the family of Mr. Creddick, a well•to-do farmer residing at St. Dominick, in Cornwall. There she was subjected to such cruel treatment from the farmer's wife that the woman was summoned before the magistrates at the Plymouth Petty Sessions upon a criminal charge. Many acts of cruelty alleged against the prisoner were of a gross and disgusting character. Besides these she had beaten and kicked the complainant repeatedly, and once flogged her on the naked back with stinging-nettles. The only cause of this violence seemed to have been that the girl was employed to watch the children, and they " told lies about her." After hearing the evidence of the complainant and a solicitor for the defence, the bench ordered Mrs. Creddick to be imprisoned, under the recent act, for three months. The woman ap pears to have expected that the worst result would have been the infliction of a fine, and was quite over come on learning that she must go to gaol. A CHARGE OF GROSS AND REPEATED ANNOYANCE was laid against Eliza Delacourt, the wife of a commercial traveller, by Mr. Geddes, secretary to the Seamen's Pension Society. The case was beard at Worship street on Monday. The complainant and his wife had formerly occupied a house at Limehouse, adjoining the residence of the prisoner, who appeared to be labouring under the delusion that Mr. Geddes had formed an improper intimacy with one of their daughters, to whom he was in the habit of paying clandestine visits. There were no grounds whatever for such an imputation, as Mr. Geddes was an entire stranger to them ; but the defendant allowed her mind to be so completely warped by her jealous hal lucinations that she was in the habit almost every night of presenting herself in front of the house, and assailing them in language of the most scandalous and disgusting scurrility. On one occasion, when they had an evening party at their house, they were favoured with the usual visit from the defendant, who hurled a heavy iron missile through the drawing•room window, which passed close to the head of one of the daughters, and struck with great violence against the wall of the apartment. The prisoner was then given into custody, brought up at the Thames Police Court, and ordered to find bail for her good behaviour, but had no sooner obtained her liberation than she resumed the same course of molestation and annoyance,which compelled the complainants at last to move out of the neighbourhood, and take up their residence at Homerton. The prisoner, however, succeeded in tracing them cut; and on the previous evening suddenly made her appearance in front of the house, to which she directed the attention of every one that passed, and reviled their daughter with such oppro• brious and disgusting epithets that she was again given into custody. When called on for her defence, the prisoner renewed her vituperations against the complainants and their family, and displayed so much violence that Mr. D'Eyncourt sentenced her to pay 40s. fine, or suffer a fortnight's imprisonment. DIVERS inhabitants of the parish of Allhallows Barking were summoned before the Lord Mayor on account of their nonpayment of tithes to the rector. The summonses were issued under a statute dating from the time of Henry VIII. When the case came on for hearing on Tuesday last the Mansion-house Court was crowded with. parties interested in the result. The fact that no tithes had been paid for many years by the several defendants summoned was satisfactorily proved. Another defaulter, whose arrears amounted to 501., had settled the claim, it was stated, since his summons had been issued. Of the others, one said he had paid no tithes for twenty years, and thought it hard to be called on to SATURDAY, do so now. Another, a Jew, pleaded that he had taken his premises under the belief that they were tithe-free, and. moreover, that he contributed hand. somely towards his own synagogue Mr. BALLANT/NE, who appeared for the rector, said that his client felt his position would be one of considerable difficulty in reference to the incumbent who should succeed him, if he did not require the inhabitants to pay those dues which the law made compulsory for the maintenance of the clergyman. It was far (ruin the wish of the present incumbent to press unneces sarily upon the inhabitants, and with a large number, who no doubt had to struggle with unavoidable hardships, the yectorwas perfectly willing, sod hadoarried the intention out iu a great many instances, to mitigate the burden so that it might not fall upon them too heavily. All he contended fur was the maintenance of the principle of sufficient payment from the class of individuals to which the defendants belonged to maintain the exigencies of the act of Parliament; but in the case of others, whose pecuniary circumstances were such as not to stand in need of such lenity, he was determined to enforce that which the law