The Sun.
London, England, 1863-08-27 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, THURSDAY EVENING, AUGUST 27, 1863.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The trial of a certain Frederick White
at the Middlesex Sessions on Monday brings up the
grievance of the ticket-of-leave man and his com-
plaint against society of which we have heard a
good deal lately. Indeed, this poor victim of ill-
usage has been brought on the stage under such
pathetic circumstances as, it was supposed, must
soften even a heart of stone ; so affecting was his
case that even handkerchiefs could hardly do justice
to it. The tenderest sensibilities of nature rushed
to his relief; the old blind beggar who has so long
stood as the type of pitiable humanity was sup-
planted by a worthier object, and the opening line,
braving the laws of rhythm, altered itself to " Pity
the sorrows of a poor ticket-of-leave man." Hav-
ing a duty to perform to the public we are compelled
to restrain our emotions on these occasions, and to
look at facts soberly and calmly. Frederick White
was, it appears, sent to Coldbath-fields Prison in
1819, and again in 1850 ; in 1852 he was sentenced
to seven years' transportation, and in 1856 to six
years' penal servitude. "On his last conviction he
was sent to Gibraltar, and while there, being a
practical tailor, he invented and made reversible
trousers, for which, when he came to England, he
wished to take out a patent, but he had not
the means. Through the assistance of the Con-
vict Aid Society they were exhibited in the Great
Exhibition, and the prisoner, as an exhibitor,
had a free admission, and while in the building
he acted as interpreter." The Commissioners
did not like the constant presence of such a visitor
in the place under their especial patronage, and
withdrew his free admission. His next appearance
before the public was at the Middlesex Sessions on
Monday, where he was tried for stealing-a £2O Bank
of England note. On presenting for payment the
note, which had been stopped, he was put into the
hands of a city detective, to whom he described
himself as a bullion dealer, asserting that he had
given the full value of the note in Prussian thalers.
The officer appeared incredulous, and the prisoner
took another tack, and made his captor a generous
offer. " You had better take the £2O and let me go;
I'll walk beside you and can get away quietly, and
you need take no notice of it ; make your own bar-
gain." The officer's honesty still holding out the
offer was increased. The prisoner, whose experi-
ence of mankind apparently agreed with Sir Robert
Walpole's, that " every man has his price," pulled
out of his pocket a bag and handed it to the officer,
saying, "Well, then, take that." It contained £l2O
stock. But Justice was still stern, and the prisoner
is now entering upon another period of four years'
penal servitude. These are the judicial statistics
relating to Frederick White, and the case on his
side and the excuse made for him is that " he endea-
voured to procure employment, but could not, as
wherever he went it was bruited about that he was
a returned convict, and at length he had no alterna-
tive but to return to a course of crime." Everybody,
we are told, has illtreated this poor man. The Com.
missioners ill-treated him in dismissing him from the
Exhibition; the police have ill-treated him in let-
ting the fact that he was a returned convict be
known. Why could not the commissioners say
nothing, and the police say nothing ? If they had
held their tongues and allowed the man another
chance, he might have taken advantage of it and
obtained employment somewhere. As it is, we are
told the whole world of employment has been shut
against this unfortunate Frederick White, and he
has been compelled to take to stealing again to sup-
port himself. It must be admitted, then, that a
ticket-of-leave man is placed under peculiar diffi-
culties with respect to obtaining employment by
the fact being known that he is a ticket-of-leave
man ; but we do not think he has on that account a
right to expect that this fact should not be made
known, and that those who are aware of it should
let employers take him without the slightest hint
or caution, or a word said about the person whom
they are thus receiving into their employ. Should
any bad result happen, and should the man after-
wards rob his employer, the latter might fairly
turn round upon the police and say, " You ought
not to have kept this a secret from me." The em-
ployer may fairly complain of having been kept in
the dark, and represent himself as the victim of a
system of concealment. Could the released convict
have the advantage of such disguise without a vio-
lation of the rights of another man, he ought to
have it, because every opportunity ought to be
given him which can justly be given of procuring
honest work; hut such an advantage cannot be given
him without injustice to another man, and there-
fore he must do as well as he can without that ad-
vantage. The plain rights of the employer must be
considered before we go to a work of benevolence—
that of helping the liberated convict out of those
difficulties which he had brought upon himself. He
