The Sun.
London, England, 1865-08-02 00:00:00

HIE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, AUGUST 2, 1F65

bad, or indifferent, whether it would not be the in-
terest and the duty of Canada to find equivalents
elsewhere for the enforced loss or restriction of her
trade with New York and Chicago. A Free-trade
party exists in Canada as well as in the States, and
if Canada, resorting, as Great Britain has done, to
an income and property tax to supply the deficiency
of revenue caused by the abolition of Customs'
duties, were to throw open her ports to the com-
merce of the world—as she has a perfect right to do
—and make herself the free-trade emporium of the
American continent, what, it was pertinently asked,
would be the fate of the high protective and quasi-
prohibitive tariff of the Federal Government ? With
free trade in Canada, and duties varying from 50
to 60 per cent. on British goods in the seaboard
cities of the States, the smuggler would ply his vo-
cation along a frontier of 1,500 miles, on a consi-
derable portion of which the boundary is a geogra-
phical and imAginary line, and defy an army of
Custom-house officials, were it as numerous as the
army of the Potomac, to prevent the ingress of im-
mense quantities of manufactured goods. The
American delegates were not prepared for this re-
sult, or for the danger to Federal finance that might
grow out of it. Attending the Convention from
purely commercial motives, they were averse, for
the most part, from listening to the political
arguments so inappropriately and unskilfully of-
fered by the consul, and looked not only without
disfavour, but with placid satisfaction, upon the
rebuke which some of the most eminent Canadians
present did not fail to administer. It was at one
time thought that the Convention would declare
itself against the renewal of the treaty ; but thanks
to this blundering official, and to the plain but cour-
teous statements and arguments of the Canadian
delegates, it passed with unexpected unanimity a
resolution in favour of the old Reciprocity Treaty,
subject only to such modifications as might be ren-
dered necessary by the new financial condition in
which the civil war had left the Federal Treasury.
Thus, whatever feeling in favour of annexation may
be latent in Canada—especially in the Upper Pro-
vince, more exposed than the Lower to stiffer the
first brunt of war, should war unfortunately arise—
is likely to remain unaffected by the Reciprocity
Treaty, or any considerations connected with it.
The strength of the annexation party rests mainly
on the foregone conclusion in the minds of those
who favour it that sooner or later annexation is
inevitable, and that, come when it will, it is the
cheapest and most satisfactory mode of securing
peace to this portion of the continent, and removing
from it all the dangers to which it is now exposed
by its connection with England. _ _

The great party opposed to annexation, and in
favour of the continuance of British connection, if
not in perpetuity, at least till such time as the
colonies shall be strong enough to defend themselves

