The Sun.
London, England, 1849-08-09 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, THURSDAY EVENING,

proceeded to carry out their views in a culpable manner,
and, although success would have prevented an exami-
nation, the contrary allows no justification of the means.
The moment the bankrupts signed that deed heir inde-
pendence as merchants was gone. They hearegeable
with another breach of commercial duty in treating the
property and debts so assigned as their own, in con-
tinuous accounts—treating it, in fact, as if no such
assignment had been made. The Bank o Eland
was ignorant of this assignment ; the c England
ircum
stance came upon them by surprise. The intention of
Messrs. Cruickshank and Co. in making it may have
been good; this may in some measure extenuate though
it cannot be an excuse to justify their n from
the plain and obvious rules of duty. In business in their
own name, apparently as free agents for their own
account, and. although as between themselves it might
be understood that no new engagements were to be
entered into, still in all contracts concerning negotiable
paper, as well as in all other business transactions, any
one of the partners had the full power to bind the firm.
The partners, by their proceedings, reciprocally gave to
each other the power of acting one for the other in the
partnership business, in the same manner as if no
assignment had been made to Messrs. Trueman and
Cook. Each of the parties was the cause of confidence
or credit being reposed in the firm, in any matter in
which the partnership was concerned. During that
period it appears that Mr. Street, in August, 1847,
without consulting his partners, took the bill for
7,8001., which was drawn by him in the name of
the firm, Cruickshank, Melville, and Street, and
accepted by Trueman and Cook, to the Bank of England
for discount. The bill was discounted, and the amount
was handed over to Trueman and Cook for the purposes
of the assignment. With respect to the discount of that
bill, the bankrupts say that Mr. Street, being aware how
very generally it was known in the City that the firm of
Cruickshank, Melville, and Co. had been for nearly two
years in difficulties, and during that time been supported
by Messrs. Trueman and Cook, he considered that the
bill was discounted by the Bank entirely in reliance on
the names of Trueman and Cook, whose credit stood
very high, as is evidenced by the ;fact that, at the
time of their suspension, the Bank held their
acceptances to the amount of 60,0001. Judging,
however, of the discount of that bill by the
ordinary rules applicable to such transactions.
I cannot come to any other conclusion than that the di-
rectors of the Bank were in reality deceived, and that
the deception was as real, if not as palpable, as if the
bankrupts had made a direct false representation of the
state of their affairs. There is another circumstance
affecting Mr. Melville and Mr. Street. I allude to the
arrangement in July, 1846, for a new partnership with
the son of Mr. Oddy, with the obligations of the old firm
still upon them, and the more questionable fact of the
assignment hanging over them. Actions which are ad-
judged criminal in a small trader cannot be admittedtn
chant. The conjuncture s
amoef
seCirrtCourasterioenesmtuosbtebleessgesnoeirnalalympeerr:
mitted or forbidden. So, in judging of any commercial
delinquency, we must look to the general consequences,
rather than to the particular ones; and these must be es-
timated by asking what would be the mischiefs produced
by the general toleration of actions of the same sort.
Applying this question to the proceedings in connexion
with Trueman tind Cook, and to the discount transaction
with the Bank of England, to mercantile men, the
answer must be obvious. After duly weighing all the
circumstances of the case, the Court feels bound to ad-
judge that the certificate of Mr. Street be suspended for
twelve months, and those of Mr. Cruickshank and Mr.
Melville respectively for six months from the date of the
hearing of their application.

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.
OXFORD ClRCUlT.—Monmouth, Aug. 7.
The business was brought to a close last night at
half-past eight. This day the commission is to be
opmed at Gloucester, and to-morrow business begins at
ten o'clock, contrary to an ancient custom, according to
which the Judges attended Divine service at the cathe-
dral on the morning after the commission day, and went
into court at twelve o'clock.

