The Sun.
London, England, 1840-03-13 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY, MARCH 13. 1840.

not desire to see the place of Juries supplied by •
Magistrates.
One great advantage of the assizes is, that the
trials are attended by a bar, by reporters, and by a
public. We are by no means sure that Courts of
Summary Jurisdiction would be so attended. Civil
causes, which are most lucrative, have consider-
able influence in collecting gentlemen of the bar
at the assizes. Other business also, besides the
criminal trials, carries reporters thither, and collects
a large multitude to crowd the Courts, to disperse
far and wide the knowledge of what is transacted
in them, and give a tone and force to public opi-
nion. All, or most, of these checks would be wanted
m Courts of Summary Jurisdiction, and to hand
over our peasantry, even more than at present, to
the tender mercies of the country gentlemen, would
be to consign them to the vilest subjugation, with.
out a hope or a chance of redress. Such a man as
HENRY JAMES might not then be sent six weeks
to gaol before trial ; his case would be summarily
disposed of, and he would get six months' or twelve
months' imprisonment on felon's fare. To expect
that any two or more country gentlemen sitting in
their parlour, or in some County Court, surrounded
by toady beadles and toady clerks, should acquit a
a man charged of stealing by Sir H. JENNER, and
I actually guilty of taking away three twigs of the value
of three halfpence, is to expect a complete miracle.
Why, all country gentlemen stiffer from twigs being
stolen. That the wretched half-starved shivering
peasantry take away sticks from the hedges, is one
of the most fretful sources of anger in country
gentlemen ; and if they be allowed to inflict sum-
mary punishment on all stealers of twigs, GOD
help the otherwise helpless beings whom they guide
and govern. Before the public can tolerate more
summary jurisdiction, the whole Magistracy must
be changed ; it must be made elective—taken from
various classes, not from one class only—and must
hold its office by meriting the public esteem. Summary
jurisdiction is, in many cases, good—trial by jury,
as in the case of the Chartists in Cheshire and
Lancashire, may be most partial and unjust—but
to give summary jurisdiction into the hands of our
unpaid country gentlemen over the stealers of twigs
and hurdle stakes, would be as great a mockery of
justice as constituting two slave-owners a Court
for the trial of the offences of their slaves.

As long as Our landlords keep up the Corn-
laws to starve the people, with a view to enrich
themselves, we beg leave to say that nothing too
hard, nothing too severe can be said or expected
of them. The men who consign a large population
to the slow and lingering death of hunger are capa-
ble of any thing. That involves all the minor
crimes which we believe they could commit
when clothed with summary jurisdiction over
the liberty and persons of those who may invade
their property. But of what they are capable
in this way, the committal of HENRY JAMES
to gaol may be taken as a specimen. Publicity and
a Jury fortunately rescued him from their hands.
Another example of what they are capable took
place at Hertford on the 19th of February, of which
we borrow a description from a Morning Contem-
porary :
This was an action brought by a labourer named Cave,
against the Rev. Mr. Mountain, a Magistrate of the county
of Hertford, for false imprisonment.
The case as stated by Mr. Platt, and afterwards proved,
was as folloWs

" On the sth of February, 1839, the plaintiff, who was
at the time working for his master, was taken into custody,
and conveyed to the cage without warrant. He remained
in the cage till the next day, when he was taken before the
Rev. Mr. Mountain, and a rigmarole story was told by a
person named Wilson, to the effect that he had heard a boy
say that he had heard the plaintiff say that he had cut down
some trees belonging to the Rev. Mr. Butt. Upon this
information, without sending for the parties who were re-
presented to have heard the statement made, the defendant
at once made out a warrant for the committal of the plain-
tiff to Berkhampstead gaol, as the warrant alleged, ' upon
strong suspicion of feloniously cutting down some timber
trees.' Upon this warrant he was detained in custody until
the 13th of the same month, a period of eight days, without'a
witness having been produced to speak to any facts tending to
implicate him at all in the offence with which he was charged.
During the time he was kept in solitary confinement, and
fed on bread and water. Wilson was the only person who
gave evidence before the Magistrate, and his statement
was read over to Cave, and the defendant said there was I
quite sufficient evidence to transport him ; and that most
likely he should be in Hertford, and would say a good
word for hisn there. He then remanded the plaintiff. to
Berkbampstead gaol. He asked for bail, and Mr. Moun-
tain answered, a Phoo, phoo I I shall not allow you any
bail ; take him off, take him off.' "
At. the Petty Sessions at 'Bernet Berripstead, Cave, for
whom the Rev. Mr. Mountain Would not receive bail, and
against whom he said there was quite sufficient evidence
to transport him, was instantly discharged.
The Judge was Lord Abinger and the Jury was special.
The verdict was for the defendant.

