The Sun.
London, England, 1847-10-12 00:00:00

tr Um-in

LONDON, TUESDAY. OCTOBER 12, 1847.

CABINET COUNCIL.

In compliance with the summonses, issued the
week before last, for a Cabinet Council at the
Foreign Office this afternoon, at two o'clock, the
several Cabinet Ministers began to assemble shortly
before the appointed hour.

Lord John Russell and Viscount Palmerston
came to town soon after one o'clock from Windsor
Castle, where their Lordships had been visiting the
Queen.

The Marquis of Lansdowne, the Lord President
of the Ccluncil, also came to London from Bowood
Park, Wilts.

The Lord Chancellor arrived to attend the meeting
of his colleagues from Copse Hill.
The following were the Members of the Cabinet
present on the occasion :—Lord John Russell (First
Lord of the Treasury), the Marquis of Lansdowne
(Lord President), the Lord Chancellor, the Right
Ron: the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Earl
Grey (Secretary of the Colonies), Viscount Pal-
rneriton (Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs),
the Right Hon. Sir George Grey (Secretary for
the Home Department), the Earl of Aucklan4
(First Lord of the Admiralty), the Marquis of Clan-
ricarde (Postmaster-General), the Right Hon. Sir
John C. Hobhouse (President of
the Right Hon. HenryY Labouchere (President of
the Board of Trade), Viscount Morpeth (Chief
Commissioner of Woods and Forests), and the Right
Hon. Thomas B. Macaulay (Paymaster of the
Forces).

The Ministers remained in deliberation lip to ths
hour when we were compelled to go to prest.

It was the first Cabinet Council since the dissolu-
tion of Parliament, and as all the Ministers have
made arrangements to remain some five or six weeks
in town, it is generally thought that there will be a
succession of Councils this month.

The infamous BEAUVALLON has at length received
the penalty of his numerous offences against the laves,
and his heinous deeds of immorality. After mur-
dering his friend in coil blood—after evading the
grasp of justice by flight into the Peninsula—after
perjuring himself with the utmost deliberation and
effrontery in two successive trials, he has now en- I
hanc.d the ignominy of his character by striving to
defame an honourable man by the calumnious letters
of n flagrant adulteress. But BEAtiVALLON has
at length passed through the fiery ordeal of a public
examination—he consummated a life of de-

