The Sun.
London, England, 1840-12-02 00:00:00

i}.e argument. We think it would be nnjuat to the
plaintiffs that their right to the ordinary course of pro.
ceeding in the action should be affected on the present
occasion by the wrongful acts (if such there were) of
their predecessors.
" Taking the whole of the circumstances into conside-
ration, it appears to us to be reasonable and equitable,
on the other hand, that the Commissioners should not
be entitled to the favour they ask of the Court, unless
they are ready to abide by the ;tender which was made
by them before the action was brought, and therefore,
we think, if the Commissioners refuse to abide by the
terms proposed by themselves, so much of the rule as
seeks to discharge the order of Mr. Baron Alderson
should be made absolute, and the rest discharged, and
the Commissioners should be held to try the cause on
the pleadings as they now stand ; but that if, on the
other hand, the Commissioners are now willing to abide
by their original offer, and the plaintiffs decline such
otter, that the defendants should be allowed ter amend
Ells ir pleas by the introduction of the new plea asked for.
" And we think, as the parties throughout the whole
course of the proceedings appear to be endeavouring to
carry into effect an arrangement which has proved abor-
tive without any blame attaching to either party, that
there should be no costs of the motion on either side."
The SOLICITOR to the Commission gave a detailed
statement of all the proceedings taker: in the case. The
action arose from a newer made in Aiilbank, in 1808,
when a right was given to a Mr. White to have a
wharf' to the extent of one barge in the sewer. The
Commissioners in 1832 determined to cemply with
many requisitions, and mend and improve the sewer,
when the Gas Company and others who were tenants
under White, complained of damage done them, and
claiming compensation.
Mr. ADEY wished to ask distinctly whether under
the pleas pleaded they were in a situation to try whether
the plaintiffs were entitled to any compensation whatever.
The SOLlClTOR—Certainly ; but from the course
taken they could net now plead the steiute, the action
not being against any of the Commissioners.
Mr. ADEY apprehended that the contractors had the
same privileges as the Commissioners, under whom they
acted. In the Legal Committee it was insisted that no
compensation was due, and that the proceedings should
be. put in such a state as to try the right.
The SOLICITOR sail the proceedings as they now
stood raised •theteti question of right,- Atiffe'bieelia—
tion of pleading the statute.
Mr. ADEY—But that is the whole ease.
The SOLICITOR said they were in a situstion now to
try the whole question of right. Suppose they were to
make the tender, and it was refused, the Commissioners
would then be let in to plead the statute ; but it was a
grave question whether it would prevail. It was very
difficult to say, foe he did not believe .a strictly analo-
gous case had ever been decided.
Mr. WILLOUGHBY moved that the Court, in confor-
mity with the advice or the Court of Common Pleas,
again make a tender of 1,696/. 13s. Id. If it was not
accepted they would again be put in the same po-
sition its if the action was only now brought. The
plaintiffs claimed for damage ..done to their walls,
for the loss of accommodation, and compensation
for cousequential • damage. It was equitable that
the Court having taken land without other payment
than the right to use the sewer—they should stand by
their contract, however suspicious the circumstances
under which it was made. Under that contract the
parties holding under Mr. White had the full right to
navigate the sewer, and the contract had actually been
acted upon for )ears. That would be a full answer
in either a Court of Law or Equity. They had ac-
quiesced in it fir eta years, and full value having been
given for the privilege, the parties holding under the
bargain made with Mr. White, no Court would interfere
to set elide the contract. Public bodies should
hold themselves out to the world as scrupu-
lously anxious to fulfil every contract they entered
into, however improvident. Let them do so in •
this case, and let it be a warning to the Court in future.
The injuries done by tl.e present proprietors were not
within their jurisdiction. They had taken some land
belonging to them, and that was a fair subject for com-
pensetion, and time plea of the statute would not prove
a bar to an action in such a state of facts. The Court did
not hold the Commissioner to their former offer, because
they bad made a tender, but because it was reasonable
and equitable that some compensation was due, and
they took that sum offered by the Commissioners as •
proper one. In his opinion it was both just and pro.
per that that Court should at once acquiesce in the re-
commendation of so grave and teamed a Court as that of
the Common Pleas ; in so doing they would net in any
way act derogatory to its character. That advice he
gave the Court alter a full and deliberate consideration
of the whole case.
Mr. WM. BEACH seconded the motion.
Mr. ADEY was most happy, that like the other
gentlemen he had no words of advice of his
own to draw hack. Ever since the question came
before the Court he had maintained that the
Court could not grant any compensation to any per-
son until the tight had bean first tried. He still con-
tended that they were not justified in paying away
1,600/. of the rate-payer's money, not one farthing of it
having been awarded by a jury of the country. He
said the Court had no legal right to make the ten-
der for compensation, and therefore he would oppose
the motion.
Mr. LESLIE wisked to ask the Chairman whether the
building of et bridge by the Coreinissiouers ism 1808 was
not u compensation.
The CHAIRMAN said no—he fully believed not.
Mr. LESLIE wished for a particular answer, for he
was led to believe that such was the ease. Mr. Sibley,
the county surveyor, had put down this bridge as
White's Bridge.
Mr. WILLOUGHBY said it was not so. The bridges
were very different.
Mr. LESLIE—WeI!, be it so.. The whole of that
case was surrounded with the utmost suspicion. First,
the property was that of a Cominiseion, and the resolu-
tion was entered into in the presence of the contractor,
who was to receive the money that was to be laid out.
The whole of the proceedings of the Court in 1808
