Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-08-24 00:00:00

CAPE OF GOOD HOPE.

(EXTRACT FROM A (LADY'S) PRIVATE LETTER )
RatuvrielE (Cape of Good Hope), April 22.
Since I wrote yon last our quiet little town has gone
-head at a rate that has not a little astonished the slow-going Cape-
res. The cause of the great movement has bzen the alarm of another
Kaffir outbreak, and our Governor has wisely considered that the bet-
ter part of va'our is discretion, and that the best way to maintain
peace is to be prepared for war.
At first the grantees of farms :ere ordered to the front to protect
the district. but they were soon relieve! from their disagreeable duty
by the military arrangements his Excellency was enabled to make
from the abundant supply of troops that was sent t ) the colony.
The 85th Regiment are, for the present, stationed in (Ideenstown.
They are a quiet and orderly sat, both officers and men, and of course
stlea an increase to the population of our settlement has given an
impetus to business that could not have been calculated upon by. the
most sangu ne.

Sir George Grey has lent every assistance in his power to Improve
the resources of the district. Engineers are employe] to Improve the
harbour at East London; and the other day we heard from a gentle-
man, Just come from there, that eleven vessels were at anchor when
he left, some of them direct from England. It makes a great saving of
land carriage, instead of landing and shipping at Port Elizabeth as
formerly.
Several Cape houses have entered into business in Queenstown'
and more are proposing to follow the example ; and, to judge from
appearances, all seem to be prospering.
We at one time expected that a part of the German Legion would
be located here, but It has been arranged differently; they are estab-
',shed in villages all along the frontier.
For the present all alarm of war is at an end ; and the people are in
high spirits at the prospect of peace and at the high price of wool.

ANCIENT RULES FOR THE BALL-ROOTS.—The following
transcript of ancient fashionable regulations, copied from
a framed and printed paper in the Museum at Derby, may
amuse our readers, and illustrate manners and customs of
a century since :—" Rules to be observed. is the Ladies'
Assembly in Derby. No lady shall be admitted in a long
white apron. All rung ladies in mantuas shall pay 2s. 6d.
No Miss in a coat shall dance without permission of the
lady of the assembly. Whoever shall trapsgress any of
these rules shall be turned out of the assembly.

ALLEGED LIBEL.—JENEYN V. GLOVER AND ANOTHER.—
This was a writ of inquiry, brought in the Sheriff's Court,
London, on Thursday, to assess damages in an action
brought in one of, the superior courts. The declaration
set forth an alleged libel, which was published hr the
Morning Chronicle, on the 12th of December last, and the
defendants were the proprietor and publisher of that
journal. The particulars of the case, which were stated
at great length, were totally devoid of public interest.
The jury gave a verdict for the plaintiff, with £25
damages, adding that they did so with the greatest
reluctance.

COMMITTEIII OF SUPPLY.—The select committee ap-
pointed to corsider the present forms for the conduct of
public business in committee of supply," have agreed to
the following resolutions :-1. That in a committee of
supply the present mode of putting the question on an
amendment for a reduction of a vote be altered. 2.
That in a committee of supply a member be at liberty to
take the opinion of the committee on any item contained
in the vote. 3. That when an amendment is proposed to
leave out or reduce a particular item of a vote, the
question shall be put from the chair whether the proposed
reduction (specifying the item) be agreed to. 4. That
when several amendments to different items are proposed,
they shall be taken in the order in which they appear in
the printed estimates. 5. That when a motion shall have
been made and question put for the reduction of any
item, no question for the reduction of any preceding
item shall be put. 6. That when any reduction or
reductions shall have been agreed to, the vote so reduced
shall be put from the chair.
It is proposed to form an association in Lancashire for
encouraging the• increased growth of cotton in Jamaica,
for the supply of the manufacturers in this country.
Millions of acres of fine land are at this moment lying,
waste in Jamaica; and although in those parishes (cow
comparatively few) in which sugar is still made, more
men might find employment at certain seasons of the year,
yet there are many extensive districts in which the
labourers cannot find profitable employment, and are
obliged to rent or purchase land to grow the necessaries o
life for the support of their families, or to travel 15 and
even 20 miles from their homes, and in some instances to
Central America, in search of work. All such persons,
with numbers of women and children, might be profitably
and advantageously employed in cotton cultivation. Cot-
ton gathered in the St. Andrew's Mountains has been
exhibited at the Exchange Rooms in Manchester, and has
been pronounced as of the value of 141. per lb., whilst
the coq, when properly ginned, need not exceed 4d. or
sd. per lb. ' so that it may now be cultivated at a profit of
at least 25 to 40 per cent. All that seems necessary is,
that a few spirited Manchester gertlemen should form
themselves into a commit tee, with a view to such arrange-
ments es may be necessary to induce the manufacturers
and other capitalists of the county to incur a comparatively
triflingrisk by the advance of a working capital of £20,000,
or at the most £30.000, to put in cultivation 2,000 acres of
land in cotton, so as to point an example of profitable
cultivation to the numerous proprietors of West Indian
estates, who require to be stimulated to the improvement
of their own property. Several of the principal manufac-
turers in Manchester have undertaken to take shares in s
limited liability company, and it is believed that the
friends of freedom all over the country, will heartily
co-operate in the undertaking.

