The National Register.
London, England, 1822-11-03 00:00:00

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THE NATIONAL REGISTER

LETIER FROM 2R. RGIVRING TO MR. CANNING.

Boulogne-prison, Oct. 24.
Sto,—After 13 days of solitory and severe confinement, I
_ a permitted to address you I have liven shut out from al,
isommunication with my Government, my lawyer or physician'
with my family or frietets. Dario; this imprisonment au at-
tempt was made to remove use to Paris by a warrant Irani the
judges there. I resisted, nod resisted successfully, under the
protection of one of the articles of the rode de piuredu, a (the
100th), which these was every disposition to viotate.
It would appear the Government begins to feel that it has
hero too rash and arbitrary is its proceedings. I have under-
gone another Imo; exatuitsation—secret as usaal—ftUti even the
presence of an interpreter denied, though formally demanded.
Pour pages of interrogatories had been sent from Paris. Not
one question among them hail a reference to that " revolutionary
correspondence" of which I was suspected of being the bearer,
and on that plea, and that plea alone, delis ered over to the va-
rious acts of oritre4e of which I have been, and still am, the
victim. I again inquired wilt what I was charged, and de-
manded the ..ct of accusation. Nan! exists : ground pre-
viously token even seems abandoned. Some justification, some
plea of justification, would of ciourse he everited by yin , n
a long series of questions blase been seta in consequence ;
tome of which they deemed n i;ht possibly lead to a confession
or a detection, which might palliate their arbitrary pruceedings.
They suspect in. (they sly ), though they velour, not to accuse
me, as the proces verbal will show, of Leis; engaged in a plot
with individuals (whom I have never seen) err aged is London
(from I% hence 1 was far distant at the time) to rescue from
prison (though I never heard even of the place of their confine-
ment) the young men who who were lately eaecuted for.politi-
cal offences, (with nut an iudividaal of whom had I ever any
the slightest intereners They suspect me of furnishin," the
pecuniary means fat the escape, though not 1,000 francs have
passed through my hands since I hove beeu in this country.
The charge is as visionary as it is false—it is false in the ag-
gregate, it it false in every individual detail ; hut to support
it, the *bele machinery of moral torture (for the due operation
of which a fortnight's sufferings are supposed to have prepared
the victim) is put in action, and it is eipeeted to entrap some
new fact by a snare so widely and so artificially laid. Sir, it is
from this monstrous system of inquisitorial running and violence
that I appeal to toy country nod to you. Abandoned to the re-
sources of my own mind—a mind stronger, however; than all
the strength of tyranny—l have hitherto bad to struggle with
every thing that aatifice and oppression cou'd direct against me
abandoned, among criminals, without so touch as a Margie pre-
•amption, however weak of crime.
it eaunot sorely be tolerated, that a man, and an Englishman,
is to lie hunted from suspicion to suspicion—each ►aseless or
absurd—till something snail be found, or something shall be
fancied, which may serve to veil the original acts. If so, the
ends of suspicious despotism are gained—the sufferings are
indicted—the innocent object of dislike is buried io a dungeon.
cannot be done with impunity. I have confidence in
the dignity of your character: 1 here confidence in the high
spirit of toy country. Some redress will be demanded for the
past—some security will be witained for the future.
I Lase the homier to be, wilt every sentiment of respect;

Sir, your 'Lost oltedient mot moat humble servant,
(Signed) JOHN BOW RING.
Ti the Right Honourable George Fannin, his Britannic
31.1jeity's Secretary of State fur Foreign Affairs, 6cc..