were pregnant with suspicion. He would ask under
what statute had the Court Fewer to snake an unna-
vigable stream a navigable one, or bow couhl the Court
grant any private person a private interest,
and after a lapse of upwards of 22 years, agree
to lay out upon that same property no less a sum than
8,0001? Was it known to the Court that it was not
till ten months after that vote of the Court had been
come to that the Gis Company became proprietors of
the land. But no doubt the rieht of navigating the
stream was cold along with it. Now lie would beg to ask
of the Court where the money for meking the tender was
to come from? certainly not from the money of the rate-
payers, that he would decidedly oppose. He was well
ats are that, under the 23d Henry VII 1., six Com-
missioners might act, and their acts were legal,
but he had yet to learn that two, three, or four
gentlemen, calling themselves a Legal Committee,
had any power to involve the Commission in
heavy law expenses. The whole of the facts connected
with the case were surrounded with the utmost suspi-
cion. By referring to the resolution of 1808, he saw
that at one time it appeared on the minutes as having
appeared unanimously, but subsequently that word had
been struck out by the pent being drawn through it.
The CHAIRMAN said that word had been surrepti-
tiously inserted, and was struck out by order of the
next Court. The resolution was evidently opposed by
Mr. Sanders throughout, but carried against him by a
large majority.
Mr. LESLIE—The fact just stated increased the sus-
' picions with which the whole case was pregnant is a
tenfold degree. He would decidedly object to the
money being taken front the pockets of the rate-payers,
for it would, in his opinion, be an illegal pay-
ment. Were the Commissioners like those is
Somersetshire, to pay it out of their own pockets--
( A latigh ) They could not raise it either upon the
A Special Court of Commissioners of Sewers was whole of the districts, or upon either of them singly, its
held yesterday at their Court-house, Soho-square, for the a legal manner. Now, he did not 'knew very well the
purpose of considering the state of an action pending be- situation in which he was placed—it was one of difficulty
tween the Commissioners and the Equitable Gas Com- —supposing he were to vote against the proposition of
lhatex
by the defendant to amend the pleas by the introduc- the contract entered into in 1808,.
pany, in which the following judgment was given in the Mr. Willoughby, would it be supposed that she con_
Common Pleas, last Term :
curretl in the still greater expenditure that would follow
"MEDLEY v. PRITCHARD.
its rejection ? ho certainly did not ; and, to get out of
" Lord Chief Justice TINDAL—The application made
the difficulty, he would move as an alt:er.:lnngdroal illegal `ei k
tion of a new plea, which would furnish an answer to ercise of the authority of the Court, could not therefore
the plaintiff's rig'at of action after se long an interval be binding upon the present Commissimiers, and that
since the pleas were put on the record, is an application all compensation and law expanses would be an illegal
to the discretion of the Court, and ought not to be ac- payment, and could not be paid out of the monies of
ceded to by the Court, unless on the equitable consi- the present payers of the Sewers' Rate." H e would
deration of the whole case, us it stands between the move that amendment in order to save himself; for it
parties ;it appears to fall within their determination. any rate was attempted to be made for such a pay-
"lt appears, by the affidavit of Mr. Hodgson, that, on merit, most undoubtedly it would. be carried to the
the 3d of April, 1835, a tender of 1,6961. 13s. Id. was Queen's Bench.
made by the Commissioners, as a compensation for the Mr. c nit BER 3 seconded the amendment.
injury sustained by the plaintiff in consequence of the A COMMIS3IONER wished to ask the Chairman
alteration of the sewer, which tender was declined by the whether the payneent would be an illegal one. If it
plaintiff. was to be contested in the Bench, and with a chance
"It appears, further, that the action is brought against of success, he would vote against it, however much he
the Contractors, by an arrangement with the Commis- might deprecate incurring further expense.
sioners of Sewers, for the mere purpose of trying the The CHAIRMAN, under the advice of the solicitor,
plaintiff's right to a larger compensation, said the payment would not be illegal.
"On the part of the Commissioners, it is alleged, that In answer to a question from Mr. LESLIE,
such tender having been refused, they are remitted to The SOLICITOR said he had no doubt whatever but it
any defence they might originally have on the plaintiff's could be made legally out of a rate to be made.
right to recover any compensation whatever, and to the The question was then put, when there were—
arrangement for presenting the question and submitting For the motion 7
it for decision under the special case to the Court ; and For the amendment 4
that they never intended to waive any legal defence Majority
they might have. We think the pleas, put on the record On the original motion being put,
by the solicitors of the Commissioners who conduct the Mr. ADEY said he was most anxious that at some
case for the defendants, appear to support the view future time he should not be supposed to have given
taken of such arrangement by the defendants. I his sanction to this motion. He moved that the pay-
" But-facts arc stated in the affidavit, on the art of , tuight be
the Commissioners, from which an paised consijered illegal.
argument was raised
and strongly insisted on before 'this amendment was negatived by the f
merit of 1,6631.,
ormer ma-
some that there had been
some imposition
muus
practised on the Co • sioners of jority.
Sewers for the time being, with reference to the original The original motion was then carried by 9to 5.
arrangement in 1808. The names were ordered to be token down.
A copy of time resolution was ordered to be furnished
there is not the slightest gnd to
grousurmise that the to the solicitors for the purpose of' their communicating
plaintiffs had any share in it, who claim as purchasers it to the ether side.
from the former owners,
of whom mention is made in iThe Court was then adjourned.