THE MURDER ON THE HIGH SEAS.

OPINIONS OE TRIILONDON PRESS.

On Friday we made some remarks respecting this
terrible affair, in which we took occasion to point out the
justice of the verdict and sentence. The subject has
called forth some comments from the London press. We
reprint them, and our readers will find that they generally
coincide with our ob ervations.
The horrible charge of murder on the high seas just
tried at Liverpool has resulted in a verdict, of guilty
against Henry Rogers, the captain, and William Miles and
Charles Edward Seymour. the first and second mates of
the vessel. This verdict the jury have thought fit to
couple with a recommendation to mercy. To this recom-
mendation, for which no ground whatever is laid in the
evidence, we trust that the authorities of the Horne-office,
as far, at all events, as Henry Rogers, the principal culprit,
is concerned, will show the most absolute disregard. A
more atrocious and appalling case of infernal barbarity it
is utterly impossible for the human imagination to con-
ceive. It is a case for justice and not for mercy : or rather
it is a case in which clemency to the individual would be
cruelty to a class—an unprotected and suffering class
over whose welfare the executive government of this
country is especially bound to watch. There is no body
of men more liable to gross tyranny and brutal violence
than the mariners in our merchant service; there is none
whose safety and comfort ought to be an object of such
paramount care to the government of the greatest
maritime and mercantile community in the world. Unless
a signal and terrible examp'e be made of such monsters
as this Henry Rogers, the annals of our mercantile marine
will continue to teem with instances of oppressiJn and
crime that make the blood curdle, and the heart stand
still in an icy trance of disgust and horror. So loath-
some are the details cf this atrocious crime that
nothing except a strong sense of public duty could
prevail on us to reproduce them. Even as it is,
we must refuse to polute our pen with some of
the unspeakable horrors whose recital sickened even
the least squeamish hearer in that Liverpool assize court.
The witnesses gave their evidence with perfect simplicity
and straightforwardness : a searching cross-examination
failed to elicit any semblance of inconsistency or exaggera-
tion. And this. miscreant a jury of Englishmen have
recommended to mercy.. Mercy 1 why it makes one's
very blood boil to hear the word profaned in connec-
tion with atrocities so merciless. Mercy ! yes, the same
mercy that he meted to his victim is all that ought to be
to this abominable culprit. That instinct of wild justice
which all the conventions of civilisation cannot utterly
put down, irresistibly impels every honest hearer of this
vile story to regret that the law, even if carried out to
the very uttermost, can only punish, and not retaliate.
Rapid extinction at the hands of Calcraft is but a poor
requital for the protracted tortures under which this
miscreant worried the life out of his defenceless victim.
But mercy—the remission of the death sentence—would in
this case be an unpardonable weakness. An example—a
terror-striking example—must he made of this fiend in
human form, if there is to be hereafter any security for
life and limb for our mariners amid the silence and
solitude of the seas. The brutality of masters and mates,
both in the British merchant service and that of the
States, has long been tending to a climax. The climax is
reached. It is time for hstice to interfere with all her
salutary terrors. In certain classes of crime we have no
great faith in the efficacy of deterrents. Where the man
lives by crime as a profession, he will not be frightened
out of its pursuit by penal awards; but such crimes as
those of Henry Rogers are precisely of the class in which
deterrent punishments are mostefficajucisotuly fors.Akesittelr. law
stands, this brute's life has been moat
mercy to an oppressed class oLmeritorious and defence
less men, we demand that the Ink should take its course.
—Daily News.

