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London, England, 1825-07-18 00:00:00

'their labels vend it further Wal urged, that on two Otero] ores.
sions the inhabitants had passed by-laws for the purpose of re-,
Plating the illt Of witting for the appointment of Bailiff. Tbel
title's refer* to win to the erect of preventing any personal
The *add -oaths 91111,0 In lir Borough, and not possess an ads.]
Arm of ..wohlt vetti,i .I,Autit.:*tash "caveats. merael bees ntalued sujeh liirinitt
rights of hot nut, and was not possessed by the inha•
blunts of the
Mr. Jostle, IsvertenaLv went through the whole of the eel.
deuce, and summed up the case in his charge to the Jury ; is
doirtg which he said he should principally direct their attention
to two points, which it was for them to determine. The first point
for their consideration was, whether it had been customary for the
constable of one year to he the bailiff of the next year, and, whether
that custom stood established in time immemoriaL lie was of
opinion the immemorial usage had been e ittirlished.' It was proved
to have existed for two.periods of thirty. years each, from 1616 to
1716, and from 17V7 to the present time, anti as no evidence
was given to prove that in the interval between those two periods,
namely, from 1716 to 1797, • contrary practice had prevailed.
they were to assume it had been continued uninterruptedly and
fined in the affirmative upon that point. The second point, and
indeed the main one to be considered. was the right of the Lord of
the Manor to elect to the office of bailiff; and this involved a ques.
tion of more difficulty, and, as he had said, was the important cir.
icumstance op the decision of which the case depended. There was
a remarkable terraces in the terms of the documents relative to the
1 mode in which it had been customary to appoint the bailiff• In
one the bailiff was described as " elected and sworn," in another
the words were " A. B. was presented ar.d retutned to serve
the office of bailiff," and in the third he was said to be " chosen
and sworn." Sure a word had been caught up from ends
of the former and inserted in this latter document; the words
i " elected" sad " chosen" being synonymous and of similar
• signification. Now the' question the Jury had to try was, I
whether upon tine face and. from. the terms of these documents it 1
appeared that the right of appointmer.t lay in the Lnrd of the.
Manor, the appointment being merely recorded or confirmed br
1 thetJ ury, or whether the documents did not rather demonstrate that '
1 the;election vested in the Jury itself ? When he mentioned the right
of sppointnient, he meant the fact, the former being dependent
upon the latter in this case. For his part, he was iuclined to think that
the Jury possessed the right, and had exercised the power of elect- •
ing the Bailttli as they had not, he could not perceive the utility of
the documents that bad been produced. If the Jury thought the 1
custom of the Borough bad been foe the Lord of the Manor to
appoint the Bailiff; they would find forthe defendant ; but if they
hodieved the contrary to be the fact, and that the Jury had been
the parties who were in the habit of electing that officer, their ver-
!diet must be for the Crown.

The Jury, without hesitation, found a verdict for the Crown.
RIDGE v. 11`ZAY.

lklr. Comes opened the pleadings, and
111 r. ERSKINE stated the ease to the Jury, and said that the
question for their consideration was, whether or not the defendant
had acted as a trustee to the turnpike roads leading from Basing-
stoke to Stockbridge, without having previously qualified himself
by taking the oaths as by law appointed ; and if he had done so,
what amount of penalty he had incurred, or in other words. how often
lie had committed those acts which subjected bins to penalties
under the existing Statutes 7 The Acts of Parliament which ap-
pointed those penalties were first passed in the 29th of George
and continued down from thence to the present rime. In the first
Act trustees of made were nominated--some of them becoming so
by virtue of their office, among whom was the Bailiff of the Bo-
rough of Sto:kbridge. By. a Statute passed in the 4th yen of the.
present reign, the qualifications appointed in the former Acts were
confirmed, aid it was further enacted, " That no person shall act
as Trustee or Commissioner of Roads until he has taken an oath in
the presence of another Trustee or the Treasurer or Secretary to
the trust, that he will to the beet of his power and ability discharge
the duty devolving on him in his capacity of Trustee; and it is
farther provided, that any person acting as Trustee, without having
duly taken the oath above recited, shall forfeit a aum of M. for
each and every act he shall so perform without having ohtserved
the necessary qualifications.'' All that was necessary, on the part
of the prosecution, was to prove these two facts, that the defendant
had acted as a Trustee, and that he had not qualified himself to do
so by taking the necessary oaths ; and if he could establish those
facts, he should expect. a verdict in favour of the plaintiff
Mr. Sergeant WILDE admitted that the defendant had served
the office of Bailiff of Stockbridge in 1824.
Mr. William Henry Attwood—l am clerk to the trustees of
the Basingstoke road, by Popham to Stockbridge, and have seen
the books in which the proceedings of the trustees are entered.
I was present when the defendant was sworn into the office as Bai.
liff of Stockbridge, for the year 1824. (It was here intimated by
Mr. \Vilde that the defendant could not have been sworn, as, being
of the Quaker persuasion, he had an objection to taking an oath.)
Mr.lll`laay did not dress like a Quaker. I have seen him at our
church. I can tell by reference to my boobs that the defendant
attended a meeting of the trustees of the Basingstoke Road on the
13th of September last. After the business of the day had con-
cluded I saw him sign his name to the memorandum of the pro-
ceedings of the meeting, as was customary with the attending true-
tees. lie also signed the minutes of the proceedings of the trustees
of the 27th of September; he did so on the 16th of Nevember last.
I saw him attend the meeting of the trustees on the 27th of January
in this year, but he did not then sign his name to the minutes.
I can swear there is no entry in the books of Mr. laPliay having
taken the trustee's oath, aerequired by the Statute.

