The Sun.
London, England, 1833-05-22 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF TM' PUBLIC JOURNALS.

It is with the greatest satisfaction that we have
to announce that a preliminary treaty was signed
yesterday by the plenipotentiaries of Great Bri-
iain, France, and Holland. By this convention
the English and French embargoes will be taken
off Dutch vessels in the ports of England and
France, and the interruption of their navigation,
on the part of the Dutch Government, will be
removed. The services of the English and
French united squadrons will thus likewise be
dispensed with, and the intercourse between the
respective parties and Holland placed on the
s tine footing as before the French expedition in
November last. The Dutch garrison of Ant-
werp, now prisoners in France, will, by the same
arrangement, be sent home. The armistice be-
tween Holland and Belgium will be continued
till the definitive settlement of a permanent sepa-
ration, and till that time the navigation of the
Scheldt will remain free. This convention has
been agreed upon with the Dutch plenipo-
tentiary, and was sent off to Holland for ra-
tification yesterday. " But," we think that
we hear the pretended friends of his
Dutch Majesty, though the real enemies of
Holland, exclaim, " this is literally nothing.
His Dutch Majesty has not accepted the treaty
of the 15th of November, 1831, which your
English embargo and your French military ex-
pedition into Belgium were meant to enforce.
He starts as free in the race of negotiation as
before your measures of violence, and may hold
out against all your proposed arrangements in
1833 as sturdily as he did in 1832 and the pre-
vious year." This would be a proper correction,
or a useful caution, if we had said or insinuated
that the present arrangement was reported to
be final, or was intended to preclude all fur-
ther negotiation. We have, however, said or in-
sinuated no such thing. But though we have
guarded ourselves, and must guard ourselves,
against any expression of confidence in
pacific arrangements, where his Dutch Ma-
jesty is one of the parties, we can by no
means allow that the present convention is
unimportant, or that it only replaces things
in the same situation in which they stood
before the convention of the 22d of October last.
In the interval Antwerp has been taken by a bril-
liant French enterprise, and delivered up to its
legitimate owner, in the face of suspecting
Europe, with an unflinching good faith that all
Europe admired. His Dutch Majesty has thus
learned, that when nations are desirous of peace,
it requires more than the irritating obstinacy and
intriguing policy of one Sovereign of a secondary
order to embroil them. He has likewise learned,
that in the loss of Antwerp he has been obliged
to surrender one of his greatest means of main-
taining uncertainty or exciting alarm on the
frontiers of his rival. The salutary lesson
taught by these events has been enforced by the
sufferings of the embargo, and the growing dis-
contents of his own people at the diminution
of their trade, or the capture of their shipping.
lie has probably likewise become aware that this
lesson, ifinsufficient to put him on his good beha-
viour, might have been carried further. That it has
been so already, to a considerable extent, and that
it promises to result in a gratifying final change
of temper and conduct, will be evident to the
most inconsiderate observer of diplomatic tran-
sactions. After the capture of Antwerp, and
even after the return of the French expeditionary
army, his Dutch Majesty loudly declared that
he would enter into no terms with France and
England, either for removing the embargo, for
recovering his brave defenders from a captivity
in France, or for re-establishing his former
amicable relations with his allies. He had been,
he declared, treating with the Conference of the
tive Powers, and he would not alter his posi-
tion by renewing his negotiations with two of
them separately. It was in vain to say that,
these two were only the executors of a treaty
agreed to by all, and that he must now begat by
making his peace with them, and entering into
such engagements as the rest might sanction.
This difficulty he has now got over, and we,
therefore, think that we are not exposing our-
selves to any signal disappointment in expecting
that a definitive treaty with all the Powers will
not much longer be delayed. Let us not, how-
ever, be too sanguine on a matter, where we
have already more than once been deceived. It
is expected that the ratifications of the Con-
vention will be exchanged in the beginning of
next week.— Times.

