The Sun.
London, England, 1837-05-16 00:00:00

SvIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

Doctor Baldwin, one of the Liberal Members for
Cork, has been astonishing the natives of that fair
city by pronouncing a high-flown eulogium upon the
Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel. Those
personages, he considers, are " anxiously disposed to
serve Ireland," but the baneful influence of Lord
Lyndhurst is too powerful for them to resist it, and
they are dragged along, forsooth, in his train. He
particularly admires the Great Captain, of whom he
seys—" I do believe that many people stand up and
make speeches of apparently great ardour for Ire-
lend, that have not half the true devotion for the name
that the Duke of Wellington possesses." Really ?
Since how long has this idea gained a lodgment in the
Learned Doctor's mind ? Has anything occurred
(luring the present session of Parliament to con-
vert him to a belief in the philhibernism of that il-
lustrious pair? We never could have imagined that
a devotion for the name of Ireland was among the
weaknesses of the Duke's character. If such had
been our opinion of- that great man, or of his
great man, %Ye certainly should not have exerted
ourselves as we did—and with some effect, too,
we are vain enough to suppose—to drive both
cue and the other of them from the helm, on the ex-
press ground that they were hostile to Ireland. To
Statesmen sincerely and amicably disposed towards
that country, we should have held it only justice to con-
rede what they so eagerly demanded, " a fair trial ;"
but we had the best possible reason to know that their
piofessions were mere cobwebs, finely spread to entrap
the unwary, and therefore we opposed them. So also,
we are happy to say, did Dr. Baldwin, whose votes in
Parliament have up to this moment been his country's,
though he 'thinks proper to make a compliment of his
consistency to its foes. We would remind this learned
physician, that such pseudo-liberality is a morbid symp-
tom. Almost the first token of that perfidious imbeci-
lity which has just ended in the lamentable and degra-
ding apostacy of Sir Francis Burdett, was an unneces-
snr:- eulogium which he pronounced upon the Duke
of Wellington in 1832. The Reform Bill had
scarcely passed, when he began to lavish the most
fulsome praises upon the greatest enemy of liberty
and popular rights that the present age has •
produced ; and it is remarkable, that from the time he
accustomed his lips to such honied accents, this man,
v ho at one time stood so high in popular regard, never
performed any one act to merit the esteem or call forth
the approbation of his country. Is it necessary to
o);giffq Doctor Baldwin into a persuasion that he
never can hope to be so great or so popular a man as
Sir Francis Burdett was when he began the slippery
trade of adulation towards his political adversaries ?
As to the distinction which this Irish patriot draws
iwtwcen Wellington and Peel, per se, and Wellington
and Peel in a leash with Lyndhurst, it is far too nice
erd subtle for our plain comprehension. They
are neither of them such tender colts as to move along,
a,.,:einst their will, in the harness of a person for whom
it is impossible that they can entertain the slightest
epect. Bnt even supposing they were the reluctant
cr.-atures of that Lord, such a circutestance should not
!lake thear less the objects of popular distrust, whilst
it would give them a title, which they do not yet seem
to have earned, to a very large measure of public
rweempt. In the same spirit which dictates this
mawkish generosity towards the Tory chieftain;, the
oelcet Doctor bestows a portion of his blarney upon
the ultra-Tory Member fur Cork county, and talks
ith soft complacency of the day when the electors
s,!loold " for,et all si3 y antipathies, cast aside the
ielite..s of Tory, Whig-, and Radical, and cheerfully
sit;,pt:rt Mr. Longfield as a candidate for that county.''
We c.omot see anythim in the present situation of
laire, and especially of Irish affairs, to call for ob-
se-vations such as these from an advocate of the
p,:‘ople. An oblivion of the kind suggested, amiable
as the proposal may sound in certain quarters, would
just now indicate a most treacherous memory indeed.
Te talks of " names ;" but in this -case names are
; ;nil to for2,et them would betray a criminal in-
iiiiserencc about some very substantial realities. If it be
" silly antipathy" to object to placing our liberties
nquin, under any circumstances whatsoever, at the
mercy of him who was the champion of the Holy Al-
liance, and is the advocate of Don Carlos—Will), when
a Minister, gave to proclamations the force of laws,
to create offence and gag the people—who went
purr; passu with Castlereagh in all his nefarious
attempts and complots against universal freedom—who
poke, intrigued, and protested against Reform, and in
he last resort attempted to step between the people
and their prize, to play the Polignac and perpetuate
abuse at time hazard of a civil war—who, finding that
design baffled, offered to carry, as a Minister, tho very
measure which he had so lately denounced, and would
have resisted sword in baud—who is playing the same
game now with respect to Ireland which he then
played, and for the self same object, power—we are
content to take our full share of the imputed folly. We
shall always retain that silly antipathy, and while
the Morning Chronicle and the Duke of Wellington
exist the people of this country shall not forget it. Dr.
I;aldwin has been for some months " damned with
faint praise" by the Orange, journals published -in his
native town. This speech of his shows that he was
not altogether unworthy to be so distinguished ; and
time electors would do well to consider whether, by such
testimonials, as well as by' his recent exhibition of him-
sr lf, he has not made out his claim to a bene decessif.
We should certainly hold him an unsafe depository of
the trust which he now holds in a new Parliament.—
Morning Chronicle.

