The Sun.
London, England, 1870-03-28 00:00:00

LONDON, MONDAY, MARCH 28, 1870.

The acquittal of Prince PIERRE is precisely what
might only in reason have been anticipated. He
was charged with the murder of VICTOR SALMON,
otherwise NOIR. That he shot this man NOIR, he
does not himself in the least deny. His assertion
simply is, in reg,ird to the act of homicide, that he
Committed it under intense provocation. The facts
are undeniable that the two persons aimed at by
Prince PIERRE—one fatally, the other twice
ineffectually—went uninvited to • the private
dwelling-house of the Prince, one of them at the
least (the survivor, as it happens) armed to
the teeth, carrying about him, in fact, a sword and
a loaded six-shooter revolver. This was DE FON-
VIELLE, the individual, whose flagrantly disgraceful
conduct in Court, throughout the whole of this ex-
traordinary trial at Tours, has really, as much almost
as anything else, led to the complete acquittal of
the prisoner. The scenes witnessed in Court
day after day have been in point of fact
a disgrace to modern civilisation. It is with a sense
of relief that we know now the whole spec-
tacle has been played out. In the result arrived
at we can see no miscarriage of justice. That there
was provocation it would be simply an abSurdity to
deny. The arms carried into Prince PIERRE'S private
dwelling-house by his visitors are proof positive on
that point. Had they gone there unarmed there can
be no manner of question but that then in
that case the verdict of the jury must
have been altogether different. Then, th J
mere circumstance of any amount of insult or
provocation on the part of two unarmed men
could never, would never have been regarded as in
any way justifying the shooting at either or at both of
them by the insulted and assailed. The act of homi-
cide, the killing of VICTOR NOIR, would have been
considered, could only have been considered an
act of murder, a a
.of deliberate assfissination.
The arms carried by Al. DE FONVIELLE—anns
intended no doubt to be employed on emergency as
offensive weapons against Prince PlERRE—have
proved, in point of fact, triumphantly defensive
weapons for him and his reputation. They
have warded off from him the otherwise inevitable
verdict of murder or of a homicide in no way justi-
fiable. The whole incident is calamitous. But-, we
still cannot but think that the decision come to by
the Court of Justice at Tours is the only one at
which the jury there empannelled could, in the exer-
cise of their common sense, have arrived.

TEE M.P.'s who plodded their way to the 'House or
Commons on Saturday through the vile slush and
mud of a London snow-storm, must have felt as dis-
pirited within as they wore comfortless without.
Four years ago they assembled on a Saturday morn-
ing to pass through all its stages a bill to suspend
the Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland. On Saturday
they found themselves again assembled at an
abnormal time in order to pass an abnormal bill. In
1800 Mr. Bright made one of his grandest speeches.
He opposed the Suspension Act, declaring that these
repeated violations of the Constitution were a scandal
to succesive Ministries, and that Ireland would con-
tinue to be a disgrace to us until we devoted a Ses-
sion to measures for ameliorating the political condi-
tion of that country. On Saturday Mr. Bright
was unhappily absent; yet, if he had been present,
he would have been compelled to side this time not
with the little minority, but with the large majority.
For his remedy has been tried, and it has failed. We
have, given religious equality, we are protecting
tenants against the tyranny of their landlords, anp
yet there is neither peace nor order in Ireland. And sc.
We find '. ourselves forced to resort to the old
style of legislation disguised under a new
name, and to forbid the carrying of arms, to suspend
trial•by jury, and to authorise the suppression of
newspapers. All this is terribly unsatisfactory and
wearily sad. But at least we are acting with a clear
conscience. There are hot-headed political par-
tizans who rejoice over the discomfiture of the
Government, the failure of the Ministerial policy, an,."4
argue that because it has failed it ought never to
have been tried. This is not the argument of states-
men: They will say that they were bound to do
their duty, and that having done this they are now
enabled to appeal to all right-thinking men to support
them in taking a course which is as necessary as it is
lamentable.
It was under these circumstances that the Peace
Preservation (Ireland) Bill passed the House of Com-
mons on Saturday. At the same time we are not
surprised that certain provisions of it have met with
serious opposition in committee. The proposal to
give Government the power to suppress newspapers
without trial by jury is a very serious one. It is
altogether novel, and it might become excessively
dangerous in the hands of a despotic Ministry. And
-though no one can suspect the present Govern-
ment of being unduly severe, though its
enemies accuse it of being slack and over
lenient, still we must remember that the
Gladstone Ministry: is not eternal, and that it may
be succeeded by an Administration far more rigorous
in its conduct. But, after all, the question comes to
this—are peace and order to be main-
tained in Ireland ? Are life and property
to be secured against violence ? If so it is im-
pbssibls that the present "nationalist " journals can
be allowed to continue. They spread the poison of
sedition throughout the whole country, and they
incite to the worst of crimes. They carefully abstain
from counselling a civil war, for if they did counsel
it they would render themselves liable to a prosecu-
tion for treason. But they tell the people to be pre-
pared for certain contingencies and conditions, which
are desgribedi and which tsar au unmistakeable aua-

