The Express.
London, England, 1849-12-05 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, WEDNESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 5, 1849.

to organise legal machinery for the better adminis-
tration of our charities; but as, in each case, the
proposal involved such cumbrous and expensive
@waves the establishment of a rew law tribunal, to
be milled the Court of Trusts, the House of Commons
'break from the responsibility ef its cost, and
&mink wisely ; for recent experience of new
ends of law (with the excitption to be no-
ticed) has proved that the contentious hostess
at
of the community scarcely required them. Thu,
present the amount of liminess in the Court of Chan-
cery is rapidly declining; and the probability is,
that were a thorough revision of Chancery prooldure
and forms to be made, the reduction of judicial busi-
ness in that court would be so great, that parliament
would be enabled to diminish the number of its
judges; for at present half their time and learning is
occupied with qu. stions of form. The exoeption re-
ferred to is, of coarse, the new County Courts, which
have not only acted so admirably in the recovery of
small debts, which was, and still is, their main ob-
ject, but whose jurisdiction has been so usefully
extended to the administration of insolvency, that it is
now proposed to be further enlarged.
The delay which has taken place in providing a
better system for the administration of smaller chari-
' ties, will not haveunprofitable or uneconomical,
if, as this bill propene, the sew County Courts shall
be the medium for enforcing the due and cheap ful-
filment of their trusts. For the number and the
aggregate value of these charities hears no proportion
to the smallness of their individual income. After
the conclusion of the former charity commission, an
analytical and tabular digest of the trusts they had
inquired into, was prepared and printed by order of
Parliament, in two large folio volumes; and in look-
ing over this digest, it will be found that the
income of by tar the majority of charitable
trusts in England is under 1001. To ensure
the better administration of such charities,
under the ordinary procedure of the Court of Chan-
cery, is to condemn them, if not to extinction, at least
to serious pecuniary injury, by costs; whilst, to erect
a special court of trusts would be to establish a tribu-
nal for the permanent occupation of which there is no
reasonable prospect of providing an adequate amount
et business. Thus situated, the bill before us is in-
tended to provide a better system for keeping the
smaller charities of England right without any such
exoensire agency as a new legal tribunal.
It divides the smaller charities into two classes;
those having an annual income of not less than 301.,
and not more than 1001.; and those that have an
income of less than 301.; taking the estimates
of their incomes from the analytical digest of
the charity commissioners' report before-men-
mentioned. The former class it still reserves for the
administration of the Courts of Chancery; the latter
it confides to the care of the new county courts. But,
whilst still reserving for Chancery the former, the
bill proposes to dispense with informations or bills ;
to substitute for them the most inexp'nsive of all
equity procedures—petitions ; to refer, as of course,
petitions to the Muter ; to give to Masters' orders
validity without confirmation, and to get rid of the
costly forms known as "states of facts" and " war-
rants"; in short, it will substitute the simplest mode
of procedure in the Curt of Chancery for the most
complex, costly, and dilatory. S), with the latter
class of cases, it confers all the powers of the Court of
Chancery on judges of the new county courts ; it will
enab'e them to proceed, on the application of any in-
terested party, to inquire into the whole state of the
charity, to settle and conform schemes for its better
administration, to vest all the property, reel or per-
sonal, in the treasurers of these courts, and not by the
expensive formality of long deeds, but by merely en-
dorsing the vestry order on the old sheepskins, and
to compel the acting trustees to file their annual
accounts with the clerks of the county courts, where
they are to be examined by all the world
gratuitously. And the expense of all this
need not, if the applicant choose, exceed a
few pounds : for there is no good reason
why the applicant should not conduct all
the proceedings before the judges of the county
courts, without the expensive aid of barristers, attor-
neys, solicitors, or agents ; and every clause in the bill
seems to have the fear of law ooh before it.
All its provisions are simple and efficacious, and
are quite in accordance with our general legal system
—a consideration of no little practical impottance ;
seeing that it has been a departure from that system
on which lawyers have been able to wreck so many
admirable projects of law reforms. It may indeed
be urged that the limitation in amount of the awes
referable to the judges of the county courts is too
small ; but recognising the force of that objection, the
well working of the @menet oasts by those courts
will soon, we may rely on it, secure them an enlarged
jurisdiction. There is, however, one limitation in the
bill which ought either to be struck out altogether,
ere to be fully explained. It is in the 31st section ;by
which it is proposed that the previous consent in
writing of the ATTOSNEY•GENERAL or of two, justices
et the peace of the district in which the charily shall
be administered, shall be required to enable " any per-
son interested in the application," to originate tiese
peeseedinge in the county courts. This restriction is
very unwise. For, in the first place, it deprives a
man of his common law fight to seek redress
be wrongs done in that which he is inte-
rested, and makes that riAht dependent on
the whim of the ATTORNET-GENEIIAL, or,
worm still, two justices of the peace. Upon ever,
known principle of law or morals, this restriction is
untenable. But, in the next place, any restriction is
foolish : for, in the great majority of cases of charita-
ble abuses, correction and better administration is en-
sured by the exertions of persons who are in no way
legally "interested" in their reform. And the safest
way to prevent improper applications would be to
mulct malicious or litigious applicants in costs.
The object of the bill is so excellent, and with this
exception the details are so welt calculated to ware
its object, that the public will expect its enactment
next session with the least passible delay. In the
meantime the increasing importance of the County
Courts, and the prospect of still further augmentation
of their powers, render the appointment of compe-
tent persons as their judges most important and a
matter to be closely watched. Hitherto the pablio
have no reasonable complaint to make on this head;
and the nomination to ajudgeship of so good &lawyer
and so excellent a man as Mr. Serjeant DOWLING is
proof that the government feels the responsibility
which the patronage involves.

