The Sun. — London, England, 1846-03-23 00:00:00

POOR REMOVAL BILL. The following outline gives the general clauses in Sir James Graham's Bill "to consolidate and amend the laws relating to the removal of the poor." 1. Repeal of such former Acts of Parliament as relate to the removal dV poor persons settled in England. 2. Declaration, that unsettled persons are to be re lieved at the charge of the parish where they are desti titute, as if they were settled there, until they are lawfull; removed, or their destitution there is lawfully at an end. a. Board of guardians empowered to charge relief in doubtful cases, subject to warrant of removal, or appeal to the Commissioners. 4 The books of oveneers and relieving officers made prima facie evidence of chargeability. 5. The Commissioners, with the consent of the ma jority of the board of guardians, may make houseless poor a union charge. REMOVAL-6 Persons chargeable to a " parish" in which they ere not settled, declared liable to be removed to the parishes o: their settlement. RESTRICTIONS oN REMOVAL.-7. But persons are not to be removed from one parish to another parish in the same union. Their settlements may, however, be ascer tained by order of justic-!s. V. Persons exempted from the liability to be removed after five years' residence in parish without relief. 9. Also widows for twelve months after the death of their husbands. 10. Also children and wives, when the father, mother, step father, or husband is not removable. 11. Also persons chargeable through temporary sick ness or disability from ace , dent. 12. Power to overseers to admit settlements, and agree to amicable removals. 13. Summons of pers,ns liable to be removed ; their examination; the warrant for their removal. Proviso for the examination of persons who cannot attend the summons. 14. Board of guardians may apply for warrant of re moval after notice to the overseers. Proviso for saving the power of overseers to apply for such warrant. 15. Paid officer msy be appointed to conduct removals and regulations to be made with reference to his duties. 16. No removal to be made until after forty days' notice, unless the removal be previously übmitted In case of appeal, the removal not to be made until such appeal is ended. 17. Overseers, or persons employed by them, may ex ecute the warrant of removal. 18. Persons procuring removals for 'the purpose of causing chargeability to another parish without warrants, made subject to penalties. 19. Delivery of paupers under warrants of removal, at the workhouse of a parish or union, to be regarded as delivery to the overseers, 20. Suspension of the removal ; recovery of the charges incur:ea b y suc h suspension. 21. An , - .real where such charg es excee d 101. 22 . Overseers may abandon a warrant of removal, Paying the costs caused to the other party. 23. The clerk of the justices to transmit a duplicate of every warrant of removal and the original depositions to the clerk of the peace. 24. The clerk of the peace, on application, to furnish copies to the overseers of the parish to which the re moval is directed to be made. 25. The pari,h aggrieved by a warrant of removal may appeal, giving n,,tice of the grounds of their appeal. Appeal to be ri.spited only on affidavit of special cir cumstances. Warrants of removal made before the passing of this Act may still be appealed against, as if the Act had not been passed. 26. Appeals against warrants of removal from parishes out of the union not to be entered without the consent of the board of guardians. Expenses of removal to be controlled by the board of guardions. 27. Overseers may have access to the pauper touching his settlement. 28. Summonses of witnesses. 29. Quarter Sessions held fourteen days after notice of appeal to hear the appeal ; no grounds to be gone into, but such as have been set forth in the respondents' and appelants' statements. 30. On the trial of the appeal, the duplicate of the warrant, and the original depositions transmitted to the clerk of the peace, may be referred to for certain pur poses. - 31. Costs incurred by reason of notice of removal, or of appeal, and costs of trial, and costs caused by state ments of frivolous or vexatious grounds of removal or appeal, to be awarded and certified by the Court ; re covery of such coats. _ _ 32: Costs may be taxed by the proper officer at any time, although the Court be not sitting. 33. The cost of relief and maintenance of persons under warrant of removal incurred from the time that notice of chargeability was sent, till the time when the warrants might lawfully be executed, to be repaid to the parish. Proviso saving the provisions in clause 15, re specting suspended warrants. 34. Certiorari taken away. 35. Notices of removal, appeal, &c., may be sent by post. GUARDIANS OF PARISHES INVESTED WITH POWERS FOR REMOVAL OF POOR Pisasows.-36. Boards of Guar dians of single parishes may act in matters relating to the settlement and removal of the poor. CONSTRUCTION AND LIMITATION OF THE ACT.- 37.—This Act to be construed as one Act with the Poor law Amendment Acts. 38. Forms set forth in the schedule to be sufficient in law in proceedings under this Act. 39. The Act limited to England. 40. The Act may be amended this session. The schedules . give the form of order of settlement ; forms of admission of settlement, &c. ; of warrant of removal ; of suspension of a warrant of removal, to be endorsed on the back of such warrant • of a permission to execute the warrant of remov a l, t o be endorsed there on, and order of payment of expenses incurred by the suspension ; of notice of application for a warrant of removal ; and of consent of guardians to overseers ap pealing against warrant of removal. CASE OF THE LADY SALE. (From the Nautical Standard.) The owners, master, and crew of the ship Lady Sale, have been subjected to every kind of annoyance and in justice short of being tried and condemned for an offence of which they were not guilty. We trust their guilt or innocence will yet be made clear as noonday. The owners of the Lady Sale cannot sit down under the im putation of trading in slaves; and if their vessel has been illegally condemned, the Portuguese Government must restore the value of her and pay all expense -. It is evident the matter cannot rest in its present undefined position. Capt. Tyrrell, and his crew, after being brought to England as felons, in vain appeal to the Thames-police magistrates; they are referred to her Majesty's Government. The Lords of the Admiralty virtually dismissed the case, when the master and crew were ordered by them to be liberated from custody on board the Duke of Cornwall. If innocent; surely they had serious grievances to redress —if guilty, justice was outraged, and the sincerity of Eng land's anal in the oppression of slavery laid open to suspi cion by our Government not showing itself anxious to sift this matter to its last grain of truth. One would really imagine it an affair of every-day occurrence, for the crew of a British vessel to be sent home as prisoners guilty of felon in trading fur slaves ; and that Ettgland felt inclined to make as light of the crime imputed to them as the Portuguese, when slave-crews are sent on shore at Princes Island. Yes, these men charged with felony are turned loose in England by Government, without a single intimation of being made to them, as to the belief of the authorities in their guilt or innocence. The owners have lost their ship, and refuse to pay the wages of their crew; and,while the amount claimed by the mate takes his case oat of the magistrate's halide, and transfers it to the Court of Admiralty, the sailor is refused a summons, which might lead to the recovery of his few pounds, hardly earned in the pestilent climate of Africa, because, forsooth. he is Rile , rably poor, and cann. t buy even two shillingsworth of justice! What a mockery is it, that the Merchant Seamen's Act provides for the pay ment of a sailor's wages " within three days after the cargo shall be delivered, or seven days after the man's discharge, whichever shall first happen," when it must first happen, that the seaman whose wages are unjustly withheld has two shillings in his pocket wherewith to buy a summons from those who sell the commodity in a court of justice. If he has eot that sum, he must raise it from some Jewish money lender, who having tame ,got a lien upon the poor fellow's wages, knows well how to appropriate a considerable proportion of the remainder. We could hardly have believed it possible, did we not know it as a fact, that on the Friday of last week, two seamen of the Lady Sale were refused summonses to recover their wages from the master of that ship because they had not two shil lings a-piece wherewith to pay for the m. Of what use is the " Merchant Staten's Act - " to the sailor without two shillings in his pocket? It would seem that the whole case of the Lady Sale, from first to lest, re quires .inveatieation a n d etnendmene Guilty or innocent, her senors have in either ease less than their due. The country is not satis fi ed, f or a P ortuguese man-o f- war h as insulted our fl tg. and appropriated the proprerty of our merchants under false pretences ; or that flag has been prostituted to the wOrstof pal-pees, we have slere-dealere in Liverpool! and a British slaver has been taken in the African seas, beneath which the bones of many thousand English sailors lie, whose lives have been sacrificed to suppress the slave trade. Iti defiance of our treaties with a slav er foreign nations—in despite of our law s , which declare slave trading piracy, and give to the cr ew of the pirate's death, the: seamen of the Lady Sale. w i t h their characters blackened by . the judicial condemnation of their vessel. as a slaver, with the pirates' brand upon their brows, are even now walking the streets of slavery. hating London with as bold a front as though they were treading the accursed slave marts of the Havannah. Let us hope that the proper authorities, however tardy at to present, and difficult to be discovered, will be o blige d interfere, and justice be done to England, ai well as to the owners, master, and ship's company of this myste rious African trader. PERSONAL APPEARANCE OF DAVID FILTME.-- - NatUre, I believe, never formed any man more unlike his real cha racter than DaOld Hume. The powers of physiognomy were baffled by his countenance; neither could the most skilful in that science pretend to discover the smallest trace of the faculties of- his mind in the unmeaning features of his visage. His face was broad and fat, his mouth wide, and without any ether expression than that of im becility. His eyes vacant and spiritless, and the corpu lenee of his whole person was far better fitted to communi- cate the idea of a turtle-eating alderman, than of a refined tifEws philosopher. His speech in English was rendered ridieu loust_V:thb broadest Scotch accent, and his French was, Cv ,1" --- if pe . ssible;\still Tore . laughable ;so that wisdom most L., 7..;`,.