Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-08-11 00:00:00

Yarmouth, the Liberal candidates were elected

and Captain Hamilton has been returned for the
Falkirk- Burghs. Mr. Merry, the unseated mem-
ber, was on the hustings, and addressed the
electors.
The Liverpool summer Assizes were opened in
due form yesterday. Mr. Baron Watson charged
the grand jury at some length, upon the pre-
valence of crime of the most serious character in
the county. He referred to some of the causes
which led to thse unhappy results, and expressed
his conviction as to the diffusion of a proper
system of education. His Lordship next referred
to the abolition of transportation, and of the substi
tution of penal servitude in its stead His Lordship
then, in a marked manner, wished it to become
known that in future ithose persons sentenced to
penal sersi.ude woull be slaves, and kept to labour
during the respective terms of their sEntence. In
the latter part of the learned judge's charge, he
made pointed reference to two particular cases of
murder oa the calendar. For the charge in its
itlAa, u

to our report in another part of te-day's paper.
rrTi''ail'citnliAririniananurMc?.ll,!tt:Leißt.i?.? 111.9
wife, by poison, at Lancaster. The wretched man
was found guilty, and sentenced to death. During
the time the learned judge, Baron Channell, was
passing sentence, several ladies, who happened to
be in court, fainted, and it is said that his lordship
was deeply affected in consigning a fellow-mortal
to an untimely end. _ .

We are grieved 'tn say that a melancholy and
fatal occurrence took place yesterday on the West •
Derby Road, wheresy a lady of much respectability
and standing in society lost her life. The lady
was the wife of Mr. John Garner, of Breck-lane,
ironfounder and merchant. We refrain from
making comment on this melancholy affair, until
the Coroner shall have held an inquest on the body
of the unfortunate lady.
The chief item of Continental news is the
rupture between the protectors of Turkey about
the Moldavian elections. We do not know what au-
thenticiry is attached to a series of private letters
between Kaimakam Vogorides and members of his
family, which are published by the organ of the
Rouman unionists, at Brussels. If authentic, they
must have been taken clandestinely from his desk
On this assumptian, they go far to show that France
and her allies have a right to complain of Prince
Vogorides' treatment of the Moldavian elections,
and of the underhand proceedings of the English
and Austrian diplomatists iu urging him on to play
their game. In connection wi.h this subject, we
may mention that we have some interesting in-
telligence in the French Univers, which represent
that the Austrian and English ministers at Con-
stantinople have not only supported the Sultan in
resisting the demands of France, but have said
that they do not shrink from taking any responsi
bility that may arise for such a refusal. It is clear,
as stated in our French news, that the rupture of
relations is not so much with Turkey as with the
European powers themselves, whO are quarelling
and taking sides as to the future of the Ottoman
empire.
A telegraph from Berlin of the Bth, informs us
that the ministerial paper, the Zeit, in its evening
edition of that day, accompanies the announce-
ment of the rupture of the diplomatic relations
between Prussia and Turkey with some refi :c•
tions. It shows that article 23 of the Treaty of
Paris, which was inserted on the demand of
England herself, has not been executed. At the
same time the Prussian ministerial print, in
replying to the Austrian press, reminds it of
the mission of Prince Leiningen, Extraordinary
Austrian Envoy, in 1833, connected with the
affairs of Montenegro, when the Porte yielded to
the threats of Austria, without being humiliated
by it As far as Prussia is concerned, says the
Zeit, her interes:A are limited to the preservation
of the peace of Europe, which can only be con-
sidered secure on condition that everybody con-
scientiously fulfils the engagements he undertakes,
and respects treaties.
The Echo du Danube, the organ which the
Unionist party plashes at Brussels, contains in
its lost number extracts of the confidential letters
of Klmaikam Vngorides. which the Unionists, by
a successful diplomatic burglary, seem to have
recently abstracted from his desk at Jassy; at least,
such is the only possible pretence of those who
now give them to the world as genuine. The Echo
du Danube at the same time pretends that the
originals of these letters is under safe trusteeship,
accompanied by proofs of authenticity.
The Prussian ministerial paper gives the reason
why Prussia has taken a part in the protest, and
this final rupture of diplomatic relations. Prussia,
it says, has done so in the interest of the peace of
Europe, which can be firmly established only when
international engagements are kept and treaty
observed.
' The last advices from Madrid inform us that,