NORTH WALES CIRCIIIT.—Chester, Aug. 7.
(Before Mr. Justice MAULE.)
THE BIRKENHEAD, LANCASHIRE, AND CHESTER JUNC-
TION RAILWAY COMPANY V. FILCHER.
This was au action for calls upon 130 shares held by
the defendant; the defence to which was that the defen-
dant was a minor, and therefore not liable on his con-
tract.
Mr. Townsend and Mr. Welsby were for the plaintiffs,
and Mr. Brandt appeared for the defendant.
The plaintiffs proved their case by putting in the
minute-book of the company, signed by the chairman,
and containing an entry of the call; also a notice to the
defendant by letter, that he must pay the instal-
ments. The . defendant put in a transfer cer-
tificate of the registry of the shares in the defendant's
name, which proved no more than the mere fact of re-
gistry, and he was unable to show, under the notices
given to the other side to produce books and docu-
ments, that at the time when the calls were made he was a
minor. The father of the defendant swore that the de-
fendant was born on April 7, 1827, consequently that
he was not of age till April 7, 1848. The secretary of
the company acknowledged that the certificate of transfer
put in by defendant was in his handwriting, and that it
showed that defendant was holder of shares on March 7,
1848.
The Learned JUDGE directed the jury to find a ver-
dict for the plaintiffs for 3101. 14s. 6d., the amount of the
calls, with leave to move the superior Court to enter the
verdict for the defendant if the Court should be of opi-
nion that the defendant had sufficiently proved his case
' by the production of the certificate of registry, and
1 that the contract took place at the time of the transfer
and registration, and not at the time of the making of
I ' the calls.

THAMES.
William For, a baker, residing at 4, Darling-place,
Cambridge-road, was finally examined, charged with
stealing a gold guard chain, ♦alue 51., and a silver chain
value 55., the property of S9,muel Isaacs, a foreign Jew,
residing at 25, Cutler. street, Houndsditch.
A solicitor named Steadman appeared for the pri-

soner.
The prosecutor, who spoke English with considerable
fluency, said that he was going with a box of bijouterie
through Ratcliff-highway, about half-past three in the
afternoon of Tuesday week, when he was followed by
three men, one of whom, not the prisoner, came up and
said, " You have something to sell." He answered in
the affirmative ; on which the person who addressed
him took him by the arm, and led him to the Crooked
Billet public-house, saying he would purchase some-
thing of him. They then proceeded to the skittle-ground,
when the person who first addressed him said, " I'll
play with that old fellow (meaning the prisoner),
for he has plenty of money, and you shall count the
games." The prisoner then challenged the prosecutor
to play, but he declined. The prisoner insisted that he
should play; upon which the prosecutor took his box
upon his shoulder and was about to leave the ground,
when the prisoner seized him by the arm with one hand,
and knocking his cap off with the other, whipped a gold
chain off his neck. He had a silver chain in his waist-
coat pocket, with the swivel hanging out, which the
prisoner snatched immediately after, and rolling both up
together, put them in his pocket. Complainant called
out, and said he would go for the police, but as he was
moving up the steps for that purpose the prisoner caught
him by the coat and tore it. The waiter then came as
he was entering the house, and, pushing him back,
said, " Don't make such a row, you rascal, and we'll
make it all square," the prisoner using the same
words at the time. Being a stranger, with no one
to help him, complainant forced his way to the front
door, and giving his box to a man in the street
whom he knew, blocked up the way to prevent
egress, and called loudly for the police, but no constable
came for a considerable time. His cries collected a mob,
who encouraged him not to let anybody pass, but ren-
dered him no further assistance. The prisoner came
up, and said " You —, go out, and do not keep the