*.?:- certainly utter disguised herself before in so uncouth -", F .. , -,LIN- a garb. Though now, near fifty years old, he was Z .1 4 -, --.' healthy and strong; but his health and strength, far from < ' being advantageous to his figure, instead of manly comeliness, ( 0 \ --_ - had only the appearance of rusticity. His wearing an uni form, ~--;_.- . form, added greatly to his natural awkwardness, for he wore it like a grtoer of the.trained bands,—Lord alcrienkmf. ! COURT OF COMMON COUNCIL. THE CITY PRISONS AND THE INSPECTORS APPOINTED BY GOVERNMENT. A Special Court was held on Friday. for the discus sion of an important motion relative to the Ci - y prisons. The members did not assemble till two hou a after the usual time of meeting, and the discussion was necessa riiy protracted to a late hour in the evening. Mr. WIRE said, in rising to introduce the motion which stood for discussion that day, he thought it was not necessary for him to go into very minute detail as to the state of the prisons in the City, in order to lay the foundation for the appointment of a Committee of Inquiry. The attention of the public had already . been sufficiently directed to the subject by the publication of the reports of the Prison Inspectors, by the recent dis cussions in another court, and by a threatened motion in the House of Commons. These sufficiently indicated the necessity for inquiry. —(Hear, hear.) It the state ments respecting the condition of our prisons were true in part, or in the whole, it was true that something should be done to remedy what was detective, to remove what was evil, and to make the metropolitan prisons not only a model for this country, but fcr all other countries. If the reports were false, it was equally necessary for the Corporation to inquire, and to veidicate itself from the charges of inattention or neglect of the important considerations involved in the construction of prisons, the treatment of prisoners, and the moral effects result ing therefrom. He was not going to descant upon the various subjects involved in these large questions, nor to examine into the details given to the public by the prison inspectors. It was sufficient to state tha the Corporation had five prisons under its jurisdiction : Britiewell, which was simply us. d for confining refrac tory apprentices and persons summarily convicted, with its house of occupation, adjoining Bethlem Hospital, in St. George's-fields, a most noble refuge for reforming young criminals, and receiving destitute youths of both sexes, and teaching them household work and trades ; N. , wgate, which wad now used, not as a place of punish ment, but of safe custody for the prisoners ewaitng their trials. and who, every month, were removed thither from the different gaols of Kent, Essex, and Surrey, within the jurisdiction of the Central Criminal Court, and who, immediately after trial, were removed again, ei.her to the different gaols or to the Peniten tiary, preparatory to transportation, so that the average duration of a prisoner's detention in Neweate was not more than ten days. Then there was Giltspur street, used both as a house of correction and a place for persons remanded for further examination ; Whitecross • street, a prison for debtors, for London and Middlesex ; and lastly, the Borough Compter, happily untenanted, except now and then by a few debtors. All these prisons (except Whitecross-street) were built in the last century, and were then adapted to carry out the only ideas which then prevailed, that of being places of safe eustodly for criminals, tried and untried. Since then more correct notions of the object and end of criminal law hed been diffused, both amongst our legislators and the public, and that not only in this country but in America and on the continent.—(flear, hear.) America, untrammalel by the prejudices of the old world, had taken the lead in discussing the question, and in the construction of prisons on a different system. France had thought of the question—Belgium and Holland had re modelled their prisons—all had been anxious to combine with safe custody, correction for Fist offences, and the reformation of the offenders.—(Hear, hear.) Nor had our own country been indifferent. In various counties, in this great metropolis itself, prisons had been erected ; and efforts had been made in all to combine the great end of criminal law —pu nishment and reform.—(Hear, hear.) Nor ought that city to be the last in the race of improvement. Some thing had been done already; but, owing to the construc tion of our prisons, much that ought to be done could not be accomplished ; and, although the building of a new prison or prisons might be attended with great ex pense, that expense would be cheerfully sustained if it were deemed necessary to incur it.—(Hear.) He was far from thinking that prisons should be made so com fortable that parties would be more ready to break into than out of them ; or that the diet of prisoners should be superior to that of the honest industrious poor, whom necessity, not idleness, had reduced to the workhouse.— (Cheers.) He would have prisons "a terror to evil doers," but he would not have them places of torture, where bodily suffering or privation led to morbid disease. —(Cheers.) It was the dictate alike of humanity and of religion to seek out the desolate and the neglected— to reform the vicious—to correct the evil—and, by all moral and spiritual means, to bring the depraved, the erring, the tempted, and yielding natures under the healing influence of Chris tianity. Let it be known, that "he which saveth a soul from death" accomplishes a more meritorious act than he who builds a palace, and " they that win souls" will shine brighter in celestial history than the con queror of nations, or the mighty in art or science.— (Hear, hear.) The Court was bound then, by a careful examination of the whole of this great subject, to master its details, and apply to the principles of common sense and common humanity, and it would soon wipe from the Corporation any reproach, and set an example worthy of all imitation.—(Cheers.) He concluded by moving the following resolutions :—" That it be referred to a special committee, to be appointed by this Court, to view and examine the prisons belonging to the City, and to report their opinion as to the accommodation afforded to prisoners, the o p portunity for classification and separate confinement, and whether there exists any necessity for building a pew prison, or enlarging or altering the ex isting prisons, wither view to carrying into effect the im provements in prison discipline which modern experience has suggested on the subject " That the committee do also inquire whether any, and what alterations are necessary to be made for the ac commodation of judges, prosecutors, witnesses, and the public at the Sessions House in the Old Bailey, with a view to expedite and facilitate the administration of justice, and to save both time and expense to the public." Mr. BENNOCH seconded the resolutions. Alderman COPELAND rose, and said that he had no intention or desire to impede the investigation, but he wished the Court to understand that he and his colleague (Alderman Farilcornb) being in the position of visiting magistrates to the priso: a for the next fortnight, they could not, at the same that they were anxious to do all in their power to aid those engaged in the investigation, allow any persons, except those who were duly autho rised to visit the gaols, to enter as a right.—(Expres sions of disapprobation.) Mr. ANDERTON said he had never heard a more ex traordinary speech than that which had been just ut tered.—(Hear, hear.) What I was it to be endured that one of the members of the corporation should refuse the application of the corporation itself to give aid to the magistrates in an investigation of so important a nature ? (Hear, hear.) Was it to be endured that, while the aldermen were dipping their hand for any purposes they fancied into the City purse, one of their body should oppose the offer of co-operation in investigating the causes of complaint of so serious a description, in volving as it did the character of aa its branches ? Alderman COPELAND— I refuse no co-operation. I say, that while no impediment shall be thrown in the way of the investigation ; still, the gaols being under the charge of the magistrates of the City, if a committee be appointed, the viewing of the gaols must be considered as permissive, not as a matter of right, and I would give every facility to the committee to further the inves tigation. Alderman FARNCOMB coincided with the view taken by Alderman Copeland. They did not by any means object to the investigation by a committee, but, as visit ing magistrates, they were responsible for any contin gency which might turn out disevantageously. Mr. ANDERTON said that the two visiting magistrates who had just delivered their opinions had greatly mis taken the extent of their power in that capacity.— (Hear, hear.) It happened that the Sheriffs had some power. Those officers had the custody of the pri soners and the care of the prisons in their hands, while the authority of the visiting magistrates merely . extended to the matter of seeing that the rules and regulations of the gaol were properly carried out.— (Hear, hear.) He bad read some things in the reports of the inspectors, which he would not say were correct. He should be sorry to suppose that they were, but if they were, the fact would reflect no credit upon the visiting magistrates. Could there be any doubt of the necessity of inquiring into the merits of these charges ? —(Hear, hear.) As for the matter of going into tie prison, if he wanted at any time to enter, he would apply, not to the visiting magistrates, but to the Sheriffs, in whom was vested by the law the real authority ; and if there was any doubt existing, that should now be s ttled by a reference to the Secretary of State. Mr. Anderton here alluded to some of the statements made in the report of the inspectors of prisons, in which cer tain females, who had broken the Lord Mayor's windows, were represented as sitting idly and comfortably by a good fire in one of the City prisons; and to be put in pos sesion of such a luxury they Ipid committed the offe nce ; and he asked how it could be that indulgences of this kind could be tolerated ? Alderman COPELAND —They were punished for their conduct, but it did not suit the inspectors to give that information. Mr. ANDERTON believed that the City workhouses would be found to be much worse places of punishment than the City prisons, and he wondered that crime was not more extensive in consequence of the temptation thus presented to it.