The Sun.
London, England, 1825-03-30 00:00:00

MERCANTILE SHIPPING.

DEAL, MancH 29.—Wind E.N.E.—Arrived off Folkstone
yesterday the Helens, Rankine, from Charente for Newcastle.
Passed through from the River the Lady Nugent, Coffin, for
Madras ; General Phipps, Baxter, for Mexico ; Argo, Mardn,
and Planter, Smith, for Oporto ; and the Retrieve, Steel, for
Cadiz.

PORTSMOUTH, March 29.—Wind S. by E.—Arrived leis
Majesty's ship Calliope from a cruize. Put back the Morgiana
for London.

COWES, IIARCh 29.—Arrived from the eastward the Baltic
Metehant transport, to take troops to Gibraltar.
FALMOUTH, MAncir 28.—Wind N. to E.N.E.—Sailed
the Sarah, Bowten, for Vera Cruz; Ocean, Struthers, for Ham-
burgh, and between 70 and 80 coasters. .
Iffy El:TOO L, MARCH 28.—Light airs and variable.—Airived
the Fairy Queen, Davies, from Gibraltar, and the Gesina, Tye.,
from Dordt.

Arrived off Cork the Dolphin, Atwill, from New Orleans.

ROBBUR Y AT THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.

QUEEN-SQUARE.—Edward Mainwaring, a man advanced
in life and of rather a respectable appearance, was yesterday
brought to the Office, charged with having committed a robbery
in the House of Commons. On being placed at the bar he ap-
peared in an extreme state of agitation, so much so, as to be
partially deprived of memory; for when Mr. WHITE, the
sitting Magistrate, interrogated him as to his place of residence,
he could not immediately bring it to his recollection, but after a
short time said, that about a month since he resided at No. 19,
South-street, Lambeth.
The evidence adduced against him was that of Mr. John
Bellamy, Deputy Housekeeper of the House of Commons, and
Handley, one of the officers of this establishment.
Mr. Bellamy stated, that about twelve o'clock yesterday, he
observed the prisoner examining a bundle of papers in a
private passage leading from Westminster Hall to the
Courts of Law, and that, on seeing him placing them up-
der his arm, he walked up to him, and asked him how they
came into his possession ? The prisoner replied, that he had
fbund them ; he then demanded his address, which he. gave
as 19, South-street, Lambeth. Suspecting that all was
not right, he proposed to accompany him to his lodgings,
for the purpose of judging by their appearance whether
the account he gave was justified by their respectability. The
prisoner consented, and on their reaching Westminster-bridge,
perceiving him shifting something from his pockets, he (Mr.B.)
insisted on his turning about and accompanying him to this
Th The papers acßoundseiscltedto
ofw aereFtinhaenncehaßnedpeodrttoofMthr.e Byeealoffice.c
lamy, who identified them as those he saw in the possession of
thef prisoner.e.
1820 and some other Parliamentary documents, and were, as
Mr. Bellamy said, generally kept in the Committee Room,
No. 9, of the House of Commons, and were all the property 'of
the House, and had been committed to his care as Housekeeper.
Handley the officer, who had been sent to search the prisoner's
lodgings, said that he accompanied Mr. Bellamy to 19,
.South-
street, and there discovered that the prisoner, together with his
landlord, had shifted their quarters to Webber-row, in conse-
quence of which he proceeded thither, and on examining pri-
soner's room, found in a trunk two more volumes of Finance Re-
ports, markei with the names of Grant and Ricardo, and a vo-
lume of the General Statues of 4 Gen. IV. endorsed ommittee-
room, No. 4, and, dispersed through the apartment, papers, new
pens, sealing-wax, ink-stand and glasses, and green worsted tas-
sels. Here the articles were produced, and Mr. B. said that, to
the best of his belief, they belonged to the House of Commons,
more particularly the tassels, as they were of the same pattern
as those then in use, and belonged to the room No. 13.
The prisoner being called on for his defence, said that he had
been a tallow-chandler, hut that having failed in business, he
was driven, bnecessity, to the commission of crime; he re-
quested
quested Mr. White to prevent the publication of his case, as his
connexions were respectable.
Mr. WHITE said, he deprecated the publication of Police
Reports previous to the parties going to trial, as they, in some
degree, created a prejudice against them : but in the case of
the prisoner, he thought it would be of general utility, as it
might prevent the repetition of similar offences.
The prisoner was committed for trial to the Sessions only,
the Parliamentary documents being estimated as waste paper,
and valed at the moderate price of one shilling.

CORN EXCHANGE, MARCH 30.
The report of arrivals for this week are only small, but a
good many more vessels have got up to this day's market,
chiefly laden with Oats. There is very little business doing hi
the Wheat trade to-day, and Monday's prices are maintained
only for the best parcels. Barley continues very dull in sale,
and prices are rather lower. Beans and Pease are dull. In
Oats there is not much trade to-day, but prices remain as on
Monday.
ARRIVALS.—English Wheat, 3,00—Barley, 2,loo—Oats,
2,600 quarters—Flour, 2,200 sacks.

