The Express.
London, England, 1866-01-16 00:00:00

CASES FROM TRZ LAW COURTS.

The case of the man Fletcher is just such a casus
omissus, observes the Times, as is coostently occurring to
bring discredit nom) the administration of our law., Mu-
venous es it may seem, that a man who has committed a
robbery in Australia end escaped to England cannot be
committed to pris an, even upon his own confession, unless
• warrant for his arrest shall have beau received from the
colony, it is nevertheless the law, and the same rule applies
in the convene cue of offenders escaping to the cola
nisi. They are only liable to apprehension on pro-
duction of a warrant issued here, and endorsed by a
judge of the colony. There is, therefore, no apparent way
of securing the arrest of any one committing • crime in one
part of her Majesty's dominions and escaping to some other
part or parts unknown, except by forwarding a separate
warrant to each. Some loophole of this kind will always be
left, so long as our legislators, in the taus spirit of English
law, refuses to provide, on comprehensive principles, for
exigencies that have not yet been illustrated by precedents.
However apparently inconsistent, the verdict in the case
of " Hill o. Finney " yesterday evening, in the opinion of
the Post fully meats the justice of the case. Captain Hill's
object in instituting the action wee to vindicate his charac-
ter, and in that he b►s been successful. It is to be regretted,
however, that Mr. Finney, a gentleman who, it is conceded,
acted throughout from the bast motives, and who from the
verdict given must be taken to have been guilty of no appre-
ciable negligence, should, as the Lord Chief Justice ob.
served, have been made the scapegoat in order to enable
Mr. Hill to have his case reheard. Regarded from this
point of view the recent trial was a seandel on the adminis-
tration of justice.
The Atifertatcr thinks it would be ridiculous to as, that
!he personal or professional honour of Mr. Finney have in
reality been at all in question in this trial. The only
thing to be regretted with regard to him is that his
professional relations with Captain Hill's family led to
his professional couaexion with the plaintiff. For the
captain himself it would have been much better had he
allowed Sir Charles Wood quietly to erase his name from
the India Army List. He has done himself no good by
submitting to the awful ordeal through which he has just
passed.
Whatever else, says the Telegraph, may be doubtful
about this strange case—whatever opinion men may form
respecting the frailty of Mrs. Hill, the correctness
of Mr. Wood, or the paternity of the child born
at Boulogne—the one thing certain beyond dispute
is that Captain 11111 cannot continue to bear
the proud title of "an officer and a gentleman." However
absurd in itself, the verdict amounts to a practical justi-
fication of Mr. Finney's conduct, and to a condemnation of
Captain Hill. Though the jury expressed a benevolent
desire that the gentleman in question might have a new
start in life, the Te/roraph suspects the public will rather
lodine to hope that they have heard the last of Captain
Hill's career as an officer in the service of the Queen.

.011:RICAN

Sketching the past misoooceptioos of the North regard-
ing the philosophy of free trade. their mere play with the
soienceof political economy before the war, and the ex-
perience which they h►ve since gained, the Daily News
proceeds to comment upon the present struggle about the
tariff. The Northern manufacturers are distil:quelling
themselves, it says, from the rest of the community by a
rapacity which is as truly anti•repnblican as slavery itself.
This ass; has for many years been directing its influence