—(Hear, hear.) Dr. LYNCH could not understand the custrln of refer ring every subject proposed to the Court to a committee. It was a custom little in unison with the practices of a deliberative assembly. It was putting the judgment and iate intelligence of the Court into commission, and it was a practice more honoured in the breach than in the observ ance. The committee might be the cream, the subli nlessenocrelfolokwinisg a question itself, but the duties were too multifarious, t oo onerous , to b e accomp li s h e d satisfacto rily anduel d o e n cision u adequately.—(ilear, hear.) He preferred the alterna t i ve straight inon it the fa rr c o e, r a e n f d l. , after di scuss i on, coming to a a questio n w hi ch the Court was specially summoned refer dFirsacnueses w to h o e th is er d s e r se e r ratl ie d him of th e f ea t o f t h e Ki ng o f gone up the hill and cometheretaeshaving, w ith 20,000 me n, p were e te committee nfitt t. 3 downa r a i g e a i p n u . r p o a was not eg wnecessary the to eter have cm a inquire whether N prisons, much less for the improved system of prison dis cipline, or whether they would not admit of proper clas sification, or afford adequate accommodatio n . Mr.Wirehad endeavoured to make out as good a f ace as he could for a bad case. Was it not notorious that the City prisons were unfit for the purposes for which pri sons were intended ? They had been already condemned by the inspectors appointed by the Government, witht,genttlhee men who had no interest or desire to find .fault authorities of the City, and who had made the subject their special study. The new mode of treating criminals, by improved secondary punishments, had been crowned with success.—(Hear.) The _harsh find savage mode of irritating punishment, such as the treadmill inflicted, which, after twenty- years'. experiment, totally failed, only tended to confirm criminals in their guilty courses. --(Elm, hem) By iwrauseita, by sclueation, by spar tial use of the separate system, by which habits of self reflection were awakened, the moat encouraging effects were produced.—(llear, hear.) By impressing the pri soner with the conviction that the law was not his enemy but his friend—(Cheers)—that society was desirous to reform not to punish him he was to be won back from his meet obdurate condition to the ways of virtue, through a sure repentance. Man was not a tiger, to be tamed with bars of iron. The mind was the avenue through which his better nature was to be reached. — (Cries of " Hear, Mar.") Individuals, like nations, were not to be subjected, nor were their affections to be gained by 'coercion or cruelty.—(Cheers.) He would abhor to see the solitary system' exclusively carried out. The intellect, like the muscles of the body, required a certain degree of exercise to preserve it in a healthy state. The body, if denied the faculty of wholesome labour, dwindled into feeblenees and incapability, and the mind, under corresponding restriction, sunk into idiocy and " mere oblivion."—(Cheers.) Dr. Lynch hoped the Court would indignantly resent the childish castigation a hich one of the Aldermk n had presumed to inflict open it, by pretending to dictate the course it was bound to pursue. He then said he should delay the Court but for a tow moments, in reference to the manner in which the public health was likely to be affected by not following up the system of prison improvement. In the centre of a densely populated city there was not space for a large gaol. To absorb more of the already pre-occupied and limited area would be injurious to the health of the neighbourhood. Men were not now hung by scares. The number of felonies which a few years avo were punishable by death, amounted to one hundred and sixtr, but they were now reduced to fourteen, and that number virtually to one. Public opinion was set ting in strong against capital punishments, as they had not only ut•erly failed to deter from crime, but actually had stimulated and increased it.—(Hoar, hear.) Crime was contagious—out of 167 who had been executed, 164 had been frequently present at executions, and, havine seen the criminal made the hero of the scene, " the ob served of all observers," they were seized with a morbid appetite f r notoriety, and struck with the horrible am bition of imitating the example.—(Cheers.) In every age the same effect was produced. In the bloody reign of Henry the Bth, 22,000 were put to death—a friehttul emblem of the congenial spirit of that Prince. These executions tended to nothing but to provoke a taste for crime. The never-ending, the notorious, the terrible punishment of perpetual imprisonment was the meats of cure. Education and employment were the only means of prevention.—(Heer, hear.) Sir James Graham stated that when poverty was rife, when bread was dear and wages low, crime increased. The committals proved that fact. Many of our criminals were the victims of misfortune and might be reclaimed, but to carry out an unproved system ten times more space would be required than the Old Bailey could afford. He hoped the Court would not be precipitate in their l adoption of any plan. There were better and wiser courses to pursue than any refs rred to in the resolutions, by which the purposes of justice and humanity might be promoted, and the inte rests of the City best protected.—(Hear, hear.) Sir PETER LAURIE said it had been his intention to state all his views before the committee, but as Dr. Lynch bad gone into the suLject, he mast follow the Learned Geutleman. He was surprised that any gentle man in the medical profession should not have been better instructed on the subject. He (Sir Peter Laurie) was first roused to it several years ago by going over the Penitentiary at Millhank with Captain Chapman, the then governor, and he was shocked to find a model cell with a water-closet without a lid, lest the unfortu nate inmate should violate the system to which he was doomed by breaking the silence with it. He was shocked to see their faces covered with hoods or masks, to hide each from the observation of the other. They were, in fact, suffering from a refinement of torture, and verified the description given by Sir Walter Scott—no mean judge of human nature—who said that forced solitude was of all punishments the most cruel and in tolerable. He did not wish to. harrow up the feelings of those he addressed, but state that there were at that moment sixteen inmates of Bedlam who had been sent from Millbank, where the want of mental health was attributed to damp ; and five from Penton ville, where no such ground could be assigned, inas much as no spot could be more salubrious. Thus, there had been, in five years, twenty-one prisoners sent by the Secretary's warrant, from prisons under the control of the Government and Government inspectors, into the madhouse ' • while from the prisons under the magistrates not one had been received into that asylum.—(Hear.) Dr. LYNCH said he knew that Sir Peter Lauiie would not wish to fight with shadows, and, in the present in stance, the worthy Alderman was certainly engaged in a contest of that kind, for he (Dr. Lynch) had depre cated the system of solitary confinement as destructive of the mental power, just as the want of the exercise of the muscles of the body enervated the frame. Sir P. LAURIE said the separate system differed from the solitary system only in name, and that all experience proved its awful effects. He then referred to the report laid before Parliament from Van Diemen's Land, which, he said, stated that on the embarkation of three hundred or four hundred convicts from Pentenville, the superin tending surgeon described them as having fallen into strong convulsions on first going on board, and continued in that state for four days, their seclusion, though not greater than eighteen months at the maximum, having so far impaired their faculties that, although docile and obedient in the highest degree, they could not understand the plainest directions for settling them in their berths. —(Hear, hear.) After having, in terms of strong indig nation, described the similar effects of the same sort of system in other gaols, Sir Peter Laurie hoped that a House of Commons' Committee would look into this matter before any other prisons were constructed, and prevent such et uelties as had been exercised under the disguise of reformation from being any longer inflicted. —(Hear, hear.) It was a matter which must be stopped. There was the League mania, the railroad mania, the wood pavement mania, and now there was the seperte,or solitary mania to be contended with.--(Laughter.) He 'had given evidence before Parliament. in which he stated that he had never seen a reformed convict, and that he would go twenty miles to see one.—(A laugh.) He had seen many who pretended to be reformed, but the mask of hypocisy dropped from them the instant they were liberated. In that observation he did not mean to include transports, yet be found, from a me morial from Tan Diemen's Land, that in 1844 upwards of 800 men had been tried, and of that number 760 were convicts. Sir Peter Laurie concluded by expressing a fervent hope that, although the London Inspectors said, " We earnestly submit that nothing short of Nesvgate's complete reconstruction on the separate system will avail, by which prisoner may be separated from prisoner, by day and by night," if the Government itself should demand the observance of such a rigorous discipline, tze Geld would, as they had dune in 1837, utterly re ject its application.—(Cheers.) Sir JAMES DUKE said he was sure the Court would not lend an inattentive ear to the representations of the Inspectors, if they showed that the prisons were a dis grace to the city of _London, and the schools of crime, instead of beinr , places of reformatory tendency.