CORN LAws.—A Requisition for convening a
public meeting of Merchants, Bankers, Shipowners, Manufac-
turers, and Traders of the City of London, to consider the ex-
pediency of petitioning. Parliament for a revision of the Corn
Laws, is in course of signature. The Right lion. the Lord
Mayor has promised to preside.

THE LONDON JOURNALS.

DAILY

Extracts'fro in [lig Morning Papers , March,3o,l 825.

ENEW TIMES.]
The judgment of the Lord Chancellor, deli-
vered yesterday, in the case of the Real del
Monte Mine Company, will operate as a serious
-warning to the numerous individuals who are
daily embarking in new undertakings, without
considering the responsibility which they there-
by incur. Far be it from us to discourage or
discountenance beneficial projects! We wish the
spirit of enterprise and ingenuity to be invigorat-
ed, and to act in every possible direction, so that
it be under the direction of prudence. But it is
extremely necessary thatindividuals should clear-
ly understand the situation in which they are plac-
ed, and the responsibilities which they incur.
There is no legal limitation, that we know of, to
the number of partners, except in banking con-
cerns : and if any person choose to become a
partner with five hundred others, he is at liberty
so to do, and may do it prudently and properly
in certain cases. All that we are anxious to im-
press on our readers is, that unless a particular
company be exempted by statute from the general
provisions of the law, its members remain co-
partners, and nothing more, and are answerable
to the creditors of the concern with their whole
property. It is too generally thought, that if a

Certnpany do but procure an Act of Parliament,

the Members are safe from all responsibility
beyond the amount of their Share. This may
be the case, in certain instances, but at pre.
sent, the Legislature is not much in the habit
of passing Acts with such provisions. Many Com-
panies apply merely for a Bill to authorise them
to sue and be sued in the name of their Clerk or

other Officer. Prima. facie, this a benefit to the
Public, because it affords them an easy remedy
against the Society; but the great object of many
who apply for such Acts is to obtain, by means
of them, a Parliamentary recognition of the legal
existence of the Association to which they be-
long. When they have once been so recognized,
it becomes difficult to treat them as public nui-
sances. It is therefore important that before the
Legislature passes any Bills, however trivial in
purport for the benefit of a new Society, it should
be fully satisfied of the laudable, or, at least, in-
uocent, objects of the Society in question.

[MORNING HERALD.]
We should think that the opinion given yes-
terday in the Court of Chancery, by the Lord
Chancellor, would have a serious effect on the
modern schemes. His Lordship stated, that ex-
cepting a special Act of Parliament were got in
every case, each partner in these schemes, though
possessing only a simple share, would, in case of
the bankruptcy of a scheme concern, be liable for
the debts of the concern to the whole extent of
his property, on the same principle that an-indi-
vidual was in common partnerships. This is but
fair, for it would be highly improper that a Corn-
pany—we will say of Fishmongers or Milkmen,
consisting only of six partners, should carry on
trade, and that each partner should be liable in the
whole extent j f his property to the dents of the
concern, and *Ana ;n ...ocher Company, because it
contained 60 or 600, or 6,000 partners, or share-
holders, each shareholder should be liable only
to the debts of the concern to the extent to which
nis share went. This would, indeed, be en-
couraging a monopoly at the expence of indi-
vidual trade. We hope, when the scheme Bills
come before either House, that this unjust dis-
tinction may be considered. If it be not, and
these Companies go on increasing, there will not
tz a retailer or a wholesale trader safe from the
most serious interference on the part of Com-
panies, who, by the mere dint of capital, may for
is-time carry all before them.

[MORNING CHRONICLE.]
We have elsewhere alluded to the opinions of
the Lord Chancellor on the subject of Associa-
tions. The question came before the House last
night, on the motion of Mr. Peter Moore to re-
peal the Bubble Act. Something ought un-
doubtedly to be done to make this law
clear and intelligible ; to leave people at li-
berty to carry on business singly or by asso-
ciation, subject in both cases to liability to cre-
ditors to the extent of their means. It is shame-
ful on the part of those whose business it is to
attend to the state of the law, to allow of any
private Bills.for Joint Stock Companies. All As-
sociations ought to be placed on the same footing,
and no preferences ought to be given ; and if the
state of the Law throws obstacles in the way of
conducting business by association without a pri-
vate Bill, the Law ought to be altered. Our own
opinion is, that very few associations would be
formed, were the Law what it ought to be.

