The Sun.
London, England, 1863-08-22 00:00:00

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE,

THIS DAL—Morning, 6h. 40m.—Afternoon, 7h. sm.
To-mounow.-Morning, 7h. 30m.—Aftcrnoon. Sh. szn.

The Weather—Sun Office, Aug. 22, 1863,

THERMOMETER.

This mornli=
This day at Two o'clock

Barometer-30.02.
Wind—N.-W.; light, and cloudy.

Et

LONDON, SATURDAY, AUGUST 22, 1863,

Venerable from their very position, for their
learning, for their character, the Judges of Eng-
land are amongst the most hardworked of our
public functionaries. Receiving each a salary of
less than £4,000 per annum, they toil more labo-
riously than the unprofessional community have any
notion of—any notion even faintly approximating
to the reality. The popular ignorance as to this
excess of labour systematically shouldered on to
the venerable judges of the land, is in some mea-
sure attributable, of course, to the fact that a
very considerable part of it is got through in pri-
vate, in chambers, over desks and across tables,
in writing, or dictation, and in viva cone examina-
tions. But, even then—the enormous pressure of
hard work done in public, in open court, in session,
at assize, and that, too, hard work of the most com-
plicated character, work terribly continuous and
long sustained, work weighted with the most fear-
ful responsibility—all this, at least, is glaringly
manifest to the public at large ; there is surely
none amongst iv, not even the least observant, but
is, in some degree, conscious of it ! Insomuch has
this excessive overtasking of her MAJESTY'S judges
become apparent, even to the extent of unprofes-
sional notoriety, that there has been a talk for some
few years past, as to the necessity of increasing the
number of these revered and honoured administra-
tors of justice. Increased in number they mutt be
eventually. The only questions remaining now to
be decided, before that increase is accomplished,
being, first of all, as to its extent, and next as to the
time advisable in which that increase shall be
definitively decided upon. Another conside-
ration, however, as to the excessive hard work
done by the judges has not yet been alluded
to—meaning by this, the exquisitely painful
and, but to often, absolutely loathsome
and appalling character of the toil they have
carefully, minutely, and in all its filthiest details to
got through. Crimes of hideous atrocity, vices of
despicable meanness, abominations at the mere
thought of which even the most hardened felon
might be expected to shudder in his conscience,
have, when brought into court before the judges, as
matter for investigation, there, upon trial, to be
investigated, and that not by any means in a
superficial manner, but with a painful scrupulosity
as to the minutiro of the evidence in

every particular, in every circumstance.
As distressing an illustration as any that could
by possibility be adduced, in testimony of the heart-
sickening character of the hard work requiring thus
to be got through within a single day, before one of
her MAJESTY'S judges—we would diritet attention to
the extent and nature of the grim hard
work done only yesterday in the Central
Criminal Court before Mr. Justice KEAT-

LIG. Conspicuous among even the venerable
brotherhood of the Bench, by his personal charac-

teristics as a virtuous and accomplished Christian

gentleman, Sir HENRY KEATING had yesterday,
in the discharge of his solemn du ties, to pass through
as distressing an ordeal as we could imagine it
Would have been possible to contrive, by way of tor-

tire, thus, to a pure and gentle heart, to a re-
ntled and chivalrous nature, and all the
more BO to a man more than usually en-
dowed
..'with an exquisite sensibility of tem-
perament,
It will be sufficient here simply to
enureeriit,
brouvery briefly the nature of the crimes
ght u
before MrPfor, trial yesterday in the Old Court,
a cha.r Justice
oiwas
KEATING. First of all, there
too clearly brought home to
the accused befot only
eit
the trial was done—a charge of
rape of singular and painful atrocity, because per-
The victim herself
petrated in the midst of the poor victim's children.
b •
in regard to thiselnocge_manifestly as innocent,
the little children 137
arren--,
ue as any one of
this miserable case bad is her side. After
'en, disposed of, there
immediately followed onebeen, far more
.infamous in its
atrocity—one of those dreadful
crimes, of late so
horribly frequent in their
perPetratios , crimes
where little prattling innocents are dishano
Unhappily yesterday, in the lamentable • ured.
before Sir HENRY KEATING, the fact of in6tance
the tender
of the little victim rendered the
age child's
0"....
"
evidence inadmissible—necessitating a verdict ofl
,s not guilty" from the jury, though the judge
fcllowed up the delirery of that verdic

by reminding the prisoner that he had
merely escaped conviction in consequence of the
circumstance that the child, in point of law, was

not capable of being examined• But, added the
learned judge, it was impossible for any one who
had heard the evidence not to entertain the

strongest suspicion that the prisoner was guilty o
the offence with which he had beea charged !

Afterwards came, successively, two cases of man

slaughter, one by a young woman of twenty-four,
the other by a young man of twenty-two, both

crimes being clearly proved against the accused re-
spectively, the former being condemned to eight
and the latter to twelve months' imprisonment,

each with hard labour. Such being the slough of