The Express.
London, England, 1849-08-02 00:00:00

north-easterly direction. By these masterly
nceuvres GORGEY bas succeeded in efftchtg hi.
junction with Dnunfosufs (or Vino:mm*o an"
and has taken up a position which entirely etas e
the communications of PASKIEWITCH with Dahti
and thacia. PASKIEWITCII, unless he irate.
diately fight a dtcisive battle in the not*,
is hence cat off from his basis of operations am
forced to accept that of HAYNAU. Now, the
line of communication of lltaztau's already straight,
vied army with his basis of operations is s,rionety
threatened. It runs between Comm and the pht,
ten-See, expcsed to interruption from the notthbj .
the garrison of Comorn and the 8000 men undo,
KLAPKA in the entrenchments at Ace, and homy*
south by the 10,000 regulars under AULICH. Oa AO
other hand the army now covering Arad (and *high ,
no doubt protec•ed Groaswarden at the time of ths
bootless occupation of Debreczin), is on the oche
side pu,hing Its advanced posts into contact with the
allied armies. ,

Changed u the positions of the belligerents ay
and complicated u they have became, the pm:
pectic of the Magyars are better than those at
their invaders—even setting out of account the ma..
tinned superiority of Hungarian generalship aba
Ilunorian prowess, and regardless of the fact that
one mirehap may bring the Itucsian and Auetrial
commanders into a situation more deplorab e thy
our contemporary is voluntarily accepting in the public
estimation by its servile and nnecrupul..us anvoe,,,
of a cue which has not to r,commend it one re.
deeming p ALL