[BRITISH PRESS.I
The- West India Company Bill was read a
second time last night, after a very feeble oppo-
sition on the part of Mr. F. Buxton and 'Jr. W.
Smith. The ground of objection was, that the
Company was established to uphold slavery.
The negro question is one which some Members
of Parliament can never suffer to pass by them
without some vague and general denunciation of
the colonists. This topic is so irresistible to
these gentlemen that it even moved Mr. Fowell
Buxton to take the field against a Bill for a
Joint Stock Association. But really what connec-
tion has this Company with the question of negro

slavery ? Certainly none, excepting so far as it
may provide the means of disposing more readily
and profitably of the colonial produce, and in

that way ensure, amongst other beneficial conse-
quences, the greater prosperity of the islands
and the better treatment of the blare population.
Slavery, unfortunately, exists. It was established
by the British Parliament in the colonies for the

interets of the Mother Country. The only consi-
deration with those who are the sincere and en-
lightened friends of the Negroes is, how the work
..of progressive emancipation can be most safely
effectually commenced, and during the con-
tinuance of their actual condition, how they-can
be rei-,dered most tranquil and comfortable. It

is clear that if the planters be liable to frequently-
recurring and widely-extended distress, the slave
population must be miserable and discontented,
and that no measures can be adopted towards
them but those of coercion and severity. The first
step to the improvement of their moral and civil
condition must be to raise them from abject dis-
tress, and this end can be attained only when their
masters are in a state of ease and prosperity. A
wretched body of proprietors and a comfortable
population of slaves cannot coexist.' If Mr. F.
Buxton, then, were not warped in' his judgment
by his prejudices on this subject, he ought to
have been among the first to have given his sup-
port to this measure, more worthy of his aid,
we think, than any of the numerous schemes
in which the Honourable Gentleman is con-
cerned. The object of the Bill is only to
enable the West India Company to sue and be
sued in the name of its Secretary ; and with-
out denying the propriety of extending this
privilege to any of the Companies now before
Parliament, we do not hesitate to affirm that this
is far more entitled to the benefit it solicits than
anY one of them. The direction of the Company
will be under the most respectable auspices ;
and it is the opinion of the ablest persons con-
versant with the Colonial trade, that the forma-
tion of the Company will render the most essen-
tial services both to the planters and the po-
pulation.

[MORNING POST.]

In the House of Commons, last night, Mr.
Littleton fixed Thursday the 14th of April, for
bringing in his Bill to regulate the Elective
Franchise in Ireland, and Lord F. Gower gave
notice, that on the 26th of the same month he
should ask leave to bring in a Bill to make a pro-
vision for the Catholic Clergy of Ireland. The
only important business of the evening was Mr.
Huskisson's Motion for a Select Committee to
inquire into the effects of the Act of the sth of
George IV. chap. 59, in respect to the con-
duct of workmen and others in the different
parts of the United Kingdom ; and to re-
port their opinion to the House how far it
may be necessary to repeal the same Act. The
necessity for such an inquiry was most ably and
forcibly shown by the Right Honourable Gentle-
man, and must indeed be manifest to every indi-
vidual who has paid attention to the conduct of
workmen in various parts of the country, since
Mr. Ilume's Act of last year repealed between
thirty and forty Statutes, and also put the
common law aside on the subject. In this
Act, or rather this abortion, which it is most
surprising passed both Houses in its present shape,
the second section instead of discountenancing,
positively encourages the formation of com-
binations, for it enacts 44 that journeymen and
workmen entering into combinations for the pur-
pose of raising wages, or regulating the mode of
carrying on any manufacture or trade, or for the
management thereof, shall not be subject to any
indictment or criminal prosecution under any
statute or at common law !" Well might Mr.
Huskisson say, that any one who " read that
section might believe that the Law held it de-
sirable that combinations should take place."—
The sth section, the only penal one in the
Act, only provides, " that any person who,
by violence or threats of violence, should wil-
fully and maliciously force any one to quit his
hiring, or should destroy the goods of others,
should on conviction before two Magistrates and
on the evidence of two witnesses, be punished
with two months' imprisonment." So inadequate
a punishment also tends to encourage instead of
repressing offences, and it is not astonishing
that the men conceiving themselves set free
from all restraints should have proceeded as they
have done. The Right Honourable Gentleman
then read the articles of regulation drawn up
for the use of the operative colliers in the
Counties of Lanark, Dumbarton, and Renfrew,
which consisted nearly of forty different articles
and " appointed Presidents, Secretaries, Trea-
surers, Committees of Management, &c. with as
much solemnity as if the Government of a king-
dom were in question." lie showed that not only
did each trade form an association of this kind, but
that there was an association of delegates from
all the trades in each district, and that from these
was formed one general Congress. The 11th article
pointed out the du ties of this General Committee of
Delegates. These duties were, first, to designate
such masters as they disliked ; secondly, to warn
them of their danger; and thirdly, to try every
prudent means of putting them out of the trade.
Not to try by argument, persuasion, or even by
law, to bring back any masters who had acted
harshly to a sense of their duty, and to an act of
justice, but to try to drive them out of their
trade, and thus to ruin them for ever. Be-
sides this, the power of levying money was
vested in the General Committee. After de-
scribing some more of the regulations of this
Association,. Mr. lluskisson noticed another,
different in form, but similar in effect—the
Seamen's Union Society, founded on the prin-
ciple, that its members were to select and
appoint those who were to be in authority over
then, in the ship! He was not after all much
surprised that such associations had been formed,
when he looked to the words of the Act and saw
how easy it was by an artful construction to
wrest its provisions from their true intent.--
The labourers believed that it did not at all
interfere between them and their masters,
and they thought their associations were per-
fectly legal. Mr. 'hone endeavoured to excuse
himself and the Committee for having framed a
measure of which he could not altogether deny
the injurious results. He admitted the neces-
sity of inquiry ; and Mr. Secretary Peel having
demonstrated that the state of things (bus created
" was a dreadful vulgar tyranny less endurable
than the despotism of one man, and destructive
to the prosperity of the country," the motion was
urianimoudy agreed to, and a Committee ap-
pointed.

