The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-06-01 00:00:00

must merit by their conduct and bearing towards
the public their good opinion.

We have on more than one occasion had to
condemn the reckless conduct of police constables
not only of Liverpool, but Birkenhead. We
commented then, as we do now, for the pur-
pose of protesting against proceedings which
were alike antogonistic to law and justice. The
case which forms the subject of our present
remarks is that of Mr. JAMES M`DONALD, who
was illegally incarcerated in the bridewell of
Birkenhead, on Saturday se'nnight, and kept
there until the following Tuesday.

What are the facts of this case ? He asserts
—and our past experience of a policeman's
evidence warrant us in attaching as much credit
to his statement as to their " Police-court
testimony"—that on Saturday night, the 23rd
ult., when on his way home, he saw two
policemen dragging a poor man to bridewell.
M DONALD saw what he conceived to be undue
force, violence, and even brutality, to effect the
officers' object. This, by the way, is nothing
unusual in the police force. Often and often
have we witnessed sueh acts of tyrannical force
both here and elsewhere, and on every occasion
where parties like Mr. M`DONALD protested
against such unfeeling conduct, we have found the
police most anxious to devise a plan whereby
they could inflict a most unmerited and galling
vengeance upon those who dared to remonstrate
against their official insolence.
Mr. APDON ALD tells his tale in plain and
unmistakeable terms. He shows how he was
pounced upon—how the police treated him,
and how Mr. Bridewell-keeper GLEAVE used
him when incarcerated upon a charge which
was prepared for the purpose of annoying a
man whose tact and ability had been to them
a source of great annoyance, inasmuch as on
more than one occasion he had exposed the
villanies of the police system.
Now, admitting that the police who booked
Mr. M`DONALD had a sufficient cause for
preferring the charge they did, was it just or
honourable to refuse him the opportunity of
giving bail ? Nay more, the police who took
him into custody knew not only his name, but
his actual whereabouts. Had he committed an
offence they could have summoned him. But
that would not answer their purpose. It was a
Saturday night, hence imprisonment until Mon-
day morning would in their estimation be a good
preparation for the treadmill exercise, which they
were prepared to swear that his conduct merited .
We do not know whether most to condemn the
conduct of the police, jailer GLEAVE, or the pre-
siding magistrate, who rendered the sentence
which he did. Can it be that the observance of
peace, law, and order, were the only motives that
influenced the parties concerned ?
But there is another point in this case which
merits special attention, from the fact that it
forms one of its most important features. When
the case was called on before the magistrate,
Mr. M.DONALD asked for an adjournment, so as
to give him an opportunity of calling witnesses
to prove his innocence of the charge of being
drunk and disorderly. This was not only reason-
able, but a right to which, both by law and
justice he was entitled. The magistrate refused
the request, and on the exparte statement of the
police, sentenced him to find bail, or go to prison
for twenty-one days. This was a proceeding
which appears indefensible, and a line of policy
which we would not expect at the hands of the.
Birkenhead magistrate. No reason was given
for the refusal, and Mr. M`DONALD had to bow
to a decision which under other circumstances he
could have proved he did not merit.
We look upon the incarceration of Mr.
M'DONALD, and the treatment which he received,
as a direct stretch of the law which regulates the
liberty of the subject. On these grounds, and
with the view of at once putting a stop to all
attempts at police tyranny and magisterial
harshness, we have written. If Mr. M'DONALD
witnessed harshness and undue severity, he had
. a right to complain and to remonstrate against it.
Good men will thank him for his attempt. The
base and the depraved only can gloat over and
pompously parade the misfortune and the
sufferings he endured for stigmatising acts of
inhumanity and official insolence.

No MORE LAWYERS.—The number of law students is
at present so great in Prussia, that the Minister of Justice
has thought it advisable to address a circular to the rectors
of public school's, directing them to warn their pupils, and
the parents or friends of the latter, that the legal career
is, on the whole, not a profitable one.in Prussia; and that
those young men who poss;;s3 no private fortune would do
well to choose another.

MONEY AND MARRIAGE.—The Lord Chancellor's new
divorce bill maintains due homage to the majesty of the
law and the profits of the lawyers. A man's wife still
remains to him his goods and chatels. If a man possess a
beautiful picture, a magnificent piece of porcelain, and
either picture or pottery is maliciously damaged or frac-
tured, the owner thereof has, of course, a remedy at law
for the injury. Hs brings his suit, and is awarded in re-
compence so much money. Now the law, as it is left by
Lord Cranworth, leaves the wife of a man's bosom in the
condition, (no higher and no lower), of the picture and the
vase. If spotted or flawed she is to
,be paid for, and there
an end. Very commercial this, bat not very com-
plimentary to the dignity of human nature. But so it
is. When a wife fails to be good, she is goods.
SIXTY MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT 111ZARING Ma.
SPURGEON AT °NCH. —Among Mr. Spurgeon's congrega-
tion on Sunday morning, were the Duchess of St. Alban's,
Lady Coote, Lady Craven, Lady Mowbray, M. Baron
Bramwell, and between 60 and 70 members of parliament.
The rev. gentleman preached from Hebrews iv. There
remaineth, therefore, a rest to the people of God. Re-
specting this young Baptist minister tho Patriot says :
•• His success is indicative of two important things, in•l
both of which Congregationalists, especially, ought to
rejoice : —l. That the same sensitiveness of the popular
mind to powerful preaching which was present in the days
of Bunyan, Whitefield, and Wesley, still lives among our
countrymen. 2. That the great body of the laity still
prefer the savour of sound doctrine. For, it will soon be
evident, whether to those who read, or to those who hear
Mr. Spurgeon, that, young as he is, he has drank deeply,
and still driuks, first at the pure spring of revealed truth ;
and then, that he delights himself in the study of the
elder Puritan and Nonconformist divines. His theology
belongs to the school of Usher and Bunyan, unpolluted
by the muddy waters of German Philosophy or German
neology."