aa
rutt
:tee
dni ceitaise:
frequently
te4rnebeyert:ee
eivvhtso
stems
MERCY NEWTON, who was tried g
Sbrewsbury last week for the murder of her mother,
nd
will rank as one of the most celebrated etimieet
[ causes of our time. MERCY N ewroet, is a woman of 30,
who livid as housekeeper to an old gentleman ie
the retired liotle borough of Bridgenorth. Sae Wm
the daughter of an old woman liviug in the town, ne
the inuo cat of 300/. a year, settled on herfrelf for
200/. of which was to revert to the daughter dose-
; lately after her decease, together with the intern o
arising out of the remaining 3001.
MERCY NEWTON for many yr ate past had been in
the habit of applying the most horrible githetate •
her mother, of expressing undi•guisedly h:r anxiety
for her d.ath, of beating her ernti'y, of et& arouneg
upon one occasion to choke her, of ill using her, in
fact, so et amefully, that more than once the egcom-
stanms bad been represented to the borough magic.
traces, who, however, were unab:e to interfere
in c msequence of the old woman invariably
refit-dug to appear. Both the mother and the raugh-
ter were accustomed to drink to great extras,,
t
o
w
n
oiiaihbwtdoonlei
eigacs,
ntlyilthe
liable
ohefsgtaetbeohnirbi
vwdoetidelafyet
neuiha nfictdgewe:hrn
hr
mner
fierceness
nwebtmhetmuorknh,nxPrae
sese
ot.r enwNofihstst
.saahl
roe :eft, great
affectedo
dial r ettsofi
that..
s ha:
hpta,s.
ef,loa,ierv:sbltgttn,.ttt. lahbsiriry, degreewacal
cane
oyehe I re
the
notbue
r toat ;
I ,k 18•
1t aenbsoc
u,iyetitihprah
i
lei
•
n
f
the house in which MERCY NEWTON liv d to pay her
daughter, alit seems, a vi,it. The old woman hod a
supper avid lay down to steep on a sofa in the kitchen.
The deughmr, in the course of the eve:.ing, Leda
quart of rum bought for her, and appears t have
drunk more than half a pint of it b. f ire ten o'clock.
Abeut two o'clock in the following morning a eo vont
ire the house was awoke by a sense r f suffeatioa.
She ran down into the kitchen, and found it full of
smoke. Thereupon she opened the street door, and
callt d tin a neighbour. On retu-ning to the house they
found MERCY NEWTON drunk, and her en other lying
on her face across some steps leading from the kitchen
to a brewhouse, quite dead. The sofa en which she
had been lying was partly burnt, at the end turthed
from the fire. It was wet with water. The floor of
the place where she was found was also wet with
wates. Thu nom of the deceased was flattened don
in such a way as to induce the ser,,eeir s to think that
it must have been so flittmed before death. The
body woe fearfully burnt, but none of the medial
witnesses had ever seen a body of a person dead irom
burning, aid great doubt existed as to whe leer the
charring of the body was anterior or eubsetinent to
death. MERCY Neweos's hands were diet:an red to be
scorched and blistered—she had not been in bed
duting that night, though she may hive lain byre en
the outside, of one—a stocking was found in a crevice
of the window shutter, pat there not to keep out cold,
for there was no glans broken, hut as if to prevent
people in the street from seeing what was going for-
wnd in the kitchen. It was subsequ mtly observed
that them were traces of feet in el upon 'he ROOT
between the srfa and the brewhotem ewe tha: a pint
bottle, which woe neatly full of lamp oil over
night, was neatly emptied, whil.t meek. of
oil were] found upon the sofa, and its sheet.
at d pillow ease. The medical men thnnalot that
the body could not have ben burnt merely by the
clothes, &c., it, upon but that it might have bnn ee
burnt if the flame had been rendered more intense by
oil b. ing thrown upon it. A post mortem examina-
tion, however, established, from the condition of the
heart and lungs and brain, that death was uctually
caused, not by burning, but by suffocation. The
theory therefore was that the daughter had first
suffocated her mother and then endeavoured to destroy
the body by the action of fire.
A coroner's jury which sat ten times upon the case
arrived at the conclusion that the fade' were not such
as justified them even in putting the prisener in
:charge. Ultimately, however, MERCY NEWTON was
:committed .to take her trial for murder. She wag
tried atehe last sprang mixes, when the jury werel
unab'eto agree, and were discharged without arriving
at any conclusion. MERCY NEWTON was, therefore,
' re-committed to gaol, and a second trial took place
last meek at Shrewsbury before Mr. Baron ROLM
Tte indictment varied the charge in ten different
ways ; charg,ing'the prisoner with burning, suffocat-
ing, strangling her mother, &e. ; and under one count
with cauveng her death by means unknown.
The case for the defence rested mainly on the well.
established fact that the old, mother was in the habit
of smoking a pipe in bed, and that she hid
once before set tire to the same sofa on ,whieb
she met her death. It was set up.that the prisoner,
who was intoxicated, being awakened from a sorter
stupor by either the flame or the outcries of others,
had roused herself' up, and, finding her mother burrs.
ing, had thrown water upon her; that the flume
playirg in front of her mouth,and ncstrile, had caused
'he suffocation ; and it was urged that; except the
prejudice created by her previous language and con-
duct, there was not a single fact that pointed to her
guilt. The judge, than whom no one better fitted to
I try such a case could poEsibly be found, sp.
pears to have inclined to the opinion that
the doubts suggested were too strong to
justify conviction. " I can only tell you," he said,
addressing the jury, " that were I a juryman, ands.
less I was satisfied that the party died by strangole
lion, in the ordinary sense of tae ward, namely, by
putting the fingers on the throat, or a cushion et
handherebief over the mouth and nose, or presol
the windpipe, or by some such means, I shoukl feel
° myself bound to return a verdict of not guilty. If she
died by burning, or any suffocation arising from
burning, it might be an accident."
The jury, the third (including that of the coroner)
which has tried this case, retired to consider their
verdict of half-post seven on Saturday night. They
found it impossible to agree, and at ten o'clock one of
them was taken ill with a cholic. He was cared, hove
ever, by the application of a stimulant, which the
judge allowed to be administered in the shape of a glass
of brandy, and the jury were then locked up for the
night. After passing fourteen hours, however, in
Iclose confinement, they still disagreed, and at toe
o'clock on Sunday alternoon thejudge formed a court,
ranturtnhieng any verdictsecondaestze jury was discharged waile
ed
IThe counsel for the Crown have expressed their
intention of going to a third trial at the next
spring aesizes. At the second trial the case had become
complicited by the death of witnesses who had been
I examined at the first. The incidents of the "eon
trial will necesaarily complicate it more. Fab:
sympathy, which boos previously ruu high against °
prisoner on account of her bad charac'er, will doubt
ess take its course in another direction, in conseanell
of the unprecedented repetition of her trials. ova
I be ezid that the object of criminal process is toelica
the truth ; th-.t all the facts of this case are known
that can ba known; that three different sets diens
that
have b. en unable to d'cide upon them; In d
thee..., is little prospect of a wiser twelve baitog for
who will agree. At tho same time the case's
solemn one, and a verdict, one way or the other,