after a good deal of discussion, as to whether the
negociations on the Mexican affairs should take
place at Paris, London, or Madrid, the latter city
has been selected. One of the papers state that
the government intended to send 25,000 men to
Cuba, to act against Mexico, but the Epoca, a min-
isterial
.authority, says that it doubts that any such
force is to be forwarded, Some noted liberals of
the province of Ternal had been sent to Guip-
useoa.
By a letter from Holstein, we learn that several
members, on the meeting of the States on the 15th
instant, will propose to modify the first article of
the provincial constitution of 1854, in accordance
with the spirit of the old institutions of the
country. That article declares that Holstein shall
for ever be united with Denmark, in conformity
with the law of succession of the 31st July, 1853
" The rejection of the article," says the letter,
" would amount to a protest against the protocol of
London, and would have the greater importance
from the fact that the Germanic Confederation has
not vet recognised that protocol."
We are in receipt of New York advices of the
30th ult , which are of a satisfactory character
The insurgents in Kansas had yielded to General
Walker without a collision. The United States
frigate Mississippi had not taken her departure
for China, es she had sustained some damage by
a storm. Favourable intelligence had been re-
ceived from New Granada. Full details will be
found in another portion of to-day's issue.

THE Liverpool Assizes commenced yesterday.
Mr. Baron 'WATSON is the Crown judge, and
Mr. Baron CHANNELL presides at Nisi Prius.
The calendar is heavy—that is, the cases are
many in number, and frightful in character.
The horrid crime of murder figures conspicuously
—no less than fifteen persons being charged with
that offence. Besides these, twenty persons are
charged with felonious assaults. There are

eleven cases of rape, and no less than thirty of
highway robbery, and thirty-three for burglary.
Eight persons are charged with forgery, six for
perjury, and a similar number with bigamy,
besides a great number for crimes of lesser
magnitude. The total number of prisoners for
trial is 165. When we consider that all this
amount of crime has taken place in the short
space of four months, we cannot wonder that
Mr. Baron WATSON should say that the list
before him was calculated to create in the minds
of many persons considerable alarm.

Where crime (and crime of such a serious
character, too) is so rife—where the midnight
assassin, the blood-thirsty burglar, and brutal
and fiendish violator of female chastity can stalk
abroad and perpetrate their unholy deeds to such
an extent as the calendar of the present assizes
shows—neither life nor property can be secure.
But Lancashire is not the only county where
the serious offences alluded to are committed.
In almost every county where the judges have
held a gaol delivery murder and aggravated
manslaughter have been among the cases which
they have tried. The history of a single week
proves this. JOHN B LAG G was convicted
of murder, on Friday, at Chester. On
Saturday, a man named JACKSON was
executed at Stafford for the same crime, and a
few hours afterwards Mr. Baron CHANNEL
sentenccd the " Chorley poisoner" to be executed
at Lancaster for the murder of his wife. The
only excuse for the heaviness of the calendar
which th. ifirtze could make was. that when
vast masses of the people were congregated in

hey must naturally look For much crimi-

nality.

We were glad to perceive that Baron WATSON
places some faith in the efficacy of education as
a repressor of crime, and we could earnestly
hope that the `• powers that be" took the same
advanced view of the matter. If the object of
education is to train up good and useful citizens,
and to repress the disposition to be vicious, his
lordship was correct when he told the Grand
Jury that "he knew no means whatsoever to
stem the torrent of crime which seems to be
setting in upon the country at large, but by
beginning at the beginning with the people—
that is with education." Now, we have already
shown in these columns that a great deal of
what has passed as education has been nothing
more than mis-education, and that that mis-
education has been the means of making experter
criminals, who have plunged into one offence
after the other until the gallows has been the
denouement of their iniquitous career. Failing
to influence the morals of that portion of the
people disposed to commit criminal actions, the
next best thing is to work upon them by
punishments which have for their distinguishing
feature, certainty, permanence, and severity.
Judge WATsoN had no doubt a coincident idea
in his mind, when he alluded to the punish-
ments of transportation and penal servitude.
The system of transportation has been abol-
ished ; and no vv penal servitude, either at home
cr in foreign countries, is to be carried out, and
the convict doomed to slavery during the
greater part of his sentence. It was only last
winter that the garotte system of robbery was
in full blow. Then we found that the " ticket-
of-leave" scheme was a curse to society. It very
soon wrought out its own cure ; and we hope
the new Bill of Sir GEORGE GREY will do much
to strike terror into the hardened and depraved,
when they know that, if convicted, they will
have no chance of escape from the sentence
which the Judge may pass upon them.
It cannot be too often impressed upon the
authorities that the general treatment which
prisoners meet with, instead of stopping crime
only induces many parties—male and female—
to acts of atrocities, so that they can get good
food, raiment, and comfortable lodging. Pun-
ishment has two important functions to
discharge—the reformation of the criminal, and
an example and terror to evil-doers. This
cannot be more effectually done than by the
convict knowing that during the term of his