The Liverpool jury has done justice to the case of the
"Murder on the High Seas " tried on Thursday. Juries
have been apt to take lax views of such cases. The bias
of a seaport jury is in favour of ship authorities and dis-
cipline. It is supposed in such cases that the victim was
au unmanageable fellow, or that he was a provoking
fellow; that he brought punishment upon himself; that
the captain must deal sharply with such fellows on peril
of the whole discipline of the ship giving way ; that this
being necessary, you must not examine his acts too
accurately ; that he may have overdone it, but that the
chances are a hundred to one for his having been sub-
stantially in the right. These are the sort of general
axioms that often direct a seaport verdict. But a seaport
jury has now found its way to a verdict of wilful murder
for death brought on by cruelty on board ship. The case
is certainly an atrocious one. There is a horrible mystery
in cruelty in its not being content with scattering pain,
but selecting some one victim for continuous torture. The
tormenter must stand, like the mesmerist, in fixed rela-
tions to some ofie person for the complete satisfaction of
his cruelty, otherwise the passion is stunted as it were,
and not properly and fully developed. It may be accidental
in the first instance what victim is selected, but, once
chosen, spite has got something to hold on, and grows by
concentration. The wretched man cannot do anything
which does not provoke his;tortnenter,—if he does not look
him in the face he is a reptile ; if he does he is an impu-
dent dog; if he speaks he is obstreperous; and if
he holds - his tongue pe is a sneak. So every motion,
word, and look of the victim feeds the torturing bully's
spite, which of course grows every day, and requires, like
an animal appetite, perpetual fresh acts to appease It
Cruelty is a hungry passion, and a tormenter grows lean
under it, unless he can satisfy it by 'a continuous victim.
Even then he must have variety, for cruelty is an epicure
as well as a glutton; it wants fresh dishes, strong season-
ing, and sharp sauces. This is the secret of such institu-
tions as the Inquisition. There" must be variety, or the
torturer himself gets tired. The apparatus which the
Spanish Armada conveyed exhibited a gradual and
scientific ascent from the thumbscrew to the rack. We
almost wonder all the time we read this account at
the courage of a man who could defy the natural
horror of a whole ship's crew for weeks. Indeed. it
shows the strength of discipline in our merchant service
that he was able to do so—a strength of discipline
which in the long run is most advantagous, however it may
on particular occasions incidentally result in the painful,
simple acquisence of a whole ship's crew while such
atrocities as those were going on. We might wonder, we
say, at the courage of a man who could throw himself so
c mfidently upon the principle of discipline and defy all
'the indignation of a ship's crew, did we not know that a
strong passion often gives an overbearing energy and
resolution of its own to the mind,—a force of will which
overrides opposition and nascent rebellion by simply not
seeing them. The crew stood by in sullen disgust
while those barbarities were being perpetrated, one
man only intimating to the captain that he would
have to answer for his conduct cn shore? The
trial has at last come, and a Liverpool jury
has ' decicred that murder on the high seas is still
murder. .But at the same time this seems to be a new
idea to them at present,—they cannot quite take it in;
they only half realise it ; they only caught hold of a corner
of it, and, like many other fresh discoveries and original
ideas, it startles at first even those who adopt it. The
Liverpool jury no sooner pronounce their verdict than
they sta. t back from the sound themselves have made, and
recommend the criminals to mercy. But what can he the
meaning of such a recommendation ? If this is wilful
murder, surely it is one of the most atrocious and
revolting that was 'ever committed. A man who
knocks another on the head with a blow is a
mild murderer compared with a wretch who first torments
his victim cruelly and then despatches him. Why,
then the recommendation to mercy? Does the jury
think the case very horrible, but still not amounting alto-
gether to murder ? Then, why did they bring in the ver-
dict of g"wilful murder" at all? We will give them the
option of either horn of the dilemma—either that their
verdict was right and recommendation wrong, or their
recommendation right and verdict wrong ; but both can-
not be right together. The confusion. however, is easily
explained. At Liverpool they have but just embraced
the idea that murder on the high seas is murder. Murder
on land is murder, but murder at sea—what .is that?
They must call it murder, because they do not know
what else it is ; but they recommend the criminal
to mercy because it is not really murder• Such a verdict
as this would disgrace, intellectually, any market town
in the country, because it is absolutely suicidal and self-
contradictory. Let them call the case manslaughter if
they do not really think it murder, but do not let them
call it wilful murder and recommend the criminal to
mercy. For, it this is murder, so far from the stain being
cleared away by the element on which it was committed,
—so far from all great Neptune's ocean washing out
that blood," it has itself the " multitudinous seas lacer-
nadined."

PASSENGERS REFUSING TO PAY TIIRIR FARES.—Six
able-bodied seaman and one ship caok were taken into
custody on Friday, at Mari-port, at the instance of Mr.
Tickle, agent for the Cambria, for refusing to pay their
fares rom Liverpoolto that place on the above day. The
men had intented to ship on board the Dykes, about to sail
from Marypart to Quebec, but owing to a dispute that
had arisen about wages, they refused to go. The money
that would have beeu advanced to them was consequently
witheid, and they were unable to pay the fare demanded.
A subscription was made by the sailors of Maryport, for
their liberation, and to pay their expenses back to Liver-
pool, to which place they returned on Saturday las', via
Whitebaven.— Whitehavert News,
SAVINGS BANits.—There has been issued a return of
the weekly and total increase or decrease of sums paid in
or withdrawn by the trustees of savings b inks between
the 20th November, 1855, and the 20;,h November, 1856,
with the amounts of stock purchased or sold by the com-
Otissioners for reducimn of the national deb'. The total
exc,ses paid in beyond the sums drawn out during the above
period was £303,009 lls 91; ditto excess drawn out beyond
the sums Paid in, £701,313 17s 6. The amount paid for
purchase Pig gock, &c., was £2,778,761 ; ditto received fur
sale of same, ...52,256,478 19s 11,1; dividends received by the
commissioners o u stock invested, and interest on Exchequer
Bills, &c., £1,05;8,711 12s ld, The amount of interest
credited to savings baTikS 99 091141 sums invested was
£1,109,502 4s 4d.