The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-14 00:00:00

h, --Cs as they sat at worship—beneath the timbers of the roof,
and in duet.: proximity to the bells that tail of births and
marriages and honest natural deaths—was a mass of decay-
ing humanity. We are all accustomed to the skeleton in
the house, and have got somewhat callous to his inevit-
able presence. But the skeletons in the church-roof—
no metaphors, hut veritable corpses of infants, " still-born"
or not, as the case may be, and parching silently in the sun
and wind from year to year—are certainly a grim novelty,
such as could hardly have been conceived oven by the mor-
bid fancy of Edgar Poe. The investigation into this strange
case has not yet proceeded far enough to throw much light
on the question as to how the bodies came there ; but it has
brought out some singular and note-worthy facts. The dis
covery was first made on Saturday, the 22d August, by some
workmen who were fining ventilators in the roof, the need
of which, one would think, must have been very apparent
to those who frequented the church. Only one coffin was
found on that occasion. The sexton and churchwardens
were communicated with, and, on further search being
made, sculls, bones, and small coffins -were found to a con•
siderable number—some of them in the belfry. Remains
of 14 bodies in all have been drawn forth from these ex-
traordinary hiding-places. Some of the corpses had evi-
dently nut been there for more than two years; others
were shrivelled to parchment, and had apparently been dead
for 30 or 40 years. Seven of the skulls are said to be en-
crusted with blood. It appears to have been a work of
some trouble and no small danger to place the bodies
where they were found. Two or more persons were
manifestly concerned in the task, for the only access to
the place is by a narrow ledge of timber, and the coffins,
says the report in the daily papers, "must have been
handed up to the person above by an accomplice. The
place to catch hold of is very narrow, and if the person
clinging on had made the slightest slip, he would infallibly
have been killed by falling into the iron machinery of the
church bells." Who were the persons who ran this risk ?
Evidently people who had some legitimate business about
the church, though as yet it is impossible to say precisely
who. At the first sitting of the inquest, a woman came
forward, who turns out to be the mother of two of the in-
fants whose dead bodies wore found in the belfry. She
was enabled to identify some of the wrappings, and her
evidence was not without value. Four children have been
born to this woman, of whom only one was legitimate.
Two were still-born; the other two only lived for a very
brief period. The two former, and one of those born alive,
which survived five days, were "fetched away" by an
undertaker's man, for the purpose, as it was supposed, of
being buried ; but the mother seems to have heard, at some
subsequent time, that they had not been buried, or at least
that ono had not. We do not gather from the report of her
evidence when she heard this : if it was before the dis-
covery in the roof, the fact is important, and demands
further inquiry. The sexton denies all knowledge of the
affair; and, though his excited exclamation on being sworn
—"I am innocent of this charge, so help my God I" when
no charge had been made against him—was not a good
point in his favour, it may be that he was really ignorant
of the strange uses to which the church roof and the belfry
had been put. He admits, however, that he formerly re-
ceived still-born children for burial in the churchyard, and
that he took no care of the certificates.
COURT JOURNAL.—The friends of the South have, at
the present moment, greater cause than they ever had to
be proud of the bold, manly attitude of the Richmond Ca-
binet and the people of the Southern States. The latest in-
telligence from America is equally as unexpected as it is
welcome to the heart of all true-feeling and liberty-loving
Englishmen. The one great stain upon the independent
banner of the South till the present moment was slavery,
and even the warmest sympathisers with freedom still felt
a lurking, though half-smothered, feeling of antagonism
towards the agitation for recognising the South, knowing,
as tbey did, that by so doing England was, after all, admit-
ting a slave•.trading and slave-holding country to the
community of great and free nations. The importance of
Jefferson Davis's last proclamation is, perhaps, not perfectly,
understood at the present moment, bat it calls for the en-
rolment of 500,000 negro soldiers, who are to have their
liberty at the end of the war. This is the first great step in
the direction of emancipation, and we have every reason to
rejoice at it, inasmuch as it holds out far greater promise of
success than the vindictive, yet hesitating, project which
originated and was addled in the brains of Northern states-
men. The negro taking up arms for the North is already
free, and has only to dread capture by fighting with any-
thing like courage; but the negro on the side of the S_uth
knows that he is struggling for freedom, and that every in-
dividual effort will tend to bring the war still nearer to a
close, and to grant him his longed-for and well-earned
liberty. All honour, say we, to the Confederate soldiers
and statesmen who have begun the work of emancipation,
and may England not be slow to recognise a nation which,
whilst struggling for its own independence, does not forget
that of the unfortunate negro—the true cause of all this
long and disastrous warfare.
ATITENJEUM.—A benevolent lady, aided by some earnest
friends, proposes to establish an Infanticide Prevention
Society. These thoughtful persons have been struck by
the frequent failure of justice in cases of child murder.
There was, for example, in a recent case some rather start-
ling elements. A woman was charged with the wilful
murder of her child. The evidence was conclusive as to
her maternity—the medical testimony was direct and clear
that the child had been born alive, and that its life had been
destroyed by drowning. It was proved that the prisoner
had provided a pan-snug of water and had thrust the child
into it. Yet the jury acquitted the prisoner. Such a mis-
carriage of justice, they urge, could only occur while the
public mind is unawakenel to the social enormity of this
particular crime. "On this ground it will be a prominent
feature in this institution to stimulate a healthy national
sentiment on this vital question—not by exciting a maud-
lin sympathy with guilt, oven under the garb of desertion
and suffering in the hour of travail, but by boldly confront-
ing the dark crime of child murder." The evil is obvious,
the remedy not so. We wish these benevolent persons
every success in their effurts ; but we may warn them that
the task of awakening the public mind is no light ono. A
change of the Bastardy Law is only ono branch of the
great work which stands before these new reformers.
SPECTATOR.—Herr von Bismark's tone toward the Prus-
sian people is that of the young gentleman in _Punch, who,
sitting with his feet on the fender, calmly replied to the in-
furiated father who thundered at him, " It comes to this,
Frederick, am I to be master in this house or you?" with,
" Don't excite yourself, Papa. I will, if you like." It is
believed, however, that the Prussian Premier's inconsist •
ency is not altogether voluntary. Another royal decree was
to have altered the electoral law, and enabled him to address
himself only to the reactionary classes. Where he expected
to find a reactionary electoral body sufficiently numerous
to play the part with decency remains a mystery. The
country squires who prefix " von" to their names, the offi-
cers in the army, and the higher official employes are pro-
bably his only enthusiastic supporters. It has, indeed, been
suggested that he intended to resort to universal suffrage,
and, no doubt, he is an admirer of the Emperor of the
French. But the despotism of France is founded on the
dread with which the peasant proprietors regard social-
ism, and socialism has but few disciples among the
orderly and industrious Germans. Well-informed
people do, indeed, seem to say that the agricultural
class has as yet been apathetic in the contest between the
bourgeoisie and the Premier, but the emancipation of the
peasantry, commenced by Stein in 1807, was only completed
by Prince Hardenberg in 1821. Thirty years can scarcely
have erased the mark of his collar from the neck of the serf,
and it is permitted one to doubt whether, if ho were directly
appealed to, he would be disposed to give his vote in favour
of the domination of his former master. But it is idle to
speculate on the projects of a man who to. day advises Aus••
tria to abandon her connection with Germany, and to-morrow
openly talks of annexing Poland. No dreams are too wild
for a mind whose natural disease of arrogance has by the pos-
session of power been irritated to delirium. It; indeed, ho ad-
vised his master either to restrict or enlarge the constituency
by royal decree, the King has not been able to summon
the necessary dishonesty or desperation. The Deputies are
to be chosen in the manner which the constitution directs,
Herr von Bismark may plead in favour of the dissolution
that the late Chamber was not elected under his auspices.
But II e late Premier, Von der Emit, was only a more
prudent Bismark. His attempts at influencing the consti.
tuencies did not procure the return of a single minister
nor, indeed, of more than a dozen ministerialists. No doubt