The opinion that we entertain of the verdict
given by the Calthorpe-street jury was briefly
intimated in our journal of yesterday ; but as the
decision of any men acting under the sacred obli-
gation, or what ought to be the sacred obliga-
tion, of an oath, deserves attention, we resume
the matter with painful seriousness to-day. This
is the verdict which the jury have obliged the
Coroner to record —" Justifiable Homicide, on
these grounds ;" and the grounds are then re-
counted, which are as follow :—" That no Riot
Act was read, nor any proclamation advising the
people to disperse; that the Government did not
take the proper precautions to prevent the meet-
ing from assembling; and that the conduct of
the police was ferocious, brutal, and unprovoked
by the people," &c. Now, we will grant for a
moment that all these allegations are true, yet is
it not obvious to common sense to remark, that
the man who murdered Cully (we will say no-
thing of others who are to be brought to trial)—
hut is it not obvious, we ask, to common sense, to
remark, that the man who murdered Cully
armed himself with an illegal weapon before he
knew that no Riot Act would be read ! (even if
that were necessary)—before he knew that no
proclamation would be made !—before he knew
that the Government would not take proper pre-
cautions to prevent the meeting from assembling!
mud before he knew that the police would act
ferociously ? Had the murderer killed the
policeman with a blow of his fist, or with any
weapon accidentally within his reach at the time,
something might be said for the finding of the
jury; but in the present instance it is clear that
he went with intention " prepense" to shed
Hood. If the verdict were a lawful one, it
riould henceforth be law for the people to go to
all their public meetings, as the murderer of
they
eeullywent, secretly armed wit.th
oNfdvaegthgdeeors
jury
conclusion so monstrous that it cannot even
.
he
e
Ith,r)ee en-
treat
mischiefcoonent
dn epan nnrlioaot
now correct
cltet
yhcec:hysoreai
rt:heseicodetuiedrtrocat
unhht
neeo,irrspr
the general
no or t
good
thaton
oddo
sense of Englishmen will, we trust, in time, re-
pair that wrong—but for the purpose of unbur-
dening their consciences. We have said the
'• more considerate part of the jury," for there
was evidently a great difference of manner and
conduct among the members. Some of them
acted almost in one breath as jurymen, witness",
S
to us no-
thing in the circumstances detailed by the wit.
coroners, and even bysta,n,d_eirisamuen.!!ed,Folorr
our-
selves, utheyr
incessantly hallooed out .
•Tlves, we repeat that there appears

tresses to justify, in a legal sense, the slaying of
that unfortunate man. Setting aside the testi-
mony of Mary Hamilton, which, all things con-
sidered, we concur with the jury in regarding as
unworthy of credit, we are sent back to the
statement of the other female, a child of 13 or
14 years of age, for the only approximation to
a clear and distinct narrative of the facts con-
nected with the violent death of Cully. From
her it would appear that a man in running away
from the meeting was struck upon the shoulder
by a policeman, who followed him, and that he
turned upon and stabbed his pursuer. This
act of sanguinary resistance would not justify the
perpetrator before any Court of Law. Cully
was a peace-officer, with the ensigns of his call-
ing about him. The Jury themselves assume
the meeting to have been an illegal one. The
mere act, therefore, of being present at such a
meeting was an unlawful act ; and nothing could
sanction in point of law, however it might have
admitted of moral palliation, the use of deadly
weapons in repelling the aggression, if' we must
so describe it, of the police constable, in even
the abuse of his power. To say the truth, we
have been led by recent information to believe
that unnecessary violence was resorted to on the
part of the police. They were provoked too soon
—they were probably alarmed beyond what right
reason, or a knowledge of the real insignificance
of the meeting, would dictate; and like other
potentates under the influence of terror, indent,
nified themselves by cruelty for the pain of fright,
and broke all the heads about them as a pro-
tection to their own. This is sufficiently me-
lancholy, but why was it not prevented ?