logy to the present state of things. Yet while they do
this it is useless to prosecute these journals; conviction
could not be sustained technically, and even if it
could, the journals prosecuted would continue to
publish their perilous stuff, would put forth fresh
claims to popular support on the ground of martyr-
dom, and would prosper by the very means taken to
check them. What Government requires is not the
power to punish seditious journalists, but the power
to suppress the 'publication of seditious journals. Pro-
visions for seizing printing presses, confiscating
newspapers and giving warnings, have an unpleasantly
French sound ; but there is no help for it, and we
may be quite sur3 that the present Government, at all
eveat3, is not likaly to exercise its power with undue
harshness. We must trust to the influence of public
opinion for restraining within duo bounds any
Ministry which may succeed the present. There is
the less cause for apprehension because the Act. is
for a limited period, and if its renewal should be
required a year hence, Ministers will be compelled to
obtain the permission of Parliament.

IT cannot be said that the majesty of the law
has added anything to itself by the bribery prose-
cution at Taunton. It is right that efforts should
be made to enforce the decisions of the
Legislature, but it is none the less deplorable that in
this instance such efforts have served only to chew
that the latest Parliamentary edicts against bribery
are quite useless. Of the two men who were
charged .with worlcing in the cause of cor-
ruption, the one has been taken and the other left; but
no one desired that an Act should be passed, and an
elaborate machinery set in operation with no better
result than the conviction of a mere agent, such as
Mr. Fennelly, whilst the principal accused escapes
altogether. The end may be in accordance with the
law, but the law that cannot secure us a more satis-
factory issue than this is a mere farce, and the time of
Parliament might advantageously have been devoted
to some more profitable labour. We might just as
well have been content with the old committee of
the House of Commons system. The committees
invariably let off principals as injured persons whose
characters had been unduly blackened by agents who
had bribed in their behalf, and with equal uniformity
these committees condemned the agents as
monsters of electoral iniquity. The new-fangled
machinery, however, has accomplished nothing
more. Mr. Vanderbyl is, beyond doubt, in
no degree more blameable than many other
gentlemen who have displayed equal anxiety
to get into Parliament; but the plain facts are that
he was unseated by one of the judges, and specially
reported against by the Commissioners, who held
such an astonishingly lively inquiry. Yet ho has
escaped; and upon the same terms it is probable that
most, if not all, other incriminated members will be
equally fortunate. The circumstances of the Bridg-
water contest were such that we can hardly expect
worse elsewhere. Few candidates aro likely to do
more than Mr. Vanderbyl did, and very many have
managed to win seats in good style, give ample
" satisfaction" to their constituents, and yet do, a
great deal less.