dour." Complainant replied, " Give me my guard-
chain," upon which the prisoner took out the silver
chain, and was going to thrust it
.into complainant's
pocket, but the latter rejected it, saying her must
have
his gold chain also. Thep .ri.soner,. however, succeeded
in thrusting the silver chain into his cket. The
sober then struggled with. and kicked him, but com-
plainant persisted, and said, " I will not let you pass
until a constable comes, or you return my gold chain.
also." The waiter then came up, and struck com-
plainant, saying, " Go from the door, you rascal, or I
will punch your -- eyes out ; I will dash your --se
re.ciNthoaatTottehe (:_ahitoerswatasfioar
clolurr.t,lnignshtaamalybeoi
brains out:'
rndge riend
him into the dock.
form
Mr. Steadman—Why he is my witness; I did not know
that he was a prisoner.
Mr. NORTON—If I knew as much as I know at pre-
sent he should have been a prisoner long before now.
The complainant then reiterated his evidence as re-
garded the waiter, Joshua Smith, who, he said, drank
with Fox when they entered the skittle-ground, and was
present when tho latter possessed himself of the chain.
A constable (continued Isaacs) at last came up, and Fox,
who was found in the skittle-ground, was given into
custody of Damarel, an active officer, who searched him,
but the chain was not found. He had a dummy (an
imitation sovereign), closely resembling the currency in
colour, weight, and ring of metal.
Mr. NORTON committed both prisoners for trial, ad-
mitting Smith to bail, himself in 801., and two sureties
of 40/. each. One of the sureties was the proprietor of
the Crooked Billet.
SOUTHWARK.
Mary Davis and Sophia Davis, sisters, were brought
before Mr. Secker, charged with being concerned in
the suspected murder of a child, whose body was dis-
covered lying on the ground in a market-garden, near
the Greenwich Railway.
William Roberts, a policeman, stated that on the pre-
vious day, about three o'clock, while on duty in thee
Anchor-lane, Bermondsey, his attention was called to a
crowd assembled near the arch under the railway. On
going to the spot he saw the' prisoners, and they were
pointed out to him as being the parties who deposited
the body of a child, suspected to have been murdered, in
a garden near at hand. He immediately repaired to
the place, and finding the body as described, he took the
prisoners into custody.
A woman aamed Smith was next called, and stated
that on the previous afternoon, while out walking with
her child, in passing Mr. Shepherd's garden, adjacent to
the railway, she looked over the palings into the grounds,
and observed:the body of a child. She ,gave immediate
information of the circumstance, and marks of violence
being observable on the child's neck, as if it had been
squeezed to death, the prisoners, who were seen for some
time previously lurking about the spot, were suspected
of having deposited the body in the place where it was
found.
The prisoners said that they knew nothing about the
affair, except what they had heard that day; that
they lived together at Bermondsey; and, having
gone for a walk the preceding afternoon,
in
passing near the railway they were beset by
a mob, who charged them with the murder of a
child. They denied the imputation, but their denial
of it excited the crowd still more against them, and
they believed they would have been roughly handled
if the policeman had not interfered. They admitted
that they had lounged about near Mr. Shepherd's
garden, but that neither of them had been inside the
palings.
Mr. SECKER said that a remarkable feature in the
case was that a witness bad passed the garden a short
time previously to the discovery of the child, and
that it was not there then, and must have been deposited
about the period the prisoners were observed, as
described, lurking near the spot. He (the magistrate),
however, should allow the prisoners to go at large, on
entering into their recognizances of 501. each, until
Friday next ; and in the mean time the policeman
was directed to make the most searching inquiries,
in order to discover the offenders, and bring them to
ustice.