Every day's post from all parts of the United King-
dom brings evidence, whether furnished by friends, or
still more providentially by enemies, that the hour at
which Sir Francis Burdett delivered his brave and
wise declaration of stanch Protestant principle and
feeling, was the happiest among th© many surpassing
felicities that attended the Westminster election. That
the question for Ireland is " Protestant or Papist ?"
we have long and earnestly represented. That such is
the question—viz., whether Popery shall domineer
over the realm, or the reformed Church be suffered to
exist in peace ? each reflecting and well-informed poli-
tician throughout England and Ireland has, even for
years, while sitting by his own fireside, been per-
suaded. But the alarm-bell was never rung before in
tones so clear, or with a peal so thrilling. Protestants
have hardly ever yet been so distinctly, so emphatically,
or in a voice of command so stern and authoritative,
summoned to unite for their common protection. It is
tlic cry of " No Popery," not for aggressive purposes,
nut for offence to any man or injury to any, or for the
sake of threatening any, but in answer to the exter-
minating yell of " No Protestantism," " No Protestant
" religion," " No Protestant Irish people." We have
talked of evidence, as if any had been wanting, to show
with what sort of foes we have to deal; and what sort
of spirit actuates that power on which the present offi-
cial tyrants, who have forced themselves upon the
Protestant King of England, are dependent for their
s,flaries, comprising every portion of those appendages
of Government which they can dare to call their own.
Irish patronage they have none—they have bartered
every pennyworth of it for their own miserable mess
of pottage. Policy they have worse than none—for
whatever they dare propose to Parliament has, by the
supervisors of their statesmanship, been well cleared of
eve, iv sound and wholesome principle, and nothing
lett for the Legislature to act upon but noxious
dregs, and vile and loathsome offscourings. Had
these worthless pedlars, nicknamed Ministers, not
made love to their disgraceful offiee, we might have
pitied the mischance through which it was inflicted on
them. But theirs is not a case for pity. They saw
degradation directly in their path, and doubled their
peed, though without a rival in the race of infamy ;
and such as it is, they have their reward,—they are
doomed to crawl on the earth, and their food is " bitter
vslies." The first business prescribed to these mean-
spirited men, professing to be members of the Church
of England, was the subversion of that Church. They
tried it in one form, and were utterly defeated. They
have ;row tried it in another form—a form more malig-
nant—fitted to purposes more immediately persecuting
und grinding in their effect upon the ill-used, because
ill-defended, Protestant clergy, from whom the new
Tithe Bill exacts 40/. out of each 100/. of their in-
comes, instead of 30/., which was the practical limit
.of the robbery of 1836 ; and how is this fresh and ag-
Lravated outrage upon the clergy received by the mas-