began the mischief; the disorder in the relations of
himself to the world at large began with him, and
therefore he is the person to bear the consequences
of that disorder. The Commissioners of the Great
Exhibition could not with justice to the public have
allowed a ticket-of-leave man to go about with their
certificate and mark of honour in the shape of a
free admission, mixing with the rest of the visitors,
and placing himself on the same level with the
public at large. This man has stolen a £2O-note
since his liberation,—what if he had stolen that
note in the Exhibition, and while bearing the Com-
missioners' badge ? So, as a matter of fact, a system
of concealment cannot be kept up without injustice
to society, and the criminal must meet whatever re-
sults arise from his former history being known in
those quarters which it concerns. if it be said that
this is to shut the door of employment upon the re-
leased convict and to thrust hies back again upon a
criminal life, we deny the alternative. It is true he
is under difficulties, but not greater difficulties than
by consistent, steady conduct he can surmount. To
say that a man in this country, where the necessa-
ries of life are guaranteed to him by the law of the
land, is obliged to steal in order to live, is simply
untrue. He may be under a certain temptation to
take this course, and there may be more obstacles
to a right course in his case than in that of other
men ; but that is a very different thing from being
obliged to take the wrong course instead of the
right one. A man who has begun as a criminal
must be under difficulties on his return to an
honest life; it is in vain to expect that he should
not be ; it is an inevitable fault in his position
from which nothing can wholly relieve him. There
would be something wrong in the whole order of
things under which we live if no such fault of
position followed from such a start. But the diffi-
culties are difficulties and no more; they are not
impossibilities. Let us suppose that nobody gives
him employment at first,—well, ho cannot, by the
law of the land, starve, he must be living some-
where; wherever that may be he can show himself
sincere in his professions; he can abstain from crime,
he can obey directions, he can do the work allotted
to him, even if it is breaking stones; he can be quiet,
steady, civil, and respectful. If he is all this, and if
he goes on being all this, he will be sure in course of
time to obtain such an amount of confidence in his
reformation as will justify a moderate recommenda-
tion to an ordinary employer. It is true, perhaps,
that society contains a great many hardhearted
philosophers who do not believe in repentance;
who will tell you that their experience is against
such a process, or, at any rate, against the reality of
it; who think that whatever men have been, that
at the bottom they are and that they will continue
to be. Such men will not be the patrons of re-
formed criminals. But while this philosophy has
many disciples, it is also true that a 'large class
among us take the other side, and they exceed in the
direction of benevolence and sentiment, that they
hope the best in spite any past disappointments, and
that they gaze with interest on the deadly struggle
and warfare with evil in which the combatant, after
a severe fall, stands on his legs again, and appa-
rently copes manfully with his antagonist. There is
a considerable class whose bias is rather in favour
of romantic revolutions in modern life, and whose
predilection, if they would own it, favours the
returning and repentant prodigal rather than the
righteous who need no repentance. This amiable
and philanthropical part of society would
certainly not reject the reformed criminal whonould
bring with him the testimonial of a certain period
of good conduct and respectability. And once ad-
mitted to a situation, even though he is under a
cloud at first, his re-establishment in life is secured ;
a year or two's respectable employment is a recom-
mendation for good to the world at large, and a tes-
timonial which gives him a wholly fresh start.
HERALD.—There have, been rumours of late, of
frequent as to induce a belief that they are not alto-
gether without foundation, that the Confederates
intend to add to their army a large force of eman-
cipated negroes. These reports come only from
Northern sources, and may be merely the fruit of
that terror which always haunts the conscience of
great criminals. The Yankees know that they have
done their best to collect a negro force, partly to
save the lives of soldiers whose place it is becoming
daily more difficult to fill, and partly to alarm the
South with the idea of a general servile war. They
know that their hopes have been signally disap-
pointed. Their negro troops have proved docile
pupils in the school of plunder and massacre insti-
tuted by the Federal generals, under the auspices
and patronage of the President ; but if they are to
be made use of as a screen for their comrades, it is
i 70 ,n andsto
idleness, rapine,
necessary that the bayonets of their fellow-soldiers
should drive them forward upon the bayonets of
their masters. They find, moreover, that except
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