WILL OF PETER THE GREAT.—We perceive that
this remarkable document, already published in extenso
in our own columns, has been reprinted in a separate
form by Mr. Kerbey and Mr. Gilbert. As indicative of
the grasping policy and insatiable ambition of the Czar,
the paper is deserving of study rather than of a merely
passing perusal. It is the key to the rc.ystery of the
Russian invasion of Hungary.
IMPORTATIONS FROM IRELAND.—The collectors and
comptrollers, and other principal officers of the Customs'
Department at the several ports and places throughout
the United Kingdom have received directions from the
Commissioners to prepare and transmit to the Inspector-
General of Imports and Exports, the following account
with all practicable dispatch, viz., an account of the im•
ports into their respective ports of each sort of corn,
meal, and flour, from Ireland, in each month for the
years 1846, 1847, and 1848, respectively, and of the first
half of the present year; the returns to correspond with
the quarterly returns o imports.
FOREIGN SUGAR.—The vessel Edwin Augustus
arrived in the Docks on Tuesday from the Havannah,
with 2,550 boxes of foreign sugar; and the vessel Siberia
art ived in the Docks on the same day from the Ha-
vannah, with 2,724 boxes of:foreign sugar on board. In
both these cases the vessels belonged to the United
States of America, which precluded the admission of the
cargoes for home use under the laws of navigation at
present in force.
ACCIDENT AT A TELEGRAPH OFFICE.—As the
youth employed in the telegraph office at Ely was in the
act of working the telegraph in reply to a communica-
tion during the recent thunder-storm, he was knocked
down by the force of the eleetric fluid acting upon the
wires, but fortunately without receiving any injury be-
yond the momentary shock. The wires from the office
communicating with the main wires were severed, and
the business of the office suspended for some hours.
The following have been appointed the Commis-
sioners to act under the Encumbered Estates Act (Ire-
land):—The Right Hon. John Richards, third Baron of
her Majesty's Court of Exchequer in Ireland, Mounti•
ford Longfield, Esq., Q.C. and LL.D., and C. J. Har-
greave, Esq., conveyancer, of 69, Chancery-lane. Baron
Richards will have 1,5004 per annum, instead of 3,000 t,
remaining on the bench.
A CANINE PATRON Or RAILWAY
. TRAVELLING.—
A terrier dog, belonging to Mr. Hodgkinsen, spirit
merchant, of Matlock, Bath, having been accustomed to
travel with his owner by rail from the latter named
place to Matlock-bridge station, took it into his head to
start railway traveller on his own account. Now, master
" Spot" had a little acquaintance of his own species near
the bridge—a sweetheart, if the truth must be confessed
—to whom he was accustomed to pay frequent visits, and
finding walking, or rather running, somewhat fatiguing,
he adopted rail travelling by preference, and has gone by
himself, sometimes once a day from one station to the
other, invariably coming back by the return train, and
never once making a mistake by taking the express train,
which does not stop at Matlock-bridge station.—Derby
Mercury.
THE HARvEsT.—The active operations of the har-
vest very generally commenced in this county yesterday,
fields here and there having been cut in the course of the
past week, and before Saturday night, should the wea-
ther continue fine, a large breadth will have fallen before
the scythe and the sickle. The reports which reach us
are that the crops are generally heavy, and though par-
tially beaten down by the occasional storms of the last
fortnight, we do not hear a murmur of any serious da-
mage, beyond that done by the hail, in one district,
which we have before noticed. The potatoes, too, look
healthy and untouched by the disease—as far as the
digging has yet gone, they come up perfectly sound, so
that altogether we may calculate on a good average, in
fact, an abundant harvest. Oa Saturday night and Sun-
day large bands of those labourers who usually at this
seasoa temporarily emigrate from their own districts to
those in which the harvest sets in earlier, entered this
town, and we were glad to see that in the morning many
of them attended the church and other places of worship
—a fact which we hope may in a great degree be attri-
buted to the improved religious feeling of the labouring
population, but was no doubt partly owing to that
wholesome Act which closes the door of the inn and
ale-house, and prevents the Sabbath morning being made
a time of unholy toil to their landlord, and of weakening
dissipation to his guests. Our own labourers, too, are
re
tnaoswk ; n
and full
by P
longloy ;
h
m thaebitglteaner will soon begin
the scattered ears that run
over from the full band of the reaper, have been re-
garded as the equal right of all, we are inclined to agree
i employ;
with a correspondent, that it is desirable there should
be no favouritism in the matter—that the privilege
be left to freely and fairly pick the patient hroadfull.—
should be widely extended, and the industry of all should
Zasex Herald.