tors of the Radical Ministers ? How, we say, do the
Itomish priests behave upon the publication of
this new-invented scheme of wrong? We present
our readers, English and Irish, with a picture of
what has lately passed in the neighbourhood of that
exemplary patriarch of sedition—the ir-Reverend Dr.
M'Hale. The actors are mostly of that description,
of which so many and such valuable specimens have
been produced from the rich storehouse of Maynooth.
It will be found by the subjoined extract from a Con-
naught newspaper, that with the priests of the NH-laic
diocese, the new Tithe Bill of Lord Morpeth has met
small favour, because, in addition to the plunder of
40 per cent. from the Church establishment, they in-
sist on a, formal revival of the " appropriation clause,"
as a pledge for the certainty that no particle of sup-
port shall be left henceforth in the hands of the Pro-
testant clergy ! Instead of graciously approving the
magnitude of the outrage thus offered by their vassals
to the Church, they despise and insult them for being
too moderate in their iniquity. They scold and brow-
beat the unfortunate menials in their service for having
abandoned " their principles" (alas ! what princi-
ples ?), and forfeited their claims to the support of the
Papist power. This, then, is what Protestantism has
to look for from such a source. This is the " stabl-
ing of the Church establishment," which has been so
conscientiously provided for by the framers of King's
speeches to Parliament. This is, in sober truth, the
demon of destruction, against which Sir Francis Bur-
dett has summoned all honest Protestants to defend
themselves and their posterity
RESOLUTIONS.
" At a meeting of the inhabitants of the united parishes
of Kilcoman and Robin, held at the Roman Catholic church
of St. Michael, Roundfort, on the 7th of May, 1837
" Mr. Michael Lyndsey, in the chair.
" Resolved—That Mr. Bartholomew St. Ledger be re-
quested to act as secretary.'
" Moved by the Rev. James M'llale, seconded by Mr.
John M'Namara—
" Resolved—That considering the principles by which
the present Administration were brought into power, and
their own repeated declarations since they cattle into
power, we have no hesitation in declaring that they have
abandoned their principles, and have on this occasion for-
feited their claims to the support of the Liberal repre-
sentatives of the people, by abandoning the Appropria-
tion Clause.'
" Moved by the Rev. John Cavanagh, seconded by Mr.
John Meath—
" Resolved—That we most respectfully pray the repre-
sentativLs of the people who are advocates for the total an-
nihilation of tithes and a fair and useful system of eduet-
tion, to eppose this
" Moved by the Rev. Patrick Prendergast, seconded by
Mr. Thomas Judge—
" Resolved—That wo most particularly request our
honest and faithful representatives, Sir W. Brabazon, Bart.,
and Mr. Robert Dillon Brown, to resist, with all their
might and abilities, the proposed tithe system, and that our
respected parish priest, the Rev. James M'llale, be de-
puted to convey to them these our wishes.'
" Moved by Mr. Jan M`Namara, seconded by Mr.
John
Resolved—That the system of general education con-
templated by this measure, so far from affording any real
or substantial relief to the people of Ireland, is a complete
mockery, an insult to their feelings, and calculated to ex-
cite their dissatifaction and distrust.'
" Moved by the Rev. James M' Hale, seconded by Mr.
Thady Lynskey—
" Resolved—That these resolutions be published in the
Mayo .raph Evening Freeman newspapers.'
" :MICHAEL LYNI)SEY, Chairman.
" BARTHOLOMEW ST. LEGER, Secretary.
" Mr. Michael Lyndsey having vacated tire Chair, and
the Rev. James M'lhtle being called thereto—
" Resolved—That the thanks of this meeting are due
to Mr Michael Lyndsey, for his dignified conduct in the
Chair.'

" JAMES WHALE, Chairman.
" BARTHOLOMEW ST. LEGER, Secretary."

