The Sun.
London, England, 1864-08-31 00:00:00

it was quite moonlight. I boarded the boats of the prisoners,
and there being too heavy a sea to tow them in I took the
captains out. The crew were in the act of hauling their nets;
they said that owing to the wind and darkness of the night
they were driven in. The wind would drive them in a little,
but not to the extent they were ; the sea would, if anything,
carry them out. He generally made an allowance for the
wind. Geo. Maxwell, pilot, Holy Island, said on Friday
evening he saw a number of French fishing boats in the bay.
Two were boarded, the bearings were taken, and the boats
were found to be within the three miles. The tide was
half flood. The prisoners were each fined £O, which was
paid. Tuesday morning, before Mr Alderman Fleming and
Robert Thompson, Esq., Captain Marescourt, of H.M.
gunboat Louisa, charged Deforge Joan Baptiste, Fe. 762 ;
Ramcz Jacques Francois, No. 749; and Leerivain Augustin,
No. 707; all from Boulogne, with fishing within the limits
on Monday night. He was cruising on Monday evening
between Berwick and Emanuel Head and Holy Island.
He towed three French boats out of the line. There were
about 80 French fishing boats lying about with their heads
towards the shore. About 11 o'clock he came across the
boats of the three defendants, and found they were within
a mile of the shore. At that time it was moonlight. The
wind was such that they might have easily got out ; but
instead of doing so they kept the heads of the boats inwards.
Several boats, when they saw him, tacked about. This was,
he said, a most deliberate case of illegal fishing, for they ran
as it were right under his nose. Ho further stated that
he would likely be before the fishery commissioners next
year, and he would most certainly state that the present
punishment was not adequate to repress illegal fishing.
There was no use, he considered, having a law, unless it
was upheld. The pilot, George Ma: Atwell, gave confirma-
tory evidence, stating that at the time the prisoners were
caught he could see twelve miles along the coast. The
magistrates fined the prisoners each £lO, or in default of
payment to be kept in custody till their boats would be
brought in, which would then bo detained for fourteen days.
The Bench were of opinion that the ends of justice were not
attained by merely fining them, as one night's fishing, they
remarked, would cover two or three years fines; and in
future they determined to detain their boats. The money
was paid in this case, and the prisoners were discharged.—
Berwick lVarder.

lIIS ROYAL HIGHNESS PRINCE ALFRED —We
understand that the Racoon, with Prince Alfred
and the Duke of Roxburghe on board; has arrived at Ice-
land. The prince will make a few visits and return early
in September to this country. His Royal highness, who is
an expert angler, killed 62 salmon during his short stay in
Norway in the Duke of Roxburghe's fishing waters. The
first afternoon he killed six fish, and on the following days
eighteen minion each day, and on the fourth day, after
going a little further up the water he killed twenty salmon.
All of them were large fish, weighing from 16ibs to 271bs
each.—Eninburgli, Courant.
'THE IiOUSE OF COMMONS.—A SKETCH.—By
half-past four the House has sacrificed enough to
the:decent fiction of private legislation. The time for pub-
lic business has arrived, and the seats begin to fill rapidly.
The Ministers arrive to submit themselves to the battery of
questions by which their constitutional responsibility is
supposed to be carried out. Of late this has been the moat
exciting period of a House of Commons' sitting. The se-
curity of Ministers has depended on the skill with which
they have been able to keep their secrets from the Opposi-
tion, and the hopes of the Opposition have turned upon the
possibility of luring or taunting the Ministers into some in-
cautious revelations of their misdeeds. The portion of
public business at half-past four has consequently taken the
form of a sharp tournament of question sad answer, in
which a good deal of ingenuity is sometimes displayed.
Each Minister has his own peculiar mode of parrying the
thrusts which are pointed at him. Mr. Layard gets
angry and stands upon his dignity, which is un-
doubtedly the worst plan. Mr. Milner Gibson says some-
thing wholly beside the question, and at the same time
Brii;les in so bewitching a manner that a questioner who
shall httempt to pursue his inquiry would feel himself the
most bru:".9.l of mankind. Mr. Gladstone plunges into a
labyrinth of words, through which his listeners despairingly
give up all attempts to follow him—and when the torrent
stops ho leaves th;nl so bewildered and dazed that they are
fain to abandon all further questiens till their intellects
have boen tranquillised by a few minutes' repose. But
Lord Palmerston is by far the greatest master of the foil.
A keen perception of what the point really is—a firm deter-
mination not to seem to see it—and an audacity in making
bad jokes, and returning impertinent answers, which often,
often as the exhibition of it has been repeated, seems every
. .

time to take the louse by surprise as a refreshing novelty,
all these qualities constitute him the most perfect adept in
the use of language upon Talleyrand's principles that the
present genet,ation has witnessed. It is a game in which
the Opposition N;ory seldom win.—Qua7 telly Review.
CRACOW FRom. KOSCIUSZKO's MOUND.—To see
Cracow to the greai.est advantage, you must climb
to the top of Kosciuszko'i; mound, two English miles with-
out the walls. You then d, :cover that the city is built at
the spot where the two rivers, the Rudawa and the Via-
tale, converge, and that a range o: wooded hills, terminat-
ing in the mound on which you are tending, runs up into
the triangle formed by the convergence of the two rivers.
This mound, raised by patriotic hands in Oem"Y of their
greatest national hero, was ruthlessly seized :Ipon by the
Austrians and converted into a fortress when the)' violated
the treaty of Vienna by destroying the liberties cf C. acow,
which, by th 3 stipulations of that treaty, was to re-
main a free town for ever- The traveller who has taloa.'
the trouble to mount to the top of the mound has but to
look around him and he will at once see that the Aus-
trians have not been idle since 1848, As the Russians
have rendered the citadel at Warsaw impregnable, and
the Prussians have done the same by Posen, it would
appear that Austria is bent on turning Cracow to the
same account. It will be many years before the works
are anything like finished, and, until iheir completion,
Cracow is any day at the mercy of the Russians pouring
in through the gates of Michalowice on the top of
yonder hill, and less than five English miles distant, Im-
mediately in front of the spectator is spread out the
picturesque old city, out of the centre of which, as from
a forest of churches, raises itself up majestically the
castle hill, with its royal residence and cathedral, big with
the memories of Poland's departed glory, Now, the Pole
who would visit the tombs of S Kosciuzko, and
Poniatowsky, or would go to worship in his own cathedral,
if; only admitted at certa n hours of the day by a little
wicket gate in the fortifications, and has to thread his way
through frowning cannon, which command the approaches.
When the national feeling is thus cruelly wounded, is it
wonderful that the Pelas should be dissatisfied with the
Austrian Government ? During the 15 years which have
elapsed since they laid violent hands upon Cracow, I would
defy the Austrians to point to a public work of theirs which
hail fur its object the development of the material resources
of the country. The railway which connects Cracow with
Lemberg, and that now in course of construction from
Lemberg to Czarnowi z, in the Dukov, ina, is the work of
Prince Sapielm, to whom the province of Galicia owes what
little commercial prosperity it can boast of. Were the
Austrians driven across the Carpathians to-morrow, the
only trace they would leave behind of their occupation of
the country would be a few dozen glaring red brick forts
in a more or less forwarit etato of preparation.—BulAck's
ExpericaCT.B,