unaided against all aggression, is by no means
agreed in Canada—to say nothing of the maritime
provinces—as to the means to be adopted to that end.
The politicians in and out of Parliament incline to
the idea of a Confederation of all the colonies—to
be effected by mutual consent, if that be possible,
or in the case of any smaller recalcitrant, such
as New Brunswick or Prince Edward Island, to be
enforced by gentle though firm compulsion on the
part of the Home Government. Another party,
which seems to be increasing in public favour, would
prefer Consolidation to Confederation. It is argued
that a Legislative Union would be more economical
and more effective than such a Union as that which
exists in the Federal States, where each sovereign
commonwealth is not only burdened with the support
of its representatives in the General Congress, but
with the cost of its own local Legislature. The fact
is called to mind that State rights in America pro-
voked a disastrous civil war and in other respects
proved a signal failure, and it is insisted with reason
that the British Provinces will be unwise if they do
not take warning by the mistakes of their neigh-
bours, and that as the result of the civil war pro-
mises to be the abolition of the right of local self-
government, and the substitution of a centralised
Government to rule over a homogeneous and indi-
visible nationality, the true policy of the British
Americans is also to become a nation, one and indi-
visible, and cease to be a congeries of separate com-
monwealths, one only in name, and diverse, if not
hostile, in spirit and interest.
The official declarations of Mr. Cardwell in the
House of Commons, and the published statements
in the English and Canadian press, of the under-
standing come to between the British Government
on the one side, and the Canadian Ministers who
lately visited England on the other, have been re-
ceived with much favour ou all points except one.
The finances of Canada are not flourishing. The
country is but slowly recovering, if recovering at all,
from the depression of trade caused by the deficient
harvests of 1864, and the people, having never yet
sensibly felt what taxation means, look with im-
patient alarm at the prospect of the smallest increase
of their existing burdens. For these reasons they
strongly object to that portion of the scheme of
Confederation or Consolidation, whichever it may
happen to be, which seeks to impose upon them the
charge of purchasing the interest of the Hudson's
Bay Company in the arable lands of the Red River
and the Saskatchewan. They claim that these
valuable territories belong, or ought to belong, to
Canada, and would gladly receive them if there were
nothing to pay. But as the two Canadas alone are
not half or a quarter peopled, and could find room
for an immigration of five, ten, or 20. millions of
labourers, and be all the better for the influx, they
object to the proposal to pay the Hudson's Bay
Company for a right of colonization of which they
are not now, and are not likely for many years to
be, in a condition to avail themselves. The Crown
granted the Hudson's Bay Company its rights, and
in Canadian opinion the Crown, if it desires to with-
draw these rights forreasons of public policy, should
make equitable compensation, and not the people of
Canada, who will derive no tangible benefit from the
accession to the already large area of these remote
regions. On the other hand,Canada would gladly see
that territory included in the limits of the proposed
Confederation, though as yet she is quite unprepared
to tax herself for the acquisition. After all, this is a
minor point and one that does not press for immediate
settlement. The great work in hand is the erection
of a new and strong nationality on the north bank of
the St. Lawrence. The question of the rights of the
Hudson's Bay Company can bide its time; and whe-
ther the fertile lands to the north and west of Lake
Superior become nominally a part of Canada, or be
converted into a Crown colony with another name,
to be ultimately fused into the Confederacy, is likely
to be a matter of comparative unimportance for at
least a dozen years.
For the rest, although a few New York papers and
stump orators- , desiring to catch applause by a fling
at England, every now and then strive to exasperate
the loyal Canadians by boasts of their intention to
annex the whole of British America, the Canadians
have heard the cry so often that they have ceased to
be disturbed by it. There were some much more
sensible Americans than these, who at the time when
the Confederate agents on this side of the St. Law-
rence organised their useless but wicked raids into
Federal territory, and the buccaneering expeditions
on the Lakes, were impelled by passion to declare
the annexation of Canada to be necessary for their
own security, whatever might be the price at which
it would have to be purchased. But this feeling has
gradually cooled down, and the business men of
America—who, whenever they choose to make their
voices heard, which is unfortunately too seldom, are
able to shape the policy of the Government—have
returned to the old conclusion, that if not better for
the Canadians, it is better for the United States that
Canada should retain its connexion with the mother
country. The American Union, they rightly argue,
is quite large enough already, and the Great West,
together with the mining States of Nevada, and
slopeof
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The right to navigate the St. Lawrence
secured,
and the irritating question of the fisheries
removed
from contention by mutually beneficial arrange-
ment, there is nothing in British America that the
people of the Federal States can desire. Being
satisfied that Great Britain will not seek cause of
quarrel with the States, they are content, for ulte-
rior purposes of their own, that, secure in her sea-

girt isles, the old country should have a vulnerable
side on the North American continent.

Such is a broad outline of the many questions
that in one form or another will continue for
many months to engross the attention and tax the
patriotism of British America, and the progress of
which towards a satisfactory solution cannot but be
watched withsolicitude in the mother country. To
see a nation springing into life is as interesting a
study as to trace the symptoms of its decay, and
from present indications avid the necessities that
have grown out of the American conflict it is not
unreasonable to expect that these colonies are des-
tined of no distant time to take a prominent place
among the powers of the earth, and play a useful
part in the politics of this continent.

SUMNER ASSIZES.

HOME CIRCUIT.--CRoYnoN, Aug. 1.
(Before Mr. Baron Pigott.)

Before beginning our report of the case referred to, it is
important to mention a complaint of the learned judge
in the course of the day, of no small importance as to tho
administration of criminal justice. The complaint was as
to the omission to instruct counsel for the prosecution, the
result of which it was found is to cause several serious
inconveniences. One of thiiisi is that the depositions have
either to be handed to some counsel in court, who of course
has not time enough to read them, and has to get through
the case as he best may ; or else the learned judge has to
confound the two functions of judge arra prosecuting coun-
sel and examine the witnesses himself. In the former case,
as the counsel has the depositions, the judge has not them
before him, as he ought to have, to refer to in case of any
discrepancies in the eviance of the witnesses for the pro-
secution. This occurred in the course of a case to-day,
when the prisoner's counsel wanted the judge to refer to
the depositions, and he observed, "They are in the hands
of the counsel for the prosecution. There appears to be a
practice here of not instructing the counsel who has been
called upon to conduct the prosecutions, but to leave cases
to be managed as best they may be in court, a most incon-
venient system." This,;it• may be mentioLed, occurred in
a case of manslaughter-, in which no counsel had been en-
gaged- to'conclua the case, anti tho depositions were handed
down on the instant to one of the counsel in court.

A man named Janis, described as 43 years of age, was
indicted for feloniously stabbing and wounding one Wm.
Moen, with intent to murder him.

Mr. Poland was for the prosecution. The prisoner was
not defended by counsel, but he appeared to be a man of
remarkable intelligence, and he defended himself.

