The Sun.
London, England, 1839-05-08 00:00:00

NEW DELEGATE

A new Delegate from Walsall, &c., Mr. Hickin, was
introduced by Dr. Fletcher.

Dr. TAYLOR bore testimony to the patriotism of Mr.
Hickin.
Dr. TAYLOR proposed that the Standing Orders should
be suspended, in order that the Convention might discuss
the question of Simultaneous Meetings. Seconded by
Mr. Neesom, and carried.
SIMULTANEOUS MEETINGS.

Mr. LOVETT said the Committee had a great deal
of difficulty in fixing the places at which the meetings
were to be held, and also the members who should at-
tend those meetings. However, they hoped that the
list which he should now give would be satisfactory.
The Secretary then read the list, but in consequence of
the many alterations which were afterwards made in it
the places finally adopted are given in course.
Mr. CARPENTER said this was the proper time for
him to say that he had a Letter from Leamington, ap-
plying for a missionary to attend the meeting to be held
there.

Mr. GILL hoped that the arrangements as to mem
hers going to particular districts would not be arbitrary.
This would be inconvenient, as arrangements had been
made for the attendance of particular missionaries at places
which would be set aside if the list was made without
reference to the arrangement.—(Hear, hear.) Appii-
cations were then made from various parts of the coun-
try requesting the attendance of missionaries.
Dr. TAYLOR would move that simultaneous meetings
be held in the places mentioned in the list during
Whitsun-week.
Mr. GILL seconded Dr. Taylor's resolution.
Motion carried.

MR. VINCENT'S ARREST.

Mr. O'Connor and Mr. Frost returned from visiting
Mr. Vincent. On their and Mr. Roebuck's application
at Bow-street, they were told that they could not be ad-
mitted to see him, as he was not arrested on the authority
of the Bow-street Magistrates, but on the warrant of
eountryMagistrates; upon the suggestion of this inspector,
who seemed to treat them with little respect, Mr. Roebuck
was induced to apply to the Secretary of State for an
order of admission. That gentleman bad not returned
yet from this- interview. What they were told, on a
second application to the inspector.for permission to see
Mr. Vincent was; that he Vincent) was In custody
of the country policemen, who were then absent, and
therefore it was impossible for them to get admission.
On the motion of Mr. Bailie CRAIG, seconded by
Mr. BURNS, it was carried that the general meetings
in Scotland be held in the first week in June.
A long and unimportant debate took place on the
claims of the different places for missionaries, during
which Mr: O'CONNOR said, that if they were to admit
the claims of all, they should require 3.50 Delegates to
furnish the demand made on them.
After much canvassing as to the merits of the different
Delegates, as suitable to the places proposed, the fol-
owing list was finally adopted
Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Somersetshire, on Mon-
day, to be attended by Messrs. Mealing, • Carpenter,
and Neeson.
North and South Lancashire, Messrs. O'Connor and
Whittle, with Dr. Fletcher, on Saturday.
Birmingham and its districts, on Tuesday, Messrs.
O'Brien and Moir to attend.
Weft Riding of Yorkshire, on Tuesday, Messrs.
Frost, Pitkeithley, Bussey, O'Connor, and Whittle.
Leicester, Loughborough, Derby, Nottingham, and
Sutton in 'Ashfield, on Monday, to be attended by Mr.
James Taylor.
Northampton and its districts, on Monday, to be at-
tended by Messrs. Collin and Jones.
Plymouth and its districts, on Monday, Messrs.
Duncan and Cardo to attend.

Sheffield and its districts, on Monday, to be attended
by Messrs. Frost and O'Connor.
Liverpool and its districts, on Monday, Dr. Fletcher
and Mr. Whittle to attend.

Hull and its districts, on Monday, Messrs. Hartwich
and Burns to be the missionaries.

Cornwall and its several districts, on Monday, Messrs.
Duncan and Cardo to attend ; Monmouth and Gla-
morgan on Monday, to be attended by. Messrs. Hether-
ington, Williams, and Frost ; North Wales, Cheshire,
and Shropshire, on Monday, Messrs. Marsden and
Dean to attend ; Brighton for Sussex, on Monday,
Messrs. Richardson and Warden to attend ; Ips-
wich for Suffolk on Monday, Messrs. Moore, Fenny,
and Osborn to attend ; Northumberland and Durham,
on Monday,Messrs. Lowry, Knoxaad Harney to attend ;
Norwich for Norfolk, to be attended by Messrs. Car-
rier and Powell on Tuesday ; Carlisle for Cumberland,
on Tuesday Messrs. Lowrey and Harney to be in at-
tendance.

