The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-29 00:00:00

rying► through the uneven lanes and thickets to the
open where they could deploy. Spite of the ex
seeding y difficult nature of the advance, they se,vept
rapidly on at the doable, and just as they reached
the plain deployed is line, taking ground rapidly
to the left so as to outflank Gen. Russell's force in
such a manner as left it no option but to make a
slowly retiring fight cf it to avoid annihilation. And
now the plan fast developed itself. To save the out-
flanked and hard-pressed right wing of his force
Gen. Russell hurried corps after corps from his
left to strengthen his right, and to stop their rein-
forcement the feint attack on his left was now
really pressed, and the fight then teemed to rage
fast and furious. The cannonade and file fire was
terrific; the smoke lay thick and heavy among the
heather, just gently curling up as if the plain was
on fire, while, as the keen wind lifted it now and
then, the hurry of the troops to reinforce the right
wing could be seen, with the attacking forces still
pouring out into the p sin, and outflanking them
more and more every mie ate. The result of such an
attack beceme a matter of military certainty. The
troops outflanking were on the spot they threatened
—those to protect it had to come at least a mile, so
that three corps were deployed by the assailants for
one that came to the rescue, and before half-an-hour
elapsed, during all which time the battle seemed to
rage with awful din upon the right, the attacking
force on the left outflanked the defenders by nearly
half a mile, and outnumbered them by at least one
third. In such a position there was no help for it
but an orderly retreat, and the whole line of General
Russell's force fell back—the guns covering the
movement—the infantry in echelon. As they did so
General Rumley pushed forward, still continuing
as he advanced to outflank his antagonists, till at
last the two armies, if we may so call them, stood
nearly face to face, extending in line nearly a
mile, on every foot of which the firing from guns
and rifles was going forwards on both sides as
fast as the pieces, large and small, could be
loaded and discharged. What followed after this
was a mere repetition of the same manoeuvres,
the defenders retiring as the assailants advanced,
and so on till the former were forced back nearly a
mile, and the engagement was brought to a close
amid such a general discharge of musketry and
cannon as probably never before woke the echoes
on the hills round Guildford. Once in the open,
where the movements between the intervals of
smoke could be distinguished, and it became evident
that the corps, in spite of the rough nature of the
ground, were all doing their work quickly and well.
The marching, considering the difficulties of the
advance, was really admirable. The file firing was
as good as the average of Line Regiments, though
the volleys were scarcely up to the same standard.
The City of London Rifle Brigade, the London
Scottish, the 19th Middlesex, the 2d, 11th, and 40th 1
Middlesex corps, with the sth, 19th, 23d, and 10th
Surrey, were remarkable for the rapidity and solidity
of their movements. There were very few corps on
the ground, in fact, of whom the same could not be
said, bat those we have mentioned were especially
worthy of notice, and the artillery of all the corps
in the field managed their guns from first to last in
the most soldierlike style. At a little before four
o'clock the manceavres were brought to a close,
or rather the firing ceased, for the movements had
ceased some time before, and the troops were
formed up in columns of companies for marching
past. The ground over which they had to step was
little less uneven, and quite as thickly overgrown
with heather as any part of the common. Under
all the circumstances, and after such an exhausting
day, this was rather a trying ordeal, but, neverthe-
less, all went through it with great credit, and
some in such a manner as to elicit deserved applause.
We regret to say that the day did not pass over
without three rather serious accidents. Many got
heavy falls over the stumps of broom and gorse
which lurked among the heather, and in two cases
these unfortunately resulted in broken legs. The
third accident happened to a civilian, who was shot
in the groin by a ramrod and badly injured. In
all cases the sufferers were immediately removed to
the hospital-marquee, erected in rear of the grand-
stand and specially sent over for this duty from
Aldershot. Beyond these three most unfortunate
mishaps no other cecident up to the time of march
ing past took place.

The railway arrangements both on the South-
Western sod South-Eastern line were admirably
csrried out, though the crowd of visitors very con-
siderably overtaxed the slender resources of the
Chi'worth station. It will need considerable en-
largement if these displays are to be of annual re-
currence at Guildford.

Dreadful Boiler hxplosion and Loss of Life.