Colonel Rowan was there upon the spot, and
on horseback ; he is a Magistrate as well as
head of the police : why did he not ride in
among the mass of the police force to restrain
its violence? or among the misguided people, to
prevail upon them, by good-natured represen-
tations, to disperse ? There is ground, for cer-
tainty, that, in the first instance, mild and manly
expostulation, or indeed the early appearance and
resolute countenance of only forty or fifty police-
men, would have settled the business more
effectually, and with less risk of future evil,
than did the furious onset of from 1,500 to
1,700 of these officers. The very consciousness
of the overwhelming magnitude of the constabu-
lary power employed ought to have produced
ex►raordinary moderation and forbearance in the
conduct of it. As the matter stands, so great
has been the mismanagement, that the public
sympathy—we say nothing now of that of the
jurors—goes along with the acknowledged vio-
lators of the law, and adversely to those who
could have no interest or object but its fair en-
forcement. Still this does not exonerate the
verdict from censure. The jury could not,
either on the evidence, or on their own de-
clared admissions, justify the slaughter of
the unhappy policeman,—it would have
been to legalize an unlawful meeting ; and
even had the meeting been lawful, it would
not have authorized the carrying about the per-
son of concealed and deadly weapons. We are
bound to say, that in everything which fell from
the jurors after the verdict, there was proof of
perfect earnestness of conviction, and honesty
of purpose, amidst obstinate ignorance and
error. Their duty was to determine how a par-
ticular individual had lost his life ; and they
stepped widely out of the course prescribed to
them, when they inferred the nature of a cer-
tain fact, from general impressions relative to
the proceedings of actors not concerned with it.
The verdict may be salutary as a lesson of temper
to the police, but we cannot say that it will
much increase the confidence of disCriminating
minds in the knowledge and sagacity of juries.
Indeed, when we consider the not improbable
consequences of the. verdict, in encouraging low
ruffians to resist authority, we think that the
jury, who represent themselves as having some
stake in the country, may before long lament
that their anxiety to repress the violence of
power, has made them disregard the law of the
land—the surest protector of the poor against
the rich, no less than of the rich against the
poor.— Times.

We rejoice to see, and hail as a good omen of
the reformed Parliament, that the House of
Commons is sincerely desirous of extirpating the
rotten places in the representation. The election
committees of this session have made many
signal examples of electioneering corruption ;
and the ranks of the Conservatives have been
especially thinned by several void returns de-
clared by the reports of the committees. On
Monday Sir Ronald Ferguson, an old and con-
sistent Reformer, moved for returns of the ten-
pound rate-payers of Leamington and Kenil-
worth ; probably with the ultimate view of add-
ing those populous places to the boundary of
the borough of Warwick. We also do not doubt
that the writ will be further suspended, and that
the indecent canvass now going on • in that bo-
rough, by Sir C. Greville (and the very parties
who effected the gross bribery of the last election),
in favour of the Conservative candidate Mr.
Sergeant Goulburn, will be an abortive attempt to
substitute for the ex-Member a new nominee of
the Noble Patron. We do not, indeed, expect that
the money and influence of Lord Warwick will
be used as heretofore ; but it is the constitu-
tional duty of the House of Commons to pre-
vent the possibility of a recurrence of the abo-
minable abuses prevalent at the last election.
Hertford, Carrickfergus, and other detected
places, will, doubtless, receive the judgment of
Parliament. Liverpool, and its venal freemen,
we are glad to hear, will also be purged of their
corruption. We know of no more important
questions before the House of Commons, than
the punishment and reform of the delinquent
constituencies, and the correction and extinction
of that abominable aristocratic usurpation which
has thus debased the freedom and purity of
election, for the purpose of trafficking in the
rights and privileges of the people. The coun-
try, we are sure, will jealously watch the since-
rity and progress of these remedial measures ;
and, in the cry for justice, we trust that Stafford,
the Gomorrah of political iniquity, will not escape
condign judgrnent.—Morning Chronicle.
A motion was last night made by Mr. D. W.
Harvey, for a return of pensions, with a view to
ascertain the grounds on which they were
granted, as he considered that the public money
should not pass into the hands of any one who
had not rendered to the state some positive and
essential service. The motion, and another
made on the suggestion of Mr. Hume, for a
return of the pensions on the Barbadoes Four
and a Half per Cent. duties, were assented to
by Lord Althorp, who " at once admitted as a
general principle, that no person was entitled to
receive pay from the people, in the shape of
sinecure ur otherwise,
.unless for public service
past or to come. The sum paid in pensions of
one kind or other in this country is very great,
and means must be resorted to for gradually re-
ducing it. Would," said Mr. Harvey, " the
country credit it, when he stated, that in pensions

one way or another—by superannuations, com-
pensations, and the like—no less than nine mil-
lions of money were annually paid ?" In the
pensions chargeable on the English, Scotch, and
Irish Civil List, and the Four and a Half per Cent.
duties, there were 1,303 persons, of whom I ,022
were of the fair sex, and of 208 persons of title
and distinction 121 were ladies of family."
