The Sun.
London, England, 1846-01-16 00:00:00

THE INNER TEMPLE.

(The Barristers of the Inner Temple, whose names are
subscribed to this Memorial, beg leave to submit it for
consideration to the other Barristers of the Society.)
TO TILE BENCHERS OF THE HONOURABLE SOCIETY OF THE

INNER TEMPLE.

The undersigned Barristers of the Inner Temple take
the liberty of requesting the attention of the Bench to the
subject of the present mode of election to the office of
bencher, which has been recently brought under the notice
of the public.
They assume the mode of election to be, as generally sup-
posed, by ballot, and that one black ball excludes.
This mode of election has been occasionally adopted by the
members of clubs formed exclusively for social purposes ; but
it is submitted that there is no analogy between associations
of this kind and the Bench of an Inn of Court. The social
intercourse which takes place between the benchers is
only an incident to their position. They.are constituted for
very different purposes. They enjoy peculiar rights and
advantages, and exercise functions of great importance to
their profession and the State. They are the trustees of
large funds, as well as the arbiters of the discipline and pro-
fessional honour of the bar; and they are invested with the
power of allowing or rejecting claims for admission to the
bar, and of disbarring any member of it who, in their judg-
ment, has been guilty of misconduct. It is believed that no
other instance can be found of a body with similar powers
and duties, to which the admission is not either of right, or
by some mode of open election.
The undersigned beg leave to notice one other broad dis-
tinction between the case of admission to the Bench, and that
of admission to private clubs and societies. In the latter, the
candidate is under no compulsion to incur the chance of re-
jection k he encounters the ordeal of the ballot by his own
free choice. Candidates for the Bench are very differently
circumstanced. The greater number are such as claim the
honour on being appointed Queen's Counsel. These cannot
decline claiming it without incurring a self-inflicted degrada-
tion
in the eyes of the profession ; yet they cannot claim it in the
Inner Temple without running the risk of injurious exclusion
by the secret act of a single bencher. It is respectfully sub-
mitted that this is RO ordinary grievance for men to whom an
honourable estimation is of the highest consequence, to be
exposed to so painful an alternative.
That the rule under consideration had never, so far as the
undersigned are aware, been acted upon at all until a very
recent time, is a strong proof of the moderation and honour-
able principle which have governed the conduct of the Bench
—a strong proof, confirmed by the experience of the other
Inns of Court (where the rule does not exist), that it is un-
necessary—but assuredly no argument in favour of it; for it
is impossible not to foresee that when once such a rule, after
long lying dormant, is practically revived, its application will
probably be repeated, and certainly feared.
The undersigned are sincerely anxious that they may not
be considered as actuated by anyspirit of undue interference.
Such a representation as the present cannot, in their
opinion, be considered improper in a matter in which any
member of this Inn may at some future day have a direct
personal interest. Nor do they question. the power claimed
by the benchers, great as it is, erecting them, in a certain
sense, into a court of appeal from the Lord Chancellor's
appointments. The object of the present application is
merely to press the expediency and justice of establishing a
better method of exercising that power • and, with this view
the undersigned pray the Benchers to take into consideration
the speedy adoption of such a mode of election as they shall,
in their wisdom, think best adapted to maintain at once their
own independence and protect candidates from being ex-
cluded on insufficient grounds.

W. -ATHERTON J. DEEMS
E. L. BAEELEY E. H. FITZHERBERT
F. CALVERT K. MAcAurAy
J. M. CARROW H. A. MEREWETHER
A. CLEASBY H. MERIVALE
H. DAVISON W. F. POLLOCK.
Inner Temple, January, 1846.

MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF A FEMALE AGED EIGHTY
YEARS.—Yesterday Mr. Baker resumed and concluded an
inquiry at the Black' Horse, Kingsland-road, on the body of
Hannah Seeley, aged eighty )Tars. The deceased occupied
an apartment in the house- No. 7, Luke-street, Curtain-road,
Shoreditch, the landlady of which was a person named
Mary Warwick, who had a son about twenty years of age;
both the latter have gone out of the way, the son being a
sailor, having gone to sea, and the mother not at present to
be found. The deceased had lately frequently complained
to her neighbours that she was knocked about and ill-used
both by Mrs. Warwick and her son ; the former, it was
proved, was in the habit of doing so whenever she got in-
toxicated, which she frequently did. The neighbours ad-
vised her (deceased) to sell what furniture she possessed and
to go into the Shoreditch Union, where she might end her
days in peace. This the deceased according did. On being
admitted she complained that her arm had been broken by
a poker, which blow had been struck by her landlady or her
son three weeks previous. Mr. James Clark, of No. 3, York-
place, Kingsland- road, parish surgeon, said he found a frac-
ture of one of the bones of the right arm, which she said had
been done three weeks previously by a blow. Witness at-
tended her up to the time of her death, which occurred on
Friday last. He had since, by the coroner'sorder, made a
post mortem examination, and found the brain, chest, and
viscera very healthy for a person of her advanced age, and
as such likely to live some years. The fracture of the arm,
and the beatings she had stated to have received, at her
period of life and emaciated condition, causing irritability of
the system, had, in his opinion, caused death. The jury re-
turned an open verdict founded on the medical testimony.
MR. FORTNUM'S WILL.—We are requested to in-
sert the following, in correction of some of the details of the
will of the late Mr. Fortnum, which appeared in our paper
of yesterday :—The will of the late Mr. Richard Fortnum,
of the firm of Fortnum, Mason, and Co., 182 and 183, Pic-
cadilly, was proved in Doctors' Commons on the Bth inst.,
by his executors, Frederick Keats, his nephew and partner,
and Mr. William Urwick, wine merchant, Great Tower-
street. The personal estate was sworn under 100,0001. He
leaves his entire interest in the business to his four surviving
partners, and secures to them the premises, &c., for a long
term. He leaves to his sister, Miss Fortnum, 10,0001. ; to
his niece, Miss Keats, 20,000/. ; to his niece, Miss Mary
Fortnum, 30,0001.; to Mrs. Keats, 5,0001., should she survive
her husband ; to Mr. Scorer, 2,000/. ; to Mr. Oakley, 1,500/. ;
to Mr. and Mrs. Selt, 5,000/. ; to his executor, Mr. Urwick,
5001. •, to his solicitor, J. D. Finne, 500/. ; liberal sums to the
establishment, and many other legacies; and the residue,
real and personal, to his nephew, Frederick Keats. The
will was dated October, and he died December s.—Post.
NEW BIBLIOTHEQUE ROYAL, PARIS.—The present
buildings are long and straggling, covering an im-
mense surface of ground, and manifesting a great desire
to tumble into ruins—a disaster from which they are
only saved by heavy annual outlays. Exist much longer
they cannot, even with all the expense they occasion,
and so down they must come. The Government pro-
poses to erect the new library in a different quarter
of the town altogether, so as to be able to sell the
parcels of land in which the present edifice stands.
'Those parcels are in one of the busiest, richest, and
most populous quarters of the town, and their sale would
realise an immense sum, almost enough to pay for the
new bnilding. But interested parties object to a change
of the present site, on the ground that in any other
quarter of the town it would be inconvenient to that
small portion of the public which frequents the library.
It is not likely, however, that their convenience will be
permitted to outweigh the general interest which un-
doubtedly requires the removal of the present odious
Bibliotheque Royale, and the sale of the site on which it
stands.—Paris Correspondent of the Builder.
THE POWER•LOOM WEAVERS' DELEGATE MEET-
ING AT MANCH6STER.-011 Sunday a numerous meeting of
delegates, from Ashton-under Lyne, Oldham, Stockport,
Heywood, Rochdale, lioyton, Bury, and other manufactur-
ing towns, was held in the Bradford-street School-room,
Manchester, for the purpose of devising the best means of
forming a union ofthe power-loom weavers generally through-
out the kingdom. An operative, named John Greenwood,
was called to the chair. He opened the business by stating,
that it was the determination of the power-loom weavers, in
every part of the manufacturing districts, to adopt such mea-
sures as would henceforth prevent their masters from reduc-
ing their wages in times of depression, as they had hitherto
done •, and, therefore, it now rested with those present, as
they had been sent there as the representatives of the
weavers generally, to consider what steps should be taken in
suppprt of that branch of factory labour. Considerable dis-
cussion followed as to the propriety of the formation of a
general union of the whole body, when it was afterwards re-
solved that a central committee, consisting of one delegate
from each manufacturing town, should be formed, and com-
mence its sittings at Oldham ; that a code of rules or laws
should be drawn up for the government of a union of the
power-loom weavers throughout England, Ireland, and Scot-
land, and that immediate steps should be taken in the forma-
tion of the union. In order to effect this, it was agreed that
local committees of the weavers in each town should be
forthwith formed, and that they be requested to forward their
views to the central committee, who hold their next meeting
on the first Sunday in February. Mr. Richard Cooper, a
schoolmaster, of. Oldham, having been appointed general
secretary, the meeting, after a vote of thanks to the chair-
man, separated.
ISLINGTON LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY.—
On Tuesday evening Charles Woodward, Esq., F.R.S., deli-
vered a lecture on " Optics and Optical Instruments," to 800
juvenile wenaber4 cf th 9 Camillo 9f aubicribera.

LAW INTELLIGENCE.
ROLLS' COURT, Jan. 15.
His HoNoun was occupied during the greater portion of
the day in hearing the remaining petitions.