The Sun.
London, England, 1823-03-01 00:00:00

the stable, which *the . nessepshire •telTiterielis, . had ele-
scribed as' being so kindly etelitet lei 'bun. ' •11lie2:Loedihip
instead of listening to as constitutional and eloquent a speech
as ever was echoed in the Ileteec.pf Lords, when a Moe; import-
ant trial was then going oft, this 'Noble Lord was engaged in
writing a letter to the aee. aneAnerobure• complaining of the
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conduct of his parish clerk.. Ile (Mr. Wetherell) should select
this letter as one otthe'WeiliesOcts of.an understanding,: that
a man could well be guilty ofee On that important
.occasion,
this Nobleman, instead. of trying her. late Majesty, Was' ry.
ing the poor parish-clerk ol Attort, In the church, thit• de-
vout unto, who was- sitid:eo lead the prayers with devotion,
t and to sing the Ipsalms .with attention, was engaged one
Sunday in writing a note' to this very clerk; and forgetting
I his prayers—he meditates :upon punishing.. .Writh respect
to the Ecclesiastical phalanx who. had appeared, no doubt
they were men of the highest respectability, and gave
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.„. their evidence with truth ; :but then they -saw but little of
'; the Noble Lord. In short: they proved nothing. The escula-
, pian assistant, Mr. Alder, when committing those adulterous
acts in Wales and at Fairlawn, made no impression upon. the
• Noble Lord, at least not like the fear of the whip. Did the na-
tural eye see him ? If it did .the moral eye was blinded. This
~.
• Noble Lord who endured, this adultery, who was compelled to
witness it—this same Nobleman who was seated on the red
benches of the Peetage in 1820, on that important occasion when
the Queen of England was tried, .had been :accessary to, and
administering to his own pelutioe. Bid if the vision of the
• eye saw it, did the mind's eye , see it ? .Or if it saw it, did
it understand it; There was: here .a . dilemma, either that
the Noble Lord was base and wicked enough to promote his
own dishonour, like that Nobleman in the reign of Charles 11.,
or else on witnessing the fact he was not conscious of its being
a crime. In either way he must be considered an insane man.
,
t It was ridiculous- to attribute to him the power of cliscritninae
f tion between yice and virtue,' between what was odious and
i what was honourable. net toed apart froth those who bore
Ii the human form. Was undeserving of puuishinetits for his
defects, or of praise for, thoseiinetincts which. occasionally raised
him to a comparison with those animals which became sub.l
dued to the useful servitudeeof man. .A slave he was in body, i
and a slave he was in mind. It had been said that this Noble.
man followed suit at Whist ; that he knew the queen of
hearts and diamonds frour:the queen of clubs, and this die-
cernment constituted the genus °nine of the, rational acts of
this Peer. Could any oneeeuppose that Mr. Newton lellowes,
the brother of this unfortunate Nobletuane would have pressed
this exhibition of the evidence of . his insanity, were it not
clear and convincing ? Bow long was he to. wait before he
came forward for the purpose of setting aside this spurious
issue? Was he to wait until six or twelve children were-born ?
or how long was he to wait ? Was he to wait until they reaped
all the honours of this ancient family, and enjoyed-the property
of others? Mr. Coombe and 'Mr. Skirrow were insinuated to
have planted soirie seeds in this Noble Loed's mind, seeds
of delusion which had sprung in a mighty tree, that spread
abroad its branches wide and far. The delusions had exist.
ed long before Mr. Skirrow saw him ; that had been 'clearly
proved. But what sort of a mind is•that which can be so Mould.
ed ? It is like lead in a: crucible, teking any shape that the
fancy pleases to give. Cana mind capable of being framed to
any shape so versatile., be it sound one? The fact. of the mar-
riage proved how clearly his mind was bereft of reason ; he
went with his board unshorn, in a dress most unbefitting the
occasion—not even a .clean shirt on, and was married. llia
Learned Friend had disclaimed all conections with the Countess
and her family,—they threw the carcase overboard when they
found it was no longer subservient to their purpose. 'When
the galley-slave was desired to be married, he married, —when
• be was desired to administer to his own dishonour, lie did so.'
—The Learned Counsel then commented on the evidence of
several of the witnesses,. and concluded by telling the Jury they
could not but believe . from the powerful evidence which, had
been given, that the Noble Lord was Unsound in mind, and the
question would be wlaelethat period could be lilted. Ile appre-
hended that either iii thelast day of 1808, or the first of 1809,
would be a time therinight safely fix upon. The Learned
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• tientlernan then celled :upon the Jury to execitee the. duty of
f hristians and Gentlemen, and concluded a speech which was
greatly applauded by a most crowded Court.
, Mr. Commissioner ni OWE it charged the Jury. lie ohserVed
upon the law of the case, that it had been stated that they trust
find whether the Earl, the subjectof the inquisition, wait a Ittnetic
or not. But this was a mistake; the Jury were net hound so to
find their verdict, or to :find it (as had been represeftteo in the
express words of the Corninission, or in any technical terms.- It
was not necessary to go through all the cases to slieW that the
returns must be in the precise. legal acceptation. There was,
howeeer, no doubt, that a return stating that the subject of in.
quiry was a man of weak mind, would not stand in law for no,
man could be the judge of the degree of weakness of mind upon
which the Jury found their verdict. The legal term lunacy, or
unsoudncas of mind, -comprehended every description of mad-
nems—the furious, the melancholy, the Moping, the hypochon-
driacal, whether it arose from a weakness of Mind, accompanied
• by aberrations or epileptic fits, or from continued drunkenness, or
from old age, it was not material, so that the person was non
If vompos mentis, and incapable of managing. his own affairs. If a
verdict were given upon this foundation, it certainly would not
be quashed, milled been asserted. 'rho Learned Commissioner,
11, in support of the position, that the return of the Jury need not
be confined to any particular terms, cited the case, ex-parte
Cranmer, in 12th EaSt's Reports, in which the Jury bad made
1 a return that the subject of the inquiry was so far debilitated,
itiislanto
ttltieo ttewithrleegtueiredod such
iaitnitvl
es ufienhditnhgings.
and Itn ohtand
reasoning
finding; but certainly Lord Erskine had acted upon. that re.
turd in the case of ex-parte Crammer. Persons were in general
, • greatly misled by the term " Commission of Lunacy,'' and a
great mass of affidavits had been presented in the case, de-
daring the opinion of the deponents that his Lordship was
: ' unfit for a Commission of Lunacy. Many of the deponents
certainly would mot• have ventured to give such an opinion,
had they clearly understood the legal acceptation of the term.
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All the Jury had to consider was, whether or not Lord P. was
in an unsound state of' Mind, so as to be incapable of managing
his own affairs.