-- (Hear, hear.) Perhaps the Lord Mayor and he knew as much of the condition of Newgate as any one who had passed the shrievalty, and it was quite palpable to them that it was impossible to adapt that prison to the existing improved notions of discipline. He hoped the Committee which should be appointed that d ly would join cordially with the Aldermen in the investigation, and that, if they came to the conclusion that a new prise', should be erected. they would, from motives of economy as well as other cogent reasons, build it out of the city. The sale of the sites of Newgate and Giltspuristreet prisons would defray the expense incurred by the con struction of a prison of adequate dimensions at Hollo way, where the city possessed nineteen acres of ground. Alderman SYDNEY declared that there was no founda tion for the staternente of Sir Peter Laurie, at any rate for the inferences deduced from them. It was not taken into consideration that the very fact of a number of per sons, who had before them the certainty of traneporta thin, was likely to lead, in several instances, to great depression aid distress of mind ; neither was it consi dered that the Penitentiary at Millbank was the place to which convicts from all parts were consigned previous]) to transportation. The state of that prison was by no means a criterion of the of et of the separate system, of the eetraordinory efficacy of which Parliament had the most indisputable proofs. He agreed with Dr. Lynch as to the fatal effect of solitary confinement up in the mind, but the separate system differed as much from the soli tary system as night differed from de.y.—{ilear.) Mr. R. TAYLOR said that the characters of both Courts of the Corporation were concerned when such complaints as had been made by the inspector formed subjects of conversation. Whether the subjects were matters of humanity, of policy, of law, or of finance, in quiry ought to be instituted ; and as the Court of Coni mon Council were the keepers of the money of the City, they hail a right ta join in an Investigation which would, in all probability, have reference to that money. --(Hear.) He altogether dissented from the position of Sir Peter Laurie, that there was no hope of reforma tion in the case of a convict. lie knew that the instances were numerous. tie had, three weeks ago, shaken hands with a man who had, thirty-five years ago, been convicted and transported, and who was a person at that moment of high respectability.—(Hear, hear.) The notions tliat criminals were not to be reformed was ab surd in the extreme. As for the present notion, it would era do for the Court to say the inspectors were unworthy of' credit. The Court must go into the inquiry, and either decide that the inspectors were in error, or correct the errors in the exis tog state, of the prisons of the City.—(Hear.) Alderman WooD said that insinuations had been thrown out that the Alderman had, in the course they pursued with respect to the regulation of the City pri sons, been influenced by selfish motives. There had been no foundation for any suspicion of the kind. They were anxious to meet the public views, consistently with the expenditure of the Corporation. The while of the prisoners in Newgate were classified according to the principles of law, and it was not iu the power of the magis trates to make a different classification. The inspectors complained.and it was their interest to complain—(Hear, hear)—but they were not' justified in making the state ments which had appeared in the report. After all. if the City were to go to an infinite expense, they could not accomplish a legal classification. He contended that a gaol out of the City would be attten'eled with the greatest possible inconvenience, and observed, that the practice of the Government itself, in the treatment of prisoners in the hulks, showed a total disregard of the classification contended for. The Inspector of the City Prisons never thought proper to say a word about that.—( Hear, hear.) Alderman Wood concluded an able speech by expressing hi's surprise that such a report should have proceeded froin persons appointed by the Government to enter upon so grave an inquiry. Mr. Weitz briefly replied, and the resolutions were carried by a vast majority, rid the committee was ap pointpoecl; Upon the motion of Mr. WIRE, it was a that. John Clark, Es q ., th e c l erk of thepeaceflosro be requested to naeke a ret urn to the Co the resolved City, Court the atm- , ber of criminals tried at the Central Criminal Court during the years 1843, 1844, 1845, ending the Septem ber session last year. MESME - RISNI. AMPUTATION (AT CH ERB , iURG; OCTOBER 2, 1845), OF THE LE‘l. OF A YOUNG PERSON, SEVENTEEN YEARS' OF AGE, IN MESMERIC SLEEP, WHO DID NOT EXPERIENCE THE SLIGHTEST PAIN. (From the Zoilit.) Miss Mary D'Albanel, seventeen years of age, had laboured for many years under disease of the right foot, occasioned by a sprain. For above three years amputa tion had been pronounced inevitable. But, notwith standing the progress of the disease, the patient could never be brought to consent to an operation which the most courageous matt never contemplates without dread. At length it was deternieed to have recourse to mes merism, in order to rendsr her insensible of pain, and in order to perform the operation, the necessity for which was every day becoming more imminent, without her knowledge. She was mesmerised by M. Durand, who had no doubt of success ; tied the result proved the ac curacy of his judgment. rho first effect of mesmerism was the restoration of Miss D'Albanel's appetite and sleep, of which she had been very long deprived. The degree of her insensibi lity having been frequently examined, was at length found to be such as was necessary, end she consented during her sleep walking, to submit to the operation, or rather she earnestly eta; eater' to have it performed The amputation was fixed kr the following Thursday, the 21 of October, at halt-past twelve. On the day fixed, at eleven o'clock. Miss D'Albenel was sent to sleep in less than three minutes, and then placed upon a table. Preparations were immediately made in her presence ; and, as soon as M. Durand was !satisfied that the insensibility was deep and positive, be informed the surgeons that they might begin the operation with perfect certainty. Then, in the midst of a solemn silence, and while all the a,si-tents were fixing an attentive and s..rutinising eye upon the peaceful countenance of the patient, Dr. Los eel made a large circular incision with his knife, which, penetrating deeply into the flesh as far as the bones, laid bare the greater part of the tibia and fibula. The blood flowed abundantly. The two flans were cut and dissected, the periosteuw cut, the bones sawn ; the ligature of the arteries, the cleans. ing and puttirg up .4 the wound, the application of bandages and lint all was done without • the patient giving the slightest symptom of pain. Her countenance continued calm and undisturbed ; her hands remained constantly free, and she several times smiled and con versed with her mesmeriser, even during the most pain ful stages of the operation, which, including the putting up, lasted above half an hour. The insensibility was complete • the patient had no knowledge of what was deing ; the pulse underwent no change in either strength or frequency. Miss D'Albinel was immediately carried to bed, and allowed to remain still for a short time. In a quarter of an hour she was awakened, as on former days, by the mere will of' her mesmeriser. in three or four seconds, and at the distance of two metres. She opened her eyes suddenly, smiled to those around her, and thus remained above ten minutes without perceiving what had taken place, and free from all suffering: then she said, without too strong an emotion, " Ah, [ perceive it is over ; what a blessing—oh, thanks! thanks! gentlemen." _ Being requested to mention what she had felt and ex perienced during her sleep, she replied, " I know of no thing ; I have felt no pain ; I recollect nothing." She was then asked, " How then did you 'mow imme diately that the operation had been performed ?" " Without that elevation which is above my knee," (the cradle to elevate the bed-clothes from the leg), she re plied, " I should not have perceived it so soon ; for I have no pain at this moment." She was very calm the rest of the ,day, and slept quietly the greater part of the night. It was the same the following days. On Monday, October 6th, the first bandages were removed at two o'clock, and the wound dressed during mesmeric sleep. The dressing, which is generally very painful, gave her no sensation. On being awakened she had no knowledge of what had been done. From the moment of the operation (ten days had now elapsed) she constantly preserved a remarkable serenity and cheerfulness. She had not one bad symptom ;' not even the nervous excitement which is so common after painful operations. The wound is now nearly gradually healed, and there is every reason to hope for a speedy cure. It is thus completely proved by experience that mes merism, producing the most absolute insensibility in the organs, may be of valuable assistance and render great service in surgical operations, and in amputations which are always so painful, by sparing the unfortunate patient both terror and anguish. And after an operation, the agony of which excites an irritation which Is sometimes very dangerous, how happy are we in being able, through the means of mesmeric sleep, to prevent nervous acci dents, lock jaw (tetanus), for example, which often de stroys life, and to restore the vital powers which sueh a shock has exhausted. This is always the result when sleep-waking is effected, and was very striking in the ease of amputation which we have just witnessed at Cherbourg. What happy, what blessed results, then ! The ter rors which usually precede amputation, the agony which accompanies it, the cruel recollections which follow it, are all destroyed and annihilated by mesmerism . What an astonishing phenomenon, and how deserving of rivetting the atttntion of the learaed ! Unluekily for the science, mesmerism, this unknown but real power. this mysterious and imponderable agent, ecapes obser vation ; and the men who have devoted themselves with the most ardour to the study of this most interesting branch of anthropology, have hitherto been unable to discover the causes of so prodigious a change, of so deep an alteration of the laws of life.—Cherbourg, Oct. 11, 1845. P.S —Yesterday, Sunday, the tenth day after the operation, the patient got up, and sat at the window from twelve till five o'clock. To-day, Monday, Oct. 13th, she left her room and took a turn in a neighbouring garden, and sat there afterwards for above two hours. She is now perrectly well and goes out every day.