The Press. — London, England, 1858-08-14 00:00:00

~s i z es to six years' penal servitude for a high wa y s ro bbery, escaped from the gaol of Newcastle-upon ire. lie had been placed iu a cell situated in one o f the wings fronting the governor's residence. In this cell there is a pipe from the roof to the draia for carrying off the day water. T his p i p e is a lar g e iiietal one, and sunk into the wall. It is covered in front by a deal board, which conceals it from view in the cell. By means of a cold chisel, which must have been thrown over the wa to him, Boyd had forced sway the pipe, and thins got an opening between the wall and the roof of about nine inches breadth and fifteen his inches in to len th g ethroof . Th was e ba thus rrier which prevented removed, and raising himself on a fixture in the cell lie bad squeezed Lis body through the aperture, a somewhat narrow passage for a tall well-made fellow of twenty-two years of age. In the wing where he had been confined are several empty cells, and there he possessed hitnself of a number of rugs. Thence he passed by a gallery, and proceeded in front of the governor's house to a foot-bridge; thence to another wing of the prison, where he dropped on the ground on a site which the gaol committee propose to cover with additional buildings. It is an open space between the building where the prisoners are con fined and the outer wall to the south-east and north. He leaped over a wall into the stone yard, where lie found a plank that had been used by some persons who had been employed whitewashing, and also two bags of teased hair. He ascended the wall by means of the plank resting against it, and, carrying with him the two bags of hair, he made fur the boundary wall. The boundary wall of the prison at this point it east and west, and the wall up which Boyd had to ascend is about forty feet below it. The latter wall runs north and south, and from the point at which it intersects the outer wall it is furnished with a for midable chevaux-de-frise. Upon this apparatus, which is immediately adjoining the outer wall, he placed the bags of hair, the object being to prevent the spikes from revolving, when, having placed one end of the plank upon it, lie raised the other to the top of the boundary wall and clambered ur. He curried with him the rugs that he had brought with him out of the empty cells. He knitted the rugs into a rope, fastened it to the plank, and descended itby cleverly into the street, and was free. About hslf-past three in the morning a police officer, who was passing down Carlisle-square, observed the rope hanging over the wall, and informed the gaol officials. Boyd was immediately missed, and an active search was made for him in the town, but he appears to have got clear of the town, and is off. Ile had been confined in Durham, Ripon, and Morpeth prisons previous to his last conviction, aml appears to be a very bad character. sq I ' o 1, of 11: ft ti fi b it 1 1 1 THE PRESS, AUGUST 14, 1858. officer. On his arrival the President addressed him as follows :—" Signor Nicotera, I think you must be pleased with the justice and impartiality with which you have been tried, and grateful for the sovereign clemency, at which we all rejoice." Nicotera replied that they had not acted as judges, but " as vile hirelings of the Government, confirming what ever has been ordered to you from Naples. To give a semblance of mercy, the King has compelled you to condemn seven to death, when strict legality would have obliged you to condemn only myself." The President interrupted him by saying that seven had been condemned to death, to render the chances of mercy the greater. "Yes," replied Nicotera, "you were compelled to sign sentences of death for seven, in order that the world might be deceived by a hypocritical clemency ; but the time is not far distant when you will answer for it before the tribunal of the people, and tremble and turn pale before them, as you did when you signed the sentence, from the reproofs of your own consciences. We were not frightened when the axe hung over our heads, and we despise alike the Ergastolo and our chains. We have fulfilled a sacred duty, and listened to the cry of humanity and justice. We therefore can support with intrepidity all those sufferings which tyranny well knows how to inflict, in the firm hope of the triumph of that liberty to which we now are sacri ficed." " Signor Barone," said the President, " I am old, with one foot in the grave. I know not what to reply, nor do I wish to enter into any dis cussion, fruitless both for yourself and me. It is my duty, as President, to exhort you to be grateful to the King, who has commuted your punishment, and I had called you, therefore, to beg you that if you will not yourself cry Viva it Re,' after the reading of the decree, you will at least persuade your com panions to do so." Nicotera, who was greatly agitated, replied : " Signor President, I address you now as Dominico Dalia, not as President, for in such a character you are a hireling and a slave of the Government. To Dominico Delia, then, I say, that I cannot and ought not to comply with your insinuations, and that I would never degrade myself so far as to ask my companions