BIRMINGHAM IN A STATE OF SIEGE.
After being submitted to the Correspondence Com-
mittee and approved of, the following letter from Bir-
mingham was read :

" Now that you are seated in the Conven-
ion, do your utmost to move the Convention to
Birmingham, it is their battle field, and the
men of Birmingham their forces. We had such a
meeting last night as was never seen in this town be-
fore. There has been no work done here for the
last week—all is excitement—the Bull-ring is crowded
from morn to night all anxious to hear the fate of the
petition. The state of fermentation is such that I have
been obliged to address the people in the middle of the
day for the purpose of protecting the peace. The riot act
has been read, and the soldiers have been continually
under arms, but all is well at present. And although
the Riot Act was read with the evident intention of
goading and exasperating the people to acts of vio-
lence, still, from the prudence of the people, they have
failed in this attempt. I intend to hold meetings twice
a day during the week. Mr. Wilson and myself have
just returned from Worcester, where we had a very
good reception, but no public meeting in consequence of
the Proclamation.
In that place the authorities employed the bellman to
publish that pigmy document of the Queen's ; and such
was the loyalty of the inhabitants that the unfortunate
bellman found it difficdt to escape with his life. He
nearly met the same fate as St. Stephen.
Tile people of Worcester are to hold a county meet-
in Whitsun week.
This letter was received with great cheers; it was
directed to Mr. Brown, a Delegate.
Mr. COLLINS then said, before the Convention dis-
solved, he would announce to them that he heard tl.e
Duke of Wellington had been appointed Prime Minis-
ter. This statement was met by a long and loud
cheer of defiance.
The thanks of the assembly was then given to Mr.
Woodhouse for his conduct as chairman, before which
Mr. 13uart handed in two pounds rent from Wands-
worth and that neighbourhood.
The meeting then dissolved

DEATII OF A WELL-KNOWN CHARACTER.
—An inquest was held before Mr. Whitley, on Saturday,
at the Two Brewers, Brook's-market, Holborn, on the
body of Jahn White, aged 82, who was well-known as the
messenger of the Judges when at Chambers in Sergeants'
Inn. It appeared the deceased had been run over by a
cab some months hack, and the accident had impaired his
general health, which though an octogenarian, he could
previously boast of. - He was found dead on the floor of
his room "on Thursday morning. Verdict—" Died by the
visitation of God."

TRIAL OF THE EARL OF STIR.
LING ON A CHARGE OF FORGERY, &c.

COURT OF JUSTICIARY, EDINBURGH.

Monday, April the 29th, bcin9; the day appointed
for the trial of Alexander Humphries, the soi-disant Earl
of Stirling, the avenues and passages leading to the Courts
were thronged at an early hour by persons anxious to wit-
ness the somewhat singular event of a person claiming to
rank among the peers of Scotland, and who had on two
occasions absolutely exercised his privilege as a peer, by
voting for representative peers, being tried on a charge
which, a few years back, would have affected his life.

The alleged rank of the panel, as well as some extraor..
dinary and almost romantic circumstances connected with
the offence charged against him, appear to have excited
considerable interest, and, consequently, soon after the
doors were opened, the Court was crowded with persons of
respectability, of whom a large proportion of the gentler sex
occupied all the galleries and side benches which could be
conveniently appropriated to their use.

The indictment charged the panel with forgery, as also
the wickedly and feloniously using and uttering as genuine
a forged document, knowing the same to be forged ; as
also the wickedly and feloniously fabricating false and
simulate writings, to be used as evidence in courts of