Here, then, is an example of the manner in
which our Reverend Country Magistrates administer
the law, and of the manner in which they would

frequently administer it,with summary jurisdiction, to
such men, being labourers, as HENRY JAMES and
Mr. CAVE. The Corn-law tyrants have qnite
power enough already ; and it is no better than
folly or madness in the soi disant Liberal press to
call for more summary jurisdiction if the country
gentlemen are to be the Judges.

Our readers, on referring to an article from the
Handlesblad, under the head of " Dutch Mail,"
will be greatly shocked on perusing the following
introduction to its melancholy contents :—" We have
to fulfil to-day, as Journalists, a very melancholy
duty, that of announcing, what we could not hitherto
believe, but which is now communicated to us on
indisputable authority." We were afraid at first
to read on and come to the awful catas-
trophe, believing that it could be nothing
less than some dreadful massacre in Java,
or the bursting of a Dutch dyke, causing the me-
lancholy death of thousands, or some wicked plot
of the arch enemy of the house of Orange, King
LEOPOLD, to rob the heir apparent a third time,
and take from him at last his whole kingdom ; and
we were therefore greatly relieved on summoning
courage to proceed to the conclusion which is given
in these words—" His MAJESTY has come to the
positive resolution to contract marriage with
the Countess HENRIETTA IYOULTREMONT."
Why should the Handlesblad make such a piteous
lamentation, and pray with such fervour, that the
advisers of the good old KING may succeed in
averting a❑ event which gives joy to none but the
enemies of the House of Orange ? It is a very
old practice, and has been adopted by Jewish, Ca-
tholic, and Protestant Kings. Old FERDINAND
of Naples made a left-handed marriage, so did the pre-
sen t King of PRUSSIA, and many others, according to
high historical authority, have done the same, or
something worse ; and why should there be such
universal grief in Holland at an event of ordinary
occurrence ? Let the Handlesblad answer the ques-
tion. If this is the only public calamity which it
has to lament, Holland must indeed be a moral and
a happy country.

We have had our attention directed to a pamphlet
purporting to be written by Mr. DAVID BURN, a
Tasmanian landholder and settler, entitled, a
" Vindication of Van Diemen's Land" from cer-
tain charges preferred against the morality of the
free Colonists by a Parliamentary Report, and
strictures thereupon by the Archbishop of DUBLIN,
and his Grace's domestic Chaplain, Dr. DICKIN-
SON. The pamphlet consists of seventy-nine pages
of letter-press, of which all that is pertinent to the
settlement of the real question at issue is contained
in ten pages of Appendix. Mr. BURN writes like
a man in a passion, and in his eagerness to set his
friends right before the world, forgets that it is not
allowable for him to employ inferences which he
denounces as often as he supposes them to be em-
ployed by the Members of a Parliamentary Com-
mittee, an Archbishop, or the domestic Chaplain
of an Archbishop. Any attempt to sneer at the
exalted moral worth and high literary attainments
of a man so universally esteemed for his piety, libe-
rality, and scholarship, as the present Archbishop
of Dublin, Dr. WHATELy, must provoke the pity
or the contempt of the well-informed who witness
it ; and therefore we are sorry that Mr. BURN did
not follow the advice of those really sincere friends
who advised him to be more sparing of indirect at-
tacks in his own person, and in the correspondence
of his friends, upon the motives and talents of the
NIOSt Reverend Prelate. For instance, a gen
tleman named MANN, the author of a
book on Australia, discovers a great diffe-
rence between the scholarly pretensions of
Dr. WH &TELY and his late predecessor Arch-
bishop MAGEE, because Dr. M_AGEE's book on
the
" Atonement" is more extensively circulated in
the Penal Colonies than any of the treatises of
nIDN,N,HATELY is only that he sought to h
mode
eWolifATreEaLsyo.aingT.hisTihse racthhaerrge a
against
lnt cre-
diteda
trhis
ow:sn mexocreellwenatntle,dreiantiVseaonnDLioemgiecn. 's
TLand
circulation
in Dublin
that a book on the " Atonement"

