The Sun.
London, England, 1852-12-06 00:00:00

PERSECUTION AT FLORENCE.

On Saturday a deputation waited on Mr. Secretary
Walpole at the Home-office, to place in his hands a me-
morial addressed to her Majesty, on the subject of the
persecutions for religious opinions now carried on at

Florence. The deputation consisted of the Earl of
Shaftesbury, Colonel Alexander, Mr. Wilbraham Taylor,
Captain Giberne, Mr. J. M. White, Mr. T. R. Wheat-
ley, Mr. R. B. Seeley, and Mr. J. Macgregor. The
memorial wa.. follows :

" We your Majesty's most loyal and devoted subjects,
beg leave to approach the Throne with our sincerest
assurance of attachment to your Majesty, as supreme
head of a Government under which your people are
truly and. deeply sensible of the full enjoyment of civil
and religious liberty. Your memorialist have heard
with deep dismay of the trial, in the capital of Tuscany,
of Francesco and Rosa Madiai, on the charge
of ' impiety, shown in making proselytes to
the so called Evangelical or Pure Gospel
Confession'*--a charge whose sole foundation con-
sisted in their possessing and reading the Holy
Scriptures and other religious works in their own house-
hold, and being ready to share the blessings they pos-
sessed with all who sought them. For no other cause,
and with the express declaration of Government that the
charge was totally unconnected with politics, the said
Francesco and Rosa Madiai were sentenced by the
Tuscan authorities, on the 31st of July last, to imprison-
ment with hard labour for the respective terms of 56 and
45 months. Your memorialists recognise in your
Majesty the representative of a great and free country,
whose glory it has been practically to proclaim the
sacred right of every human being to liberty of con-
science ; and though they are fully ally() t(.l the danger
of one nation interfering with the interllal regulations of
another State, they feel that witen peaceful and li4i7hless
individuals in any professedly CAitisli4:':l Ommunity are
condemned as criminals Pot Ilb greater offence than
that stated above, it is no less imperative on
every lover of libe';:ty, civilisation, and security, to
protest, in the 'name of justice, of civil freedom and
of common humanity, against so glOttig a violation
of the 'right of every mmt moAdolis, to follow the die-
tatP,s of his own conseietttd. While your memorialists,
as Britons, as faelhen, and as members of the great
human family, would consider themselves bound to pro-
test against such a misapplication of eivii.o*ff,,„ if
the sufferers were followers of a false they feel
that those among them. who fire professors of a faith
which proclaims the Written word of God to be the free
and precineA birthright of all mankind, are more
urgently impelled to protest openly ancl bold,ky against
so flagrant a violation of the first 04040 f feilgious
liberty. As the loving iniliket% Christian Queen,
your memorialists tite skkikflaht that your Majesty will

share their al.holteilet at the spectacle of a woman, on
such a charge, condemned to imprisonment in the de-
grading company of the worst of crilithitls. Sympathy
for a woman thus cruelly tlitraged will filid t ready
echo in the heart of. Tot* Majesty, as iii that Of every
woman capable of *link foi 'th'e of a sister
and a fellow OhriStiarv. our memorialists, having
discharged tear bee duty in laying at the feet of
your Majeity this solemn public protest against the
great outre.s. which ha, hcen .fr,red to humanity,
would entreat your Majesty to make the feelings of
of the British nation known to the Tuscan Govern-
ment, and endeavour to procure either mt reversal of the
judgment on the !laid Francesco mid itosa Madiai, or at
least such alteration of their sentences as would admit of
their seeking refute itt some land where it is lawful for
each man to WOrship God after his own conscience. That
your 11"1
."?.sty's throne and the Constitution of this
country
may ever continue by God's blessing, based, as
now, on the surest of all foundations, the conscious
happiness and affectionate confidence of a Christian peo-
ple, who study to use, without abusing, the principles
of civil alid religious liberty, is the earnest prayer of
"Your Majesty's loyal Subjects."
The above memorial was signed by the Dukes of
Sutherland and Argyll, the Marquis of' Cholmondeley,
the Earls of Winchelsea, Fortescue, Ducie, Shaftes-
bury, Dartmouth, Roden, Waldegrave, Cavan, Ban-
don, Darnley, Donoughmore, Meath, Annesley,
Clancarty, Carnwath ; Lords Stopford, Dunk,
Lorton, Bangor, Bernard, Monck, Calthorpe, Ran-
furley, De Saumarez, Hatherton, Clanmorris, Downes,
yfaaa3t, Moreton, Claud Hamilton, T. Pelham
Clinton, Charles Pelham Clinton, H. Cholmondeley,
Rev. Lord Wriothesley Russell ; by the Archbishop of
Dublin, the Bishops of Manchester, Worcester, Nor-
wich, Cashel, Down, Ossory, Kilmore, and Tuam ; by
21 members of the House of Commons, 26 baronets, 10
deans, 8 archdeacons, 9 generals, and 94 other officers,
19 admirals and 71 other officers of the navy, 321 jus-
tices of the peace, 630 members of the professions, 1,302
clergymen, 230 dissenting ministers, 11,431 bankers,
merchants, and private gentlemen ; and by 8,894 other
ce
person. sdeebreeitnagryaltvoataipol oiforerved the deputation most
23,172. signatures.
Mr
courteously, and promised to lay the address before her
Majesty immediately.

* Literally translated from the original charge.

DEATH PROM FRIGHT.—We read in the Presse :—"An
extraordinary case of death from fright has just taken
place. A few days since a young woman was passing
near the Rue Cadet, when she suddenly fell to the
ground, exclaiming 'The rat ! the rat ! At first nobody
could comprehend the meaning of her exclamations, but
on her being taken into the shop of a druggist and placed
on a chair, a rat was seen to run from beneath her gown.
It was then evident that the rat, which had come from
a sewer, had got between her legs, and that when she fell
from
fright it had concealed itself under her clothes. She
was taken home to her friends in the rue Duperre in a
state of delirium, which lasted four days, during which
the only words she uttered were The rat ! the rat !'
and on the evening of the fourth dLy she Mired."

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