—Cherbourg, Oct. 13th, 1245. The fourteenth day of the operation the wound was completely healed, and all dressing left off: This amputation, performed under sur•h extraordinary eircumstances, and the rapid cure which ensued, have produced a strong sensation here. Cherbourg, Oct. 30, 1845. DELENTE, Directeur des Lits Militaire, de la Garrison de Cherbourg. Docteur illefeciiin de la MARIA D'ALBANEL. d ie :: :10:ph ie. L c. OY ci s lEBl.o,l4Dcpuo,icr:lt.feeseuiss.srpae Sava. NIA AGO Professeur. D u i a:A A ' N R 2 " D ! u, The operation performed by Dr. Loysel does the "reatest honour to this young surgeon, and to Dr. Gibon, who assisted him with the obliging concurrences of M. Araene Delentr.." With the printed account came the following private letter : "Sir—ln the two-fold interest of science and hu manity,of which you are one of the most noble supporters, and to which you have devoted your whole life, I have the honour to send you three copies of the account of an amputation of the leg lately performed at Cherbourg. in circumstances and with success altogether remarkable, upon a young lady, seventeen years of age, in the mes meric state. This operation, with those which have taken place in your country, always at the head of useful inno vations, and which is of such importance to medical sci ence, is exciting the very highest sympathy in our city. and producing a great sersation at Paris in the learned world. It is the first mesmeric amputation of a limb that has been performed in France. A fact worthy of rotnark is that this young person was very insus ceptible. The steep-waking state did not appear till she had been frequently mesmerised : and I could not induce perfect sensibility, such as I considered indispensable, till I had mesmerised her a hundred and sixty-two times. Great patience and indefatigable p-r -severance were necessary, and you may conceive that, moreover, I had to struggle with more than one kind of prejudice and obstacle ; but I was firmly convinced that I ,hould succeed ; hope and charity gave me courage. My expectation was not disappointed ; thank God, all was completed. " If, Sir, as I doubt not, you are interested in this offi cial communication, and judge it, as well as my letter, worthy of being translated into English and inserted in the very interesting journal the Zoist, in which you are one of the most enlightened writers, I shall request you kindly to receive other accounts, which I will transmit relative to some successful mesmeric cures of mine, and of fresh operations which will be performed shortly by the same means —two amputations of the leg and the re ns,,val of a cancerous breast. " A very remarkable and consolatory circumstance in the present case was, that the two surgeons who assisted were but a short time before shockingly incredulous. But both, being men of feeling, talent, and f.)reaight, at length did hom4ge to truth; and, after having witnessed numerous very interesting physical and psychological phenomena., which I produced expressly for them, they bent before the undeniable testimony of fact, which is stronger than all reasoning. Their well-grounded con viction of the reality and importance of mesmeric science will prove a happy circumstance to all of us here, and to you likewise. It is another triumph of good sense and experience over prejudice and preconception. " Persons who, like you, Sir, ate practising mesmerism, with such praiseworthyperseverenceand disinterestedness, ought to take courage more and more. I say it with deep conviction, the day of ridicule and spite is past. Our age is one of cool reason ; observing. finalising, and dis posed to eclectism, it no longer affirms or denies ; it doubts. This is the most favourable state for the ex amination of the important question which agitates and excites all mines at present. Men at length comprehend that it is neith er ra ti ona l nor phil o sophic to co n d emn a pr i ori whatever human reason cannot at the first glance embrace in all its details—whatever resists the first in tuition of intelligence. In truth, all is mystery around us; without speaking of the phenomena of gravitation, light, and electro-magnetism, the faintest act of human will is sufficient to confound the proud pre ensions of those who still desire to measure the greatness of the wonders of creation by the standard of their own intelligence, and to blast with powerless anathemas the truths which they cannot understand. Contemptuous silence, prejudice, and obstinacy are now useless before the material facts which any person may produce and renew in some measure at will ; and whatever, in short, be the situation or grandeur of individuals, they must submit to the admirable and eternal order established by turnsthe Sovereign of all things. The earth, I herefors, still in spite of the chains with which the Inquisition dared to load the unfortunate Galileo : and the blood still cir culates in spite of the implacable enemies of Hervey. Lord Bacon has said with reason, " Time is a great in novator." '1 he father of experiment and philosophic method might hav e a dd e d, when raen dev a fact of na- I Sure, it is certain that sooner or later she will oe.squor. " Accept, Sir, I beg, my expressions of the esteem respect, and admiration with which your distingui , hed taletas and ardent philanthropy in.ipire- me.—Your very obedittit and devoted servant. . 4 1. OUR A. NO, " Professor of Philosophy in the College at Cherbourg, Officer of the Royal University of Paris. " Cherbourg, Nev. 8, 1845." HE it MAJESTY'S GAOL OF NE WGATE. The following report of the Prison Inspectors has, within the last few days, caused a great deal of excite• ment.amongst the City authorities : " The alterations that have been made in the con struction of this prison since our last report have been few, and some of them insignificant. The females' ward, No. 28, adjoining the matron's office, has been convertel into a bed-room for that officer. She used to sleep in a small recess in her office, which was iinper fectiy lighted and ventilated, as well as inconvenient arid unhealthy , ; and this led to the present improve ment. The dust-bin, which is as formerly in the females' bath•room, is now removed to the adjoining p'issage, and the walls of the bath-rooui are covered over with maetich cement, and p timed to prevent the damp from rising The aberetion is a desirable improvement upon the for mer slovenly arrangement of having a dust-bin in the bath-room of the prison. The chief alts ration in the discipline of the prison since our last report, has been the nomination of a deputy-keeper, William George Wright. formerly a master in the navy, lie was ap pointed on the 30th January, 1844, with the salary of 300/. per annum. acid au allowance of 601. ex ra, for a result nee outside the prison. We have repeatedly no ticed the want of a deputy-keeper in this important prison, and we feel satisfaction in adverting to the pre sent appointment, which supplies a deficieney which had been lung and severel. felt. In the beginning of June last, the subordinate officers were put into unitOrm. con sisting of a blue coat and troutsers, and a scarlet waist cost. This is also au improvement. But, with the ex ception of the fore-mtntioned alterations, everything remains in the same defective and oijecrionable condi tion as before. The routine of duty also of the governor, chaplain, surgeon, and other officers, is the same as when last reported. We found some of the wards on the south side of the pri on at our last inspection costs and defective in venti lation, which was in a great measure caused by the de fective state of the adjoining water-closets, which are upon a bad construction; and, althoueh they are said to be cleansed every morning from a reservoir on the rued of the prison, the process would appear to be ineffectual; besides, the soil pipes sometimes get closed up from the mischievousness of the prisoners, who are in the habit of throwing down pieces of their clothing, scrubbing brushes, &e., so that when the water is let on f• om the reservoir, it oserflows the closets, and floods the interior ward. It would also destroy the ceiling of the alien went below, were it not that the joinings of the flour are filled with pitch, to make the whole floor water tight. The frequency with which the wards were flooded in this way led to the necessity ot pitching the flours. We noticed, however, one floor that had se veral holes in it, through which the prisoners could communicate with those in the ward below. The plan adopted for ventilatine the dining-room on the master's side, and that of the middle yard, is very inefficient ' • it consists of several circular perferaems, about two inches in diameter, slanting down from the top of the walls to the outside adjoining the slaughter-houses of Newg,ate market : and, occasionally in hot weather, instead of ventilating the apartments, they only serve to convey the offensive effluvia arising from the decaying animal matter into the dining-rooms. Sometimes the stench in hot weather is said to be very bad. Many rats also come through these so-called ventilators, as they open close to the ground at the back of the pri-on. Surely a. less objectionable method of ventilating these rooms might be devised. The dining tables are scrubbed with soap and water every day after dinner ; and, in those departments of the gaol where there are no dining-rooms, the prisoners take their meals in the wards. All the bedsteads were taken down last year and cleansed, and large quantities of bugs were destroyed, but those on the male side ha. e not been similarly cleansed this year ; the females' bed steads are said to be taken down and cleansed once a year. It would appear that as a general rule, the rugs were never washed prior to the appointment of the deputy-keeper. In the beginning of last year, however, they were washed and fumigated, and this year the same most necessary process is being performed. The pri soners' clothing are only fumigated tied cleansed when there is a suspicion of contagion, or when they are very foul tram filth or vermin. The Newgate clothing ot convicts, when returned to the gaol, is always fumigeted beffire it is again used. The washing in this prison is always a laborious ope ration, and very often a disgusting one, from the foul state of the prisoners' linen on admission. The female prisoners do all the washing, but receive extra rations, including beer and tea. The general cleanliness and order of the female side of the prison appeared to us to be much better than those of the male side. We think few prisons could exhibit such a disgraceful list of prison offences, which, however, furnishes an index to the practices going forward in New. gate, and which are precisely such as might be expected to result from the system in force in that prison. If we anal) se the list of offences, the following would ap pear to be a fair specimen of those which are tt,e more common:---" Laughing an' , talking in chapel, stealing a handkerchief, stealing bread from each other, four