PRICE sd.

spelt with the same letters, was a very different word in
the year 1812 and in the year 1832.—(Laughter and
cheers.) The man who owned it was a marked man—he
was shunned or jeered by those who appropriated to them-
selves all the virtues of loyalty—his very bill was not
so discountable as another man's; and even in 1817 in
the vigorous attack upon our corrupt burgh system,
which I had the honour to commence, we were obliged
to have recourse to a circumlocution, in order to avoid
the ondaous word" Reform," lest we should alarm some
of the more timid of our adherents, and burgh reform
was transmogrified into " an improvement in the system
of our burgh polity."—(Cheers.) Before this, few, very
few, dared to speak out. Nevertheless, the sacred fire
of liberty had been long smouldering in the hearts of the
citizens of Edinburgh, and it only required the small
breath of a slight agitation to blow it into a flame. And
from that day the citizens of Edinburgh, nobly seconded
by our lion. Chairman, Lord Archibald Hamilton, and
a trusty band in the House of Commoes, persevered in
their exertions, till they cleared out the Augean stable,
and marched in the representatives of the ten-pounders.
—(Great cheering.) Here it would be unpardonable
to omit mentioning the extraordinary, the untiring, and
persevering assistance rendered by that prince of pa
triots, our most excellent croupier, Sir James Gibson
Graig, during the whole of that and of every struggle
for the liberty of the subject.—(The whole company
here rose, as by one consent, and continued to cheer for
several minutes, waving handkerchiefs, &c.) Indeed,
it is but justice to say that in all our exertions the ci-
tizens have been nobly seconded by the Whig party,
with whom we were glad to co-operate—not because
they were Whigs—not because they were in opposition
—not because they were in power, but because they
coincided with us as friends of civil and religious
liberty.--(Loud cheers.) Tatar was tips booj of our
union ; we acknowledge no other ; and while they ad-
here to that, we adhere to them : but should they ever
desert the standard of liberty, they will not be fol-
lowed by the citizens of Edinburgh, who will stand
by the old flag %, bile there is a rag of it left flying.
—(lmmense cheering.) In the late election there
were some unseemly examples of backsliding, but I
have reason to believe that the section who deserted
their colours was small and by no means influential. I
cannot believe that that great party to whom Britain
and the world are indebted for such great advances in
liberty will ever as a body tarnish their fair fame, by
countenancing the endeavours of any who would un-
dermine or overturn the foundations of freedom.—
(Cheers.) I cannot forget that it. is to them we are
mainly indebted for the blessings which flowed from the
Revolution of 1688—that fifty years ago Mr. Fox
moved the repeal of the Test and Corporation laws,
and that although he and his friends were defeated
on that and succeeding occasions, the conflict
was again and again renewed, till at length the victory
was achieved in 188, on the motion of Lord John Rus-
sell. I cannot forget that it was the same party
who struggled for many a long year to remove the civil
disabilities from the Catholics, and who in 1806 pre-
ferred the loss of place and power to the abandonment
of the principle of religious liberty, and that they never
relaxed in their endeavours till the emancipation of the
Catholics was accomplished. I cannot forget that they
were the earliest and steadiest advocates for the aboli-
tion of slavery, and that it was under their administra-
tion that the fetters of the slave were broken off, and
Great Britain vindicated from the reproach of this un-
holy traffic. I cannot believe that those who have for
so many years fought manfully and successfully under
the banner of civil and religious liberty will ever prove
recreant to their principles, but I trust that the effect
of this day's proceedings will be to encourage them to
oppose with unflinching courage every attack on the cita-
del of our liberties, and to support every measure which
has a tendency to strengthen its bulwarks. At all
events I trust it will be made apparent that whatever
others do, the citizens of Edinburgh will continue sted-
fast in their adherence to the great principles which
have actuated them in all their struggles for liberty and
good government.—(Loud and.long continued cheers.)
Sir J. G. CRAIG said that the toast which had been put
into his hands was that of " Iler Majesty's Ministers—
may they be enabled to carry measures in unison with
the opinions of the great body of their liberal snppor-
ters." No set of men who ever ex'sted had shown
themselves more anxious on every occasion to support
the Constitution, and tile rights and liberties of the
country—none had been more forward to promote every
improvement—than the members of her Majesty's pre-
sent Government. The worthy Baronet dwelt on the
importance of the union of the fri-gds of civil nod reli-
gious liberty, by which alone the Tories could be ex-
cluded from power.
Mr. GILLON, M.P., gave the next toast—" Tee
People, the only legitimate source of power—may they
assert and maintain their rights with modem:ion."
After a few more toasts and speeches of little into.
rest, the meeting separated.