Much as we regret the disgrace which has lately
befallen Westminster, it is some gratification to per-
ceive, by the boundless exultation of the Tories, the
pitiable plight to which they are reduced ; for the con-
dition of that party must indeed be desperate which
bases its hopes on an apostate, and especially on such
an impotent apostate as Sir Francis Burdett, who,
incapable of keeping pace with public opinion, en-
vious at being superseded by men of superior intellect
and powers, and urged by the desire of distinction
without the qualities to obtain it, had no means of
gaining even temporary notoriety but by the suicide of
his own reputation. The Tory journals arc certainly
bestowing on the honourable Baronet the meed for
which lie bartered his character, by constantly referring
to his proceedings ; but for this they scarcely deserve
praise, as every act, whether of good or evil, which
strikes the public with surprise, would meet with
similar attention, the greater the turpitude or crimi-
nality the more valuable for the gratification of a
depraved taste ; and thus, as every act of atrocity is
made instrumental to public excitement by the ama-
teurs of the horrible furnishing "further particulars,"
&c., the Tory press appears as if it could never surfeit
its readers with " additional details" of the West-
minster renegade. The Times even in endeavouring
to extol exaggerates his apostacy, and had not Sir
Francis already escaped by the vilest machinations
the verdict of guilty from the electors of Westminster,
we consider his case would be much prejudiced by the
commentaries of his Tory advocate—for a more false,
truculent, evil-designed, and sanguinary article we
never read in any journal than appeared in our contem-
porary of yesterday, of which the following extract
from the confessions of Sir Francis furnished the text :
—" Ireland was Protestant Ireland, and the Pro-
testants of England and Scotland would never submit
to a Roman Catholic ascendancy in that country."
Upon this audacious and lying statement was erected a
pyramid of falsehood, of which the apex was the fol-
lowing infamous calumny :—" The first instinct and
vital element of Popish policy in Ireland is, at the
earliest favourable opportunity, to sweep every living
Protestant off the face of the island." Through the
whole article " lie follows lie, like alp on alp," in
such quick succession that to undertake their refutation
would be a tiresome task, and as useless as tiresome,
for who does not know that Ireland is essentially a
Catholic country ? or who but a reckless renegade
would not blush to call a country " Protestant" where-
in but one-sixteenth of the population are members of
the Established Church, and of these no inconsiderable
portion unite with all the Dissenters and Roman Ca-
tholics in opposing the undue exactions of the Church ?
Who need be told that the Catholics of Ireland, no
more than the Dissenters of England, seek not ascen-
dancy, though both are determined, and they would de-
serve to be despised if they were not determined, to as-
sert their rights to equality ; but, above all, would it
not be worse than useless, would it not be an insult to
public opinion to dwell on the refutation of the enor-
mous, the infamous, and atrocious calumny, that it
is " the Popish policy to sweep every living Pro-
testant off' the face of the island," when every Ca-
tholic country in Europe, and the well-known sen-
timents of every intelligent Catholic in Ireland,
give the lie to the slanderous assertion ? The
mode of argument by which the slander is endea-
voured to be sustained is highly characteristic. It
is as follows :—The right of holding landed pro-
perty was asked by and conceded to the Catholics in
1778. Not content with this " boon," they had the
assurance to seek access to certain professions, and to
the elective franchise ; and in 1793 " these boons were
also conceded." But the " Papists," still dissatisfied,
kept up agitation till 1829, when they were admitted
to both Houses of Parliament, and the highest offices
in the State. Whence the writer in the Times, with a
perception discovering " gunpowder in every line of it,"
gravely infers that the whole drift of the Irish Catho-
lics, in not tamely submitting to the spoliation and
tyranny of the ascendant Church, is to extirpate Pro-
testantism ; and after enumerating the several disabili-
ties from which they have been relieved, gives the fol-
lowing most humane and conciliatory peroration :
" But what has happened since ? Not a year has
since elapsed that did not witness a course of seditious
and rebellious machinations on the part of those' eman-
cipated' PapLts, such as no Government ever yet en-
dured without putting an end to them by the sword or
gallows." To any mind that cannot form its own opi-
nion of this barbarous suggestion, commentary would be
useless ; we therefore leave this recommendatory hint of
the policy to be pursued towards Ireland, and which cf
course the Tories are most anxious to put in practice,
to exhibit its own hideous depravity. We should say,
let them try it," and dare them to the conflict, did not