law, and so using the same as genuine ; as also the
wickedly and feloniously using and uttering as genuine,
fabricated, false, and simulate writings, knowing them
to be fabricated, false, and simulate, by producing the
same as evidence in courts of law; he having formed
the fraudulent design of procuring himself to be recog-
nised as Earl of Stirling in Scotland, and of obtaining
certain great estates or territories in North America and
Scotland, with the pretended right of conferring the ho-
nours, and bestowing the titles of Baronets of Nova Scotia,
as being the representative, and entitled to the honours,
privileges, and estates of William first Earl of Stirling
and of procuring loans cr advances of money from igios
norant and credulous persons, on the faith of his being
entitled to those estates and privileges, as he falsely re-
presented.
These charges were brought against him under five
separate counts. The first two related to one document,
and charged him with having, by the hands of his agent,
tendered to the Court of Session an excerpt from a pre-
tended charter of novodamus to the first Earl of Stirling,
as evidence of W.s claim to certain lands in Scotland,
which he maintained in two separate actions ; and in each
rested his claim upon the evidence of the excerpt in
question. The excerpt bore to be granted to his ancestor
by Charles the First ; on the margin, at the com-
mencement, it contained the abbreviations, " Reg. Mag.
Sig. lib. LATH.," and after reciting the grants for-
merly made by his Majesty to the Earl of Stirling,
which were limited to heirs•male of his body, went on
to state that Lord Stirling had resigned these grants
into the hands of the Crown ; and that his Majesty by
this instrument gave them of new to the Earl of Stir-
ling, extending the succession to heirs-female, on the
failure of the line by heirs-male. At the end of the
document were the words, "[Gratis] Per Signe-
turn," and the instrument, which was in Latin,

closed with language, of which the following was
admitted to be a correct translation :—" In tes-
timony whereof to this our present charter, wa
have commanded our Great Seal to be appended. Wit-
ness the most reverend father in Christ and our well-
beloved councillor John by the mercy of God Arch-
Bishop of St. Andrew's Primate and Metropolitan of our
Kingdom of Scotland our Chancellor our well-beloved
cousins and councillors James Marquis of Hamilton Earl
of Arran and Cambridge Lord Aven and Innerdaile
Robert Earl of Roxburgh Lord Ker of Cesfurd and Cover-
toun keeper of our Privy Seal our beloved familiar coun-
cillors Sir John Hay of Barro clerk of our Rolls Register
and Councillor John Hamiltoun of Orbestoun our Justice-
Clerk and John Scot of Scotstarvet Director of our Chan-
cery knights at cur Court of Quhythall the seventh day of
the month of December in the year of God one thousand
six hundred and thirty-nine and of our reign the fifteenth
year."

The third charge stated that Lord Cockburn, as Lord
Ordinary, in December, 1836, having pronounced an un-
favourable judgment to the panel in the last civil action, on
the ground that, supposing the above- mentioned document
to be genuine, the pana had not proved his descent, and
especially pointed out that the evidence in support of two
links in his pedigree was defective—the prisoner proceeded
to Paris, and there, in a house in the Rue de Toureon,
occupied by Marie Anne Le Norm md, bookseller or for-
tune-teller there, between the 31st of December, 1836,
and the 27th of July, 1337, he forged certain documents on
the back of an ancient map of Canada. The alleged forgeries
under this count consisted of two classes—the first was a
note by a M. Ph. Mallet, dated Lyons, A .;anst, 1706,
stating that when he was in Canada, he had seer. de char-
ter of novodamus from Charles the First to the Earl of
Stirling, and that he wrote on the back of the map, " in
order that every person who opens this map of our
American possessions, may form an idea of the vast
extent of territory which was granted by the King of
England to one of his subjects." The extracts so
written confirm the charter mentioned under the
first and second counts as to the regranting of the
American possessions, and also as to the extend-
ing the line of succession to heirs-female. Near to this
note, on the map, was a second, purporting to be from a
M. Caron Saint Estienne, stating that he also had seen the
charter, and confirming the account given of it by Mallet.
Near this again was a third note, purporting to be from the
celebrated Flechier, Bishop of Nismes, stating that he had
read a copy of the charter, and certifying, at the request
of Estienne, that Mallet had given a correct account of
it. Near Mallet's writing was another note, purporting
to be from Louis XV., expressing interest in the
matter, and wishing to see the original documents. The
second class related to a letter, purporting to be from an
ancestor of Lord Stirling to a lady in France, giving an ac-
count of his family, and supplying the defective evidence
with regard to the two descents which was pointed out by
Lerd Cockburn; and on the margin of this letter was
written a note by the celebrated Fenelon, Archbishop of
Cambray, authenticating it as a genuine document. This
letter, with Fenelon's note, was pasted on the back of
the map. Another document, pasted on the back of the
map, was a copy of an inscription on a tombstone, which
was alleged to have once existed in the church-yard of
Newtonards, county of Antrim, another copy of which,
however, had formerly been used in Court. This docu-
ment was also authenticated by the writings and signatures
of other parties. The count concluded by charging the
prisoner with having presented this map, with these fabri-
cations on the back, as evidence to be received by the Court
of Session in the action then depending.
The fourth count related to another class of documents,

