The Sun.
London, England, 1846-10-01 00:00:00

even as the snow-ball melts before the noon-tide
beams.

Had Alderman WOOD been a 'wealthy man, we dare
illy he would have been in the civic chair years ago.
But it is considered unlikely that he will trench upon
his private resources, derived from his professional
exertions, in order to spend more in the Mansion-
house than the very liberal sum allowed by the City.
Already, during the eleven years he has discharged
the high and responsible duties of magistrate, he has
given to the public a great portion of his time, besides
affording his colleagues on the bench the advantage
of his excellent judgment and his matured experience.
If none but millionaires are to enjoy the highest civic
honours, there will be an end, at once and for ever, to I
the honourable ambition of the men best qualified to
serve the public.

Is it to punish Alderman WOOD'S want of wealth
that, on the present occasion, a poll was demanded in
Guildhall? This involves an expensive and trouble-
some contest, which must continue for eight days.
The appeal to the Livery, however, is being honour-
ably responded to. There is every chance that the
majority obtained by Alderman WOOD will continue
and increase, so as to show, once more, unequivocally,
that the popular feeling is in his favour.
It is understood, that if the election terminate in
the return of Alderman Woos, the Court of Alder-
men, respecting the wishes of the Livery, will also
select the worthy Alderman to fill the high office of
Lord Mayor of London during the ensuing year.

It is the privilege of the State at any time to re-
qnire any of its subjects to come forward, and fully
and explicitly to declare, under the obligation of an
oath, all they may know respecting any matter that
may be submitted to investigation, in which the State
itself, or any of its citizens are interested. Every
private individual has a similar right to demand the
benefit of the testimony of his fellow-subjects, no
matter what inconvenience that other may be sub-
jected to by the loss of time he may sustain in attend-
ing on, and waiting for, his examination before the
competent tribunal. In return therefor it is the first
duty of the nation to afford full protection to the
persons thus called upon to see that he shall sustain
no unnecessary damage or injury for the evidence lie
has thus given, if he has answered truly the several
questions demanded of him ; and if he has:not done
so, there is a specific punishment decreed by the law
of the land for any wilful violation of truth. It is
perfectly manifest that any other description of
punishment than that thus recognized and sanctioned
by the authorities is in the highest degree objection-
able and unconstitutional, and more especially so
when the witness has not been brought to any public
trial, or been convicted by the judgment of his peers,
or of any other body within the jurisdiction of which
he may, by reason of his peculiar position in society,
be placed. Great expenses have from time to time been
incurred in affording that protection to crown wit-
nesses, when, in consequence of any disturbance in
the country, they may be supposed liable to any
peculiar danger on account of the testimony they have
given. In Ireland particularly we find that the ex-
penses of the emigration of such witnesses, or of
their removal to other localities, and the placing them
in at least as good a position as that they had pre-
viously occupied, has constantly been defrayed by the
country. If such steps are taken (and most properly)
to defend the witnesses from illegal violence, it is
doubly incumbent on the Executive to guard in the
most effectual manner against any advantage of
authority, derived from itself, being made use of to
crush, injure, or deteriorate the condition, or make
more uncomfortable the position, of any person of
inferior rank in its service on account of the evidence
he has given, to prevent the superior from ex-
ercising his power in a harsh, oppressive, or tyrannical
manner.

On Monday our columns contained a statement of
a district court-martial having been ordered upon
private THOMAS MATTNEWSON, of the 7th Hussars,
for alleged insubordination to Sergeant-Major ROBERT
O'DONNELL, his superior officer, while on duty at
Hampton Court on Sunday, the 20th September.
This court-martial was held on Tuesday, the 29th
ult., and, although its result is not as yet publicly
known, the finding and sentence (in case of convic-
tion) having to be submitted to the Commander-in-
Chief for his approval and confirmation before it is
promulgated, sufficient appears on the evidence offered
in support of the charge to make it manifest that the
unfortunate young man has been subjected to petty
persecutions and annoyances sufficient to worry and
tease an ardent, perhaps an impatient, spirit into the
commission of an offence that would bring him within
the letter of the law, and subject him to severe punish-
ment. Even before the termination of the inquest sitting
on the body of poor WHITE, the victim of military
severity, of the atrocious and abominable system of
corporal punishment, complaints were made of wit-
nesses who had been examined during the course of
the investigation having been reprimanded for the
evidence they had conscientiously given. One of the
persons so treated was COOK, a private in the regi-
ment, who deposed on oath before the Coroner--
" That while on parade, the Colonel (Whyte) had
ordered him to stop, and called him before the ranks;
that in the presence of his comrades he told him that
what he had stated in his evidence was not the fact, in
which he was immediately corroborated by his obsequious
Adjutant, and that on his (Cook) stating the grounds on
which he had made the statement, viz , that the Ist
Dragoon Guards flogged by trumpeters, and that he had
heard that other regiments did the same, the Colonel
said that such was not the case, and that he (Cook) had
been as near committing perjury as damage, and,
afterwards,, that he could plainly see that Cook had
endeavoured to throw misconception over the whole
affair."

Such a course at that time, pending the inquiry, and
in the presence of other persons, who might possibly
still be examined, we consider, a most improper and
unjustifiable proceeding, calculated to impede the
administration of justice, and to prevent the men from
freely discharging the duty they might be called on to
perform, from giving their unbi,,ssed and disinterested
evidence. The unfortunate man MATIBEWSON was also
honoured by an interview with his commanding
officer. It appeared that he was privately called into
the august presence, and spoken to respecting his
evidence. What took place on that occasion we shall
not refer to, as a distinct and unequivocal contradic-
tion took place between Colonel WHYTB and MAT-
THERSOF as to what had occurred ; we shall merely
say that MATTKEWSON'S statement was made under
the sanction of an oath, while the Colonel's was a mere

simple, uncorroborated assertion. We shall not, how-
ever, not do we intent; to impeach his veracity. It is

Nothing is easier than to
" Accumulate the slander, heap the lie,
And raise the pyramid of calumny "
against a public man ; nothing more difficult than
1 fur even the most virtuous character to vindicate
himself against such attacks. One by one, however,
the imputations against Alderman WOOD have " va-
nished into thin air." Some have been abandoned as
utterly untenable, from their evident improbability--
,ome have been dismissed, on proof of their untruth--
and the decision of the supreme court of law in
Ireland, pronounced by Chief Justice PENNEFATHER,
has recently placed all the rest hors de combat.
The charges against Alderman Woon have sub-
4ided into a residuum nearly as fine as the thin muslin
which the Parisian modestes poetically called "woven
air." All that is now said against him amounts to
this (and to no more), that some years ago
he was connected with a joint-stock company for
procuring coals in Wales, and that :by that connexion
he lost money—an indication that he was "rather
sinned against than sinning." Had he gained money
it is doubtful if any complaint would have been made.
Two years ago (long before the additional proof had '
been supplied by the important judicial decision in
Ireland, to which we have referred,) it was agreed,
11 on the motion of Mr. ANDERTON, then Under-
Sheriff, that the charges against the alderman in
connexion with the company in question were
"groundless and unfounded," and that they had been
" most fully and satisfactorily refuted." At that
time Mr. ANDERTON said, in his usual fearless
manner, that "there was not a single advertisement
for a bubble company in which they would not find
an alderman's name." Since then how many aldermen
have been connected with railway and other public
bubbles," and to what extent ? Yet, Alderman WOOD
is condemned, maligned, and persecuted, because he
had connexion with a single public company, and
that one not of the " bubble species," for we believe it
is a paying concern in the hands of the present
owners. This is the mote and the beam with a
vengeance!,