empowered him to obtain, as he considered he was acting in a fair and liberal spirit by consenting to take about two-thirds of the amount to I which the law entitled him. Some questions arose as to the power of the Lord Mayor to pronounce judgment under the act, as well as of the practical effect of his judgment, if given. The alternative seemed to lie between a summary decision in the Mansion-house Court or an appeal to Chancery. Eventually it was suggested and agreed to that the defendants should wait upon the rector, who the Lord Mayor entertained no doubt would be happy to meet them iu a fair and liberal spirit. APPLICATION was made by a young Russian on Wednesday to Mr. Yardley, at the Thames Police office, but which, owing to the applicant's imperfect knowledge of English and the absence of any Rus sian interpreter, was with much difficulty understood by the worthy magistrate. Mr. Yardley at first thought that he wished to obtain an order for the payment of wages, and told him the case did not lie within his juns ction Applicant: No, no; me ship Francisco. Mr. YARDLEY : Are you a prisoner on parole ? Applicant: No, no; ine Russ. Mr. YARDLILY : Then you are an enemy at large in the heart of the country ; but still we must treat you civilly. as I hope we shall always treat our open enemies. Where were you born? Applicant: Me born Riga. Mr. YARDLZY And how did you come here? Applicant: Ship Francisco. Mr. YARDLYI : Well, though you are a Russian enemy, you do not seem to be a very formidable one. (Lotui laughter.) Tell me, my man, do you belong to a captured vessel; sud what are you doing here ? We cannot allow our Russian euemies to be thus at large amongst us. (More laughter.) Mr. Yardley, on further inquiry, having ascertained that the Russian ship was sold in Belgium after the breaking out of the war, directed an officer of the court to make inquiries at the Alien-office, to see what might be done in the case. When informed of this course, the applicant said, Me not go back Russia; me not go back to the tyrant; me stay here. Mr. YARDLEY : Well, it is a very laudable resolution. I see we have not much to apprehend from 3uu, and the officer shall see to your case. SOME CURIOUS PROCEEDINGS are stated to have taken place at Bow-street Police-office on Wednesday, when Dr. Peithman, formerly of Bonn, an author of scholarly repute, and about fifteen years ago a Ger man professor in Ireland, was brought up by warrant, charged with being a person of unsound mind, and unfit to be at large. The charge was preferred by Mr. Reynolds, solicitor to the Treasury, and much mystery seemed to attach to the case from his re questing to have the investigation conducted in per fect secrecy in the magistrate's private room, and with the attendance of only a single officer of the court—namely, Mr. Burnaby, the chief clerk. Mr. Otway, M.P., as a personal friend of Dr. Peithman, and Mr. Lewis, in the character of his solicitor, ob tained permission to be present after much difficulty. Notwithstanding these attempts to keep the detals from the public, the reporters seem to have suc ceeded in accomplishing their purpose, and a circum stantial account of the case was published in the papers next day. From the defendant's own account it would appear that in the year 1840 he came over from Ireland with some testimonials and letters of recommendation, which he left at Buckingham Palace for the perusal of Prince Albert., his object being to obtain some professional employment. He states that he was promised an Interview with the prince, and after waiting about two hours at the palace was eventually dismissed by Colonel Phipps, with an intimation that the prince could not see him. His subsequent endeavours to obtain mu audience of his royal highness, or to get bark his testimonials, led to his being conducted by a detective officer to the Hume-otrice.where he was taken before the chief magistrate (whom he says he was led to expect would be the Marquis of Normanby), and declared to be of unsound mind. He was then sent to Bethlem Hospital, and there remained in confinement for fourteen years, without a sin gle act of violence being recorded against him. He states that he was liberated a few months ago upon the certificate of one of the medical gentlemen who were then present to certify to his insanity. The medical certificates given in at the bearing were stated to be sufficient to warrant the issue of an order for Dr. Peichman's transference to a lunatic asylum. This was accordingly done, and he was conveyed in the course of the evening to the Colney Hatch estab lishment. Remonstrances against the ex parte nature of the proceedings were offered in vain, but Mr. Lewis declared his intention of obtaining a habeas corpus for his release, and Mr. Otway is stated to have promised to bring the subject before the House of Commons. The immediate cause of the proceed-