and coming through another channel, though bearing on
the same point. It charged him with having forged a
series of papers, which were sent to his publishers in
Tavistock-street, addressed to the Earl of Stirling, accom-
panied by a note, intimating that they had been stolen from
the prisoner's father by " a young man in a situation of
trade which placed him above suspicion." The young
man had just died, and his family were anxious to send
hack the papers ; but " for obvious reasons must remain
unknown. They make this reparation, but cannot be
expected to court disgrace and infamy." The note was
dated April 17th, 1837. Accompanying this note was a
genealogical tree of the Stirling family, bringing out the
defective evidence relating to the two descents; as well as
some letters, purporting to be written by members and
friends of the family, relating to the same subject, and also
to the destruction of the tombstone in Ireland, of which the
copy had been preserved, and which is charged under the
former head. The prisoner was also charged with utter-
ing these documents, by tendering them as evidence in his
case.

The fifth count related to his producing, on being re-
quired by the Court of Session, the copy of the letter
which was said to have accompanied the transmission of
the map to Mlle. Le Normand, and which was also
charged to be a forgery. It was in French, and the writer
stated that he had bought the map in 1819 for the sake of
the autographs ; but learning that Mlle. Le Normand
took a lively interest in the success of the Earl of Stirling,
he had sent it to her in gratitude for certain great obli-
gations that he had been under to ber ; but excused him-
self from coming openly forward in the matter, on the
plea " that the duties of an office which I at present hold,
do not permit me to make myself known in this affair of
Lord Stirling's. You who know a great deal about it,
will feel no surprise that a man in office should not dare to
interfere in it openly."
The prisoner pleaded Not Guilty ; but, after a trial
which lasted five days, the Jury, last Friday, having deli-
berated for five hours, returned a verdict, finding the for-
gery of the principal documents libelled on completely
established, but the prisoner's guilt not proven, he was ac-
cordingly dismissed simpliciter from the bar.
The verdict was as follows:

Ist, Find unanimously, that the excerpt charter, marked
Nos. 1 and 2, is a forged document, and by a majority,
find that it is not proven to be forged by the prisoner, or
that he uttered it knowing it to be forged.
2d, Find unanimously, that the documents on the map
of Canada are forged ; but, by a majority, find, that it is
not proven that the prisoner forged them, or uttered them
knowing them to be forged.
3d, Find unanimously, that it is not proven that the
packet mentioned in the fourth charge was forged.
4th, And find unanimously, that it is not proven that the
letter sent to Mademoiselle Le Normand is a forgery.
On hearing the verdict, the prisoner, who had con-
ducted himself throughout with great firmness, suddenly
swooned, and sank into the arms of Colonel D'Aguilar,
who was sitting at his side. He appeared to be seized
with a strong hysterical affection, and his frame shook,
while he sighed deeply. He was instantly attended by
Dr. Wilson a,,d Dr- Campbell, under whose directions he
was removed into an adjoining room, where he gradually
recovered. As the medical men, hoWever, gave their
opinion that it would not be safe for him then to return
into Court, the verdict was recorded in his absence by con-
sent of all parties, and the prisoner was assoilzied.
The Scotsman of Saturday is almost wholly occupied with
a report of the trial. We see it stated in that Paper, that
during the five days of the trial the Court was crowded,
and the doors besieged in the same manner as during the
trial of the cotton-spinners. Mr. Humphreys, the pre-
tended Earl of Stirling, is a mild- looking man, apparently
about 50 years of age. A few years ago, we believe, he
was a schoolmaster in the city of Worcester.

DREADFUL DEATH.-On Tuesday, an occur-
rence of a very unfortunate description took place in the
workshop of a Mr. INl‘Gregor, hat manufacturer, Dean,
side lane. Two workmen, named Harrington and Burton
quarrelled, while in a state of intoxication, and got into a
scuffle, in the course of which several blows were ex.
changed. Harrington at last threw Burton into a large
boiler of boiling logweod, and the latter, laying hold of
the aggressor at the moment, drew him also into the liquid.
They were taken out, as may be supposed, in a state of
dreadful torture, and removed to the Royal Infirmary,
where Burton died on the following morning, at one o'clock.
Harrington suffers severely, but is expected to recover.
-He is a native of Ireland, and has a wife and family. Bur_
ton was an Englishman, and married, but has left no chil.. I
dren. Should Harrington recover, the case will, of course,
be taken up by the authurities.—Glasyow ilryus.