• •
Mr. Janke LITTI.rDAtI charged the Jury, and recapitulated
the facts of the case. Ifis Lordship expressed' himself of opinion
that the Statutes should be esibarrned In • literal manner, fur even''
it' the plaintiff weriseorballoesuited, it would only occasion further
litigation. With respect to the act of trusteeship alleged to have
been committal on the Nth of Jan., it was not clearly made out.
The points for the consideration of the Jury were, whether the
defendant took the oath required by tie Statute, and secondly,
whether he performed acts of trusteeship within the time specified
in the Act ?

The Jury found that the defendant did not take the oath of
a trustee. and that he wed in that capacity on the 11.:b of
November.
CROWN SIDE.
Before Mr. Justice datzwt.rd.
James Pieria,: was put to the bar, indicted for twisting, with
divers personvunknown, on the 3d of June, in the pariah of Mil-
ton, in this county, in unloading a certain vessel liable to seizure,
and unlawfully smuggling therefrom WO gallons of spirits, contrary
to :he provisions of the Act of the 43th of Geo. HI. The ildict-
roost also stated, that James Pullen, Lieutenant in the Coast Pre.
vehtive Service, assisted by Wm. Young and NVm. Willisms, had
endeavoured to apprehend those persons : and that they were tin.
lawfully opposed and obstructed in the execution of their duty by
James Pittran, misted by several others unknown.
The prisoner pleaded guilty.
The prisoner was further charged with shooting at the three re-
venue officers already mentioned. on the night of the 34 June, at
Lob's-hole, in the parish aforesaid, and assaulting and obstructing
them in an attempt to seize the contraband goods mentioned in the
last indictment.
The prisoner pleaded NotlGuilty to this indictment.

!Ur. Justice OASELEE said that it wan not the intention of the
prosecutor to O'er any proof in support of the last indictment, to
which the prisoner had pleaded lsiot Guilty, and 'crawling/iv it be-
came his thity.to direct the Jury to acquit the prisoner.
Not G ihy.

The prisoner being called upon for what he had to urge in miti.
Ration of the judgment of the Court, for the offence to which lie
had pleaded Guilty,
Mr. Selwyn recommended the prisoner to mercy, on the ground
of his contrition for themffence.
Mr-Justice GASELEE passed sentence upon the prisoner, and
in doing so observed, that the offence to which he had pleaded
guilty—the obstruction of persons legally authorised to seize
contraband goods in the execution of their duty, was one of a
very grave and serious nature. It was punishable under the
43th of the late King with transportation for seven years,or
imprisonment and hard labour in a House of Correction for three
years. The indictment on which the priaaner had been charged
grew out of the transactions that occurred on the 3d of June at
Lob's-hole. and which had been before the Court yesterday in a
difforent shape; and after what had been developed of those
occurrences on that occasion, he thought there could not be
any one that heard him who was nos deeply impressed with a sense,
of the danger and illegality of such combinations as there ap-
, peered to have been formed. It was of importance to the ma.
gidedoilnatdlvforidusaulschenagac-emde
A ituheyhosweerie"eltalle iaatttoemaptsvertyo inform'asv
puniere
;liment, more particularly when, as on that occasion, they
assembled with clubs, sticks, bludgeons, and other unlawful]
weapous, in order to effect the landing of contraband articles.
Such was the strictness of the law, and so decidedly did it dis.
countenance all such proceedings, that it looked upon all who
were present, aiding and abetting upon those occasions by their
presence, although they took no more active part in the trans-
, action, as guilty of stunting in the commission of a felonious set.
He had already sussed the severe punishment provided by the
I law against the perpetrators of this offence, and, if were not in-
flicted in its fulltat extent, it was only because the prosecutors
were mercifully disposed to be satisfied with such a measure of
punishment as might eifect the abolition of the crime. In the pre-
sent case the public prosecutors considered that the prisoner had
been unthinkingly led iota the illegal combination and the corn.
mission of crime by means of pertains more deeply implicated in I
guilt than himself, 'and that at the period of his connexion with
them, lie was not fully aware of the magnitude anti extent of the
offence. He was also happy to understand that, since his commit-
ment, the prisoner had conducted himself in a becoming manner,
and it was under those circumstances his case had been recom-
mended to the favourable consideration of the Court ; he was happy
to am it would be in the power of the Court to pay attention to the
recommendation. emanating from the clemency of the prosecutors.
The Court, oat this !account, would not inflict the punishment of
transportation, and would further make some mitigation in the
quantity of imprisonment it was cmotent for It to award, The
prosecutors had displayed singular forWarance not oily in recom-
mending the prisoner to mercy, but also in abandoning the capital
part of the charge, and he trusted the prisoner would show himself
sensiblojof the mercy he had teetivcd,'and not unworthy of it, by in
ftuure acting with more circumspection, and abstaining from the
commission of illegal acts, or joining illegal combinations. The
sentence he should pronounce upon the prisoner was that of im-
prisonment and hard labour in the House of Correction for the apace
of one calendar month,
(The above case formed a part of the system of smuggling pur.
sued on the coast, and was closely connected with the transactions
developed on the trial of Lieutenant Pullen, which excited so ex-
traurdicary AVAlAtira in this part of the country yesterday.l