The Sun.
London, England, 1847-04-14 00:00:00

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND AGAIN.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
SlR,—Raving read in your journal of the 10th inst. a
reprint of a letter addressed to the Editor of the Times
journal, signed " Audi Alteram Panetta" in relation to
the recall of Sir Eerdley Wilmot from the government
of Van Diemen's Land, accompanied by your own edito-
rial observations upon the measures adopted towards that
gentleman (as worthy of admiration as they were cha-
racteristic of that independent spirit which has ever
distinguished your valuable print), I am induced to bring
under your notice another case connected with the same
colony, involving, I will venture to say, circumstances
no h as grievous in their features, and no less calculated
to produce ruinous consequences to the individual prin-
cipally concerned than those which have already evoked
the well-earned mead of your condemnation.
I al!ude to the case of Mr. Sydnegy Stephen, late a
practising barrister in 'Van Diemen s Land, where he
itad, fcr many years prior to 1842, enjoyed an unsullied
reputation, and an almost unexampled professional
succesF. In the above-mendefted year, Mr. Stephen was
called upon by the Judges of the Supreme Court of that
colony to answer to a charge of having acted in some
specified
case at Nisi Prins in the twofold capacity of
coun'el and attorney. There was something in this
accusation calculated to produce ill-natured ex.
citement, the facility of stimulating which is pro-
verbial in all small communities, and criminatory
affidavits were readily supplied, for the purpose of
heaping condemnation upon this gentleman. A judicial
that
investigationeph nfound
h succeeded,imself deprived o
the result w
tleges, and emoluments of the colonial bar, for which he
had many years before resigned those of a practising
barrister in England ; deprived by a sentence of dismissal
itich was,
honours,th privi-
leges, )firs
Stephen
pronounced by the two judges who composed the Su-
preme Court, and pronounced, so far as relates to Mr.
Justice Montagu, in language so redundant of invective,
as to call for the severe reprehension of my Lord
Brougham in pronouncing the judgment of the Judicial
Committee of the Privy Council in reversal of the sen-
tence, declaring that there was no colour whatsoever for
the charges so preferred against Mr. Stephen, and
stating that that gentleman's character,. professional or
otherwise, stood unimpeachcd by that unjust decision.
By the Act of the Imperial Legislature„ 9th of-000. --
IV., cap. 83,:the lawa-0£ this colony 'were declared and
regulated, the 24th section thereof enacting, " That all
laws and statutes in force within the realm of England
It the time of the passing of that Act not being incon-
sistent therewith, or with any charter or letters patent,
or Order of Council, which might be issued in pursu-
ance thereof, should be applied in the administration of
justice in the courts of New South Wales and Van Die-
men's Land respectively, so far as the same could be
applied within the said colonies. Pity it were that the
Imperial Legislature did not at the same time declare
and enact that all the rules and regulations which moral
obligation and common decency suggests and enforces
in this country should be maintained and observed at its
antipodes. Had such been the case, the colonists of Van
Diemen's Land would still have reaped the benefit of
Mr. Stephens's unexcelled judgment, ability, and great
practical experience, that gentleman and his family would
still be in the enjoyment of that ample and honourable
independence which was the just reward of his merits
and high legal attainments. and of which, by the recent
decision of her Majesty in Privy Council, it now lies
beyond the reach of controversy to deny that he has
been illegally and unjustly deprived. In this country
the duties as well as the privileges of those to whom the
public confide the conduct and management of their legal
affairs are separated and distinctly defined.
Not so in the colony of which lam now speaking.
There the practitioner is permitted to exercise conjointly
the accumulated functions of barrister, solicitor, proctor,
attorney, &c., &c.
Here no solicitor or attorney ever thinks of usurping
the peculiar province of the advocate, there the profes-
sions are, as it were, thrown into what the lawyers term
" hotchpot." Is it not, therefore, an irresistible con-
elusion that Mr. Stephen has become a victim to "the
,:elusion, the mockery, and the snare" of this disgraceful
system? And will it not be readily conceded that, esen
supposing he had been guilty, though pronounced to
oave been innocent by the unanimous judgment of the
Privy Council, that the system and not the man would
have been chiefly answerable for the consequence, nay,
rather I would ask, would it not be matter of surprise
that any class of men surrounded by the seductions of
so vile a system should have maintained the fortitude to
tto
resist contamination?
Son
offfn rforth
s t ase
pen has
the
been professional
assailedcl b
r a ct;
the andrjudgment
r e puta -
so pronounced against it.lie has at length, by in-
.tomitable spirit, energy, and perseverance, rescued it
from the daunting influence of this colonial adjudication,
bat whence is he to seek a sufficient reparation for all
his mental sufferings and anxiety—for that enormous
sacrifice endured (at least to a certain extent) for a
period of nearly five years of that untainted reputation
which is the one thing needful in the estimation of every
hunourably-minded man? Where is he to seek repara-
tion for that pecuniary sacrifice which compelled him and
his family to abandon the home of their adoption, with all
its surrounding comforts and affluence, in pursuit of the
restoration of that peace of mind, that spotless reputa-
tion, and that well-earned wealth, through the dangerous
and troubled ocean of expensive and protracted liti-
gation?