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY, MAY 16, 1837

human feeling shudder from the horrors to be encoun-
tered in the redress of grievances by violent means.
However just the cause, and however successful the
issue, the inflictions of violent changes in political sys-
tems are seldom or never compensated by the result.
The same arguments which are here applied to the
Catholics of Ireland in respect to their successive ac-
cessions to their rights as citizens, may, with equal
justice, or rather injustice, be applied to the people of
England. The people of England have obtained
Magna Charta ; not satisfied with this first intro-
duction to the rank of men, being previously consi-
dered as beasts of burden, they, after various struggles,
obtained the Bill of Rights, and ultimately wrested the
Reform Act from their oppressors. Even yet they are
not satisfied ; hence, in accordance with the logic of
the Times, they are a revolutionary rebellious race, that
will not be satisfied so long as they find themselves ex-
cluded from any of the rights to which as men and citizens
they are justly entitled. They also, we presume, are, by the
programme of Tory politics, to be subjected to the dis-
cipline of " the gallows and the sword." Intensely
ought the people of England to sympathise with their
fellow-subjects in Ireland. Tyranny at home, that is,
in England, will be apportioned to the extent to
which its application may be tolerated in Ireland.
And on this account, as well as for our own sake, we
rejoice and exult in the demonstrations at present be-
ing made in the sister kingdom, to repel the encroach-
ing attempts of the Tories upon the Administration.
According to the accounts received from the " Paro-
chial Pacificators" by the General Association, at its
last meeting, every parish in Ireland is about to pre-
sent an address to the King, and a petition to the
House of Commons, in favour of the present Ministry.
These addresses and petitions, at least such as are
particularly reported, are supported by signatures va-
rying from 500 to 5,000. Will the Tories, in the
face of these manifestations of Irish feeling, supported
as they are by all that is genuine of public feeling in
England and Scotland, dare another usurpation against
popular sentiment, popular rights, and popular free-
dom ? If they do, though England and Scotland, un-
,eoerced by the same extremity of ill which presses
upon the isolated " alienated" portion of tire United
Kingdom, should remain passive—lreland will prove
the NEMESES of British wrongs, and let the Tories
prepare for the consequences.—Morning Advertiser.

A most striking,-practical illustration
_of the conse-
quences of our intertneddling policy in the domestic
concerns of other nations appeared in the Gazette of
Friday night. We allude to the two orders of the
King in Council relative to the future regulation of our
commercial relations with Portugal, the first imposing
a tonnage duty of 9d. per ton upon all Portuguese ship-
ping entering any of the ports of the United Kingdom.
and second imposing an additional surcharge of
one-fifth of the duties now levied upon the productions
of Portugal when imported in vessels of that nation.
These are indeed severe restrictions upon the trade of
our " faithful and ancient ally"—imposed by whom ?
By the free trade Government—the Ministers who
have a Poulett Thomson as their commercial oracle, to
instruct them how to " liberalise" commerce in aI;
parts of the world, and a Dr. Bowring as their well-
paid " commercial traveller" to carry a pedlar's pack
of free-trade theories abroad, and receive a share of
those public taxes that shackle " free trade" at home.
Such are the statesmen who have just now placed
restrictions on the trade of Portugal, in defiance o'
the " sage saws" and peremptory dogmas of poli-
tical economy with which the learned pundits of that
profound science have been enlightening mankind !
An evening Ministerial journal—The Sun—thus
gravely comments upon the " new leaf " which Mi-
nisters have " turned over" in their book of politica!
wisdom. "As these orders in council are purely rata.
liatory on the part of 'his Britannic Majesty," quoth
The Sun, " the Portuguese Government will only have
itself to blame for the immense injury which they must
inflict upon die commerce of Portugal. The first order
but reciprocates, after several months of dignified en-
durance on the part of England, the injury atteinpted to
be done to our trade by a Royal decree of the Queen of
Portugal of the 24th November, 1836, imposing, an ad-
ditional duty of from five to thirteen pence on British