FRANCE.

The discussion on the affairs of Rome was brought
to a close in Tuesday's sitting of the Assembly', by
M. de Falloux, who declared himself in favour of the
unconditional restoration of the Priestly Government
in Rome.

the raw material. It is well known that some of the
large manufactuters laid in very heavy stocl,.s when wool
was at its lowest point.
MACCLESFIELD, Atm. 7.—The throwing department
of the silk trade is now in a more healthy state than it
has been for some length of time. When the " commis-
sion throwstert," are busy (which is the case at the pre-
sent time), it may be considered that the manufacturers,
who chiefly employ them, are at least preparing against
a coming demand. As yet, however, the inquiry for au-
tum❑ manufactured goods continues slack, and at prices
which preclude any large amount of business being done.
Hundreds of weavers are idle; whilst a large number of
country weavers come to town for work, which they take
at cheaper rates than the list of prices recently made by
the local board, alluded to in our last report, to com-
plete which cost upwards of 1,0001., raised by levies
upon the weavers. The last improvement made in
throwing machinery is now very extensively shipped for
Italy. . _

HUDDERSFIELD, AUG. 7.—Scarcely so much has been
doing as last week, which is partly owing to consider-
able quantities having been purchased on speculation, in
consequence of the advance in wool. Every description
of cloth commands higher price.
HALIFAX, AUG. 4.—Although the amount of business
transacted in our Piece Hall to-day has not been so
large as it has been for several weeks past, yet there is
a fair amount doing, both in plain and fancy goods, to
order, and in the warehouses, and the quotations are
fully sustained. In yarns, the business continues good.
The spinners are full of orders, and prices remain with-
out alteration. There is a moderate trade doing in wool.
The market is well supplied, and the sales that are
effected are upon rather easier terms. In short wools
there is very little doing, and prices are stationary.
LEEDS, Aua. 7.—We have nothing to report to-day.
The brisk demand for goods still continues. The
clothiers being fully employed, and there being a steady
business doing in the warehouses, prices are firm and
stocks light.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS
CHRONICLE.—A man of genius, or even of
acknowledged talent and proved integrity, is not an
every-day production ; and the electors of Reading
could hardly be expected to supply, on so short a
notice, a new member duly qualified in all respects
to replace the distinguished poet, lawyer, and orator,
who has recently been elevated to the Bench. But
they might surely have found a candidate of sound
understanding and enlightened views, who would up-
hold the great principles of commercial and religious
freedom, repudiate the fallacious doctrine of finality,
and give his steady support to the judicious advocates
of economical reform, without going out of his way
th attach an undue importance to the ballot, or pre-
judging the momentous and embarrassing question of
State Endowment for the Roman Catholic Church in
Ireland. Moreover, the more sagacious and refl sting
portion of them might have come to some preliminary
agreement as to the best method of forwarding the
wishes of the majority, instead of presenting the
unseemly spectacle of divisions and dissensions,
resting upon no apparent ground beyond local
rivalries or personal predilections and dislikes. We
by no means admit that an occasional difference on
particular topics is discreditable to Liberals or Liberal
Conservatives. Such diversities simply show that
they are in the habit of thinking for themselves,
and of acting honestly on their own matured convic-
tions. On the other hand, the unanimity of the more
violent section of the " Country Party" is a proof
that they do not (perhaps cannot) reason. The late
Sir John Astley could never be made to comprehend
the bearings of any new question before the House,
but his vote was invariably secured by the whipper-
in who boldly asserted that the game-laws were in-
volved in the result of the expected division. Just
so, the fierce and faithful few who still obey the signal
of the Gallant Member for Essex are ready to follow
him, at a moment's warning, on being assured that
they are assisting to fetter commerce or promote
bigotry, or (should even this be beyond their depth)
that they are about to spite Mr. Cobden or to annoy
Sir Robert Peel. Still, although this kind of unity
may be unattainable by persons who seek truth, and
who are not kept together by self-interest or vindic-
tiveness, the sensible townspeople of Reading might
at least have concentrated their forces in favour of
one of the more rational candidates (Mr. Bowyer or
Mr. Norton, for example) ; and the consequence of
their neglect or folly in this respect has been, that
they have actually incurred the disgrace of being
represented by a Protectionist of the white-glove
and lady-killing school, who evidently adopts
Lord Malmesbury as his prototype, and who presents
himself on the hustings with a tuft upon his chin, in
in open defiance of Mr. Place's well-known axiom—
" it you desire to get on with the English people, you
must shave clean." Yet the truth of the axiom was
curiously confirmed on the nomination day. Mr.
Norton, looking at Mr. Stanford, observed—" Then
th ere was another young gentleman on the other
side, who looked quite a genius. He bore in mind
the promise that gentleman had made to the electors,