prisoners conjointly engaged in forcing open the school master's desk, eight punished for tearing and defacing the bible (among the bibles we examined at our last iu speetion we found one defaced with ob-cene language written on several leaves), indecent conduct to a fellow prisoner, using bad language, spitting through an in spection hole into an officer's face ; and, as the re-ult of idlene-s with gaol association, numbers are punished for marking and cutting their names on the bedsteads, win dows, and prison walls and floors, gambling, selling their clothes for bread, throwing potatoes at each other during dinner ; whilst whole wards, comprising from three up to sixteen prisoners, have been disorderly, riotous, insubordinate, playing at leap-frog, and throw ing their beds about, Bse., ten have been punished for striking their fellow-prisoners, and twenty-six for fighting." - _ 'Sueh is the lamentable summary of the scenes going forward in this metropolitan prison. They speak for themselves and need no comment. There is scarcely an offence mentioned in the return which is not, directly or indirectly, referable to and consequent upon the associ tion of prisoners. We are rather surprised to find only five eases of gambling recorded ; for we are convinced that gambling, in some shape or other, is extensively carried on in Newgate. Amongst the first wards, we saw, through the inspection opening, about eight pri soners busily engaged at some game, with a sentinel keeping his eye on the inspection hole, but when we en tered not a vestige of the gaming was discereible. Doubt less the noise of turning the leck was sufficient warning to the pri.oners within, and when we entered, the whole group departed themselves as if nothing had beer going . on—a proof of their being used to conceal their practices by their dexterity. Before, hove ever, we bad ascended half-a-dean steps on the staircase, we again looked into the ward through another inspection opening in the wall, and there we clistincly saw that the ga-:, had been resumed. The Governor then directed the officer to make search for the implements of their amuse ment. Besides, there is scarcely a table or form on the male side of the prison that is not marked for gaming, although these marks are generally planed out once a year. It is said that the prisoners have recourse to" many contrivances to supply the means of gambling; they cut off the buttons from their clothes, reserve piles of their bread, pick up portions of coal or stone, of break off pisces of wood, leed,&c., or anything they can lay their hands on, and these they convert into rude implements for gambling; whilst the paper supplied to them for necessary purposes, together with the leaves from the prison books, furnish the ready means • for making substitutes for cards. The return of prison punishments also attests the fact that many tobacco pipes and !wirer matches are occasionally conveyed into the wards, a circumstance which says little for the strict ness of the searchers, although the prisoners undergo two or three ordeals of searching before they are ad mitted. The governor says, that prohibited articles are .very often attempted to be introduced by the visitors, and that when they are detected, he sometimes himself admonishes them; occasionally he takes them before a magistrate, when they are most frequently admonished and discharged. We have not been able to find any notice in the prison journals of their being punished. In this prison, where communication and intercourse are the characteristic features of the discipline, we have often bef ire detailed, at length, the various circum stances which facilitate this most demoralising associa tion. It would appear that even prisoners under punish ment for infringements of the prison regulations, have occasionally the opportunity of communicating with their fellow-prisoners, and of obtaining through them a mitigation of their just punishment. We were in formed of the following case in point at our last in spection :—Three men were, for a prison off nce, sepa rated from their companions, and sentenced to a short confinement alone, with a diminished dieters . , in one of the lower wards adjoining the staircase leading to the juvenile department of the prison. They easily ob tained communication with the boys passing up and down stairs, and prevailed upon them to give them daily a portion of their provisions. Under ordinary circumstances, we think it would have been no easy matter to have devised the means of introducing the food, especially as it was in a liquid !orm. But what might be difficult, or impossible, in most prisons, or with an ordinary class of prisoners, is not so in Newgate. Tice men under punishment soon accomplished the feat. They tore from a Bible several of its leaves, which they rolled up in the form of a tube ; this they passed through the inspection opening in the door—and, by the aid of the boys, they made it funnel-shaped, by means of which soup and gruel were conveyed into the mouths of the adults, each in his turn taking the smaller end of the paper funnel into his mouth. We are unable to ascer tain exactly how long the practice had been carried on before it was detected. But we may he permitted to ask. what are the inferences to be drawn respecting the results of a discipline which admits of such irregularities. Is it calculated to reclaim theguilty ,or to protect the innocent? on the contrary, it will be evident that the guilty must become mere hardened and expert, that the innocent will be corrupted, and that the inmates of Newgate, when they regain their liberty, will be the more dan gerous to society from the experience they have ac• quired in this most defective prison. As an example of the numbers in confinement in the various wards of this prison, we have annexed to this report return (B), brine a copy of the ward-book for the months of No vember and August., 1844. It will be observed that the numbers in a ward vary from three to n;neteen. There are, indeed, a ew cells, wherein prisenera may be separately confined, if they desire it, but they are the old condemned cells of Newgate, and are *sly ordinarily need ss refraetory colic, sad the confinement of unnatural offenders, and others, charged with heavy and brutal crimes ; they are, besides, I cold, and gionuq, an t: , us ia- -01, ttv I). c:.: ; tv;t u .y ; n,rs u:;:isi-d it- &'i'.r 6, l•', are prev4lent in Neegate. and desirous er re:ate:llg the lade good that remains in them, have the couritee to seek an asylteo ,ven in those eininfortlesa and offensive calls, rather wan live in the contaminating atmasphsre of the common wards. We found two young men at our last inspection who preferred being separately con fined even in these places to being assietiated with others worse than themselves. One, "I. 0.," had been a month alone, and did not resret the choice he had male ; nor did the oth-r. " E. 5.," who had been there five weeks. From all that we could leern, prisoners very seldom, if ever, r. quest to be again associated with others after a short cosfinemeat even in those cheerless cells. An imperative sense of duty has compelled es, )ear after year, to remonstrate against Newgate as a most objectionable prison, and on the pre sent occasion we have no alternative but to reiterate our complaints of it. We have repeat,dly - entered into the details of its radically wrong construction, and of its pernicious system of discipline. In whatever light we contemplate this prison, we see in it a vast school, where the juvenile and immature offs-niter, or any one in whoa, there may yet be some sense of virtue remaining, is, by reason of a compulsory gait' association, quickly per cted is the arts of crime. This result is in-vitable. liere prisoners of various degrees of depravity are thrown into the most intimate companionship, itt numbers varying from three to nineteen, for t Away hours of the twenty-four, in the various wards. in utter idleness, and with,uut even the re straining presence of an officer. And during the two hours allowed ler exercise, that sphere of association and mutual contamination is prodigiously inert ased the prisoners of the different wards being allowed freely to associate in the airing-yards. That contamination goes on to a fearful extant in the wards and yards of Newgate is not a matter of conjecture or random specu lation, for every day's experience demonstrates it. It is no uncommon thing for young men, committed to this prison for a first offenee (although they ma) on entering evince deep and unfeigned sorrow fir a short period), tee recover rapidly from their depression of spirits, and give way to a reckless state of mina, which soon binds there in the closest intimacy with the depraved, and the tile and oft-committed du-predator. The reply of a prison officer on this point ;las very significant; he said that it is a commoe occurrence to see persons brought int. prison for the first time, who, when then erief had subsided, became the companions oi the worst characters, and in a short titee they may be seen walking with them in the common airing yards, arm in arm. Every one must ad mit, who has paid attention to the subject, and narrowly watched the progress of the criminal's career, that his first commitment to prison is the crisis of his future destiey. The very turning-point of such a culprit's subsequent career depends upon the kind of disciplue he may be subjected to on his first commitment. A per son, for instance, under circumstances of greater or lass tempation, is led to commit a criminal act, without duly weighing the probability of detection. It is only when he finds himself lodged within the walls of a prison that be becomes thoreuehly }dive to his unhappy con aition. Anti then, indeu ti, he sees every thing in the darkest point of view ; his prospects are blighted, he oharacter is gone ; sorrow and disgrace are brought home to those nearest and dearest to him, are. his own utter ruin would seem complete. We snbmit that this is the state of mind prevail ing in the case of most criminals upon their first commitment to prison —a mental condition predis posing them to be the recipients of good or bad impres sions, according as circumstances may present either the oneor the otheato his mind. I the prisoner be at th is critical moment set apart from the vicious, and be made the object of kind treatment, judicious instruction, and religious admonition, the best hopes may bat entertaine , of his being rescued from ruin, and restored to society as a useful member of the community. But if hi, treatment be the reverse of this—if he be thrown at once and unavoidably into the society