The Express.
London, England, 1861-06-26 00:00:00

SPORTLYO INTELLIGENCE.

A late odition of the Express is published every
evi•ning during the racing season, containing the
walks of the day's races.

Tue death of the Strxraw—more than once
prematurely reported by telegraph during the last
week—was announced lest night by Lord JOHN
IitSMILL in thi House of Commons. His Majesty
Asut•t.-Mewtn died yesterday morning, in the
thirty-ninth year of his age. His eldest son,
Sultan Mutton, will be twenty-one years of age
next September.

Ditiorrr readers of the daily Police-court re-
ports must have been startled yesterday morning
at finding amongst those brought up for examina-
tion under heavy charges, the name of • well-
known representative of • metropolitan con-
stituency. one of the Members for West-
minster was brought up before the sitting
magistrate at Marlborough-street, in custody of
the warrant-officer, charged with a most odious and
revolting offence. But if the charge was surpris-
ing, the evidence adduced in its support was still
more wonderful. Several witnesses were exa-
mined at considerable length, but it was difficult
to extract from any one of them a single statement
aufficienUy definite, consistent, and precise to be
accepted by those accustomed to test the value of
evidence as really trustworthy. Tho wit-
nesses all belonged to the emotional sex,
who, nut unfm.luently, under the stimu-
lus of a common excitement, allow their feelings
not only to override their judgment, but to con-
fuse their perceptions; and the evidence given in
this singular case affords a striking illustration of
this tendency. The witnesses had evidently worked
themselves into • state of considerable indignation
at the insult which they imsgini-al had been offered
them, and they expressed this natural sense of in-
jury in various forms and very decided language.
But the strength of their feelings was surpassed
by the weakness of their facts. Much of the testi-
mony was vague, weak, sad confused ; while on
the main points of the charge the witnesses either
openly contradicted each other, or unconsciously
invalidated their own statements. The charge,
however, was precisely of the kind—so monstrous
and so incredible—that nothing short of the
strongest, the most united and overwhelming
testimony could have established. Under these

circumstances the case could end in only one way.
After a long and careful hearing, justified by Use
gravity of the accusation and the important public
interests at stake, the case wag dismissed, and Sir
Joe's Sgatz.sv left the court in taiumph sur-
rounded by his friends, and, as the magistrate
stated, " unstained in character."

As • matter of private feeling it would be
more grateful to say nothing about this osea,
but its public bearings are too important to be
wholly lost sight of. It is a most serious thing for
any one, but above all for a public man, to be ex-
posed to an unfounded charge of this tremendous
nature. And • brief investigation of the real
grounds of this particular accusation—its actual
rim and progress—may, perhaps, help to prevent
the recurrence of such scenes. The whole history
of the alleged offence is, we believe, very like
the history of the Three Black Crows. We do
not charge any of the witnesses who were 1,1-
'mined yesterday and the day before with any
deliberate intention of accusing Sir Jose Sumter
unjustly. Most of them gave their evidence with
an air of conviction which, not lees than their
confusion and discrepancies ea to the actual facts,
tends to exonerate them from the charge of in-
tentional deception. But if free from the guilt of
bringing a false charge against an innocent
man, they are certainly not equally free from
the reproach of indulging • questionable
curiosity, and fostering • morbid state
of feeling. What was really visible across the
substantial breadth of St. James's-street was a
gentleman in a light dressing-gown--• spectacle
that may be seen in this weather across most
streets by those who watch for them, or have
nothing better to do than to look out of the
windows. This ordinary spectacle had evidently
arrested the morbid fancy of some inmate
of Mr. STAFFORD'S house, whom, first of all, it
would perhaps be difficult to say. But the gentle.
man opposite had been talked of in the kitchen'
and probably noticed in the parlour, before last
Wednesday ; so that, on the day of the Drawing-
room, it was an object with the party at Mr.
STAFFORD'S windows to watch the gentleman op-
posite as well ea to look at the Blues. If there
was but little to be seen—and there could not be
a great deal through • window.with deep curtains,
muslin blinds, and a table before it—there
was all the more scope for a fanciful interpretation
of what was visible. And the party at No. 18
seem to have mutually excited each other on the
subject till at last they came to believe, not only
that Sir Julie's movements were all animated by
an evil purpose, but that they were all directed
against themselves. The results • charge soserious,
and so seriously supported, that it might, under
different circumstances, have produced all
the evils of • cruel conspiracy to de-
stroy the character of a public man. Fortu-
nately, in this case the charge was so extravagant
as to refute itself. But it might have been other •
wise ; and the only effective protection is that of
thoroughly sifting the evidence to the bottom.
Mr. Colima was, therefore, fully justified on