The Sun.
London, England, 1864-10-27 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—One of the cases heard at the Mansion-
house on Tuesday involved a point of great delicacy
and importance. About ten days ago a suicide was
committed within the jurisdiction of Mr Serjeant
Payne, the coroner for the City, and an inquest was
duly held upon the body. At that inquiry it was
' proved that the deceased person when first dis-
covered after the commission of the act, was still
alive, and diet in his desk were found two letters,
one addressed to the coroner and jury, and the other
to his wifo. The latter, however, conveyed no di-
rection by means of which it could be delivered, and
the police, therefore, in their anxiety to bring the
wife to her husband before life had fled, broke the
seal of the letter addressed to the coroner, in hopes
of finding in its contents a clue to the address of
the other. For this act the Coroner summoned the
constable who had broken the seal, and though the
summons was not unreasonably dismissed and the
policeman acquitted of wrongdoing, it appears to
us that the question should not be left without notice.
Mr Serjeant Payne seems to have lost sight of the
strongest point in his case. If he had put aside all
incidental matters and confined himself to the simple
charge, we doubt whether the justification of the
policemau would have been quite so complete, or, at
any rate, whether the acquittal of the officer could
have taken exectly the form which it received.
There was no question whatever about the propriety
of the motives by which the police had been actu-
ated. Humanity alone impelled them to look after
the dying man's wife, and when it was decided to
' break the seal of a letter in hopes of discovering the
required address, the order was duly given by an
inspector to his subordinate for that purpose. In
fact, it was all done with the best of motives, and
with:unimpeachable regularity of form, but was the
act itself justifiable? That was the true question.
Sir Robert Carden held that " there was no vio-
lation of duty on the part of the police," but we
doubt whether the real point at issue could be thus
ruled. It appears to us that there was a violation
of duty, but that the offence had been committed
for purposes so laudable and under impressions
so natural that it might very fairly be condoned.
Here was a letter addressed to certain parties and
sealed. The seal was broken by other parties on
their own authority. Now, did their authority
extend to this length? We know that the Post-
office officials claim the right of breaking a seal
when a letter in their custody cannot be delivered
owing to the imperfection of the address, but for
this there is at any rate a theoretical justification.
Every letter once posted is held to be the property
of the Postmaster-General until it is delivered ac-
cording to its address, and if therefore this delivery
cannot be accomplished, the Postmaster is but
dealing with his own in ordering the letter to be
opened. But in this case the police were not, under
any assumption, the proprietors of the letter which
they discovered. It belonged to the Coroner and
jury, and when Sir R. Carden remarked that the
Coroner's ownright in it was imperfect, and that he
himself " ought not to have opened it except in the
presence of the jury," he was surely admitting by
implication that the police " ought" not to have
opened it at all. In short, if the question is put in
direct words, what are we to consider would be the
answer ? Has a police officer any right to break
the seal of a letter for such a purpose as existed in
the case before us P No doubt the act was so excus-
able that it would have been hard to visit it with
any penalty, but were the police actually empowered
by law to do as they did ? We cannot hut think
that Mr. Serjeant Payne's impression was correct,
and that when he determined, not from any feeling
of private resentment, but with a sense of public
duty, on summoning the constable, he had the right
on his side. No man has a right to break the seal
of a letter intended for another person. Unfortus
natoly, the real issue was obscured by incidental
matters, until the important question seemed to be
missed. The Coroner stated that after the opened
letter hal been banded to him, and the inquest had
been concluded, a reporter asked permission to copy
it. Tcis permission Mr. Payne declined to give, on
the ground that such documents had an injurious
effect on minds in a morbid state, and occasionally
produced imitations of the acts to which they
referred. The next day, however, ho read in a
newspaper, not, indeed, the whole letter, but
those very portions which he would least have
wished to be published, and he seems to have
arrived, therefore, at the conclusion that the police
had not only opened the letter, but had copied it,
and had allowed the copy to be used. In the end,
indeed, he surrendered what was really the strong
point of his complaint, by saying that " he did not
complain of the opening of the letter exactly, but
he did complain that it was not sealed up after it
had been opened." This, however, was tantamount
to giving the case up. If the police had done no-
thing to be caniplaincd of in breaking the seal of a
latter, they had certainly not committed any breach
of law in omitting to reseal it. Upon this supposi-
tion any one who has been infamous enough to
break open another person's letter has only to re-
seal it to excuse his offence. It is not so, for the
act is as infamous afterwards as it was before.