There is no doubt that by the system pursued
during the late Tory Admini,tration, the dead
weight was kept unnecessarily high. Govern-
ment must strengthen themselves by Committees
of the House, in order to reduce all expenditure
which is either beyond the occasion, or which is
without justification. Most of the strictures on
our expenditure in Sir Henry Parnell's ad-
mirable work on financial reform, are still appli-
cable. " The great amount (lie says) of the
non-effective expenditure in the army, navy, and
ordnance, shows the profusion and the want of
due consideration for the public interests, with
which everything in the nature of pensions, half-
pay, and retired allowances has been regulated.
Those persons who were the authors of these
schemes, ought to have known that
exercised at the expense of the public, is but an-
other name for waste, and a vice, and that all
praise bestowed upon it is false and hypocritical.'
In order to protect the public for the future from
this system of making provision out of the pub-
be purse for so many thousand persons, who,
while in active service, receive full remuneration
for their time and trouble, it may be well to con-
sider whether any individual, not now in public
service, who shall be hereafter appointed to any
civil or military employment, should be allowed
to receive any pension, half-pay, or superannua-
tion allowance, except in special cases, and under
the responsibility of Government." Whatever
the sum may amount to, which is paid unneces-
sarily, the public are justified in calling for its
reduction. We have, too, the means of com-
pelling attention to our wishes. While repre-
sentation was virtual, it was the complaint of Mr.
Herries, that Ministers were more economical
than Parliament would suffer them to be. How-
ever, that excuse avails no longer. The people
can now, through their representatives, insist on
a rigid economy. There are abundant means by
which constituencies can influence their repre-
sentatives. It is only necessary for the people to
watch them and stimulate them if they fail in their
duty. We cannot, therefore, approve of the sort
of indecent sanction given to unconstitutional
proceedings by Mr. Harvey. " What had passed,"
he said, "in the metropolis within a few days
plainly showed that they were beginning to look
to themselves. If reform failed of its ends—if
good and cheap government were not granted,
the people would then look to that of which
those who had raised only to disappointment
their hopes would be the authors—and that was
revolution.—(Hear.)" This is not the way to
accomplish the object. Threats of revolution
only tend to divide the people, and by alarming
those who dread confusion, to prevent them
from joining in the measures which the Consti-
tution allows to be taken for compelling all
practical reforms. Revolutions are matters of
serious import, and not to be even talked of un-
necessarily. It may be advisable to hazard re-
sistance to the laws when the laws cease to bene-
fit those subject to them ; but let us never forget
that the masses of a nation cannot be put in
motion to overturn any Government, without
creating an immense amount of suffering to the
generation by which the revolution is made. All
revolutions do not, besides, terminate so fortu-
nately as our Reform Bill terminated. It is
well nut to tempt Providence too far. Let us
bear in mind the Italian adage, Stava hen, ma
per star meglio,sto qui (I was well, I wished to
be better, and here I am).—Morning Chronicle.