It was quite clearly established that Mr. Vander-
byl opened his campaign with the determination to
conduct proceedings without corruption. This reso-
lution was formally announced to a meeting of those
great worthies whose records are enshrined in
the report of the Commissioners. But his
conduct afterwards is much less reassuring. The
said worthies strongly objected. Great resistance
was shewn to the iniquitous decree in favour of
purity. Though Mr. Vanderbyl was the sitting
member, and possession is nine points of the law, he
soon - found that old associations were as nothing
compared with the endearment of pelf. Serious
flaws were discovered: in his- conduct as representa-
tive of the .b6rough, and criticisms Were pas:,,cd,
which were never dreaMed of so long as
Mr. Vauderbyl was prepared to spend. .They
vanished, likewise, as soon as it was known
that he was ready to conform to the goal old rule,
and pay the electors of Bridgwater for their services.
Mr. Fennelly told the local worthies that money
should be
,spent. The old game commenced with
more than pristine vigour. The old agencies were
set in motion ; the old slang vocabulary called into
play. Mr. Fennelly was looked to as the cashier
of the candidate, and inferior agents distributed the
Money. In all these transactions Mr. Vauderbyl
keep aloof from direct complicity, and the result is
.that his partner is convicted, whilst the evidence is
found insufficient to trace bribery hothe to the actual
candidate. In almost any other branch of crime
the evidence that a person, who derived no advan-
tage from a certain act, had committed that act
on behalf of some person who did profit
thereby would be held to involve the
latter. In Parliamentary proceedings they
manage these things better. Hundreds of
pounds, spent on Mr. Vanderbyrs behalf by his
partner, cannot be traced to him. All that
can be said is that no other candidate need,
unless he be very foolish, commit himself
to any greater extent than the ex-member for
Bridgwater. The result is such a miserable failure
that it would be more honest to dismiss Mr. Fennelly
without punishment, and give the business up as
hopeless under present conditions.

TIIE COURT.— Preparations are being made at
Windsor Castle for tho reception of her Majesty an 1 Royal
Family on Wednesday next.
SERIOUS ILLNESS OF GENERAL GRET.—Gen. Grey
was, we regret to stato, seized on Saturday with epileptic fits
of a very severe character. The latest intelligence which
the Queen has received from Sir William Jenner is that the
General is in a critical state, but that there is a slight im-
provement. •
A serious fire occurred yesterday morning in the
premises of Mr. Murray, a fish salesman, in Grafton-street,
Soho. It was with the utmost difficulty that six of ihs
lodgers were rescued- from the burning house alive.
The drapery establishment of Messrs. Reid and
Sons, Clonmel, were destroyed by fire on Saturday morning.
Twenty assistants were sleeping in the house at the time,
but, fortunately, all escaped. The origin of the fire is
unknown, and the loss is estimated at £B,OOO.
Mr. Taylor will move the rejection of Lord Chehr. s-
ford's Sunday Trading Bill on the second reading iu the
House of Commons to-morrow.

The execution of William Mobbs, for the murder
of a boy named Newbury, at Linford, took place this morn-
ing within the walls of the borough prison.
Woolwich Arsenal is closed this week for stock-
taking.

A Special Court of the Common Council will be
held on. Thursday next, when the first motion to be brought
forward is that of Mr. Rudkin relative to the desirability of
constructing on the vacant land in Smithfield a new market
for poultry.

terrible conflagration occurred on Thursday last
at Comptaaßombay, 200 houses and 6,000 docras of cotton,
equal to 2,500 bales were burnt, leavinr, a stock of only
4,000 docras. The loss is estimated at 25 laks of rupees
(t 250,000.)

The Army and Navy Gazette understands that Mr.
Seely has given Mr. Childers notice that he intends re-
viving again during the session the question as to the
wisdom of continuing naval officers as superintendents of
her Majesty's dockyards.
The Elgin Courant understands that a marriage is
arranged between the Earl of Wicklow and Lady Geor-
gians Hamilton, daughter of the Duke and Duchess of
Abercorn. The Abercorn family does not seem to fear
the result of the trial much.

A return, called for by Mr. Charles Forster, has
been issued containing an account of the property of
felons forfeited to the Crown in each county,' city, and
town in England, and Wales since 1864. It also specifies how
much of such property was restored by the Crown.

The Queen has had a telegraphic wire connected
with Windsor Castle, and a few days since her Majesty
sent a message to Prince Arthur and went for a walk on
the slopes. There was an ans-sver on the Queen's return.
Of coursgAl zire§.§4.ge§ aiYgPiaskt&th.4 4yal cipher,

The very extensive Distillery now being erected
at Belfast, with all recent improvements for the manufacture of
Irish vrhisky, by Mess's. DUNVILLE & Co., who have gained
a world-Wide celebrity for their Lino old Irish whisky, is to be
called The Royal Irish istillery:: • •