The Sun.
London, England, 1865-12-27 00:00:00

proposals for regulating the traws,
The effort has, indeed, ih, been far too long ael _
The obstruction and insecurity of the street' of
London have furnished for years the most urgent
occasions for remonstrance, and it is reproach to
our powers of organization that the evil has been
allowed to grow to such a height. The streets were
always too narrow, even in the comparatively quiet
days of former generations ; but the introduction
of railways has multiplied their insufficiency in even
a greater proportion than it has multiplied their
traffic. The conveyance of passengers and goods
to a City terminus is now almost as great a feat
as the conjuror's performance of putting a full-
grown pigeon down the neck of a wine bottle.
There is plenty of space for it when it reaches
the broad part of the bottle, but how it passes
through the neck is a mystery. The Strand,
Fleet-street, the Poultry, and even sonic streets
at the West-end are just like so many necks of
bottles, through which, by some means or other, their
solid contents have to be forced ; and as a number
of persons are all trying to introduce these at
once, without the least regard to order, it is in-
evitable that there should be an almost con-
stant deadlock. Meanwhile it is hard if some means
cannot be found of modifying the evil by regulating
the order of transit, and, in fact, if the public can-
not enforce upon its own members rules which would
be for the common advantage of all. Something
has been done by the mere interference of the police,
and the ease with which a few constables are able
to distribute the traffic on a crowded place like Lon-
don-bridge might have led, before this, to a more
constant employment of similar means. The City,
it must be allowed, have displayed good intentions
in the matter, though they cannot as yet be
credited with anything more effectual. An act,
indeed, was passed in 1863 with the same general
object as the bill upon which we commented the
other day, but, from some unexplained reason, it
has remained practically a dead letter. Some by-
laws have been authorised in pursuance of its pro-
visions, but omnibuses, unhired cabs, laundresses'
carts, draymen, loads of timber, coals, and beer,
vtehearnefdoreo,mrnighipoutyentthoaus
thought it
some more effectual necessary'al fel ie Cj so
rt p otaros a to oi
obtain
t[nl au,
powers., and
it is to be hoped that the bill they have now proposed
will prove sufficiently compulsory in its character.
POST. —The Report of the Commission on Capi-
tal Punishment is now before us. It recommends
that the punishment of death be retained for all
murders deliberately committed with express malice
aforethought—such malice to be found as a fact by
the jury—and also in cases of treason as distin-
guished from treason-felony. In the case of murder
being committed in perpetrating, or in the attempt
to perpetrate, or to escape after having perpetrated,
arson, rape, burglary, robbery, piracy, or murder,
the punishment of death is also recommended to be
retained. In other cases of murder, such as those
in which, although not committed after posi-
tive and evident premeditation, the law infers
or assumes general malice, through the absence of
legal provocation, the punishment suggested is
penal servitude for life, or for a term not less than
seven years, according to the discretion of the
court. With reference to the particular species of
murder known as infanticide, which the present
law does not distinguish from murder generally,
thereby apparently causing repeated failures of
justice, the commissioners recommend that to inflict
grievous bodily harm or serious injury upon an in-
fant, either during its birth or within seven days
afterwards, shall bo constituted an offence at law
punishable with penal servitude or imprisonment at
the discretion of the court. In such case no proof
of the child having been born alive should be re-
quired. Persons should not be convicted of con-
cealment of birth upon an indictment for child-
murder, but the offence should be tried upon a se-
parate indictment of its own. In neither of these
cases should the accused be acquitted if, instead of
the Crime charged, the facts should be found to
amount to murder or manslaughter. The power of
ordering sentence of death to be recorded should be
restored to the judges. The report recommends
that executions should not be public, but private—
within the precincts of the prison—such regulations
being made as would prevent abuse and satisfy the
public that the law had been carried out. With re-
ference to the expediency of allowing an appeal ou
matters of fact to a court of law in criminal cases ;
to the mode in which the Crown is advised to exer-
cise the prerogative of mercy by the Home Secre-
tary ; and the preseht state of the law as to the
nature and degree of insanity which is held to re-
lieve the accused from penal servitude in criminal
cases, the commissioners observe that these difficult
questions are not confined to capital offences only,
but pervade the whole administration of the crimi-
nal law, and therefore require a more general and
comprehensive treatment than the terms of the
commission under which they act will admit. They
confine themselves therefore to the suggestion that
these important points are deserving of further in-
vestigation. Such, in substance, are the recom-
mendations of the report. The commissioners for-
bear to enter upon a discussion as to the expediency
of the abolition of capital punishment, considered in
the abstract. On this point differences of opinion
exist among them ; but they are unanimous in
thinking that the alterations stated above should be
made in the present law.

