Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-09-21 00:00:00

story told by the individual in question, accords
precisely with many others of a somewhat similar
kind, which have recently been brought under
our notice. He says, "I had occasion to pass
some waste land at the back of Conway-street,
on my way home on Saturday evening. I was
accosted by a policeman, who demanded my
business and seize I my parcel. I told him I was
going home, and looked at his number. lie
then struck my hat over my face, and took from
under my arm a pair of old shoes I was carrying
home. I told him his conduct was improper,
and I would go to the office and report him.
I went accordingly, and when stating my case,
the policeman came in, and charged me as a
suspicious character. Oc his charge I was
booked; although I had referred them to a
respectable party, to whom I was known. My
papers were taken from me, and all perused by
the officers, and I was locked up in Thidewel
until Monday morning, when I was brought
before the magistrate, by whom I was remanded
until Tuesday, when I was discharged ; a
gentleman, to whom I was known, having
satisfied the magistrate of my respectability.
Before being liberated however. I had to pay
nine shillings for accommodation !" Such is the
statement of our correspondent, Mr. NEAME, of
whom we know nothing.

But we wish to ask the authorities of Birken-
head what they have done in the matter. The
charge, and it is a grave one, has been
before the public long enough to have enabled
the magistrates to have investigated it thoroughly
and pronounced on its truth or falsehood. Has
anything of the sort been done ? We believe
not. It matters not how gross the conduct of
their officers may be, the magistrates are, it seems,
ready to throw their protecting shield over them.
But they may rest assured such conduct will not
always escape without meeting its just deserts.
What ! is it come to this ; that a person going to
the Police office, to prefer a complaint against
an officious policeman, is to be (out of revenge)
charged as a felon, deprive I of his liberty for
days and nights, and mulcted in a very heavy
penalty, ere he can again procure it ? monstrous.
We read of oriental and continental despotisms,
and we shudder at the outrages perpetrated on
the unhappy wights of those lands, and we
rejoice that we live in a free country. A free
country, forsooth ! Where is the freedom, when
an organised Police can, with impunity, commit
the acts• which these men have been recently
charged with committing. It is something more
than disgraceful to the Cheshire Magistrates that
they have not long ere this instituted a searching
investigation into the doings of this confederacy.
Their apathy is positively criminal. Charges of
the most serious kind have been preferred against
them ; yet no steps have been taken to investi-
gate these. But if the magistrates 'cannot, or
will not, perform their duty, they may rest
assured we shall not neglect ours, nor shall we
fail to denounce, in the manner it deserves,
conduct such as has been recently displayed by
the Birkenhead Police—conduct which is a
reproach alike to Christianity and civilisation.
A combination such as this has been de-
scribed to us, must not, cannot, be tolerated in
any country having any pretensions to free insti-
tutions. Orange or Ribbon confedracies, with
their burning passions, their fierce hatred, their
blood-thirsty spirit of revenge, their certain
tendency to perjury, and the grossest immorality
of every kind, are not the elements of which an
honest, respectable, well-disciplined police force
ought to be composed. Yet, if we are not much
misinformed, such are the constituents of that
body in Birkenhead.

WANT or SoLnizas IN INDIA.—The Indian government
is straini'rg every nerve to col!ect the troops wirhin its
reach. Tha Globe states that "the Pottinger, the Assaye,
and a small sailing vessel have been sent back to the
Mauritius to c-mvey another wing of the 33rd, a troop of
Artillery, and a wing of the 4th to Bombay. Captain
Griffiths J3nkens has been despatched to the Cape with the.
Chusan, the Madras, and the England, screw ships of 1,000
tons each. The Himalaya has also been sent from Calcutta
to the Cape."

Tae Leader enters its protest against the present system
of literary purling, and olaerves that when, after all forms
of pufiling have been tried in vain, the book rerwtins
unsold, a fresh title-page is printed. The volume formerly
called " The War in the Panjaub," is now culled " Ths
Bengal Mmin3.'", Misery," a tale of appalling interest.
re-appears as "Woe ! Woe !" a work wt.i,l should be in
every young lady's hands. It will come out next year as
" Lualine ; or, the Story of an Anguished Heart." We
shall be t .1.1, " Tnis is a fiction of surpassing power," But
who will tell us ? One who would as wi:lingly indite the
pr she of a pill or a psletot as promote the iramortllity of
"Eialine." There may be no vice, ro d;sh,n‘szy in the
practice; but if it m's'eads the public, it is at least per-
nicious, and out t) k sown for what it

The Atlas thinks there must be some such weighty
reason as the personal convenience of Soasebody'a Cousin—
or surely even our governmert would not, at the present
crisis, subject the public to an unnecessary suspense of two or
three days in waiting for Indian news, as it does, by sill
insisting that the deep atchos in anticipation of the overland
mail; shall be seat via Cagliari. Cagliari is four, if not fire
de) s' sail from Alexaedria,evea for a quick steamer; so that,
when the mai's have safely passed the perils of the Indian
Ocean and the desert five days, setae time must elapse ere
any telegraphic Ina: of their contents can be pat in motion.
Now, there happens to be a city called Constantinople, which
is only two days' sail from Alexandria, and from which
city there is a telegraphic communication all the way to
London. The question then arises, why not send the
mails from Alexandria to Conslaetinople, and telegraph
the nature of their contents from Constantinople to Lon.
don ? Oae objection has been urged to this, that the line
ottelegtapWc oommunicatin with the Turkish capital runs
through Austrian territory, and our Cl•vernment would
rather trust their secrets in safer keeping than' the hands of
our great Imperial (we beg pardon, and Royal) German
ally. Very good ; but are they in safer keeping
now ? What guarantee have we for the fidelity of the
Sardinian and French goveraments to our own intlreets in
preference to that of the Austrian ? During the Crimean