of the corrupt , d the result is inevitable. To drown his cares, he lime , - -to the seductive narratives of his depraved companions, amid only longs for his liberty that he may give scepe and gratification to his criminal propensities. Th, common dictates of humanity, the safety and well being of the community at large, and the all im portance of moral discipline to the prisoner himselt, alike condemn a system of discipline that compels a prisoner to be the companion and close associate of the hardened and depraved. It is DO mitigation or excuse to urge that prisoners are here confined but for short periods; that they are classified; and that order is main tained. We reply, that no discipline, however rigor ously enforced--no classification, however judicious— can prevent contamination where there is gaol a: social tion, and that the period of this association matters little, if . it allows of the evil being a ccom pli s h e d. might have been reasonably suppos' d that Newgate, the chief prison for this untried in the metropolis, should combine everything in its construction and management which experience could suggest to render it an example worthy of imitation. Indeed, the necessity of its being so is as great as any other con sideration, receiving as it does within its walls nearly 4,000 prisoners per annum, many of whom are of the most profligate character, and who are as dangerous te society from their dexterity and daring as from their numbers. But in Newgate we find arrangements the most inefficient in construction, anti pernicious in disci pline. A strict compliance with our duties gives us no choice but to report matters as we find them, and again and again protest against Newgate as it at present exists. We earnestly submit that nothing short of its complete re construction on the separate system will avail, by which prisoner may be separated from prisoner by day and by night ; the innocent be protected ; the moral welfare of the first offender, and those just entering upon a course of guilt, be carefully attended to ; the hardened and often convicted criminal have no opportu nity of disseminating his baneful influence among others, and by which even he may be brought to feel the effi cacy of the means employed for his reformation. THE ROYAL SOCIETY. (From the Lancet of March 21.) • A short time ago, we bt stowed. some remarks on the axtra-professional honours attainable by medical men. Our attention has since been directed to soma of those distinctions which ought naturally to fall to eminent members of the profession, we mean scientific honours and rewards. Among the first of these, and the one we shall eon shier on the present occasion, it the Fellowship of the Royal Society. This is the blue ribbon to many of the cultivators of medical science ; its value is of course commensurate with the fairness and probity with which it is bestowed on the !shot ious and deserving, and withheld from the drones and butterflies who pre tend to the honour undeservingly. Besides the Fel luwship of the Royal Society, some of PS ale. re and its , medals are just objects of ambition with a few of our medical brethren; the office of Secretary, the Rlyal and Copley medals, arc of this number It must be confessed that, at the present time, there is a very general teelinv that the Royal Society, or rather the medical Section of it, has degenerutiod into a mere clique; that the path way to honour and reward i, not clotir and open as the tempt , of Minerva eY( r should be, but that a man may more surely and see , irrly advance by sa, riticing to those who officiate than to the goddess herself ; that any one atid)i. tious of its honours had better in tact fawn and cring t to individuals than devote himself to the advance of science. May we be permitted to ask whether the office of secretary has beranne perpetual ? Troere are many an' , valid re,,sons why the secretary-hip uf the Rif': So .(.iety should not for r.ver be held by the same individual. rhp conduct of that individual may not be unirttack able ; he may not always have borne " his faculties sr, meekly" as he might ; he may not always have acted fairly towards his compeers —with such possibilities, many reasonable grounds of change might be urged. Besides, others may wish to pursue the same career of ambition and emolument, and why should one man be allowed, for a long series of years, to obstruct the fair and honourable path of all the rest! There is another view of the sutject: the secretary has. properly enough. it may be, much influence in the Society, in the election of its fellows, and the distribution of its re ards. This influence he may not always have exerci,ed in the manner wisest, discreetest, best. There is, indeed. a lark rumour afloat at this moment, concerning the award of the last royal medal, which is damaging the Royal Society in the opinion of many estimable men is a matter to which we shall return with an unflinching deterna'nation to sift the chaff from the wheat. The truest interests of the Royal Society itself call for this proceeding. Will such a state of things be allowed to continue ? Will that which aims at being the first scientific society in the world be allowed to sink still further into cliquism, ro become, indeed, under Mephistophelian influences, so scientific inquisition instead of a scientific temple ? We think not. On a fermer occasion we made some stric tures on the management of the Royal Medico-Chirnr gical Society, and there was ferth with a change of mea sures and of men. There are point-, which will ill bear the tight of professional and scientific opinion ; our present remarks are merely the first notes of a truthful prelude. THE LABOURERS AND THE POTATO CROP.—Mr Robert Baker, of Writtle, has issued an address to the labourers and others who hold gsrdens or all ,, tments, strongly advising them not to plant more than half their ground with potatoes, and to devote the other half to early frame iv!" to be harvested fbr winter use, to be fol lowed cattle cabbage, thousaed heads, savoys, or turnips; or to cultivate it with parsnips, carrots, or beans. Should the diKease then carry off what has usually formed so important a part of their winter store, they will have other supplies to fall back upon ; andsh uld Providence in its mercy this year turn the blight from their potato grounds, they will be none the worse for hrving variety in their stock of winter food. Mr. Baker not only gives advice, but practical aid, by offering to supply the poor with cab bage seeds gratis, and peas at the cost price. We strongly recommend this plan to the farmers and gentry in dilltrent parts of the countrY, as the following it out in their own neighbourhoods will avert the misery and distress which may otherwise prevail around them. EXTRAORDINARY SUICIDE. —On Friday, a girl named Cisan Pickett, aged Is, servant is the employ of Mr. Abbe' , book seller, No. 210, Tottenham-court-road, coo mined suic,de under the following singular circumstances. It appeared that the deceased had been in her situation tor about two months, and bore an excell%nt character. On Wednesday night she went to bed somewhat melan choly, and the next morning proceeded to her aunt's, in John -I `.tr.!'et! and stated that sheh ,d had a very curious dream t o the elec t t hat she had got up and lighted the Are , and then went and h and ed she was her self behind the kitchen door. Her aunt, percetviur .tn a fr n i gh d : b e e n ed, afterwardsbega n to s e u pon t , h y e e n fo t I h y o o m t e h , ear nfsare tired to rest at the usual time, but the next 'morning (F r id ay ) e m m P 7d th in ia o te re w ch it ee h r h ful er . tlehdy round her neck. A surgeon wa s ca ll ed in, but life was quite was discovered suspended !o the kitch en-door, with a ro p e Ax el extinct. The beV now awaits the inquest. At S-Itth , ,ark t. Willitttn Gordon, a man of respectable appearance, was committed the charged with committing tie-cord robberies lustier the pretext of sell ing peewit tax EXECUTION OF W. SPICE°' FOR THE MURDER OF HIS WIFF o f S af dr d.,ybr(•ak. Frid v. tie e , n ; off ed , n oem.ly . .,our toes ti ere he te.-n ex-tiding thee. way toe etds t to witness the pe.gress of fne werks. The below were thrown (Teo by the occupiers. i' B° Jersons of every age and v i z , hasten. d by I-0( rot bug l•efore the appointed h our o f e xecution -4 r o'clock. There were, at the low.st. col ep.iis 6 ; t lh ef wards of 5.000 p,rsons pre sen t, an d the took l i lf,e' most deciderily omposed of women, many havii , f; in tier arnee t The - ,vr,tclied culprit, William Spicer, threelZ hetl i huh-, of Thursday, appeared very peniteet sym e tions ui contreion, for some time ; ast, attendants and others connected with the gall to that he was prepared f o r the so l e mn even t w i ..ef toweled him ; indeed, his expre:siors aed could lead to no other conclusion. Mny hauls op° spent by him in perusing the sacred Volume) hr in devout meditetion. 113 retired to P IO tween eleven end tw e l ve o ' c l oc k l as t n ight, * 91 0 4 soundly until ab ;ut his usual hour of rising this and, having dressed himself; partook of a hear l Y .01 4 fast. The whole of th e p r i soners at e ra'ed serti ce ' chapel at nine o'clock, and after the readieg of t V , P diir era, a brief address suitable to the ccasion v , rerl by the highly-esteemed chapbntivi in, the l‘ r o f.e Field, woo at te has been u nceas i ng ly to tlfey rc et tot ate crimin 1 eve r s i nce hi s inearceialion• 'seLsll4 being concluded, o ach prisoner return: d to his c e ',„ rle , f ern about halt-pst ten until a li t tle before , Spicer was en.....aged .he chaplain, wien he 1. , .i 8 to his own room. Upon elle o his attendant. , "NP s ,irof to him a ho,:e that 1w felt re ighel and bap, 1. Id !, 0 repeeted the f passage from the . I "' 6 ,' expiessive of his felings, " Yea, there' e re throug. the valley of the s n a ile w o f d e pth, ei „ l li ;of in evil, fur Thou art with ,- ; Thy rod and Thy ,ts comfort me." The fatal hour having struck, o ",fei' w-rt to the room for him, up on see i ng w hen], 1 ) , - isi' l ' A patine. purpes. fur whiet was wanieiff "Shad I pull if my neckerchief ?" end being 5",%t01 , in the affirmative , he did so, and placed it in ' h o of leiving it upon the table. Ile was then britlg h room helow. where he underwent the prove: e P' o l o tee without being in the lea t decree excited. The re ° o ,,tht, process en here formed, headed by Li ut. Hoke wit' goy- nw. the chaplain following, reading th e ,:tos servic-, the culprit, and the officers of the moved slewk o towards the scaffold. Th, a.stenishii.g. ne-s the prisoner maintained i n ascendieg th st e : d 1 ; 1 1 1 the subject o f univers,l remark. H av ing er,. l. ' l , e d - i f eew 4 drop, he placed himself IN neeth the b e at°. L' ll ` or afterwards turned round bald heartily shock • he governor, who asked him if he had any goof;Ail bye ; t.o which Spicer replied by saying, " No, P'"'", o i .i .e ( give my love to your family. Calcraft, the e xec end from efewgitte, then drew the cap ever the e ' oo or culprit's face, and was about to adjust the roP e i - v itY the criminal's neck, it being already suspend et ori b-atn, when the noose was f o und net to r• c'' than the middle of his ,face, and a few minutes e d ,,el before it could be properly done ; and )e t ..0 111 : this time not a muscle or limb in Stne' r „ ffl oo' f ,'" served to move. At length the neces,a,ty pr e " - ;er were arranged, the chaplain continued to read i l l tell f vice in an audible voice, and at a giver , signal the et! sustaining the platform on which th e culprit ete l bet iili a e withdrawn by the executioner, and he was I,..une ofe, eternity. He made a few convulsive throes , le; taised his hands, but in a few short mini-l i t : 4 , l r, quite extinct. There was no expression of freo ll e t bey P r, the man on the part of the vast multitude, tvn e a lr li ,, turned homewards. The body, after hanging , e 0 11 was taken dewy, and buried within the preoll e. 4‘lie; t nearly close to the het con- ct, Jetilit'g 9 7 oe =training spectaters then quietly disperse s" eeiumed its usual traliquilitty.