of books in certain quarters is no proof of the sur-
passing literary abilities of their authors, otherwise
the author of " Reading Made Easy" would bear
away the palm in all the village schools in Great
Britain from BACON, LocK, PALEY, and HUME.
Book circulation in infant colonies is a slender test
indeed of literary merit. But we shall not press
farther such an hypothesis. No person in the
kingdom except Mr. MANN would think of com-
paring such a puny bigot as Archbishop MAGEE
with his distinguished successor. Another gentle-
man named MURDOCH, one of the witnesses before
the Parliamentary Committee, clenches an asser-
tion substantiative of the pure morality of the
people of Van Diemen's Land, by adding that
they have got rid of " dominant and tyran-
nous episcopacy. ' Now we do not dispute
the importance of this measure, hut we may be
allowed to express our conviction that this, per se,
will not be accepted with a good grace in England,
as a proof of the immaculate purity of the Van
Diemen's Land population. No doubt the object
of the writer was to annoy the Archbishop, but as
a witness on behalf of several thousands of aspersed
Colonists before the bar of British public opinion,
it was his duty to have repressed the idea of per-
sonal annoyance.

These remarks apply to the form and tone of the
" Vindication," and not the subject of it, upon which
we honestly confess ourselves incompetent to sit in
judgment. Having drawn much of our acquain-
tance with the moral condition of Van Diemen's
Land, from the Report of the Parliamentary Com-
mittee now impugned by Mr. BURN and his
friends, and from Hobart Town, and other Colo-
nial Journals, we conceive that it would be unfair
towards highly respectable Colonists, to question
the impartiality of their defence, without still more
decisive testimony on the other side. We are as
well aware as the Colonists can be of the little re-
liance to be placed upon much that appears in
Parliamentary Reports of Inquiry. We are sen-
sible that were the Colonists to judge of the vir-
tue and the intelligence to be found in London, by
the Report of a Committee of Inquiry sitting in
Hobart Town, before which only the Governors of
Coldbath-fields, Horsemonger-lane, Newgate, and
the Fleet Prisons, with two or three Police Magis-
trates were examined, they would find it difficult to
believe that either virtue or intelligence was prac-
tically known within the bills of mortality. This
fact should lead us to be cautious how far—on the
mere report of the prevalence of vice in communi-
ties—we attempt to represent them as especially
and singularly corrupt. But whatever may be the
Future decision of the public respecting this con-
troversy, it will be conceded by all that Mr.
BURN'S object is as generous and as praiseworthy
as his manner of giving it effect is reprehensible.
Irony is a dangerous weapon in the hands of a
dull man ; and personal allusions, when the object
of them is alike distinguished for piety, learning,
and rank, do more injury than good to the best
causes.

We invite the attention of our readers to an
article from the Glasgow Chronicle, which we have
inserted elsewhere. It appears that at the Perth-
shire election, which has terminated so unfavour-
ably for the Liberal interest, the success of the Tory
candidate is to be attributed in no small degree to
the offence taken by the Dissenters and Radicals at
the Non-intrusion principles professed by Mr.
STEUART, and by his backers Mr. FOX MAULE
and Mr. ROBERT STEUART, who, from their
connexion w►th the Government, were supposed to
speak the sentiments of Ministers on that question.
Few of the clerical Vetoists supported the Non-
intrusion Candidate, and even the Rev. Gentle-
man who holds t:te situation of President of the
Perthshire Non-intrusion Ministers, could not so
far overcome his Tory scruples as to vote for the
man whom he had recommended to the support of
others. So much for attempting to conciliate the
inveterate antipathy of the Tory clergy of Scot-
land at the expense of the Dissenters, who have
hitherto been the fastest friends of the MEL-
BOURNE Administration. The result of this ill-
adVised concession to the Non-intrusionists, has
proved that the Tory landholders, who are opposed,
almost to a man, to the Veto Act, have arrayed
themselves against the Government with a more
than usually active hostility ; that the clergy,
thonkh' Vetoists, are still more Toriei, and, with a
few disc-makable exceptions, will not sink their po-
litical prejudices, even in the " independence' of
the Kirk ; and that the good-will of almost the
whole body of the- Dissenters is in a fair way of
being permanently alienated from the Government.