At about a quarter to 3 o'clock on Saturday afternoon the
inhabitants of the centre of Greenock were startled by a
loud explosion, which was soon found to proceed from the
bursting of a boiler on board the iron screw steam lighter
Ruby, of Renfrew, lying at the Mid Quay.
The following are the particulars :—The Ruby had a
high-pressure engine of about 8 horse power, which was
supplied with steam by a common flue boiler, placed per-
pendicularly. She belongs to Messrs. Henderson and Cold-
burn, Renfrew. Shortly before 3 o'clock she arrived in the
\Vest Harbour, laden witu coal, and having on board Wm.
Crombie, the master, Richard Linn, the mate, both belong-
ing to Glasgow, Robert Gilchrist, engine keeper, belonging
to Kilsyth, and a number of labourers who had come down
for the purpose of discharging the cargo. When the Ruby
came into the harbour she passed up the west side of the
Mid Qaay, outside of a lighter named the Brownie, belong-
ing to D. Nicoll, coal agent here, which in the early part of
the day had been discharging coals on board the ship Mar-
garet Kerr, at the West Quay, but when partially dis-
charged had shifted alongside of a brig
Bing in the same
harbour. The Ruby ran against the Brownie, the Ruby's
anchor piercing the hull of the Brownie under water on the
starboard side about the waist, making a hole in her. The
Brownie began to fill with water, and it was immediately
deemed advisable that she should be run round to the bank
opposite to the Tar Pots, on the east side of the Mid Quay.
Accordingly, for this purpose, the Brownie's warps were
thrown off, and the Ruby, with her anchor still sticking in
her side, took her in tow, and both were run round near to
the Tar Pots. There the Brownio began to settle duwn,
and her crew were hurrying to get on shore, collecting to-
gether their clothing for this purpose. Just t.s the men of
the sinking Brownie were about to step on board the Ruby,
the boiler of the latter burst with a fearful explosion, send-
ing up a cloud of steam which for a few minutes con-
cealed the real position of affairs in immediate proximity
to the accident. When it bad cleared away men were run-
ning from the place suffering from injuries. It was found
that Robert Gilchrist, the enginoman of the Ruby, had been
cut about the head, and that David Hunter, the mate of the
Brownie, was missing. He had last been seen standing aft
on beard his vessel, about to get into the Ruby, and it is
supposed that he had been struck by a portion of the boiler
and knocked into the water. The after-part of the Ruby
had been blown out ; she had filled with water and settled
down on the ground, the water reaching to about the deck.
It was high water at the time. The top portion of the boiler,
weighing about 3cwt, had been projected over a number of
high buildings, alighting on the pavement at the north-
west corner cf Williarn.street and Dalrymple-street. A
second portion of the Wier, not quite so large, fell on the
Breast, between the weighing machine and the corner of
Willians-street. A thinl portion of the boiler was blown
out into the harbour. A steam pipe was blown through one
of the second floor windows of Mr. Warren's boarding-
house. The man-hole door was projected over the houses
at the Breast, alighting in Shaw• street, at the foot of Long-
well-close. The engine grating was thrown over a tenement,
alighting on the top of some cellars, and a man's coat or
jacket was thrown on the roof cf a high house. A large
portion of the lighter's deck alighted at the East. quay-
lane, The most of the windows of the houses and shops in
the district, extending• from opposite to the Fish-market on
the west to about Shannon. close on the east, were com-
pletely demolished by the concussion. Especially were the
panes of plate-glass in shops along the Breast, up a portion
of William-street, and in Shaw-street, some of them very
large, completely smashed. Shopkeepers were running to
their dome to look on he ruin which had suddenly over-
taken them without being able to account for the cause of
it, and great consternation prevailed_some attributing the
devastation to the shock of an earthquake. The streets
were strewed with broken glass, and several persons were
injured by fragments of it falling on them.—Greenock
Telegraph.