Herr Bismark is capable of going to any extremities either
of coercion or bribery, but surely it is more than even he

can hope—to convert a minority of a dozen into a mujerity.
And when he meets the Parliament, even before the budget
will arise the question of the legality of the decree gagging

the Press. If that ordinance is "not contrary to the Con

stitution," and was issued "only when the suppression

of an extraordinary necessity urgently dernanaed it"
—whatever that may mean—still it must bo "submitted
_ _

forthwith to the approbation of the Chambers at
their next meeting." We cannot anticipate any result from
the assembly of the Chambers, except the continuance of

the existing deadlock. King William will then be in that
position which is the inevitable dilemma of statesmen—he
will have three courses before him. First, ho can dismiss

his present advisers, select their successors from the majority
of the Chamber, withdraw tho decree on the Press, popu-
larise the army, break off his relations with the junker ca-
snarilla, in short, frankly accept the position of a constitu-
tional monarch. Secondly, ho may abdicate. In order to
adopt the first of these resolutions, he must conquer the
obstinacy which is his leading characteristic, and although
a confirmed military martinet abjure the habits of
thought instilled into him in youth and cherished for
more than half a century. In order to adopt the second he
must relinquish that show of power to which, like all weak
men, he clings with a tenacity which is only equalled by
his irresolution. The third course is one from which his

natural honesty of temper, if not the remonstrances of his
wife and son, will, it is to be hoped, hold him back. But,
unhappily, the man who has allowed himself to be persuaded
thus far on the road to despotism may want the courage to
confess or the brains to comprehend his error. He may
yield to the evil advisers who surround him. lie may
violate his oath, abolish the Constitution by royal decree,
appeal to the army for support, and endeavour t' stamp
out the opposition of his people in blood. If ho succeeds,
Prussia, a straggling tract of recently united proxtices,
with an army fully occupied in holding dor, a disaffected
people, ceases to be a great power. It' ho fails, theflohen-
Olicria§ cease t 9 P 9 t NUPE 12=Q, spat oinks,