Assembly seems highly favourable to Louis Napo-
leon's attempt at extra-parliamentary government
and there are few people of note or polities, whether
hostile or not to the President. who do not see that
he insucceedieg in his intentions. Even M. Thine
and M. Guizot admit that France is now destined to
pees tbrcogh a Napoleon phase Brae.
The Mountain, desirous of learning. something
positive as to the truth of certain expressions used by
the President of the Republic in the course of an ad-
dues to the prefers, had charged one of their body
to put questions on the subject. Accordingly, after
the law on the naturalisation of strangers had passed,
M. Bair rose and addressed the Minister of the Inte-
rior, but that gentleman would give no answer to the
. sad the questions were postponed till that
Rthree months.
vidently the cause of this vote is to be found in the
fear of precipitating a conflict. The legitimists, who
more than ever are ready to show their dissidence
from the majority, and who no doubt would oppose
themselves in a body to the prolongation of power to
Louie Napoleon, are annoyed at the vote of yester-
day. The Union, one of its organs, says this morning :
In adjoarniog for throe months the interptllotions of M.
Bee, the majority clearly refused
rov to hear th
eme..m We de not
blame thie refusal ;we even appe of modatn of
the majority ; but we desire in return that the government
shall also know how to appreciate it. If the chamber thinks
right to give a new pledge of its love for order, for good her-
lam between the rat powers, the cabinet and the Elyeee
iambi on their part give equivalent pledges. Let them
hasten then to *tram the palatal impression produeed by the
words ascribed to M.
Bonaparte. That is • satisfaction which
has become necessary, a satisfaction which the country and
the chamber have the right to exact.

- - -
It is not probable that the request of the Union will
be acceded to.
In the Assembly to-day, a motion for ordering the
liquidation of the debts of the late civil list to the
state was negatived. There was no other proceeding
worthy of notice.
The table of the credits put down in the estimates
of 1849 was hung up yesterday at the Assembly. The
total value of the credits already voted amounts to
1,653,349,387 f., whilst the total of the receipts is only
1,411,732,017 f. In adding the credits applied for,
and not yet voted, amounting to 32,053,733 fr., and
the non-valeurs, for additional registration and stamp.
datii s, calculated at neatly 16,000,000 fr., the deficit
for the present year will amount in round numbers to
289,600,000 fr.
When the pardoned insurgents of Jute arrived at
Havre, one of them cried. " Vive la Republique Demo-
critique et Societe!" He was immediately separated
from the rest, and sent back to Belle-Isle.
The Journal d'Elbeuf says :—" At toe market of
Newbourg on Wednesday, and at that of Elbeof the
day after, the conversation turned principally on
measures taken by the authorities of the department
of the Eure to put down the propagation of socialist
doctrines in the country districts. Among other
facts, it was stated that the mayor of one of the prin-
cipal communes in the canton of Amfreville bad been
suspended by the prefect for negligence in the per-
formance of his duty.
BOURSE.