Moreover, it had been proved by evidence that the
supposed harm had not been done. The reporter
came forward and explained that he was not in-
debted to the police for any communication or in-
formation whatever. He had never so much as
known that the letter had been in their possession.
lie took down his report word for word from the
Coroner's own mouth, and if the document was im-
perfectly given in the publication that was because
the Coroner was imperfectly heard. The published
portions of the letter were the portions which were
read to the jury distinctly; the omitted portions
were those which were read too indistinctly to be
accurately taken down. It appeared therefore on the
whole that if Mr. Payne "did not complain exactly"
of the one act which was questionable he had riot
much complaint to substantiate on any other score,
and so the decision of the magistrate was natural
enough. We refer to it, however, ourselves because
we are by no means satisfied on the main question
by which the case should have been governed. Was
this proceeding of the police justifiable in point of
law ? That there were many reasons for condon•
ing the offence we do not for a moment deny ; but
was the Inspector who gave orders for breaking the
seal of a letter addressed to other persons acting
within his lawful power and authority P Was there
not an excess of duty, however venial it might have
been ? Are we to suppose that the police partici-
pate in the powers exercised by.tbe authorities of
the Post-office P Bo it remembered that in this case
there was no doubt or obscurity about the destine.
lion of the letter. It was addressed distinctly to
parties who would easily have received it in due
time and course. We do not overlook the fact that
if anything were to be done it must have been done
immediately. The police opened the coroner's letter
on the instant, because they had not a minute to
lose in finding the wife of a dying man, and we
ought not, indeed, to disguise the fact that the con-
stable took the greatest trouble, and even expended
money from his own pocket, in endeavouring to do
this service to humanity. Still, was it not doing
evil that good might come P This is the question
which we think should be considered before the ease
is forgotten. The police undoubtedly deserve credit
for their motives, which were commendable in the
extreme, but it may be inferred from the result of
this proceeding that a constable has a general right,
in the execution of what he may regard as his duty,
to break the seal of a private letter, and that infer-
ence, it appears to us, should not be tacitly or in-
considerately allowed.
POST.—The Chinese rebellion is thought, in China
at least, to be extinguished. This is perhaps the
most satisfactory part of the chequered intelligence
that the mail has brought U 8 from Eastern Asia.
The Emperor of China has distributed his rewards
and punishments to friends and foes on a principle
which reminds us of the saying that the gratitude
of royalty is repaid by a smile and its enmity by the
gallows. His imperial Majesty has rewarded his
successful Gen. Sangkolinsin with a present of seve-
ral packages of tea and some cooling medicine. He
has at the same lime ordered the two principal leaders
of the rebellion to be brought to Pekin, where they
are expected toeundergo the penalty of being brushed
to death. It requires some periphrasis to properly
describe the refinement of this torture ; but it may
be briefly stated as consisting in the application
of wire brushes to the persons of the victims
until the flesh is torn away and nothing but the
bones remain. The revolution, under this ordeal,
is supposed to be punished, and the cause of Celes-
tial legitimacy vindicated. Let it be hoped that
this is really the end of the slaughter and massacre
that have filled the pages of Chinese correspondence
for many years past. The apparently final discern•
fiture of theTaepings hascoree upon the Imperialists
themselves, and upon our own mercantile colonies
on the Chinese coast, with considerable surprise. It
is not very long since there was some apprehension
entertained whether the Taepings would not over-
throw the Tartar dynasty and drive the Imperialists
out of successive cities, until they at length reached
Pekin. The great city of Nanking was in their hands
—and Shanghae was trembling at their approach.
