The Express.
London, England, 1861-11-01 00:00:00

as WA,11.11 AT 10/11101r.111111111111.

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teaMINIIIV.4IWiss, . Animas.

LONDON, !AWAY, NOV. 1.

TO OUR READIRB.

MPORTUICI 124TELLIGMCE.

A labs edition d the Express it published every
evening during the racing season, containing the
results al the day's nem

N ILIT to the Loan MATOlell triumph over poor
Mr. Worrwr Wool), no political victory has been
made en much of by the Tory press as the defeat
of Mr. MokIUSON by Mr. Anntworow, at Plymouth.
slow the conversion of the once liberal borough had
been brought about, who deserved the credit of it,
and what precise place it would hold in the history
of the "glorious Cooservative reaction," were
questions keenly debated, and at length satisfac-
torily solved. In fact, we were in • fair way to
net • full philosophy and literature of the subject,
when an accident intervened which we fear must
cut them short. The election took place yester-
day, when the voters placed the liberal candidate
at the head of the poll, in the old routine way, as
if nothing had happened. We have no philosophy
to offer on the occasion—nothing but the com-
monplace remark that this election shows that
constituents long known as liberal will be found
liberal still when • fitting candidate presents him-
self. Plymouth has pined • valuable represen-
tative in Mr. Moainnow, and the House of Com-
mons a good member.

TIME is something infectious in the freshness
of a young life, and yesterday even the musty
haunts and purlieus of the Law confessed its gra-
cious influence. The dingy courts were decked
with seek flowers as still hang round the robe of
departing summer, the way was guarded by the
choicest ranks of that youthful army which has
dedicated itself to the safety of its country, the
halls were thronged with the learning and the
beauty of the land, when the Hope of England
enrolled himself successively as a Student and •
Master of that science which assures our liberties
and our rights. Four countries and a half have
passed away since a Prince of WALLS gave a proof
and happy omen of that subjection of the Throne
to the Law which has preserved both invio-
late ; and the story of Prince Hai. and
Chief Justice flaseovwx, made more illus.
thous by our greatest poet's genius, still forms
the first lesson in constitutional lore which we
teach our children, and embodied in pictorial art
decorated the chamber where the Sovereign " sits
" highest in her royal estate." The petulance of
a madcap Prince is not likely in these more sober
days to call for judicial rebuke, but the recogni-
tion of the higher majesty of he law once made
by submission to its authority is now not ungrace-
fully recalled by a Prince taking upon himself the
rank of one of its chief ministers. Long indeed
may it be ere he comes to hold his mother's
place, and in her room become, in the language of
lawyers, the Fountain of Justice ; but when
that time shall come—a• in the course of nature it
must—we may feel assured that the stream will
not be muddied by the early token of respect for
thee cience of Law given by the Heir of the
realm accepting the proffered fellowship of those
who have won their way to its highest honours.
But violent contrasts quickly pall, and the
thoughts of the beholders probably soon wan-
dered from the strangeness of the spectacle of
youth and age, flowers sad legal tomes, Benchers'
wigs and ladies' bonnets, so oddly mingled, to the
thought of that future which lies within the young
brows of the new-made Barrister and his nearest
contemporaries. Shall the England of their days
—of the days when the humblest students shall
reach, by dint of that hard toil which they ham
taken to be their lot in this life, tho rank which
their Pain e ban leaped to in 'mingle hour, be like
the England of our days—shall law then be se severe
• study, as exacting • mistress, as full of snares
to the unwary, and of pusales even to the learned,
as she is nowt Shall justice always be as hard
to gain, and honesty always in such danger? Let
us hope sot. Yew happy reflections come into
the mind as we look round the walls of such a
heel Library se that which hes just been inaugu-
rated. How little of all that hearshw has been given
to the endeavour to find out bow to do justly ;
how mash has bona spent in merely teaching how
to state a case so as to permit it to be judged at
all. It is issabling enough to think that five
hundred years' study of law have only served
to bury it under these groaning shelves,
and that every year has made it
worse for plain common sense to find out
what law directa, worse even for a lawyer to
know what counsel to give. But in the England
of our future lienchers something of this may be
amended. Even this day a thousand statutes, oboe-
tete, exhausted, superseded, vanish from the Statute-
book. This day come info operation the Ann
fruits of our Codification of Law, in the Consoli-
dated Criminal Statutes. We may be allowed to
indulge in the happy prognostication of more of
such benefits to come, under the auspices of a
Pauses whese Brit day of membership of the
Society of the Law has been thus fortunately dis-
tinguished. We may dare to think of a time
when no deeper study than it is said
he has already given shall make the'