The Sun.
London, England, 1854-04-11 00:00:00

the Earl of SHAFTESBURY and his lady have bee:

silent. America and its Senate have not even the
silly pretext of English interrneddling to excuse
this unpardonable insult to the whole civilised
world. While the CZAR has been braving living
and formidable warriors in his efforts to extend
political slavery, the Senate of the United States,
a full half of its members being elected by so-
called frea states, has been consigning an occupied
and defenceless region to the horrors and abomi-
nations of personal, of negro slavery. It has
strangled liberty before it could wield its
arms, has deliberately plotted to enslave a
State, or States yet unborn, and over a land
of greater extent by far than the territory
now coveted by the CZAR, and tenanted
at present by the roaming Indian, the buffalo,
and the other free creatures of the wilderness, the
tainted breath of United States legislation would
spread for ever the malignant pestilence of slavery.
We do not ask England to interfere, certainly
not by its Government, nor even through its sin-
cere philanthropists. We have other work to do
just now ; and if we had not, Despotism, whether
in the East or in the West, is but irritated, nut
shamed, by the exposure of its selfishness. We
do feel, however, a deep interest in the question.
We long to respect America as much as we have
always done; the abominable Fugitive Slave Law
gave us a shock hard to overcome; " Uncle Tom's
Cabin," its authoress, and its tens of thousands of
admiring readers in the States, helped us to realise
that the American people were freemen at heart
after all; but if this bill should pass the House of
Representatives as well as the Senate, and receive,
as it would do, the willing assent of such a
thoroughgoing pra-slavery man as FRANKLIN
PIERCE, it would be difficUlt for Englishmen to
regard the United States with the feelings it de-
sires to cherish towards our kinsmen in blood.
We are glad to see that its progress is at least
delayed ; by a majority of 110 to 95 it is " re-
ferred to a committee of the whole" in the House
of Representatives. Mrs. STOWE is earnestly ap-
pealing to her countrywomen ; the clergy of New
York have sent a petition against it, signed by
151 names of ministers of all denominations in
few days ; and a monster petition, 200 feet long,
and signed by 3,000 clergymen, has also been
presented. We hope the delay of the bill
will be made use of to evoke an expression
of feeling so strong and so universal in the States,
which, despite the Fugitive Slave Law, still call
themselves free, that the House will be compelled
to reject it. We have many fears to the con-
trary ; but, if it becomes law, the Slave Power
will .bestride America as Russia does Austria and
the rest of Germany. It is truly mortifying to
see the House, which should be composed of the
elite of American statesmen, the House which
most Radicals would think chosen on• a plan
so far superior to that on which our House of
Lords is nominated, embracing so cordially a bill
so infamous, that we believe our House of Lords
would have hardly conceded to it a first reading,
even if sent up by three-fourths of the House of
Commons, and which :they would certainly have
kicked out at the second reading without a divi-
sion. We only pray that America' may have to
be prouder of her House of Representatiies than
she can now possibly be of her lauded Senate.

One of the most extraordinary impositions
ever attempted has just been brought to a con clu-
clusion—the curtain has fallen on the last scene
of the strange drama of the pseudo " Sir RICHARD
HUGH SMYTH, Baronet." The impostor had been
detected at the last assizes for the county of
Gloucester—his nefarious machinations brought
to light, notwithstanding the almost unparalleled
audacity displayed in carrying out his original false-
hood. No doubt could have remained as to his
guilt when the eminent gentlemen by whom he
was represented had indignantly. flung down their
briefs, having struggled zealously and efficiently
so long as there was•the remotest chance of the
claim being well founded. No person but the
criminal himself supposed that there was the
slightest possibility of carrying on the deception,
and evading the penal consequences of his mani-
fold offences. He, however, remained obdurate,
and with a perverse. and unyielding determina-
tion continued to the last moment, even until
the verdict of the jury and the sentence of the
Court were pronounced, to assert the accuracyof his
romantic statements, declaring that although he
had committed "some irregularities" (I) it was
nevertheless strictly true that he was the legiti-
mate son of the deceased Sir HUGH SMYTH, by
his first wife, and as such the lawful owner of the
wide-spread domains and princely inheritance be-
longing to his quasi father.
The trial lasted two entire days; so great is the
consideration shown even to criminals of the deep-
est dye by the constitutional law of the land.
Everything, no matter how obvious, should be
brought home to the accused beyond the possi-
bility of reasonable doubt. It was not deemed
sufficient to show that he had endeavoured to put
forward a Bible purchased by himself a short time
previously, as one that had descended to him
from his maternal grandfather, that lie should
have represented the old picture belonging to Mr.
PROVES, the carpenter(his real father), as that of his
alleged parent, Sir HUGH SMYTH, or that lie should
have ordered the engraving of the seal with which
the alleged will was sealed. All these were merely
links in the chain of evidence, but to warrant a
conviction the jury should be satisfied that he had
actually forged, or uttered, knowing to be forged,
the document on which the indictment was
founded—the suppositious will of 1823. Even
though perfectly aware of his fraud in setting
himself up to be the lost heir, it would not have
authorised a hostile verdict on that indictment,
if he could by a possibility have believed the will
which be was endeavouring to sustain by these
fictitious moans to have been a genuine document.
We do not say that he could not have been
punished for any and every one of these fraudu-
lent acts, but it should have been under a different
indictment ; and we merely allude to 'this to show i
the humanity of the British law, and' the ma-