bauchery and villany, and has just been condemned
to a sentence of eight years' reclusion, with his credit
blasted, and his name the synonym of everything that
is most impure and unprincipled in Parisian society.
It were superfluous to recapitulate the circum-
stances of a transaction which has long since been so
notorious; for in the whore history of duelling no
catastrophe is associated with such criminal disclo-
sures as the murder of the unfortunate DIJJ.LRRIER by
the hands of bis associate BEAVVALLON. It can-
not be so speedily forgotten that the quarrel between
these young men arose amidst the frivolities of a dis-
reputable reunion, and that the casual difference
which had for a moment interrupted the rattle of the
dice-box and the pleasantries of a licentious company,
was followed within a period of a few hours by one
of the most dastardly homicides ever perpetrated
beyond the limits of the Boulevards. Although the
chief stipulation of the duel was that neither of the
principals should be acquainted with the pistols, it
was satisfactorily proved that BEAVVALLON had
on the fatal morning borrowed them from his brother-
in-law, GARNIER DE CASSAGNAC, had practised with
them at a target in the garden of his second, M.
D'ECQUEVILLET, had thus rendered himself familiar
with their capabilities, while his victim was shuddering
in the raw atmosphere at daybreak, and had arrived at the
rendezvous, steady of finger, resolute of will, unsparing
in cruelty, unforgiving, unrelenting, ripe for murder,
perjury, and calumny. BEADVALLON was a marks-
man of consummate skill—what is vulgarly called a
dead shot. On arriving at the Bois de Boulogne, one
of the surgeons (M. DE BERTRAND) inadvertently
handled one of the weapons produced by D'Eccluz-
vimarr. The barrel was still warm with the explo-
sions of gunpowder. He inserted his finger at the
muzzle, and drew it forth blackened. Besides this
decisive testimony, corroborative evidence was fur-
nished by M. DE MRTNARD, a gentleman who had ac-
tually accompanied BEADVALLON to the garden of
and witnessed the skilful practice of
the duellist. Such were the prominent particulars
of this transaction—particulars which of themselves
would have been sufficient to render Bzauvaixon the
objeet of universal abhorrence. Of themselves, we
repeat, they would have been sufficient. There is
ample reason for our regarding with the most unmi-
tigated indignation a man who could so violate all
the principles of morality, and bear under the garb
of a petit maitre all the duplicity of a Valentino, and
all the callousness of a Thug. But to these original
transgressions against the Code of Christianity,
BEAUTALLON has added a baseness and an audacity
of vice such as has no immediate parallel in the re-
cords of criminality.
To save his principal from condemnation under the
charge of homicide, M. D'ECQUETILLET swore on the
original trial which followed the destruction of Du-
JARRIER, that the account of the practice with the
pistols at a target in his garden, on the morning of
the duel, was, from first to last, a lie and a fabrica-
tion. The verdict given in by the jury upon this
occasion pronounced the assertions of M. D'ECQUE-
VILLET to be altogether without foundation, and in
consequence he was formally brought up to the bar
a short time since on a second charge—a charge of
perjury. During that inquiry it will be remembered
that BEAUVALLON returned the generous false-swear-
ing of his second by protesting that the declarations
of D'ECQUEVILLEY were accurate throughout.
D'ECQUEVILLET was convicted of perjury, and his
principal was thereby prosecuted for a similar
offence. After a preliminary investigation before
the Chambre des Mises en Accusation, BEAUVALLON
was brought to trial before the Court of Assize, and
that trial has just terminated in the manner already
mentioned. It is scarcely so much to the aggregate
villanies of the accomplished murderer of DU‘ARRIER
that we direct attention, as it is to the climax of his
unprincipled career, as shown in the line of defence
adopted by himself and his advocate. Were the
imagination taxed to devise some contrivance whereby
his infamy as a murderer and a perjurer could be
enhanced, none could be conceived more entirely in
accordance with the manifest turpitude of his dis-
position. Instead of directly endeavouring to
rebut the assertions as to his familiarity
with the pistols of GARNIER DE CASSAGNAC,
BEA.UVALLON strove to exculpate himself by traducing
the character of an honourable witness. And these
calumnies against M. us Marmaap, were conveyed, be
it remembered, through the indecorous love letters of
a nameless adulteress. In those remarkable and most
suspicious epistles, DE MEYNARD is stated to have
sworn, in the presence:of the writer, that he would
wreak his vengeance upon the head of BEAUVALLON,
because of his having supplanted him in her unholy
affections. It was consequently insinuated by the
accused that the evidence of M. DE METNARD was
the result of his jealousy. In every syllable, how-
ever, these singular communications betoken so much
of adroitness as to render their authenticity most
questionable. They would appear to have been
concocted by the prisoner himself as the last resource
of his ingenious villany. Alas for RoszasonD DE
BEATPIALLON, for the promise of a brilliant destiny
blasted at its outset, for a name that might have been
enrolled upon the literature of France instead of
becoming an object of perpetual and excessive
opprobrium ! At twenty-four years of age he had
acquired a certain amount of distinction as the redac-
teur of a popular journal, he had wen decorations of
merit for the evidence of a precocious intellect, he
had obtained a not unenviable position among the
literati of Paris by the publication of a work
which had received a most propitious recep-
tion. Instead of insuring to himself a continuance
of these honours, he has wilfully plunged into an
abyss of degradation from which he can never extri-
cate himself unsullied. He might well weep, and
weep bitterly, when his counsel, M. CAPO DE FEIIIIe•
LIDE apostrophised him as " the dear child of his
affections." Alas 1 for that ROSEMOND DE BEAU-
vsizori, who might have shed a lustre upon his con-
temporaries, but who has covered himself with a
disgrace that defies obliteration, and rendered him-
self, in a manner, the flagrant impersonation of a dis-
sipated capital and a degraded age.

A strong feeling exists in many parts of the coun-
try against the collection on behalf of the distressed
Irish, which is to be made under the authority of the
QUEEN'S Letter, on Sunday next, the 17th instant,
the day appointed for national prayer and thanks-
giving throughout the entire country for the late
abundant harvest. Many who cordially concur in
the propriety of celebrating the day by acts of bene-
ficence and mercy, and who think it a fitting opportu-
nity for obtaining the charitable alms of the wealthier
portion of the several congregations for their poorer
brethren, conscientiously object to the application of
the sums so contributed to the relief of Irish distress,
while so many in their more immediate neighbourhoods
are suffering under the pressure of the times
and the want of employment, which compels
them to relinquish many of their accustomed com-
forts, and to submit to many serious privations.
Happily, in this country, that is the utmost extent to
which the destitution can prevail, as the humane laws
now acted on for three centuries, and the wealth and
resources of the nation prevent the possibility of any
perishing from want of the common necessaries of
life.

The objectors argue, and with great apparent
reason, that we have already made the most gigantic
exertions on behalf of Ireland; that during the past
year no less than ten millions of pounds sterling were
advanced from the coffers of the State, half as a gift,
the remainder as a loan ; and, that in addition to
that public and national assistance so freely
rendered, more than seven hundred thousand
pounds sterling were collected by voluntary contribu-
tions, and distributed in the most distressed districts.
They bring forward the various scurrilous and
abusive speeches that have been made, and letters
that have been published in variou3 parts of Ireland,
as evidences that these extraordinary acts, that should
have excited the warmest feeling of gratitude, have
not been duly appreciated, and they argue that such
ingrates should not receive any further assistance,
of
which they have proved themselves wholly
un-
worthy. In addition to the above they add
that there is not now that absolute necessity
therefor, inasmuch as, by the Act of last ses-
sion, the poverty of Ireland is entitled to relief
out of its property ; that every single destitute person
must be supported before one single shilling can be
applied to the purposes of the landowners ; and that,
therefore, any contributions now given, although no-
minally fur the suffering poor, will practically be for
the benefit of Irish landlords', ,a class no held in the