In times of political excitement we must take
care that the principles of law are not warped
and perverted to suit the views of contending
factions. During the angry discussion which
has been kept up by the Whig and Tory jour-
nals relative to the meeting in Calthorpe-street,
ever since the coroner's jury commenced their
proceedings, we have observed a good deal of
impassioned folly and confident ignorance dis-
played by some of our " public instructors,"
whose pride as well as duty it should be, as
teachers of mankind, to keep themselves reflect-
ing and reasonable, even although the rest of
the world had gone mad. For some years past
we have had a good deal to do in preventing the
landmarks of the Constitution from being dis-
turbed or removed according to the caprice or
pleasure of the heated partisans of conflicting po-
litical interests ; but at no time that we re-
member
has the strife of politics made wilder
havoc upon the volume of the laws than at the
present crisis. What, for instance, can surpass
the absurdity of the doctrine laid down by an
evening organ of the Whig Ministry, to the effect
that the Riot Act is only to be read when a public
meeting, regularlyand lawfullyconstituted,becomes
dangerous to the public peace ? What says the
Riot Act itself ? The preamble speaks of re-
bellious riots and tumults, in divers parts of
the kingdom, to the disturbance of the public
peace ; and then the enacting clause goes on to
say, " That if any persons, to the number of
twelve or more, being unlawfully, riotously,
and tumultuously assembled together, to the
disturbance of the public peace, and being re-
quired by any one or more justice or justices of
the peace, or by the sheriff of the county, or his
under-sheriff, or by
,the mayor, bailiff or bailiffs,
or other head officer, or justice of the peace, of
any city or town corporate, where such assem--
bly shall be, by proclamation to be made in the
King's name, in the form hereinafter directed,
to disperse themselves, and peaceably to depart
to their habitations or to their lawful business,
shall, to the number of twelve or more (not-
withstanding such proclamation -made), unlaw-
fully, riotously, and tumultuously remain, or
continue together by the space of one hour,
after such command or request made by pro-
clamation, that then such continuing together
to the number of twelve or more, after such
command or request made by proclamation,
shall be adjudged felony without benefit of
clergy, and the offenders therein shall be ad-
judged felons, and shall suffer death as in case of
felony." From the above clause it is clear that
the meeting to which the Act applies shall be
not only an unlawful assembly, but must be
actually riotous, and engaged in the disturbance
of the public peace, in order to make the read-
ing of the proclamation, and non-obedience to it,
involve the contumacious offenders in the pains
of felony. We said the other day that if the
meeting in Calthorpe-street were illegal, the per-
sons constituting it might be arrested, on re-
fusing to disperse, without the previous ceremony
of reading the Riot Act, though they could not
beus
to
subtjteleciceodntsoidetlLetion of w
pains
o}
italot sot ofnyt "Phis iismbeeritnu,ggs
that was. if it were a meeting convened, as has
been said—for we saw no placard to that effect
to adopt measures for holding a National Con-
vention, as " the only means of obtaining and

securing the rights of the people," we have no
hesitation in saying that it was illegal ; but it
was also a very nonsensical affair ; and its
very absurdity might have placed it beneath
the dignity of any other visitation than that
of contempt. Indeed it looks very like a thing con-
cocted by some such inventive genius as a Castles
or an Oliver. Government, however, thought
proper to make its obscure announcement known
to the public by its proclamation—a proclama-
tion as irregular, and, we must add, as illite-
rate as the meeting against which it was directed
was illegal and contemptible. Now the ques-
tion comes, was the meeting properly or impro-
perly dispersed ; and, under all the eircum.•
stances, what was the crime which the indivi-
dual committed, who gave the policeman (Cully)
a mortal wound ? An unlawful assembly may be
dispersed in an illegal manner. If more force
is used than is necessary for the preservation of
the public peace, the extra force is in itself
criminal. For instance, if a person who is
attending an unlawful assembly is shot, or
knocked down, instead of being arrested, al-
though he makes no attempt to resist arrest,
the shooting is murder, and the knocking down
is an assault ; and in the latter case, if the blow
is returned, even with a mortal weapon, in the
heat of blood, the act of homicide cannot be of a
higher degree of guilt than manslaughter. We
shall now inquire in what case the killing of the
aggressor would be justifiable homicide. A respect-
able Tory contemporary (the Standard) says, and
says correctly, that " the law of England recog-
nises but two classes ofjustifiable homicides—first,
such as the law commands, as in the execution
of criminals ; second, such as the law permits,
either for the advancement of public justice, or
the prevention of any forcible or atrocious crime
of the degree, at least, of felony”—as robbery
on the highway, or feloniously breaking a dwel-
ling-house in the night time ; also, killing one
who attempts the crimes of rape or murder, is
justifiable homicide ; but killing one who puts
the life of the assaulted person in danger in a
sudden quarrel or affray is not justifiable, though
it may be excusable homicide in self defence
which is in a slight degree criminal, though not
felonious—but it requires bail, and incurs a for-
feiture of goods. As to excusable homicide,
se defendendo, the evening paper to which we
have alluded quotes the law as laid down by
Blackstone, and says he who would avail him-
self of the benefit of the plea of self defence,
must have been in danger of his own life ; he
must, in fact, " have retreated as far as he could,
either by reason of' some wall, ditch, or other
impediment," of which no pretence is made in
the present case. Our contemporary, however,
omits a material part of Blackstone's definition ;
for when he says the party must flee as far as he
conveniently can, either by reason of some wall,
ditch, or other impediment, he adds, " or as far
as the fierceness of the assault will permit him ;
for it may be so fierce as not to allow him to
yield a step, without manifest danger of his life,
or enormous bodily harm, and then, in his de-
fence he may kill his assailant instantly—i. e.,
without retreating at all. As to the modes of
homicide by chance medley and by misad-
venture, we need not touch upon them here, as
they do not seem to come in question ; but we
will proceed at once to that species of homicide
called manslaughter, and see in what it consists.