The Madrid Journals received are of the 3d inst.,
but their contents are utterly unimportant. Madrid
was tranquil, but still in a state of siege ! It would
have been more honest in the Spanish Ministers, to de-
clare the Cortes in a state of siege, as it is the Cham-
bers only that are menaced by this violation of the con-
stitution.

Contrary to the general expectation, M. REMUSAT
the new French Minister of the Interior, introduced the
project of law for authorising the Government to set
apart a portion of the revenue as a secret service fund,
it the sitting of the Chamber of Deputies on Wednes-
, day. M. TIIIERS displayed a good deal of tact on this
occasion. Well aware that no portion of the public
expenses is voted with so much reluetance as the secret
service money, he prevailed upon his colleagues to re-
duce it from one million two hundred thousand francs
to one million of francs, in consideration of the
tranquil state of the country. By this mea-
sure, it was considered on Wednesday, that
he would be able to command a majority of fifty votes
on the Secret Service Bill, and this would enable him
to set the intrigues of the Court at defiance. The
"291," or MOLE section of the Chamber, is reported
to have split on Wednesday, and, if this be true, the
success of the new Premier is certain. The Project
of Law, after having been read, was referred to a Com-
mittee, with orders to report upon it on Saturday.
The debate wiN not, therefore, commence before next
week.

The Chamber of Peers, on Wednesday, adopted the
Infants Factory Bill, by a majority of 91 against 35.
Every humane mind must rejoice at the adoption of so
merciful a measure. We find the following in
a letter from Toulon, dated the 7th inst., quoted by
the Commerce of Wednesday
. _ . . . . _ .

We have received the official notice of the arrival of the
Dukes of Orleans and Aumaile, who will embark here for
Algiers. It is even said the Prince de Joinville will come to
resume the command of the Belle Porte.

Colonel Cadaignar, appointed to the command of the 2d
battalion of the infantry of Africa, leaves Algiers on board the
Coryte, which will also take M. Plenent, Alayor of the city of
Algiers, and a great number of officers.
There is no other news of the least interest in the
Pans Journals of Wednesday. There are to be great
doings in Africa in the spring.

BOURSE.--Pmds,_ YEDNESDAY, MARCH 11.

first Highest Lowest

Last

Price Piice. Price. Price
rrench 5 per Cents ll2 50 ... 112 50 ... 111 35 ... 1 2 45
4 per Cents lO2 20 ... 'C2 20 102 20 ... 102 '2O
Bank of Prance 3150 —3;55 „.3150
Laffitte Bank 1,0001: Sh lOO ...1015

5,000 f. Sh 5190 ...5190 .;.5190 ...5100
gelgian-Bank 912 50 ... 012 59 ... 905 ... 905
5 per Cents ......
3 per Cents 74 60 ... 74 60 ... 71 50 ... 74 50
United States Bank Loan 98% ... 95% ... 98% ... 995
ip.tnish Active
trasbur 291, "' 29:4 «•29'4 ... •29
Passive 7% ••• 741 .. • 7i' ... j I,L
Old Deterred B% ••• B'4 ... 8% ... 8";
Neapolitan
Roman lO4 ... 104 —. 104 ... le4
RAILWAY SHARES.
Versailles, R. B 555 .-55.5 ... 552 sn ... 553 50
L.B. 3O 25 ... 366 25 ... 362 50 ... 365
Orleans 4eo ... 400 ... 460 ...460
..
gto Bale 345 ••• 345 ••• 345 ...3d5
55%
BELGIAN k lINDS-45aus9ELs, MAncu 11.
Actual Debt, '2 per Cent. 101%
Rothschild's Loan, 5 per CGnt
Cent ....
Loan of Thirty Millions, 4 per
3 per C 74
Loan of City,N
---------....--- Cent
91
181=+4 percent 99
Society of comm''rce 454 per Cent 90%
Bank of Belgium, 5 per Cent
National Society .
Exchange on London (short)
1 •—Brussels Papers, March 11.

