Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-01-03 00:00:00

THE NORTHERN TIMES, MONDAY, JANUARY 3, 1859

which are the indications of ,improving times
Customs, (to more than half the whole amount,)
Excise, Stamps, Post Office.

We are aware that the comparison of - the
Quarter to which these Revenue Returns relate,
with the corresponding Quarter of the previous
year, is not a fair one upon the whole, since that
was a period of great commercial panic and
depression, and one therefore in which the
Revenue was naturally declining. Still, as respects
the two periods, it shows that the evil of the
occasion has passed away—that better times have
returned—and that the Revenue, so sensitive of
the influences of an adverse state of trade, has
now* not only recovered from its temporary
declension, but is rising higher than before. This
fact is attested by a comparison of the Quarter
just ended with the corresponding Quarter of
1856, which still shows an increase, though at a
smaller rate.

This, then, is one source, and no unimportant one,
of seasonable congratulation. We enter upon the
New Year with, under all the circumstances of the
case, a prosperous Revenue, generally the sure test
of a satisfactory state of the great material interests
of the country. Something is fairly due, one may
not unreasonably think, to those who are entrusted
with the rule and governance of the kingdom, and
by whose hands not only the revenue itself is admi-
nistrated, but many of its sources are directed
and controlled. We believe, indeed, that the
country at large is sensible of this. Whatever
differences of opinion there may be as to the
political merits of the present Administration,—
and there are, of course, very various and very
opposite estimates formed of it in this respect,—
there is yet, we believe, a pretty general acknow-
ledgment and appreciation of the regular, careful,
and efficient manner, in which the public business
of the country is conducted. Those who have
occasion to communicate with any of the different
departments of the public service, we believe,. are
deeply impressed with this important fact ; and,
be their political opinions what they may, feel
constrained to admit it. To properly and success-
fully conduct the affairs of the nation, in its
various public offices, has no doubt -a material
bearing, in one way and another, upon the Public
Revenue ; and we all know, how it affects,
through different influences, the general prosperity
of the country. We say this from no political
feeling. We simply make the remark in
connection with financial considerations. And
although, where the fierce and generally
indiscriminating spirit of political party prevails,
such considerations are too apt to be overlooked,
or to be set at nought, they are those which, in a
great commercial community like that of Liver-
pooi, have everything to do with its welfare and
prosperity. •

THE EXECUTION at Kirkdale Gaol, on Saturday,
was one of those public exhibitions which are
calculated to produce so debasing an effect on our
public mind, that, were there no other argument
against capital punishment, their opponents can-
not but find an irresistable one in the evil, the

have upon the crowd that collects to witness them.
We say evidently have ; for no one could have beheld
the conduct of the populace on this, occasion,—as,
indeed, is the case on all similar occasions,—without
being impressed with the fact, that the awful
sacrifice of human life that was going on, was
exciting none.of that solemn feeling which such
an occurrence should do, if it is to serve the pur-
pose intended—that, namely, of operating as a
warning and an example. The great bulk of the
spectators of the revolting deed that was perpe-
trated upon the scaffold, were apparently of
the very class to which the unhappy victim
himself belonged. And the very mind in which
they went to the execution—the very motives by
which they were actuated, and the very feelings
which affected them, could one but ascertain them

and analyse them--would not, we feel well
assured, give promise of any good result whatever,
but only of one which, in its various ramifications,
is most vicious and demoralising. One is entitled
to speak thus, from the signs and symptoms of
such effects which the crowd so unmistaka-

.bly betrayed. There was .no resisting the
conviction, that the people were not being solemnly
and salutarily warned, but only wantonly and dis-
gustingly brutalised. They showed it .by their
language—they exhibited it in their very looks'.
Of course there would be here and there excep-
tions to this demoralising state of feeling. But,
take the aspect of the crowd as a whole,—take it,
and looking into it with any degree of care and
closeness,—and the more carefully and closely
.examined, the more powerful the impression,--
it was undeniably one that was_ deriving, in
the gross, any thing but what was good,
wholesome and improving, and yet this was the
very class of society for whose special benefit, as a
solemn warning and example, the execution was
made a public exhibition of ! • ` • 3

There was another reason, in this instance, why
this horrible and most vicious scene of strangulation
might have been spared, and yet justice 'not
slighted. It was somewhat questionable whether
or not the deed for which. the wretched man
suffered really amounted to one of murder. The jury
evidently wished to return a verdict of manslaughter.
And when, through the interference of the judge,
they were prevented from doing so, they accota-
. . _ _

panied their verdict of murder with a recom-

mendation ',mercy on the ground of the man
being druuk,—the woman, his wife, whom he
killed, being drunk also, and using all the provo-
cation at which a. drunken women is generally so

great an adept. We know that, in the eye of the
law, drunkenness is no excuse for any crime. But

here, without excusing the dreadful crime that was

committed,-it might, under all the circumstances
of the case, have been allowed to reduce it to one
of manslaughter; involving, as it might, a sentence
of penal servitude for life.
,altogether, then, this execution was a most
unsatisfactory
ng in itsvery charac-
ter, as all such public exhibitions ere—demoral-
izingsatiBfactory Revolti
affair.
u the very classes on
in its influences upo