shipping entering any of the ports subject to her most
faithful Majesty ; and the second is but a counterpart
of a Decree of the Queen, dated January 10, 1837,
imposing a higher duty upon British goods imported
into Portugal in British than in native bottoms. That
Portugal should have wantonly provoked England to
impose such a heavy, and, to her merchants, all hut a
fatal restriction upon her export trade, must astonish
the merest tyro in the knowledge of the artificial and
natural productions of the two countries, and of the
principles which ought to regulate the commercial rela-
tions of nations so circumstanced and so situated."
That the wanton provocation given by Portugal may
astonish such a " tyro," or " juvenile Whig," as
Lord Palmerston, we readily admit, and we pre-
sume The Sun had the old boy Statesman in its
" mind's-eye" when it used that word ; but it cer-
tainly does not astonish us. We forewarned the
British Government and the British public long ago
that some such return would be made by Portugal to
evince her gratitude for our Quixotic folly in expend-
ing British treasure and blood in absurd interference
in the civil conflicts of that nation. Similar exhibi-
tions of gratitude we shall have from Spain, as a re-.
turn for squandering the money of which our own poor
are robbed, in aid of the stock-jobbing speculations of
the Madrid Government, and for sacrificing the lives
of 9,000 or 10,000 British subjects, whose bones are
now whitening on the marshy plains of Vittoria, or
marking the melancholy scenes of our national disgraces
at Fontarabia and Hernani. It is remarkable that the
" liberals" of the Peninsula—both in Portugal and
Spain, hate England and English influence and com-
merce, with a bitterer hatred than those who contend
for the established order of things, and against whom
our ships of war, artillery, and marines, are sent to make
war without any declaration of hostilities. If the-friend-
ship of one party or the other might, to a certain extent,
be counted on before our foolish interference began, it
has certainly had the effect of making England cor-
dially hated by both. In Portugal we enjoyed, under
the Miguelite government, certain important commer-
cial advantages and privileges, which it was one of
the first acts of our " friends" the Pedroites to abolish. •
Then came the overthrow of the Pedroites and instal-
lation in power of the ultra-liberals. 'They made a
burnt-offering of the charter of Don Pedro, which so
much British blood had been shed to establish, and
have now gone farther than the Pedroites in showing
their hostility to England. It is true that our Mi-
nisters, while encouraging their " missionary" O'Con-
nell to " preach down" the House of Lords at home,
made
Chamber
greatnahaaacomofub2iel:te
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ie:sepanveeoal
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nally failed, and now they are driven to their re-
taliatory measures, which will inflict considerable
injury on the merchants of Great Britain as well as of
Portugal, as the blessed result of the policy which will
give to the name of Palmerston a still more ludi-
crous immortality than it derives from the imperishable
protocols I We observe that the British marines were
employed the other day in firing upon the ultra-Libe-
rals of Barcelona—the real " liberty boys" of Spain.
By what right they interfered to perform the duties of
a Spanish gens d'armerie we have yet to learn. It
peace cannot be preserved between different classes of
" liberals" without employing our marines to knock
one party or the other on the head, the operations of a
slaughtering system of " non-intervention" are likely
to be very widely extended. 'The Carlists of the north
and the revolutionists of the south, will have equal
reason to hate and execrate the name of Great Bri-
tain, whose present policy in the Peninsula is not a
whit more honest, honourable, or dignified, than that
which was formerly pursued by the Barbary States.
Humanity, for many reasons, has cause to rejoice at
the approaching dissolution of the present incapable
and unprincipled Administration, but more especially
that, with their fall from power, must terminate the de-
moralising example and deplorable calamities of the
" non-intervention war."—Morning Herald.
'The Report of the Select Committee of the House
of Commons on the publication of printed papers has
recently been printed and distributed. This Commit-
tee, it will be recollected, was appointed on the occa-
sion of a direction to the Jury by th,i Lord Chief Jus