_ .
The prisoner was a convict under sentence of penal ser-
vitude, and at the time of the offence he was confined in the
invalid convict prison at Woking, in this county. He is a
cripple, and appeared unable to walk except on crutches,
and ho is incapacitated from doing hard labour; hence his
removal to this prison. The prosecutor was a Scripture
reader who visited the prison—and on the 29th of June last
the prisoner being in the refractory cell for some breach of
prison regulations, went to visit him. "How are you to-
day, Jarvis?" said he. He replied, "I am very poorly, in-
deed." The prosecutor sat down beside him and began
quietly talking with him. "It is well,"said he, " amid the
sorrows and gloom and trouble of this life to look above
them to a brighter world." He had hardly finished these
words when the prisoner shifted near to him, saying,
" Yes, it is, it is," and in the act of saying these words he
stabbed him twice with a sharp weapon concealed in his
hand. The prisoner was seized and searched, but the
weapon could not be found, and when asked for it he said
"An angel brought it to me, and took it away again,and he
(Mose) might have seen her standing by. If he dies to-
morrow he will go to Heaven." At last, however, the in-
strument was found concealed in the cell, and it was pro-
duced in court. It was merely the blade of a small pocket
knife without a handle. It was scarcely capable of inflict-
ing a serious wound—in fact it did not do much harm, and
the chief injury was from the shock. The prisoner, when
called upon for his defence, admitted the act, but disavoWed
any intention of inflicting any serious injury, declaring
that, on the contrary, he had a great regard for the Scrip-
ture reader, who, he said, had treated him kindly, and the
reader on his part confirmed this, and stated that the pri-
soner had always treated him with every respect. The
prisoner said he had committed the act only from a desire
to have a public trial and make a public exposure of the
horrors of the penal system, and he made along address to
the jury marked by very considerable ability and a great
appearance of earnestness and truthfulness. This address,
which occupied a great part of an hour and was listened
to with much interest, and which was, in fact, the
remarkable feature in the trial was to the following
effect :—He said he had been sent to the Woking Prison,
which had been called by Punch the Thieves' Palace, but
which would, he said, more properly be called the Thieves'
College. Those who went there, he declared, became 10
times more the children of hell than they were before. The
most horrible crimes, he said, were committed, and when
complained of, not only were the offenders not punished,
but the complainants were persecuted. For some such
complaint, ho said, he himself had been put upon penal
diet, and this was the origin of the ill-will with which he
had been regarded there. He had complained, he said, of
prisoners being robbed of their rations. He was brought
before the directors and sent to Millbank for nine months.
He was examined, ho said, by a medical man, Mr. Guy.
who was a humane man, and said ho could not punish him.
After that he was sent to the prison at Woking, where, as
ho represented, the same spirit of persecution was pursued.
The warder would not permit the windows to be put up,
and when remonstrated with said " They will not be put
up till I like ;" and they were open, the prisoner said, for
14 days and nights. Tho effect was that ho had caught
cold, and had contracted a disease. He complained to a
warder, "I am ill, pray remove me ;" but the warder said
"I shan't, you're only at your old games." " Shift me
higher up," said the prisoner. " No," said the warder.
For these complaints, he said, he was charged with insub-
ordination, and brought before the directors, who would
not listen to him, and sentenced him to six months' penal
diet. " They.might as well sentence me," said the prisoner,
"to death. 1 had only a pint of milk and 20 oz. of bread
daily. I could not eat the potatoes. I was so weak I could
not sit up, and they had to allow me a bed." He could not,
he said, eat all the diet allowed ; it was vegetable diet, but
every other diet was refused him, and be became ill
When Mr. Guy raw him he ordered him better diet. He
waited four weeks, however, when a director came to visit
the prison, and then he complained to him, but he said he
could not interfere. He applied, he said, over and over
again for relief, but it was refused. He described the
treatment he received, which, -he said, imposed the most
painful persecution by night as well as by day. Prisoners,
for instance, he' said, were wakened up every two hours
all through the night ; the warders knocked at the cell
doors, and if they did not get up pulled them out of bed.
It was worse, he said, than the dungeons of the Inquisi-
tion, and it drove him to desperation.. Ho had " hurt the
only man on earth he had loved," he said, and he had done
it only to get a trial. Ile had taken care that the wound
should not be serious. His only motive was to expose the
ill-treatment he had received. He had been 12 years in the
convict prison, and then had a ticket of leave for good
conduct. Then, unfortunately, he got convicted again,and
having been sent to Woking he had suffered all this. "A
worm," he said," will turn if trodden upon, and so did I."
There were many more who were suffering in the same
way, and they wanted to let the public know what they
had to endure. Tho man having finished his statement,
The learned Baron summed up the case to the jury,
pointing out that the great question was to the felonious
intent charged, for there could be no question as to the
charge of unlawfully wounding.
The jury found the prisoner guilty of the minor charge
only.
Mr. Poland then made a long statement from a paper
compiled from the prison reports, which may be regarded
as a kind of counter-statement to the prisoner's, and like
his own, was not, it will be observed, upon oath. It ap-
peared from this statement that the prisoner in 1849 was
convicted of an offence and was sentenced to imprison-
ment for six months- -and that he was convicted again in
1851, and sentenced to 18 months. In October, 1853, he
was convicted of forgery of a bank-note, and sentenced to
20 years' transportation. He was sent to Dartmoor, and
in 1856 he was said to have wounded a fellow-prisoner,
but for this he was not tried. He was afterwards sent to
Lewes, and in 1857 was said to have been insubordinate,
and to have threatened to commit a similar offence, but for
this also there was no trial, and so no legal evidence. From
Lewes he was sent to Millbank, and there his conduct ap-
peared to have improved, and in November, 1861, he got a
ticket of leave. In May, 1862, he was again convioted of
knowingly uttering a forged bank-note, and sentenced to
six years' penal servitude, which was the sentence he was
still undergoing. There had been, it was stated, since then
several instances of violent Conduct.