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the most eminent of the faculty failed to relieve. The
various suggestions of friends were likewise acted upon
without benefit, till one, more fortunate than the rest, re-
commended Holloway's Pills, which daily diminished the
pain and ultimately brinishedit entirely. This is one case
selected from thousands, which should prove to the afflicted
that these Pills will restore health after all medical means
seemed to be fruitlessly exhausted,

SPIRIT OP .HE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

POST.—Atrong the many anl3, various measures of
law referee which have been carried into effect due-
ieg the Chancellorship of Lord Westbury none hold
a higher place than those which effected the con-
solidation of the criminal law. The amalgamation
of the statutes which constitute our criminal code
has long been the dream of law reformers, and
various have been the attempts made to realise it.
Committees have been appointed to inquire into
its practicability, and their reports have been pub-
lished and duly canvassed; but some obstacle has
continually opposed itself to the legislation for
which they were intended to serve as a basis.
At length, however, some few years since, the
Legislature passed a series of bills which were de-
signed to incorporate the various statutes and sec-
tions of statutes relating respecively to offences
against the person, malicious injuries to property,
larceny, forgery, coining, and the law affecting
accessories and abettors. The statute book from
the time of Charles I. was thoroughly weeded, and
upwards of one hundred acts were either wholly or
in part repealed. Many of their provisions which
which had become obsolete, and served no other
purpose than to mislead, found no place in the new
acts, and the latter consequently were, at the time
when they received the assent of the Legislature,
considered as forming a ccncise code of the existing
criminal law. Now that the consolidating statutes
have been submitted to the test of experience, it is
satisfactory to find that the expectations to which
they gave rise have been fully realised. It would be
impossible for any one unacquainted with the intri-
cacies of our criminal jurisprudence to estimate at
its proper value the effect of this measure of legal
reform. The obstacles which heretofore op-
posed themselves to the easy specification of
the offence with which a prisoner was charged,
the doubts continually raised respecting the
statute under which he should be indicted,
and the many loopholes left for the escape of the
most notorious malefactors, on grounds of a purely
technical nature, were entirely swept away by the
recent statutes. In so far as regards offences akin
to those prohibited by the acts to which we now
refer, all difficulty has entirely ceased to exist
respecting the simplest and most efficacious means
of putting the law in operation against wrong-
doers. But, after all the most that can be said in
praise of the measures which in part consolidated
our criminal law is that they constitute a step in a
direction in which many advances remain yet to be
made. Since those acts became law the present Lord
Chancellor has urged upon the Legislature the expe-
diency of attempting to do for the entire statute law
that which was in this instance effscted with re-
spect to a certain class of Acts of Parliament. Let
us begin, said Lord Westbury, with Magna Charts,
and, turning over the statutes at large, folio by
folio, eliminate from the mass all that have beeta re-
pealed, or which the lapse of time and change of
customs have rendered obsolete and useless.
Although, however, the assent of Parligment was
given to the Lord Chancellor's scheme, the time, we
fear, is still for distant when we will see it realised.
Meanwhile, however, the work of consolidating the
criminal law might be advantageously proceeded
with. There are many statutes which, to the sur-
prise of both bench and bar, are from time to time
raked out of obscurity, and put in operation not un-
frequently to accomplish private and not public
ends. When it is recollected that the fundamental
maxim of criminal jurisprudence is that ignorance
of the law affords no excuse for the commission of
an offence, it must be admitted that those acts
which constitute offences which they prohibit under
severe penalties should be unusually clear and
easy of reference. Whatever objections may be raised
to a new scheme of general codification, they ought
not to apply to any project for the consolidation of
those portions of the statute-book creating the
criminal law. In ancient Rome it was ordained that
the laws should be transcribed and posted on the
walls of the city, so that all might have an oppor-
tunity of making themselves acquainted with the
nature of the acts prohibited by the State, and thus
avoid, either wilfully or unconsciously, committing
them ; and a most serious charge advanced against
one of the Caesars (Caligula, if we mistake not) was
that he had the laws written in small characters and
posted so high that it was impossible for the passers
by to read them. But difficult tho igh it may have
been for the Romans, under such circumstances, to
make themselves acquainted with the laws, such
difficulty was as nothing compared with that expe-
rienced, not merely by the British public, but by
legal practitioners themselves in extricating from a
vast mass of heterogeneous statutes those precepts
intended for the guidance of all, and with which
every one is conclusively presumed to be acquainted.
So few persons take the trouble of studying the law,
that, as regards the public, it might not perhaps
make much difference whether the criminal law
wore condensed into a few simple statutes or left in
its present state; but, as respects the administra-
tion of justice, the alteration would assuredly lead
to the most important results. Apart, however,
from the question of consolidation, there is abun-
dant room for reformation in the present system
of administering the criminal law. It may well
be doubted whether it is conducive to justice
that the mouth of the accused should be closed.
and that the mere circumstance of being charged
with the commission of a crime should preclude
an individual from tendering his personal testi-
mony in refutation of the accusation. It may
also be questioned whether it is c )nsistent with fin-
pattiality or humanity to secure, at the public ex-
pense, professional advocates to prose,:ute prisoners,
and leave the latter,even on capital charges, totally
undefended when without the means of securing
professional assistance. It is absurd to suppose that
uneducated men or women can be acquainted with
1 the legal definition of offences, and yet on arraign-
ment they are invariably presumed to be so. The
convict Wright may have been, and probably was,
justly executed t but no one will deny that when
called upon to plead he may have confounded
the offences of murder and manslaughter. The
State has an interest no less great in demonstrating
the innocence of those who are unjustly accused
than in convicting those who have infringed its
• laws. Under the existing system of criminal law
administration this is to all appearance lost sight,
of. We presume the accused to be innoaent until
their guilt is proved, but we place too much reliance
upon the supposed invincibility of the armour with
which innocence is conceived to invest those who
are wrongfully accused, Our criminal laws have
of late, both is their essence and is their mode of
administration, been considerably modified for the
better, but they still furnish a wide field for the
labours of the law reformer.

