The Sun.
London, England, 1840-01-15 00:00:00

DON, WEDNI4,si

► A Y

THE DISSENTERS' LEADERS.

Th Patriot of the 6th inst. claims for its " Reli-
gious Freedom Society" the merit of personal exertion,
and extensive correspondence on behalf of the Gin.,
diau prisoners, who were liberated in July last. Ti:e
Statesman of Sunday has the following remarks on this
subject :

Our readers have seen, from articles in this and
ether Journals, that the pretensions of several public
bodies in London, which affect to represent the D:s-
senters, are being very generally questioned ; and we
have a few words to say in the matter.
The Patriot newspaper recapitulates, in a recent
number the objects on which the Religious Freedom
Society has employed its labours during the past year;
and some such announcement was greatly needed, for
otherwise the operations of the Society would never have
reached the public mind through the effects they have
produced.
Ttierc is, however, one subject mentioned by the
Patriot, in which we took a great personal interest, and
had such acquaintance with it as enables us to give the
exact measure of the Society's labours-- and that was
the case of the Canadian prisoners.
These men were brought to England in December,
1838, and legal steps were fortawith taken to effect their
liberation. These step:, however, failed, and the men
remained destitute of all sympathy and aid, except from
one legal gentlemen honour ably known in his prefession,
,tad in society, and three or four private individuals,
who never forsook what they believed a good cause.
In prosecuting that cause, they were chiefly retarded lay
the hostile or apathetic state of the public mind, reflected
or produced by the newspaper press, to which the Pa-
triot certainly offered no exception.
Although the abstract e‘ils with which Canada was
oppressed ware occasionally denounced in that paper, it
had no 'good word for Mr. Rolf, an independe t minis-
ter at Toronto, who suffered for his maintenance of
non-conformist principles,
.nor for the twelve men con-
fin ed in Newgate. So late Ili the middle of March,
this fact was made the subject of complaint in a letter
publicly addressed to the Patriot, and then, hut not till
then, there visited the Canadians in Newgate some
gentlemen, who afterwards announced to ti.em that
they bad attended as a deputation from this Society.
The letters which they wrote to the prisoners are now
before us, and were thus described at the time by their
legal friend :—" You will see, from these letters, tint
the case has to undergo with them, as all other cases
do, emasculation. It would seem to me, these Societies
in London were got up for the purpose of suppression ;
their usefulness seems to be, to put out and smother."
It is announced in them, that the Society did not see
"anything on the face of the case to connect it with re-
ligion ;"—the opinion of the Society is stror.gly inti-
mated that the guilt of the prisoners was proved by their
own letters ; their case is coldly disparaged, and the
.vhole is clinched by a significant allusion to the Chart-
ists, in these words :—" The threatening attitude of the
Chartists in England has an unfavourable influence on
your case ; respectable people in general have a great
horror of civil war."

Such wee the help of the Society at that time, and
the Patriot maintained its indifference to the subject.
In the meantime the parties interested continue their
efforts, at great expense of money and of labour. The
proceedings, with which the public are acquainted, were
carried on ; and, at length, a confidential and semi-offi-
cial intimation was received, that the Government con-
templated their liberation.
Then it was, for the first time, the Society became
zealous in their behalf, and the Patriot now recounts
the case, as if it had directed the proceedings, and
worked out the results.

We noted these things as they passed, with the con-
tempt we feel for bustling and imbecile pretension. 'We
have recalled them, when we find a public body bolster-
ing up its character with claims which they have not
discharged, and duties they have not fulfilled.

NEW WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.

IN FRANCE.