The learned Judge, duringthe reading of this statement,
inquired upon what evidence it wasdrawn up, and was told
that it was made up from the prison reports. He then said
that he should take time to consider his sentence.

The prisoner said ho should like to say something before
he was sentenced.

The learned Judge said he should have an opportunity
of doing so.

NORTHERN CIRCUIT—MANCIERSTER, Aug. 1.
(Before Mr. Baron Bramwell.)
SHUTTLEWORTH V. KIPPAX.

Mr. T. Jones was for the plaintiff, and Mr. Tamplo, Q.C.,
and Mr. Quain were for the defendant. _

The plaintiff was an attorney's clerk at Accrington, and
employed professionally in the valuation and distribution
of some fixtures in a mill belonging to the defendant, on
its passing to a new tenant. There was a dispute about the
property in a certain shaft in the mill, and upon the plain-
tiff asserting his opinion about the ownership, the defen-
dant asked him who he was that he should interfere, and
threw him down among some piping in an endeavour to
turn him out of the mill, and the action was brought for
this assault. The plaintiff was ill at the time, and imme-
diately threatened an action unless damages were paid. At
the trial it appeared that he had been convicted at Lances-
, t" of felony, Which ho admitted at once, and waa the

holder of a ticket-of-leave, and he said that in consequence
of this position he was made the subject of many assaults,
it being supposed ho would not dare assert himself in a
court of law. The learned counsel for the defendant stig-
matised the action as a trumpery one, brought in the supe-
rior courts for the sake of enhancing the costs ; but his
lordship expressed a strong opinion about using harsh
treatment towards a man in the plaintiff's position, with
whom society should deal leniently wherever possible.
The jury awarded to the plaintiff £25.
LAMB AND ANOTHER V. GIRO.

The Attorney-General of the County Palatine (Mr.
James, Q.O ), and Mr. Higgin were for the plaintiffs ; Mr.
Holkar and Mr. Rostron represepted the defendant.
This was an action for a refusal to accept 1,100 pieces of
grey long cloth, being the remainder, out of 9,000 pieces
contracted for, delivered after the expiration of the timo
specified. There was some contest as to the terms of tho
contract, but a verbal contract prescribing certain terms of
delivery was admitted to prevail over a written memoran-
dum in which such terms were omitted, and the defence
then was that the goods sued for were not delivered accord-
ing to contract, and that the contract itself was cancelled
as to that part. The question turned mainly upon the in-
terpretation of the contract, and the jury returned a verdict
for the plaintiff.

LANE Y. THE LANCASHIRE AND YORKSHIRE RAILWAY

COMPANY.

Mr. Brett, Q.C., and Mr. Edwards were for the plaintiff ;
and the Attorney-• General of the County and Mr. Higgin
represented the company.

The plaintiff was a porter in the employment of the Lon-
don and North-Western Railway Company, and saw a train
safely despatched for Manchester one evening in November,
as it was his duty to do. As the train moved off a female
passenger in one of the carriages dropped a parcel on to the
line, and the plaintiff went on the rails to seek it. Almost
immediately, while searching, he was run over by one of
the engines of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Company,
which was going through the station without making any
signal, and tender first, and therefore without a light. The
plaintiff was dragged along the line and much hurt, sus-
taining a severe scalp wound and a comminuted fracture of
the thigh. Several of the London and North-Western
servants were called to pro+o the absence of light and
signal, while the driver of the engine on the defendants'
line appeared to prove that both were used.
In the result the jury found a verdict for the plaintiff,
with £2OO damages.