HERALD.—The Canada brings us but little news,
but what there is is satisfactory, as oonlirraing pre-
vious reports of the utter failure of the combined
movement of the Federal armies and fleets. Gen.
Sherman has reached Vicksburg after suffering
immense loss in men, arms, and artillery. From
Demopolis, in Alabama, the Confederate General
Polk has issued an address of congratulation to his
men, in which he remarks of Sherman's abortive
campaign, that never did so grand au enterprise
fail so ingloriously. It appears that it was Sher-
man's intention to have captured belme, in Ala-
bama, but on account of the defeat of Smith's expe-
dition from Memphis, by which he expected to be
reinforced, he was not able to get further than
Meridian. As a reward for his good intentions,
rather than for his success, General Sherman has
been appointed to the chief command in the western
district, which includes Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee,
Arkansas, and the Cumberland River. if we may
measure his future by the gauge of his past career,
this appointment is of happy augury to the Confe-
derate armies in those regions. Sherman is now on
a visit to Banks i❑ New Orleans, and is concocting
with him another grand combined expedition. The
Red River, which waters the vast region of Western
Louisiana, empties itself into the Mississippi about
half way between Vicksburg and New Orleans.
At the mouth of the Red River a fleet of Federal
transports is being collected. They are des-
tinned to carry an imposing force from Vicksburg
and New Orleans into a country which lately has
been almost given up to the Confederates. The
army, when started on its mission, is to be joined
from the North by another contingent, from Little
Rock, in Arkansas. In undertaking this campaign
the Federals are but anticipating a great danger,
which has long been gathering over them in the
South-West. Preparations have been long in pro-
gress on the right bank of the Mississippi, the
avowed object of which is nothing less than the re-
capture of New Orleans. At the very time that the
Federal army, the Federal officials, and a handful
of cringing renegades have been inaugurating the
mockery of a State Government in that very
Souther❑ city, the real governor--the one to whom
an oppressed people give all the allegiance of the
heart, if not of the lips—is addressing them from
beyond the river, and comforting them with hopes
of speedy deliverance. " Ladies of New Orleans,"
writes Governor Allen, "may Heaven guard you
and protect you. When the spring time comes you
shall see the grey-coats again, and welcome hack to
New Orleans the sons and daughters of Louisiana."
It is to nip this danger in the bud, if possible, that
Banks and Sherman are about to attack the Confe-
derates in Western Louisiana. No help meanwhile
can be expected from General Thomas, at Chatta-
nooga, whose position is now threatened in flank by
the advance of General Johnstone, to Ringold. No
help is to be had from Burnside, still beleagured at.
Knoxville. The Confederate army under Polk is
set free by Sherman's retirement and the departure
of the Federal fleet from before Mobile. If, while
the armies of Banks and Sherman are being slowly
pioneered through a difficult and hostile country
from the Wilke of the Red River, Governor Allen,