tice of the King's Bench on the trial of the cause
" Stockdale v. Hansard " for libel. The following
were the expressions of the Learned Judge—" I am
not aware of the existence in this country of any body
whatever that can authorise a servant of theirs to pub-
lish libels of any individuals. Whatever arrangements
may be made between the House of Commons and any
publisher in their employ, I am of opinion that the
publisher who publishes that in his public shop, and
especially for money, which may be injurious, and
possibly ruinous, to any one of the King's subjects,
must answer in a court of justice to that subject, if he
challenge him for a libel, and I wish to say so empha-
tically and distinctly, because I think that, if, upon
the first opportunity which arose in a Court of justice
for questioning that point, it were left unsatisfactorily
explained, the Judge who sat there might become an
accomplice in the destruction of the liberties of the
country, and expose every individual who lives in it to
a tyranny that no man ought to submit to." This lan-
guage, when it first met our eye, seemed to us to he
excellent law, or, what is much better than good law,
if it be not the same, sound sense, and clear unques-
tionable justice. The Select Committee of the House
of Commons have produced, however, a voluminous
mass of legal and Parliamentary authorities and pre-
cedents, to show that every word of this direction of
Lord Denman is wrong, that nothing is legally pu-
nishable by Courts of Justice which is done under the
authority of either House of Parliament, and that to
whatever extent any subject of the realm may be da-
maged in his character, person, or estate by persons
armed with the order of either Lords or Commons,
there is no power in Courts of Justice to afford the
sufferer any redress whatever. The Committee speak
very plainly upon this subject :—" Upon the whole
matter referred to your Committee they report, as their
opinion, that the power of publishing such of its re-
ports, votes, and proceedings as it shall deem necessary
, or conducive to the public interests is an essential inci-
dent to the constitutional functions of Parliament, more
especially of this House, as the representative portion
of it. That, by the law and privilege of Parliament,
this House has the sole and exclusive jurisdiction to
determine upon the existence and extent of its privi-
leges, and that the institution or prosecution of any
action, suit, or other proceeding, for the purpose of
bringing them .in to discussion or decision before any
Court or tribunal elsewhere than in Parliament, is a
high breach cf such privilege, and renders all parties
concerned therein amenable to its just displeasure,
and to the punishment consequent thereon. That for
any Court or tribunal to assume to decide upon mat-
ters of privilege inconsistent with the detA•mination of
either House of Parliament thereon is contrary to the
a e• of Parliament, and is a breach and contempt of the
privileges of Parliament." We do not venture to re-
capitulate, much less to impeach, the elaborate argu-
elents, historical, legal, and political, which have
led the Select Committee of the House of Com-
mons to the conclusion embodied in the above
extract from their report. We can only say
that we wish the Committee had arrived at a dif-
- rent conclusion, and that we lake the opinion of
Lord Chief Justice Denman much better than that of
the Committee. We are now speaking merely of a
point of taste, but it is one in which we imagine we
are in unison with an overwhelming majority of our
fellow-subjects. The Committee, we observe, after
asserting thus absolutely the irresponsible privilege of
the Frouse of Commons to authorise the publication
of libels, or the performance of any other act of injury
or oppression as often as it thinks fit, recommends that
this privilege should be frugally and cautiously used.
From this recommendation we confess we do not de-
rive much consolation. It is an admonition of course,
and, as in the case of all such admonitions, it is of
course that they should be disregarded I We insert
it not on account of i probable efficacy as an ad-
Monition, but because it is a tolerably accurate index
to the evils which it will certainly fail to prevent :
" To prescribe any positive rule upon such a sub-
ject is manifestly impossible. The invariable ad-
herence to such a rule might protect public delin-
quents from a disclosure of • their misconduct, or
prevent the notoriety of facts important to the ends
For which enquiry was instituted. It appears, how-
..!ver, to your Committee (and they think that the
practical experience of Members will suppoi t the
conclusion to which they have come), that it would not
be difficult, on a mature consideration of each case
wherein the exercise of a discretion may be called for,
so to apply it in the great majority of instances, as
completely to reconcile all proper regard for the cha-
racter and feelings of individuals with the faithful and
effectual discharge of public functions. The more es-
sential the privilege the more urgent the necessity for
an exclusive and unfettered authority in deciding upon
the exercise and the limits of it, the more important
and the more becoming is it to take as much precau-
tion as possible against the infliction of individual in-
jury, or unnecessary pain to private feelings." There
are some parts of the argument contained in the
Report of the Committee, which, we must confess,
perplex us exceedingly. It is contended through-
out, and authorities, numerous and high, are ad-
duced in support of the proposition, that each House
of Parliament, in matters of privilege, is absolute
and infallible—each separately possessing, in such
matters, the whole authority of the united Legis-
lature. But the report informs us (page 7) " that
upon some occasions of controversy between the two
Houses publications have been made by each severely
reflecting upon the other." How is this to be recon-
ciled or arranged ? The whole authority of the High
Court of Parliament residing undivided and unconfined
in each of the two Houses of Lords and Commons, in
reference to all matters of privilege, it would seem to
follow, that upon all " occasions of controversy" al-
luded to between the two Houses" when publica-
tions have beeh made by each, severely reflecting,
upon the other," the panoply of Parliamentary pri-
vilege must have been extended equally over the
two conflicting batteries of reciprocal libel that' the
men who printed and published libels against the
Lords by order of the Commons, and those who
printed and published libels against the Commons by
order of the Lords, would enjoy equal protection
and impunity, and that the only result would be to show
how little the spirit of Parliamentary law is in
unison with that of the common law of England or
with the common sense and reason of mankind. This
seems to us to be a dilemma which ought at least to
teach a lesson of modesty to those who, in opposition to
the judgment of the Chief Justice of the King's
Bench, undertake to maintain the privilege of Parlia-
ment that can authorise the publication of libels. We
cannot conclude without transferring to our columns
two resolutions forming part of a series submitted to
the Select Committee by Sir R. H. Inglis, and which,
although they were negatived by a majority of ten to
one, seem to us to have been worthy of a different
fate :—" That this House doth not claim any right,
and that no other body of his Majesty's subjects
hath any right to publish ally matter or thing
which by law would be adjudged to be a libel, if con-
tained in an unauthorised publication, or to do any
thing which by law would be adjudged
to be a tres-
pass or any personal injury."—" That the printing of
papers presented to this House, whether the same be
accounts, reports, or otherwise, is and ought to be, for
the use of Members of this House, and as such,
ought to be publication privileged ; but that any sale
or dispersal of such papers to any but to Members of
this House, is and ought to be publication not privi-
leged.”—Morning Post.