—Reading suiteoirt Ogit tito LOND I L. ssti t ;-vEs cia "'" the Ci Place E, 4 14i2 L 111 4 . 1h t ta I n on t uv i a n . n; i d: te rt il l or at the 1 4 4',ethee's-squar ZC liolbortt •ily .!L e' i j PIED. '''ril* , i s. On the 21st Inst., In the Polygon, Somers T o m. 0 ( 13° son road, oac, : i i din tr , i r ta t th h g 3 he e e dierll.4l4ltBshht inst. n u s s tt Whitehead,.. : t: it, agedL o j n H , o 2 i n 6 k . G e n e r o a l f r p ec tivi kh d .,,x, ° ::::' , ,i. i:: Torfarshire, North Britain. ' s „ati 9 0 0 ra l On the 14th hut., Mr.. Beberet Rickman, of at SP III4-- r" ' 1 10 $ 4 9 skirsey, aged r i tt rof' °°* Cli tf ii ii 1 8 1 9. 1n5t., in Bellwood-place, /1.1.41t°11' re , ,• 10 On the 19th Inst., In Southampton-street, --- a l I Xol e's 4111 Cooke Baukt, Esq., aged 49. Viutella n . t . 3 CO I 4 ." On the 19th inst., lu Hans-phtoc pager . .i f°, 0 1 0 ,. 11 ..i aeoe' IF .-• Bengal Cavalry. On the ?nth invt , in the New-road, Esq., of Wartif,.s,...,c,-,,v,". 4,1: On the 20th inst., John 311ine, /I" ' ....7''':l:l2l(,,trAnif. Ito:141 Lomion : Piloted and Publistwd by Lleutetistit:r. — t / l a 4 Stranti, Printer, at The Srm .•nico , - ''' 'l . i ~.. . '''- or the igavey, in tile County 28, 111411. .. . a Directory frolihl( T H :TrusittB l l:4, L , 0 4 1,N, , ors in , " '' tt Ue,le s c7f: V L 8 ti 4LGIA/ tAolderg 1° ' d ertosits e a "Z°lttteatt peh D .r tvern " Irish k Dracisely !,,,,,t`iino,?.rYote on P co od nimi ucii '7tjar°lllPartits should be . 4114, it ' t 1 112As, Solt( LGzar NL II Qrs, atte ,e-street of k ' the hu , media Ni tih lo ur ovvu TO c ANTE D t ern Cor 1117E1DMtai.1.SA 160,, await, 2d. —Aotzident xsq a ------- 4 1 EXTRAORDINARY AND L.- - Al e e,ee• e HOLY DEATH OF A GENTLEL" pritg ri i On Thursday Mr. Baker held an inquest at flo o ds °.* Cavern, Commercial-road, Limehouse, on the ere ° f >' male person, apparently about twe n ty-six Yer-oefir whose name was unknown, and accordingly so ibf the inquisition. The first witness examined was M r . Ch a rles se - t ee proprietor of the above tavern, who deposed that tee" of February last the deceased came and engaged e e • in his house; he w en t by th e name o f M r . St. jilt e d represented himself as connected with the shiPlln n t r,se r l ee Witness believed it to be a fictitious . name, fro° 'le 0 1 tenor of his conduct. He was of very gentlellot n e ante and manners. On Thursday morning, about o he retired to bed, quite sober, having only tahe n t ee P e brandy and water, and smoked some cigars in Cqffee-roOM. A Ao' ,, er By the Coroner—Deceased was of sound Min' s , gentlemanly in his manners; but there Iva' win' • anxiety to conceal his real name, he having ca t 'rom his linen. Edward Lexton, the waiter, said that on de l- e ,etlilf stairs adjacent to the deceased's bed-room, on the 7000 'Thursday last, the deceased called to him in assistance. He went in and found the deceased l y 0;0 bed. He was unable to speak foie some rninti t ijgdiV said he had been reading in bed and fell asleep; be e P i es shirt on fire, he jumped out of bed, and extingo l ' t , be as best he could. It happened at three o'clock , b n er e not call for assistance as he was unwilling •to (sti" te li mates of the home although in great pain. l eis'? Mr. Adolphus B c urrell, surgeon, of the Cetnniresign' said he was called in and found him dreadfully a il we t , the right arm and chunkier down to the hip. L.,,,„e p s favourably until Tuesday morning, when CO' 4 3 place, and he died in two hours. Death was the r e '' hel e injury sustained by the burns. e n' I 'o 11' After deceased's death, his desk was opened, Iv t est) a quantity of correspendence therein, it a ppeared . .., pree brother-in-law to the Hon. G F. Nugent, who i s ; 1 00 19,4 1 in Ireland, to whom a communication has been ',eicP The jury returned a verdict of " Death (rein s A l e burning.' 0/41 V After the inquisition was signed, the Corone r ' Mr. Clenton and signing his warrant for the 10 " 0 body, asked what was intended to be done? eo e,, , Mr. Clenton replied that he should keep the.", eiell!„ bJ premises as long as be could possibly do so, for tion, and the delivery of sums rings, &e..• re n Y ti possession. - All uB t LORD PALMERSTON AS A SPEAKER. tee s taken into account, Lord Palmerston is, perh a t reole ° , t i debater among the Whig leaders of the House. g oie In the different qualities which, when comb:_s. i render a man an orator, he is excelled by duals among his contemporaries. Lord John r`, ' 1 ;010 . 14 more tact, more intimate acquaintance witt i te eee t et t tory (not with parties, for. in that knn% oten' o etirs Palmerston beats all men living. having been re of e i ` ,l almost every Government within the memo... ern o i greater skill in pointing allusions to the polil s olig e 4 opponente,and altogether more refinement in the b of his Parliamentary case. In eloquence , bt' t , F e e 4 0 9; tion or in delivery, Lord Palmerston is, of 0 10 1. by Mr. Shiel or Mr. MacAulay, and even by s „e flelt ib a far inferior rank as speakers. In soundness "; f isvai,Ar, Argument be cannot stand a moment's col', 0 0 b4, Mr. Cobden, or with Earl Grey (when t ea nth t , P i , does justice to his own powers) 'or even 4 . ce o f e j ? Buller. Each speaker on his own side, in o ' f s t he Vance of him in some particular quality ! lo e e o e Yet no one wo u ld f or a momen t h es itate t'' e ) 1 1 ; fr e e Palmer-ton a mongs t th e fi rst speakers in e e iere ct or, Commons, tit. would deny t hat he bad (1 11 ,11 P' iii hearing one of that nobleman's speeches es r e eve of its kind, as if he had listened to the 01 4 v o efforts of Macaulay, the most spirit- stirriectioe,lo' t b f the most ekilful and satisfying of Lord doh° s , peculiarity in Lord Palmerston which ,;relies elks singular ' power of charming with an °I. Ot te :lei whole, the several parts of which arc Wed to please. if critically analysed, / 5 1 0 . 11 Or o ( d , and hearty spirit of partisanship, not malig n ! ce te s v it t 0 or mean, es is that of most zealous ad y " os eeloe i bndiei opinion or interests, but frank, inardY• Tr ` A lm , and undisguised, so much so as to o 'l 4 o Desk( sp irtive character, as if t'arliameetary t he mere pastime, a kind of relaxation from , oa t e ll cares or labours of adininistration or 00 . rt tl: j e political life, in which all men are bound by n e , es' - for compact, answering to the laws of a ganie, 17, t hetioll utmost powers to excel or to overcome each t h et o _ er sake of the distinction and applause which or e / 7::4 success.— Contemporary Orators. in Fraser. RAILWAY A CCIDENT. WORTHING. ps 11 1 1: 0 1 1 ° A ~..,b or , ti).o terday a young man named Smart, a resident of. , et . oil the works of the Brighton and Chichester Rai1v , .. 3 4 , w en ia ,. o was killed under the following circumstances ,- " De ,i 1 %01 1 :4 waggons, which had come from Brighton, had roic i o gle r Leominster, and, the steam having been shut off IL'ut foo t the speed of the train was 'educed to a rate of 311 '; d 0 0-. ' f i,e hour. The waggons being slack-coupled, there '":;I11 0 , 0 1ryi them against one another consequent en dirinflis b h . ; et515,,,0 0 the deceased, who was standing up on one of , t th e jerked out headlong. In his fall, beta een two o' Doth rit . 1 , A broke his neck, and the train pass ng over hint,.heti ,ree f one leg were also broken, and his chest was '4 1' 0 picked up dead—life was destroyed in tantaneouell, rerl- o e t , A COSTLY WEDDING ORNAMENT. ---111 ie foe, inform the curious in such matter s , that tlinel,e f seen in a jeweller's shop en the 13ouleva“ i olgai ; . 0011 0 precious stones to be worn by the Prince rib )t ; per ol on her wedding day. Thi s di a dem is 000 °( 111' The large cent al diamond is estimated at b ' e he r 0•0 1 diadem is to be presented to the brid e e pt father. Free reef t ee MAJOR BROADFoOT.—The iytons hire d in foe states that Major Broadfoot. who was kill: 90 ° I confliet in India, was a native of Wigtonell ir io ' i s ter Mr Broadfoot, a native of Whithorn, and ni Wel tit /e ' A cession Church, London. tni' sr', RAVENSNEST.—A new romance. un- ►r ,, to Ole, celebrated Cooper, is announced by Mr. Bentl% t ioni: d i d 0 days. In the present dearth of good works of " „ er e _/ tion by this most admired writer may indeed ben ', all lovers of this fascinating department 4 04 0 ° f lite rattu 8 1117113 bon, f$ ,1i P rl c i On the 17thinst., at Harrow, M r s. W. Oxen Os the lith inst., in the Belvedere, weymouto Gnstavus ilaucoekq., ./. 0 0 , 1 the 19tb inst. , at W ,at a, d s worth, Mrs It. tt• s e s ee On the 19th inst., at Wood Ilan, Downhain, '•"" IV. 1,. Joi:es, I , :sq., of a 6011 . On the Mil M e t., at Tnchfleld-terrace, IteirelVt ,i ;o4 °( Joseph Needham, of the Mi ddle Temple, Esti., od 6, 0 0 .MARRIED. 3 r. 0"„, On the 19th inst., at St. Pancras Church, - 1 , 0 ,1 Th -,, e r, to Miss Elizabeth Maria „Itis Bench• street, re, r is; of Mrs. Guest, T a vistock-square. en t ut oi l On the 19th inst., at tit. George's, EalloY, te r. t° , l3 of Hallett, Esq., of Great George-street, WestMllflotoef. daughter of W. Broackes, ( -° r , 0 41 youngest gardens. _...414ddb TU.. SUN, LONDON, MONDAY •EVENING, MAWCH . _23, 1846.