BELGIUM.

BRUSSELS, Use.%
Thif Nonileur Beige publishes an official aesonat
the commerce of Belgium during the year 1848. The
general official value of the imports and e
during 1848, was 631,600,000 L, being a decrezin
14 per cent. compared with lest year, bat a 'light
increase compared with the average of the five
pending years. In that sum, the general imports
hr hone consumption, direct conveyance in &amass
MI he the entrepots, are set down at 333,700,000 E,
sod the general exports at 297,900,000 f., being 15
per cent. less than in 1847, but 2 per cent. more
than the average of the preceding five years. The
official value of the imports for home consumption is
declared at 222,600,000 f., being 4 per cent. less than
in 1847. The exports of Belgian produce show a
falling off of 12 per cent. compared with 1847, but
an increase of 1 per cent. compared with the five pre-
ceding years.
Compared with 1847 there has been a felling-off in
the number of Belgian vessels inwards of 14 per cent.,
and of foreign ships of 21 per cent. On the other
hand there has been in the vessels outwards an in-
crease of 18 per cent. for the former, and of 13 per
cent. for the latter. With regard to importations and
exportations by land there has been a decrease of 3
per cent. in the former, and of 23 par cent in the
latter.
The country with which Belgium has the most
extensive commercial relations is France, the next
Holland, the third England, the fourth the Zollverein
portion of Germany, and the fifth Boards—the value
of the general commercial relations (imp3rts and ex-
ports) with the first being 86,800,000 f., of which
49,000,0001. are for exports to that republic; with
the second, 64,500,000 f. (26,600,000 f. for exports) •
with the third (England), 55,800,0001. (26,700,004
for imports into Belgium, and 29,100,000 for exports
to England); with the fourth, 42,400,000 f. (for ex-
ports, 22,400,000) ; and with the fifth 16,000,000 f.
(only 600,000 f. for exports). With the whole of
America the commercial relations amount in
value to 42,600,000 f. (4,600,000 f. for imports).
According to the official and permanent rate of
value, the vales of the importations into Belgium
from England during 1848 was 38,700,000 f., and that
of the exportations from the latter to the former
country 31,500,000 f. According, however, to the
new basis of value, the exportations to, exceed the
imports from, England by 2,400,0001., whilst that
basis presents a difference of 7,200,000 f. compared to
the one drawn up in 1833. The official value
of the goods (imported from England) which
are destined for-home consumption is 10 per cent.
less than that of 1847 and 7 per cent. less than
for the five years ending 1847. Raw mate-
rials figure for 19,700,000 f. amongst the articles
for home consumption ; colonial provisions for
145,000,0004, and manufactured good. for 4,500,0004
In 1847, the relative figures were 17,900,000 f.,
18,100,000 f., and 6,000,000 f. The falling off has been
chiefly in corn, rice, woollen stuffs, cloths, oleaginous
grains, and raw sager. On the other band, tt ere has
been an increase in raw salt, manure, and woollens. At
no period have our exportations to England been so
great, exceeding by 99 per cent those of 1847, sad
by 132 per cent. the average value for the preceding
five years. In those figures are included 12,600,0001.
for raw materials, also 12,600,000 f for pre-
visions, and 6,300,000 f. for manufactured goods.
In 1847, the relative figures were 7,100,000 E,
2,600,0004, and 6,100,0004 Corn and potatoes sloes
gave rise to an increase of 9,500,000 f. Zinc, flex,
woollens, and butter, furnished altogether an increase
of 6,600,000 f.
The general official value of the goods in transitu
was, in 1848, 115,800,000 t., being a decrease of 19 per
cent compared with the previous year.
The Mon deur publishes, moreover, a royal ordon-
Dance sliming the value assigned to goods in the
table of Belgian commerce.