[THE TIMES.
The first fruit of the long and laborious in-
quiries which have been instituted into the state
of Ireland, under the authority, and by Com-
mittees of both Houses of Parliament, has come
forth in the form of a Report of Evidence taken

before the Select Committee of the House of
Lords. We have just had time to glance for a
moment at this extraordinary and important pro-
duction, and to experience some of that intense
interest which it is manifestly calculated to ex-
cite. Little more, however, is now practicable
than to state the names of a few of the witnesses,
with here and there a hint as to the particu-
lar subject on which their examinations were
opened.
Mr. Frankland Lewis.—Effects of the distil-
lery laws—State of manufactures—Landlord and
tenant—Catholic question.
Mr. Doherty.—State of the peasantry—Land-
lord and tenant—Administration of justice.
Mr. Blake (Chief Remembrancer, and a Ca-
tholic.)—Opportunities of acquiring intelligence
derived to him from his office as Commissioner of
Education—State of the peasantry—Subdivision
of property—Civil distinctions on account of
religion—Feelings of the Catholics—Reforms in-
troduced under Lord Wellesley's administration
—Provision for the Catholic clergy—Elective
franchise=Necessity and advantages of Catholic
emancipation.

Mr. O'Connell.—Administration of justice—
Censurable appointments to the Bench—Vices
of the Magistracy—New police—Corporations—
Catholic grievances—Catholic principles and
views —Catholic clergy—Elective franchise—
Orange confederacy—Catholic emancipation.
Messrs. Lesslie Foster, Glassford, General
Bowker, Colonel Curry, Rev. Mr. Burnett, Mr.
Abbot, Rev. Mr. Cooke, General Egerton,
were likewise examined ; and the volume closes
with the long and most curious evidence of Bishop
Doyle, principally given with a view to illustrate
the constitution and character of the Catholic
Church of Ireland, as also the manner in which
the priesthood stand affected towards the measure
of emancipation, and that for providing them
with a subsistence under the authority of Par-
liament. We shall return to this great subject,
which grows in magnitude and i❑ urgency every
hour.

[THE PUBLIC LEDGER.)
A requisition for convening a public Meeting
of Merchants, Bankers, Shipowners, and Traders,
of the City of London, to consider the expe-
diency of petitioning Parliament for a re-
vision of the Corn Laws, is in course of signa-
ture. The Lord Mayor has promised to preside ;
and there is no doubt but the attendance will be
commensurate with the importance of the ques-
tion. The present regulations are so vicious, that
there has been long a general cry for their revi-
sion, and as the rest of the Public suffer severely
under their operation, without the Agricul-
turists being really benefitted, we indulge in
the hope that this Session will be distinguished
by another triumph over antiquated prejudices.
Without it, all the other labours of the Le-
gislature for the improvement of trade would be
incomplete, for, though with her vast capital,
skill, and spirit of enterprise, the country has
been hitherto able to beat down all competition,
she cannot always calculate on the same success,
if the necessaries of life remain here at double
the price which they are likely to fetch in any
other country.

From the LONDON GAZETTE, March '29.

BANKRUPTCIES ENLARGED.

J. Sugden, from March 25 to April 15, at the Office of
Messrs. Whitehead and Robinson, Huddersfield.
S. Keane, Long Ditton, coal-merchant, from April 9 to
April 12, at the Court of Commissioners of Bankrupts, Ba-
singhall•srreet.

BANKRUPTCIES SUPERSEDED.
J. H. and H. S. Robinson, Ridden-court, Essex, hay-sales-
men.
R. Hall, jun. Poulton-in-the-Fylde, Lancaster, liquor-rner_
chant.