a promise which could only spring from one who had
an inexhaustible fountain of self-esteem. He told
1,300 electors, in a town containing a population of
30,000, that he would marry one of their daughters."
Mr. Stanford hereupon exclaimed—" And ra do it
Set;" an announcement which elicited peals of
laughter, prolonged and heightened (adds our re-
porter) by some one ejaculating, in allusion to the
candidate's magnificent imperial, "He must get
shaved, or they won't kiss him." Mr.
Norton, however, was wrong in supposing
that the promise, litre Shakspere's circle in the water,
was dispersed into nonentity by spreading. " A
thousand naked men," says Partridge," are nothing
to one pistol ; for though it is true it will kill but one
at a single discharge, yet who can tell but that one
may be himself ?" By analogous reasoning, a thou-
sand electors' daughters are too many for one candi-
date ; yet although it is true he can marry but one at
a time, who can tell but that one may be herself ?
The value of the prize, or the amount of the tempta-
tion, is a very different matter; but, according to Mr.
Norton,. the Reading belle who is destined to become
Mrs. Stanford will find her spouse's house better fur-
nished than his head. Mr. Stanford, said Mr.
Norton, " was against the encouragement of foreign
labour. Now, if the Hon. Gentleman would go to
his own house in Foley•place, and put out of it all the
furniture that was the workmanship of foreign opera-
tives, the Turkey carpets, the Dresden china, the
various articles of vertu—if he did that, he would
leave his house nearly as naked and bare as
the young gentleman's own understanding." We
once dwelt, at some length, on the ludicrous
inconsistency of the aristocratic Protectionists in this
particular. They indulge in every foreign luxury ;
and there are few of them who have not spent two or
three years' income abroad. Yet the shopkeepers of
London and the mechanics of Manchester are to be
prevented from buying foreign corn, lest the landed
interest should suffer in their rents I The Duke of
Richmond's argument practically stands thus :—" If
the people are allowed to buy Norwegian salmon and
American breadstuffs, it will be impossible for me to
keep a French cook, or to take a box at the Italian
Opera." But the cause of free trade was most
effectively advocated by Mr. Salmon, the proposer of
Mr. Bowyer on this occasion. One passage of his
speech was really admirable
He believed it was to the fact that the rulers of
England had been wise in time, that they now owed it
that they were not, in the same situation as the nations
of the Continent—and the greatest enemies of England
were those who would re-impose fetters on commerce ;
who would re-enact the corn-laws; who would subject
the people of this country to the chances of a cloudy sky
in August, or a drizzling rain in June; who would shut us
out from the granary of the world, and would forbid the
looms of Manchester and Glasgow and the forges of Shef-
field and Birmingham from exchanging their produce
with the granaries of the Vistula and the Mississippi.
Let them not suppose that these were gratuitous suppo-
sitions—they were the calm and deliberate views of such
men as the Stanleys, the Granbys, the Richmonds, and
the Herrieses of Westminster, and of their humble ad-
mirers in Berkshire—they were the views of men who
still pursued with vituperation the character of the states-
man who saw the evil that was coming, and who had
the courage to save his country from famine by the sa-
crifice of himself."
A single fact mentioned by that statesman (on the
6th of last month) refutes and confounds the pre-
tended friends and real enemies of British indus-
try :—" Here is a great commercial country,
exporting annually in official value 133,000,0001.
worth of the produce of its industry. You have
imported, during the same time, manufactured
goods to the declared value of 4,722,000/." To
prolong the argument in the teeth of facts like these
would be a pure waste of space, time, and temper ;
yet no political speculator who has marked the
tenacity with which the human mind clings to
antiquited error and prescriptive prejudice, will be
surprised to see a Protectionist succeed at an election.
Reaction, however, is a moral impossibility, when the.
progressive policy consists merely in a return to
natural principles. Suppose the Mandarin Premier
of China were to issue a decree forbidding infant
heads to be flattened and female feet to be cramped—
it is highly probable that the Stanleys, Richmonds,
Herrieses, Muntzes, and Sibthorps of the Celestial
Empire would, for a period, prove too strong for him.
He might be deprived of all his tails and buttons, or
be shut up in a cage for life, minus an eye, an ear, and
half his nose. But if the iron-bound shoes and the
flattening boards were once laid aside, the fate of
the Chinese restrictive system would be virtually
sealed, and within half a century the Mar.darins
would be wondering at the barbarism, instead of
reverting to the foolish practices of their prede-
cessors. Perhaps Mr. Disraeli, who delights in
Oriental mysteries, will have the goodness to ex-
! pound our parallel for the edification of his friends.
al- 1

STONEHAVEN.-Our herring fishing is promising
well—one of the boats on Saturday last brought
ashore between 5 and 6 erans. On Monday night
they did not go to sea, owing to the gloomy state of
the weather; but on Tuesday night they all went
to sea, and a few of the boats b:ought ashore 4 and 5
mu of excellent Ash,---xiberdecn Journal.