The relative positions of Mr. Stephen and Sir
Eardley Wilmot are strictly parallel. The former con-
fidently submitted all his hopes as to the restoration of
his character to the judgment of the only tribunal com-
petent to pronounce its re-establishment ; so likewise
did the latter, so far as lay within his own power, and in
each case the parallel has still been maintained, and the
principal objects of each have already been triumphantly
achieved. bir Eardley Wilmot had no means of sub-
mitting the accusations preferred against him in his
official capacity through the medium of the Colonial Se-
cretary's public dispatch, to the consideration of an appel-
late jurisdiction; to this extent the breath of the Colonial
Minister was omnipotent, but so far as his moral cha-
racter was assailed by the private letter of the same
functionary, he promptly and voluntarily submitted it
to the protection of the most competent authority, viz.,
to that of a tribunal chosen and selected by the Executive
Council of the colony as well as to the scrutinising ordeal
of public opinion, and from each has he received as
confirmation of his most sanguine wishes and expecta-
tions, testified as it has been, by the voluntary signature
of all the good and the virtuous of that community to
an address which expresses the high sense which they
have at all times felt, and still continued to feel, for his
moral character, but still more powerfully testified by
the continuance of that friendly intercourse which had
never for one moment been suspended or disturbed. Sir
Eardley Wilmot, in his private capacity, still continues
to reside amongst that community whose esteem and
friendship he has so justly earned, awaiting the an-
nouncement of that retribution which he appears so
amply entitled to expect will be accorded to him by the
present successor of that moral mirror in which the Co-
lonial Secretaries for ages yet unborn must henceforth
,lelight to view themselves. He awaits the result in con-
fident reliance on the irresistible strength of a just cause
<lnd the healing influence of that glorious maxim-
- Audi alteram partem."—l have the honour to be, Sir,
your obedient servant,
A Colonist and an Impartial
OBSERVER.

--
EDUCATION IN THE UNITED
STATES OF AMERICA.
In the United States an expenditure is incurred to
educate such portions of the people as stand in need of
it, which by far exceeds anything of the kind in Europe.
The amount of the " school" fund in Connecticut (as
we find it stated in the American Almanack, for 1847),
is 2,070,055 dollars, or about 500,0004 a year.
In Keon,touocolciathyeeaschool-fund
The is 1,221,819 dollars, or
'habout
25e
State of New York devotes to the school-fund the
enormous sum of 6,374,144 dollars, or about n million
and a half pounds sterling.
Similar funds are raised in nearly all the States, but
in none so liberally as in New York. The new States,
such as Texas, Illinois, &c., and some of the slave States,
are most behind. In the new States the populletion is
probably too scattered for public schools ; in the slave
States, the whites are educated in schools which they
support independently of the State itmds.
Besides the State schools, there arc in different places
of the Union 108 colleges, the students being of various
ligions. Others are supported entirely 133 CaWiolics,
Baptists, Presbyterians, &c.
The expense of a student at Bowdom is,—for i'aistrue-
tion, 24 dollars; room, rent, and other expenfales, 22
dollars; board for thirty-nine weeks, 58 dollars.; wood,
lights, and washing, 35 dollars; total, 139 dollars, or
about 354 a-year.
Eapai
s h e
el
? o.s i Theztn
2 675 much religioushurehes;
, s
which Th"aerearlecoat
lessot,anthtisr;t3e•-ifgohutr theological s;chaomookl, st,hailrlty
two medical schools.
There is as of
CatholicshavemixtureProtestant there
ditto; Presbyterians (old school), 2,794 ditt;4); pre s_
c
bl,)2l3erians (new school), 1,494 ditto; Regular itaptists,
9,479 ditto; Free-will Baptists, 1,165 ditto; Ra !formed
Baptists, 2,500 ditto; Christian Baptists (Unitarians),
650 ditto; Unitarian ConebTegationists, 300 ditt.ok.
The number of churches belonging to the Methodists
is not given; bat of the various kinds of Methodists
there are upwards of 13,000 ministers, and about
1,200,000 communicants; and as all the sects pay State
taxes, they each of them contribute to what has been
called supporting a " lie;" but, in America, they have
not yet arrived at that point of perfection when any man
may set himself up as infallible, and they are willing, in
Christian love, to lend e helping hand each to its neigh-
hour, or to his neighbour's children, and to esublish a
sceu!ar, and moral system of education, without
f,l.ence to creeds.

Bars.--The plants for the coming season are
beginning to show ; the cold weather of so long ounti-
nuance causes them to be a month later than last spring,
et with a fine warm summer that may be overcome, for
the well-known rapid growth of the bine soon makes up
for a late spring ; some of the most prolific masons
were after a severe and long winter, 1828 particularly..
The gardens have been well manured, dug, and ciraned;
during the last month, no better weather could have
been for such operations. Poling about Farnham, Al-
ton, and villages around is becoming general ; And ''
the slight hillocks from where the plant shoots, the
white bine plant as well al the golden look healthy..
Two or three weeks' fine warm growing wewher wirk
give an agreeable change in every district where SkAis
useful bitter is grown.
LAURENCEKIRR.—The engrossing subjiect of c on-
ystialteiolnartghersotugphrrptritehwercso; an event which will ge etTSunty is the insolvency of ones
13.)th lamentation and guff, ring
hearth
at many it
cdi Anerb, u
and who
Iv. rago Lord-t
de;
iepuly-
trose Review. [We deeply regrt tto add that the arty
he ~.4 Won-
ht
eenraen at lot uf dtehde tcoouisntty of
heVKis
esteemed by all classes from the highest to thee%
low
Caledonian
.Mercury.) Kincardine,