Mn. THACKERAY AT THE SECOND FUNERAL OP
NAPOLEON.—Now the company began to arrive thicker
and thicker. A whole company of Conseillers d'Etat came
in, in blue coats, embroidered with blue silk; then came
a crowd of lawyers in toques and caps, among whom were
sundry venerable judges in scarlet, purple velvet, and
ermine—a kind of Bajazet costume. Look there ! there is
the Turkish Ambassador in his red cap, 'turning his
solemn brown face about and looking preternaturally
wise. The deputies walk in in a body. Guizot is not
there ; ho passed by just now in full ministerial costume.
Presently little Thiers saunters back ; what a clear, broad,
sharp-eyed face the fellow has, with his grey hair cut
down so demure ! . . . Bang, bang ! At about half-
past two a dull sound of cannonading was heard with-
out the church, and signals took place between the
commandant of the Invalids, of the National Guards,
and the big drum major. Looking to these troops (the
fat Nationals were shuffling into lino again) the two
commandants uttered, as nearly as I could catch them,
the following words :—"Harrum Hump !" At once all the
National bayonets were on the present, and the sabres of
the old invalids up. The big drum major looked round
at the children, who began very slowly and solemnly on.
their drums, Bub-dub-dub--rub-dub-dub—(count two be-
tween each)—rub-dub-dub, and a great procession of
priests came down from the altar. First, there was a tal
o heightere
like f man, handsome cross bearer, bearing a long gold cross, of which
the front was turned towards his grace the Archbishop.
Thenmoon
when
All
the
Then came a double row of about 16 incense boys, dressed
n thea
A l fol-
lowed
in white surplices ; the first boy, about six years old, the
a regiment of priests with black tippets, and of
whitel
ast withg
were, aind whiskers,
f haand
t oobofl) d themselves.
theblack
hoods,
v
she is at her third quarter, wherewith those who were bald
(many
reverend men held their heads meekly down, and affected
to be reading in their breviaries. After the priests came
some bishops of the neighbouring districts, in purple, with
crosses sparkling on their episcopal bosoms. Then came,
after more priests, a set of men whom I have never seen.
before—a kind of ghostly heralds, young and handsome
men, some of them in stiff tabards of black and silver, their
eyes to the ground, their hands placed at right angles with
their chests. Then came two gentlemen bearing remark-
able tall candlesticks, with candles of corresponding size.
One was burning brightly, but the ,wind (that chattered
libertine) had blown out the other, which nevertheless
kept its place in the procession—l wondered to myself
whether the rev. gentleman who carried the extinguished
candle felt disgusted, humiliated, mortified—perfectly con.-
scious that the eyes of many thousands of people were bent
upon that bit of refractory wax. We all of us looked at it
with intense interest. . . . At last the real procession came.
Then the drums began to beat as formerly, the Nationals
to get under arms, the clergymen were sent for and went,
and presently—yes, there was the tall crossbearer at the
head of the procession, and they came back ! They chanted
something in a weak, snuffling, lugubrious manner, to the.
melancholy bray of a serpent. Crash ! however. Mr.
Habeneck and the fiddlers in the organ-loft pealed out a
wild shrill march, which stopped the rev. gentlemen, and
in the midst of his music—and of a great trampling of feet
and clattering, and of a great crowd of generals and officers
in fine clothes, with the Prince de joinville marching at
at the head of the procession, and while everybody's heart
was thumping as hard as possible—Napoleon's coffin
passed! It was done in an instant. A box covered with a
great red cross—a dingly-looking crown lying on the top
of it—seamen on one side and invalids on the other. They
had passed in an instant, and were up the aisle.—Cornhill
Magazine.

THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE.—No. document, says
the New York Tribune, discussing so many diverse questions
of grave moment., seriously affecting so many vital inte-
rests as the first Annual Message of President Johnson,
could reasonably be expected to accord in every respect
with the convictions or prepossessions of a majority of its
readers; yet we doubt whether any former Message has,
on the whole, contained so much that will be generally and
justly approved, with so little that will or should provoke
dissent. It is a State paper of signal ability and of un-
usual frankness, dealing unreservedly with every great
question of internal or international policy, and calculated
to increase the hold of the author on the regard and confi-
dence of the American people.