Manslaughter.—Hawkins says that manslaughter
is understood to be such a killing of a human
being as happens either in a sudden quarrel, or
in the commission of an unlawful act, without
any deliberate intention of doing any mischief at
all. Coke, in his third Institute, says, there is
no difference between murder and manslaughter
but that murder is upon malice afore thought,
and manslaughter upon a sudden occasion.
Thus, if' upon a sudden quarrel two per-
sons fight, and one of them kills the other,
it is manslaughter. So it is if a man be
assaulted and provoked by a blow, or
even by the indignity of pulling his nose,
and he kills the aggressor immediately and
before Iris blood has time to cool, the offence is
not murder, but manslaughter. Now the girl
who stated that she saw the policeman struck
admitted that she saw the man who gave the
mortal blow assaulted and struck in the first in-
stance by the policeman. If her evidence be
good against the slayer, it is equallygood against
the deceased. We express no opinion of our
own on the subject, we only state the law, to
enable others to draw their own conclusions as
to whether the death of Cully, under all the
circumstances, is to be regarded as murder, man-
slaughter, justifiable homicide, or homicide ex-
cusable se dy'endendo. We are the more scru-
pulous in expressing any opinion, because the
finding of the Coroner's Jury is not a final
proceeding. If the individual who gave the
blow should be taken into custody, a bill of
indictment for murder or manslaughter would
probably be sent up to a Grand Jury ; and, as
we have no wish that this or any other accused
person should be debarred of a fair trial, we de-
, sire not to prejudge the case. In allusion to
the meeting itself, independently of the act
of homicide, we cannot but express our
surprise that the Standard should have
described it as levying war upon 'the King,
and of course high treason. If politi-
cal bias had not greatly obscured our
contemporary's usually acute perceptions, he
would surely not have confounded such a
trumpery proceeding with high treason. To
constitute the crime of " levying war upon the
King " there must not only be the treasonable
design, but there must be an actual movement
towards effecting it by force, which constitutes
the overt act. Thus an insurrection to dethrone
the King, or to pull down all enclosures, is high
treason ; but an unlawful assembly, listening to
the insane spouting of a crack-brained dema-
gogue, about the " native nobility of the pro-
ductive classes, is not an insurrection, although
one or two persons may have gone to it armed
with mortal weapons, while the crowd in general,
are unarmed and defenceless, ready to be scat-
tered like sheep by the truncheons of a few hun-
dred policemen. Laws that would dignify such
adisgrace to Turkey.
tahreneeKtiitnigg witl:votluieldnabmee of " levying war upon
Neither justice nor common sense could have
any part or share in laws equally vindictive arid
ridiculous.— Morning Herald.
On Monday, May 7, A. D. 1832, a certain
meeting was held at Birmingham, for the dis-
cussion of certain matters in which the well-being
deeplyou
sil
yn t e
attendedr e st e (li hisTvi;as
of the nationverwyasntimer
meeting was
unanimous in Its decisions; was addressed by
with a
dispersedocipeucloarrtmot.rato(zmaonididay
many
lablpe May 20, A. n,
1833, a certain other meeting was held at Bir-
mingham, for the discussion of' certain other
matters in which the well. being of the nation
was no less deeply interested. This other
meeting was not less numerously attended ; was
not less unanimous in its decisions ; was ad-
-1 dressed by not less popular orators ; and dispersed

with a not less laudable decorum. But the first
of these meetings was called for the purpose of
supporting the " patriotic Ministers ; ' and the
second was called for the purpose of praying
their immediate dismissal from office. And
hence it happened that numbers, and unanimity,
and eloquence, and decorum, were shamefully
contemned in 1833 by the chroniclers who had
most devoutly worshipped them in 1832. Will
it be easily credited that these two pictures were
limned by the same fine hand ?