MARINES.—A Return, which was moved for by Sir
Robert Peel, has just been laid on the table of the
House of Commons, of the number of British Marines
employed on the Coast of Spain, value of stores ad-
vanced to Spain, and sums received from Spain on ac-
count of such advances, of which the following is a sum-
mary. The number of Marines employed ashore is 703
—afloat 50, total 753. The total value of stores of all
descriptions &I vanced to Spain by the Admiralty under
the provisions of the Quadruple Treaty is 6,692/. 14s. 9d.
In addition to this there have been supplied from the
Medical Department for the use of the Forces of the
Queen of Spain, " Surgical instruments and materials"
to the value of 5721. 2s. Gd. The total value of all de-
scriptions of stores furnished by the Ordnance Depart-
ment under the provisions of the Quadruple Treaty
amounts to 567,239/., making altogether 574,5031.
The sums received for such advances are all classed
under one head--Nil, and the security for the payment
is contained in a note from Count Toreno to Mr. Vil-
liers, dated August 6, 1835, which states in answer to
an inquiry which Mr. Villiers was instructed by the
Duke of Wellington to make, that " as soon as circum-
stances will permit, the Queen of Spain will hasten to
act worthy of the noble and disinterested sacrifices
which the generous British nation has made."
REJECTED LETTERS.---We have received another
letter from nur indefatigable correspondent at Notting-
ham, who has now assumed the name of " Seneca."
We will, for once, ,gratify him by quoting a part of his

letter—the first and the only part which we understand.
The philosopher thus commences : " It is some
little difficulty to raise the Ideas above the occur-
rences of the day A wisper of new taxers flys about
are they to be put on the Rich and taken of the
Poor or is it the Salt and Malt Liquor Tax"
Thus ends the sentence, and, we fervently hope, also our
correspondence. Another correspondent, equally inde-
fatigable, writes from Paddington, under the signature
hasof a " Middle Class Chartist," and though he been
informed that his letters cannot be inserted, he still per-
severes, and, so late as Sunday, wrote a letter, nearly
a column long, addressed to Sir Wm. Molesworth,
whose radical principles by no means come up to his
mark. Since the injunction was issued against his
epistles, at least ten have been received ; but as perse-
verance is a most useful qu ility, we feel bound also to
find room for an extract from his correspondence.
After blaming Sir William for many omissions
in a speech delivered at Leeds, to " celebrate
the triumph of the Liberal (sham) party," he adds,
, " vou make no mention of sergeants receiving several
guineas a day to entrap all the able-bodied labourers
into the thou shalt do murder' standing army. You
make no mention of the several millions that is voted
annually for the maintenance of a corpulent, well-
dressed, unconstitutional, odious, degraded, detested,
and Frenchified police, which, in reality, is but a
Government establishment for the encouragement of
common informers.' This is a very mild specimen
of our Paddington friend's political feeling, and we
trust he will rest satisfied with it. Another writer of
the same description, and who holds up Bronterre
O'Brien as the god of his idolatry, thus proclaims his
intentions—" No more fooling with petitions to the
House of Incurables, no more humble solicitations.
No, no—we are going to send in such a swarm of honest
men, as will rout the clotted set of serpents out at one
fell swoop." This is to be done at the next general
election, by the Radicals holding up their hands for
their candidate (if he is an honest man). The proviso
is a good one, and when the Radicals can point out the
way to ascertain this, we shall believe our Correspon-
dent a prophet, and no longer doubt that all sham Re-
, fortners will be banished from Parliament.

MONEY and COMMERCIAL NEWS

CITY, TWELVE O'CLOCK.

We had a very late delivery of letters this morning,
owing no doubt to the arrival of a great quantity of letters
from India, New York, and other quarters of the globe.
It appears, according to the intelligence from China,
that no declaration of war has as yet been made by Lord
Auckland against ,the Chinese. Indeed it was expected
that negotiations would take place, particularly when the
imposing British naval forces made their appearance.

The ship Scotland, not a regular packet ship, has ar-
rived at Liverpool, sailed from New York on the 15th
ult., bringing American Papers of the above date.
United States Bank Shares quoted 75 ; Prime Bills
exchange at 9; Cotton Bills, 9s prem. ; not much doing
in the exchange.