to do so. Like me they have faced every kind of brutedity, and death itself ; and they would have in the same manner confronted the scaffold as they will bear their chains and the Ergastolo. I repeat, we cannot do as you insinuate. Were we to cry, Viva it Re!' the echo would be Death to liberty !' Reserve for yourselves such infamy, and leave to us the dignity of silence." At these words the President, not knowing what next to say, ordered Nicotera to be taken out, and to be bound to his companions. In another quarter of an hour the judges assembled, and the prisoners were brought in bound. The chan cellor of the court read the decree in presence of the judges and the Attorney-General, who were all ou foot, and the prisoners were then sent back. It must not be omitted, however, to be pointed out the open violation of the law, which says that " every individual shall present himself freed from every bond before the magistrates or officers of the ordinary police." This slight though shameless illegality, however, amidst so many others, must not awaken surprise • it was doubtless dictated by fear, and during die whole procedure the judges manifested an evident anxiety and disquietude. With regard to Nicotera, his greatest enemy must acknowledge that up to the last he has maintained a surprising firm ness and dignity, resulting from a conviction that be was engaged in a holy cause when endeavouring to promote the liberties of his country. Naples has many more such men, and wisdom would con ciliate them by justice ere it be too late; for the day must come when this state of things will break up. To follow the story :—ln the afternoon of the 27th the Governmeut steamer which was to carry off many of the prisoners arrived, and the inhabitants were soon after surprised at the sound of chains which were being landed. From the beach they were taken to the prison in three carts, whilst another followed with an anvil and three • large hammers. This was done in open day and without disguise. It was a new and strange spectacle for all, yet no one would believe that, contrary to law and the regulations for condemned prisoners, the Government would put their chains on before their arrival in the appointed Ergastolo, and offer so sad a sight to the city ; yet it was too true. The public executioner and his two assistants were called to iron the condemned ; and on their presenting themselves they were chained in the following mode :—The chain which bound them consisted of 10 rings, and was 4 metres (or 13 feet) in length, and 16 kilogrammes (or 351 b.) in weight; at each extremity was a large ring or semicircle, which was closed by a large nail 20 centimetres in length, and having a diameter of 3 centimetres at one extremity with the head, and at the other it was fastened on an anvil by a hammer. The right foot of one being thus fastened to the left of another prisoner, they cannot move except by common agreement ; and so they must do the necessary offices of life, not even excluding sleep. This scene of " ironing " lasted from half-past six to half past seven 789 o'clock in the evening, and the antechamber at the gateway of the prison for the time wore the appearance or a blacksmith's shop. At this inhuman spectacle assisted some of the officers of the 7th battalion of Rifles, the secretary-general of the Intendenza of Provinces, the commandante of the prison, and 200 gendarmes besides, Lod other police agents drawn up in the court of the prison. Four companies of Rifles were upder arms in different parts of the city, as though it were in a state of siege. "In strong contrast with the agent in the scene just described," said our informant, " was a woman called Poggi, of Lerici, in the gulf of Genoa, and mother of one of the prisoners condemned to twenty-five years in irons, whose grief was touching in the extreme. After they were chained and manacled, and further bound together by a long rope which extended through the whole line, they were taken between two files of soldiers through the city, and the whole length of the Marina, while all the inhabitants were horrified and quite panicstruck by this barbarous spectacle. As they passed through the streets, dragging their heavy chains along the pavement, the clanking sounds, and the sight of their feet bleeding with the recent shackles, still further awakened public indig nation against the Government and sympathy for the prisoners, who received the greetings of thousands of persons. Still later in the evening there was another demonstration. At ten o'clock at night, Nicotera, Gagliani, and Valletta were called into the room of the Custode Maggiore, where three gendarmes, a cor poral, and a sergeant were in waiting. The latter bound their hands with manacles, and crossed them over their bosoms. On being placed in the carriage they were loosened, and, escorted by five gendarmes, they passed through the city, which was guarded by many patrols. The people, who were in expectation of their leaving, ran after them to embrace them, and to give them words of comfort and of hope. From the windows and the sins, as well as from the road, they were called by name and greeted with sympathy, and so they were accompanied to the very extremity