However, the Imperi diets, with the aid which they
derived from European military skill, and especially
at the hands of the French, captured Nanking, and
there they revenged themselves with a fabulcus
massacre said to have involved one hundred thou.
sadd Taeping victims. The present mail brings us
the farther intelligence of the rebels having been
driven out of Hoochow, which is looked upon in
China as their last military standing point. Nor
does this place appear to have been surrendered until
after they had endured hardships with a heroism
commensurate with their barbarity. They had pul-
led down houses for firewood— they had even ralad
up the coffins of the clod, end burned theta for the

same purpose. Rice had come to an end; supplies
were failing them ; and their communications were
at length completely cut off. Part, at any rate, of
.
the garrison contrived to effect a retreat without beat,
of drum ; and this consideration serves to import
some doubt into the complete extinction of the re.
hellion. But having encountezed so many disasters ;,
having been cowed by the nearly equal barbarity of
the Imperialists themselves; and, having lost their
principal leaders, it is hardly likely that what ree
meine of this once formidable body will be able to
regain its former organisation. In that case the
rebels may probably by degrees be dispersed. That
is certainly the most favourable anticipation; but
it is one that appears to be so generally entertained
by the European public and press in the Chinese
cities open to our trade, that it is probably based
upon clearer premises than we have at present ride.
quote means of arriving at in this country. The
peculiarity of this extraordinary movement is the
Chinese empire consisted in its combinations of a
religious with a political character. The Taepings
set themselves up for religious reformers. Their
object was entirely to upset the established religion
of China, as well as the reigning dynasty. The re-
ligion they professed was an extraordinary come
pound. It was based apparently on certain doctrine;
of Christianity, which they contrived to mingle
with the most debasing superstitions and grovelling
obscenities, which they deduced either from other
systems of theism they had met with in the oast of
Asia, or from their own imagination. Part probably
came from one source and part from the other. The
fragments of the Christian religion which they con-
trived to pick up and distort are best explained, as
a part of their creed, on the supposition that they
represented the traces of former Christian missions
sent by the different churches into the interior of
China at different periods. However, instead of
loving their enemies, or even their neighbours, they
learnt only the principle of exterminating both the
one and the other. Why they ever derived support
from any part of the Chinese population may per-
haps be understood, even though their tyranny
was incomparably worse than that of the Imperial
Government. The Chinese administration was so
corrupt and oppressive that there were many who
instinctively caught up any alternative that offered
to it before they had had any opportunity of come
paring the one tyranny with the other. In the
meantime the corruption of all parties—both Teed
pings and Imperialists—was such that at last the
original cause of the war grew forgotten. The
Imperialist Generals and the Taeping Generals ale',
peered to have arrived at an understanding with
one another. Each was to be permitted to ravage
certain provinces and districts; and, so long as
neither interfered with the other, each army acted
merely as a swarm of locusts upon the country.
Both desolated the civil population, while neither
did any injury to the other. This state of things
continued for a long time, and possibly it would
have been so even to this day had it not been for
the Anglo-French military expedition to Pekin,
which Lord Ellenborough somewhat hastily crates
cised as likely to subvert the throne of the Emperor
of China, and to render the Taepings everywhere
supreme. The Celestial Government, it is quite clear,
learnt from that expedition a respect for European
arms, and, to a certain extent, for European prin'
&pies. They listened to European advice, and
even accepted military and political assistance from
us. From that date the military opposition of the
Imperialists to the Taepings appears, for, the first
time, to have taken place in earnest. Had such a
change occurred at an earlier period it is probable
that the Chinese civil war would not have continued
for so long a time. The last European campaign in
China clearly produced a great effect upon the Goa
vernment at Pekin, and one which is already being
felt in the farther provinces of the empire. We have
since supported the Chinese dynasty, and we have
endeavoured, not without considerable result, to
reform its system. With that policy the suppression
of the rebellion, if it has really happened, is to a
great extent connected, and we hope that the cons
fidence this event cannot fail to create will give a
fresh impetus to European commerce,

GRESHAM LIFE ASSURANCE SOCIETY,
37, OM Jcwry, E.C.
F. ALLAN CURTIS, Actuary and Secretary.

N°. 22,572.

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