MORTALITY in the METROPOLIS.

The following are the results of .‘ A Table of Mortality
in the Metropolis, showing the Number of Deaths from
all Causes Registered, in the week ending Saturday, the
21st November, 1840." The Table is issued from the Office
of the Registrar-General ;
Weekly
CAUSES OF DEATH. Total. eo Averaff

1833.
Epidemic, Endemic, and Contagious Diseases 176 265
Diseases of the Brain, Nerves, and Senses l3B 156
Diseases of the Lungs, and other Organs of
Respiration
Diseases of the Ilea-t and Bloodvessels
Diseases of the Stomach, Liver, and other

Organs of Digestion 59 57
Diseases of the Kidneys, &c.
Childbed, Diseases of the Uterus, &c.
Diseases of the Joints, Bones, and Muscles
Diseases of thu Skin, &c
Diseases of thmertain Seat
Old Age, or Natural Decay 62 79
Deaths by Violence, Privation, or Intemperance 22 26
Causes not specified
Deaths from all causes... -
Average Weekly Deaths . . 1,013
Deaths in the Average Weekly
Week. Deaths, 1838.
Western Districts ..... ... 134 ...... 156
North, Districts
Central Districts 177 ..... 208
• East Districts 194 239
South Districts ...

Total 897

1,013

It is stated that under the term Metropolis. are com-
prised the 32 districts herein mentioned, which include the
City of London within and without the walls, the City and
Liberties of Westminster, the out parishes within the
bills of niortality—and the parishes of St. Marylebone ;
St. Pancras ; Kensington ; Fulham ; Hammersmith
(Chapelry) ; St. Luke, Chelsea ; Paddington ; St. Mary,
Stoke Newington ; St. Leonard, Bromley ; St. Mary. le-
bow ; Camberwell ; Greenwich ; St. Nicholas and St.
Paul, Deptford; and Woolwich. The population as enu-
merated in 1831 was 1,494,890. The weekly average for
1836 was obtained by dividing the deaths registered in that
year by 52. In comparing it with the weekly deaths in
1840, it must be borne in mind that the metropolis in-
creases nearly two per cent. annually ; and that. if the
popul At ion had been the same in 1838 as in 1840, the deaths
would have been 1-27th part more numerous.
General Register-office, Nov. 26, 1840.

COURT OF SEWERS FOR WEST-
MINSTER AND PART OF MIDDLESEX.