MAD DOG I--This cry is 'now in full mouth at
Sheffield and elsewhere. The slaughter of " man's friend "
in that one town only is stated to have already reached nearly
two thousand. Whether the poor dogs are the victims of
cowardice and delusion, and share now the same fate which
the wisdom of our ancestors awarded to witches, we need not
determine ; but we may venture to hazard the supposition
that if all the puppies who stray about our fashionable streets,
and are suspected of being mad, were to have such summary
dog-justice done to them, their numbers would be considerably
thinned. If the public health call for the death of thou-
sands of dogs, some lovers of justice may think that public
morals and the national character equally deMand the extinc-
tion of a few of the puppies whose acts, Like those of the Irish
Marquis and his fellows, aro evidences of a most mischievous
madness.

Qn tire breaking up of the various workhouses on
forming the Plympton Union, a labouring man of the name of
Trehan, who had been receiving parochial relief out of and
in the workhouse at Meavy for more than twenty years, offered
2001. for the house rather than be turned out of his favourite
residence.— West Briton,

LAW INTELLIGENCE.

OLD COURT.

COURT OF KING'S BENCH, MAT 15.
BRINE V. JONES.

This was an action of assault and battery. The plain-
tiff was an assistant in the school of Mr. Mears, of En-
field. The defendant was a gentleman who had taken up
his residence, with his only son, a young boy, in the house
of Mr. Mears, and the boy attended the school. The
plaintiff sometimes took the boy out to walk ; and on
one occasion had boxed the ear of defendant's son, to cor-
rect him for some misconduct, while the boys were out
walking. The defendant on the following morning, meeting
the plaintiff in the hall of the house, accused him of cruelty
to the boy. The plaintiff positively denied the accusation,
and the anger of both parties were excited. Blows were
the consequence.
The Jury gave a verdict for the plaintiff—Damages, 5/.

COURT OF EXCHEQUER, .11141- 15.
YEOMANS V. LEIGH.

This was an action on the case for negligence. It was
brought by the plaintiff, a job-master, residing in Bruns-
wick-mews, near Brunswick-square, to recover from the de-
fendant, who carries on the same business in the Minories,
compensation in damages for injuries done to the plaintiff's
carriage through the alleged negligence of the defendant's
servant. The damages and repairs were estimated at
5/. 17s. 6d. The defence was, that the damage was not
occasioned by the negligence of the defendant's servant ;
but was the result either of pure accident, or of the neg-
ligence of the plaintiff's servant in backing sharply on the
pole of the defendant's carriage, which was a yard and a
half behind. The Jury found for the Plaintiff—Damages,
6/. 10s..

CENTRAL CRIMINAL COURT.

John Davies was indi:tedforWiiiul and corrupt perjury.

Mr. CHAMBERS said this was indictment preferred by the
parish authorities of St. Pancras against the defendant for
wilful and corrupt perjury. On the 27th of July last he
applied for relief for himself and fire children, on which the
prisoner and his family were taken into the workhouse. On
examining him it was ascertained he belonged to Newington
parish. He then swore that the five children were by his
wife Lucy, and the oath was made at Hatton-garden. At
the expiration of twenty days he was informed that he and
his children would be removed the following day, when he
effected his escape ; and it was afterwards discovered that
the prisoner had left his wife for some years, and the mother
of the children was a woman of the name of Prawn, with
whom he had cohabited. Evidence was called in support
of the prosecuion ; but not being able to prove the assign.
ments of perjury, as stated in the indictment, the Recorder
ordered the prisoner to be acquitted.