of the city. The subjects of the Government are destined, it is said, to Pescara—the foreigners to the Island of Favignana ; whilst Nicotera, Gagliani, and Valletta are sent to the Vicaria, in Naples, and are destined ultimatly, I believe, to S. Stefano." Several of the advocates have been exposed to persecution. One has been imprisoned eight days On the excuse of having gone to Naples without a passport. During the same interval, too, another, threatened with imprisonment, has been compelled to fly, and put himself in safety. After two days of concealment he was officially assured that he would be banished from Salerno for an indefinite time, a sentence which will destroy his profession and ruin his career for life. Such are some scenes from real life in the Kingdom of Naples, and whilst some who profit by corruption have the impudence to talk of devotion and adoration, others as mad speculate on the return of the Legations. Such a fact would cover the British Government with infamy. DENMARK. A letter of the 7th from Hamburg states that the minority of the Federal Diet has just sent a circular note to the different Governments, in which it expresses its views on the question of the Duchies, criticizing at the same time the opinion of the majority of the Assembly, and especially the report of the representative of Bavaria. A note is also talked of, sent by the Cabinet of St. Petersburg to all the German States, and expressing a wish to see the concessions of Denmark favourably received. This intelligence is confirmed by letters from Copen hagen, which say that the Russian Minister in Denmark has expressed the satisfaction of his Govern ment at learning that the Danish Cabinet, with the object of facilitating an arrangement, was disposed to suspend the action of the constitution granted to the Duchies. It is well known in Denmark, this correspondence adds, that it is the nobles and their friends in Holstein, Hanover, and Prussia who are conspiring to overthrow the constitution of the Duchies. The mass of the inhabitants of Holstein are said to be very much opposed to such a consum mation, and are far from desiring to lose the most liberal constitution they have ever enjoyed. In Germany opinions are much divided on this inter minable and most complicated question. In Denmark a strong belief prevails that Prussia is working for selfish and ambitious purposes of her own. Many Danes will gxpress their deeply rooted conviction that Prussia covets the possession of the southern provinces of Denmark, chiefly on account of the fine harbours they contain. Did she possess forts, in which she is now deficient, her sea frontier, from Memel to Stralsund, is sufficiently extensive to supply her with sailors, and she could form the navy she has long desired to possess. She has money to build or buy vessels, and her mercantile marine is large enough to afford a good school for seam!). The Danes insist that this has long been her idea, that her tendency is to push northwards (as that of Russia is to encroach in a southerly direction), and that she keeps her eyes greedily fixed on Schleswig- Holstein; and they say that this tendency, and the A fortign an 4 (Colonial jncclligencc. Flt A NCE. There is a report that the Duke of Malakoff is engaged to be married to an English heiress. The Emperor attaches so much importance to the visit of Queen Virginia to Cherbourg that he has ordered a pyramid of granite to be erected at the Peat' of the new dock, to perpetuate the remembrance of that remarkable event. The French Government has resolved, in conjunc tion with that of Great Britain, that the prosecution of the tssassins of Jeddah shall be carried on in presence of a British and French Commissioner, and that M. Emerat, who was present at the murder of the French Consul, shall assist the Commis sioners. M. Emerat and tile two Commissioners are to embark at Suez on board the French corvette Duchayla, which is to convey them to Jeddah : The Cherbourg fetes came to a conclusion on Sunday last with th e in augura ti on o f t h e equestrian statue of Napoleon I. The Emperor and Empress sailed for Brest soon after the ceremony. On the 14th of thi s mont h t h e I mper i a l par t y will visit Port Louis, where they are to be received by GOO fishing-boats, manned by 3,000 sailors be longing to Groix, Belle Isle, and Port Louis. On the 15th they will leave L'Orient for St. Anne d'Auray. three battalions, two squadrons of Hussars, and a battery of artillerY are assembled there to assist in hi- celebration of the Assumption and of St. Napo leon. ire Bishop of Vannes, at the head of his clergy and of the parish priests of the department, will go to meet the Emperor, and will receive him in the Chapel of St. Anne. NAPLES. On the morning of the 27h of July the sixteen prisoners who had received a commutation o f puntilirnent were sent f or t o h ear th e d ecree read in presence of the Grand Court. kccompanied by a company of rifles and gendarmes, bound two and two together, they were taken to the courts, and remained 50 bound, a fact which was contrary to The President immediately sent for Nicotera, w ho was unbound and led into the private Council Chamber, accompanied by three gendarmes and an