The new system of weights and measures is giving
rise to some confusion in various parts of France.
In respect of bread, of which the price in Paris is
periodically regulated by the corn averages, the
Government tax the price according to the new
system, whilst the bankers can only understand the
old. Some fault appears to lie. with the authorities
for not simplifying the matter by a detailed reduc-
tion of the old weights and prices into the new, so
that on reference the corresponding rates of each
might be seen at once. The price of bread was
taxed 'on the .4th instant at 85 cents..,-for 2 kilo-
grammes. To show the embarrassment: wbieh must be
experienced by a class of simple, and illiterate
men as bakers generally are, it is 'waked hoW the
baker is to express the price of half a kilogramme
of brown bread under the new system ? The an-
swer ought to be, 18 centimes 7i centiemes ; but
this, to be comprehended by both seller and buyer,
must be again translated into the old denominations
of value, when it results in 3 sous 3 liards. This is
a task which, it is urged, ought not to be imposed
upon the baker, but should be made clear in detail
by the Government. It is objected also that the use
of quarters of centimes in the decimal system tends
to embarrassment. A Rouen paper, more favourably
disposed towards the new system than the Eco des
ilalles of Paris, from which the foregoing remarks
are taken, acknowledges the great advantage of the
measures fixed by the new law, but states that they
caused considerable confusion in business transactions,
some preferring the metrical system, and others, on the
contrary, insisting on the ancient usages. But com-
plaints are mode that steps have not been taken to ex-
plain and familiarize the new system among the manu-
facturers, and also to complete the metre with uniform
fractional quantities ; in another respect it is stated that
tenths should be adopted instead of twelfths, which
reader calculation more complicated. At Sc. Lo cer-
tain resolutions had been come to by the Consulting
Chamber of Manufactures, in concert with the manu-
facturers at large, by which the new metrical system ap-
pears to have been partially, at least, repudiated. It will,
of course, be difficult to overcome the prejudices of people
brought up to a certain method,which,however faulty and
complex in itself, has been rendered by long practice
and universal adoption comparatively simple and easy,
But a diversity of system according to provinces or
districts in weights, Measures, and coins, must ever be
ettended with disadvantage and loss to the public at
large, however profitable to men specially skilled in cal-
culations, and able, therefore, to detect and realize a
certain gain in dealings and slight shades of difference
in denominationalrepresenting an infinite variety of values
and capacities in one and the same country. There is
nothing, above all, which strikes a stranger as more extra-
ordinary in a country like France, than the interminable
variety of coins, or fractional pieces of money which one
were coins, every where to be met with. To comprehend
thoir relative values is entirely out of the question,
withotst long and attentive practice ; and the origin of
many it would be difficult in any case to ascertain. In the
loose change out of a franc piece same half dozen dif-
fferent coins, or pieces of money of various denominations,
will not unfrequently be received. Than a total
reform of the currency there is nothing can be more
desirable.
It appears the watchmaking and jewellery business
of Geneva is in a state of great distress, and, as, a
remedy, it is proposed to adulterate the standard of
gold used in the process of the manufacture, or to
admit the use of the adulterated article as a second
legal quality different from the fixed standard, which
would allow the manufacture of jewellery and
watches at a price proportionately lower, and so ex-
tend the consumptisn in these branches of commerce.
Another remedy is also proposed, which consists in ren-
dering the stamping of the gold optional, maintaining,
however, the integrity of the :,tamp. The convenience
of these changes is strongly disputed by the principal
manufacturers of watches and jewellery at Geneva,
who. it is stated, are little affected in their interests
by the general depression of trade, and an appre-
hension of the discredit into which the slightest
uncertainty or alteration in the standard of the gold
used could not fail to bring the products of their in-
, dustry in foreign countries. In compensation, how-
ever, it was asserted
the more numerous class of less
well-doing manufacturers would gain everything by a
change which would facilitate the extension of their
'business by all the difference betwixt the actual price
of the gold and the deteriorated quality, which, in the
absence of legal restrictions, they would be enabled to
work up. So the matter remains at present, no deci-
sion one way or the other having been come to. But
the subject may be of some interest to those concerned
here, as it is known that, clat,destinelY at least, a certain
quantity of watches, if not of jewellery, of Genevese ma
nufacture, is introduced into this country.
—7 intes.

THE GREAT WESTERN .--W
vessel since her laying e are happy in
being able to say that the examination of this noble
spot nor blemish in her, that she does not require
caulking or coppetin4, beyond a .f.w sheets to replace
up shows that there is neither
those which have been tubbed off by, the coal vessels,
er have been removed for the purpose of a thorough
examination. All the parts of the engines which are
not fixtures have been taken out and thoroughly ex-
amined, and are now in progress of replacement. The
plan of the directors is to overhaul her completely once
a year, and we should say after 35,000 nautical miles
steaming per annum, en almost indispensable one if con-
fidence is to be maintained with the public. We under-
stand that the poop deck is to be lengthened sixteen
feet, and that the whole of the officers, engineers,
stokers, and servants, whose berths below were a great
inconvenience and annoyance to the lore-cabin pas-
sengers, are to be accommodated on (leek ; also that
the fares are to be all equal in the fore and after ac-
commodation, the fore state-rooms having been con-
siderably enlarged. She will sail on the 20th of Fe-
bruary.--Bri,stol Mirror.
ROYAL ExcitANGE,The Royal Exchange
Committee assembled at Guildhall yesterday, and we
are given to understand, if we are to judge from what
took place there, two years.moro will be likely to pass
over our lreathrbefore we shall see the walls in progress.