The Sun.
London, England, 1833-11-27 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBL[C JOURNAL

There is a letter in this day's Times, which
details the sufferings of the unhappy Polish
patriots lately resident in Germany, under the
protection of the local Governments of that
country, but who have been rooted out of their
charitable asylums there, through the jealous
and indefatigable malignity of the Russian Ca-
binet. That refugees from political persecution
should be entitled to a resting place in any fo-
reign state, so long as they conduct themselves
like peaceful citizens of that state, and refrain
from proceedings against neighbouring powers,
by which its neutral character might he endan-
gered, is a rule and custom of all civi!ized nations
on earth. To withhold such hospitality from
miserable fugitives driven from their native home
by force of arms, and destitute of all resoAree
and assistance, has been esteemed at every period
of modern history a breach of the most sacred
obligations. So, an attempt on the part of a
victorious power to deprive its defeated enemies,
even though they be revolted subjects, of the bene-
fits enjoyed by them under the above humane
practice, has ever been regarded as a vindictive
and odious intermeddling against the rights of
the unfortunate, a submission to which by the
protecting Government must entail upon the lat-
ter the reproach of base and pusillanimous sub-
serviency. There seems to be a tacit under-
standing among the most despotic Powers, that
exiles for political causes shall remain undis-
turbed, so long as they forbear, by overt acts or
unlawful preparations, to molest the tranquillity
of the Governments which have subdued and
expelled them ; and this is but common sense as
well as justice. Political contests not implying
that either of the belligerents are °Enders
against any but a single state, there exists no
cause why they should in their defeats be treated
as criminals on any soil but that which has been
the theatre of their struggle. There is no in-
hospitality so revolting as that which denies spel-
ta. to the political outcast, whose means of
auhsistence are for the most part under con-
fiscation at home ; nor can any tyranny be
nett re barbarous than that which strikes him
tht ou4h the sides of his temporary protector. It
appears that the Emperor of Russia, not satis-
fied with so torturing and degrading the wretched
Poles as to render their own country intolerable
to them, has hunted them into the retreats to
which his cruelty had forced them, and actually
not rested until -he prevailed on the Courts of
Germany to banish these poor men from their
dominions. The particulars are given in the
article to which we have alluded, under the head
of Poland." On what grounds, and to what
extent, the two free Governments of Europe
tray feel justified in interposing on behalf of
that scourged and trampled nation, is a point on
which we have not now materials for conjec-
turing ; but, as a general principle, it may be
fairly said that whatever act of Russia or her
subsidiary despots goes to debilitate Poland and
to degrade her below the station which it was
deemed essential to the interests of Europe, by
those who conducted the negotiations at Vienna
in 1814-1815, that she still should hold, affords
a full defence to France and England for any
interference which has for its object the restora-
tion of Poland to that precise condition. We
recommend the whole statement to the attention
of the reader, we need not add to his sympathy
—Times.

That portion of the Press which regards the
pre,ervation of Whig power as of infinitely
more importance than the principles of English
freedom, attempts to justify the prosecutions for
libel commenced against several newspapers, by
the AA big son-in-law of Earl Grey, upon the
ground that the Tory Lord Lonsdale is also a
prosecutor in the same respectable field of war-
fare. The evening organ of the Ministers says,
" We shall wait with some curiosity for the
reasoning which makes that right in one Nobl,
Lord which is wrong in another." For our part
we look with equal disgust on the proceedings
of both—though, perhaps, the conduct of Lor(I
Durham is deserving of severer censure than da,
of the Tory Nobleman, who indulges in the
luxurious pastime of hunting the victim through
all the toils of a penal vindication of character.
The reason we think so is, that Lord Durham
is a Whig by birth and education, and even an
ultra-liberal by profession. We know that the
Whigs have obtained a share of that popularity
which brought them into power, and which the
abuse of power is rapidly depriving them of,
by expressing on all public occasions an extraor
dinary veneration for the liberty of the press.
The celebrated Whir, toast—" The liberty of
tire press ; it is like the air we breathe ; if
we have it not we die"—we have never heard
of being an accompaniment to the conviviality
of a Tory banquet. The Whigs, there
fore, aggravate the crime of a malevolent
attack upon the freedom of the press by an
ueblushing violation of the principles of
liberality which they have always professed.
How Whig and Tory prosecutors for libel will
adjust the balance of superior folly and vindic-
tiveness with each other we neither know nor
care, but we know that both have a third party
to settle With, which will not so readily admit
tire servile and sophistical excuses of the re-
tainers of the press on either side—and that
party is the country. We must, however, do
the most able of the Conservative papers—tire
standard—the justice to acknowledge that it
does not take up the line of defence for Lord
Lonsdale which the 'Whig papers do for Lord
Durham. It candidly avows the wrong which
Lord Lonsdale has done, not only to a great
principle, but to himself, by not relying for the
vindication of his character on a high-minded
consciousness of his own rectitude—a fir better
security in the end to the fame of a public man
than the shield of penal law. The Standard says,
" It may be very well for those who look only to
party or to personal objects to balance acts of op-
pression and cruelty, on the one side, against
acts of oppression and cruelty on the other. We
look to higher ends. We feel that in such a
commerce of injustice and oppression, public
liberty and public morality must suffer, whatever
particular factions may gain by it." This is a
manly and enlightened view of the subject. If
the only question be whether the factions of
S}lla or Marius ought to have most license to
trample on the principles of free government,
what is to become of the liberties of Rome ?
A public man who pursues a ridiculous or even
a malevolent fakehood by a prosecution under
the existing law of libel in
%this
vttcooufmry temperis and, in our
opinion, unqualified, by
high. mindedness, fbr the due exercise of any high
office in a free state. Was not the retraction of
the foolish story for which Lord Durham had ob-
tained a rule for a criminal information sufficient
fur the clearing of his character, if it had received
any stain from it, and for the purposes of
justice ? Will any person attribute the further
prosecution of this ridiculous matter to anything
but a feeling which no man who values the

?good estimation of hie fellow citizens, in a
country like this ought by word or deed to
avow ? The prosecution of the journals which
merely copied the offensive and absurd paragraph
is in the very keenest spirit of sharp practice, and
in the highest tone of that political intolerance
which the Whigs used so eloquently to declaim
against in their political adversaries. These
nrosecntions ,affect the public character of Lord
Durham in a way which is likely i'o make him
regret that he ever took counsel in this matter of
the passions, which influence men of little minds,
instead of abiding at all hazards by those en-
larged and liberal sentiments which had so
recently thrown a moral lustre over those festive
scenes where the genius of patriotism and the
(Yod of rosy wine went hand in hand.—Morning
Herald.

A case of deep importance to the press was
ieard in the Court of Exchequer last week. A
report has appeared in the newspapers, in the
case of Johnson v. Lord Foley, of an affidavit
nut in by his Lordship. It was admitted that
the report was correct, but the plaintiff con-
sidered it injurious to his reputation, and now
hrings his action against the Times accordingly.
The decision, as to the right of reporting ex
parte proceedings correctly, was deferred by
Lord Lyndhurst. Should the decision be
against the right, there will he an end of report-
ing altogether. We recollect that Lord Wynford,
-11)011t five years ago, pronounced against the
right ; but the dictum has been deemed so
monstrous that it has never since been acted
upon. Public Courts arc public places, and
always have been so. The whole people, to
a man, have a prescriptive right, if they
please, and, provided room could he found
them, to he present, and to hear, and see, in I
propria personer, the proceedings of the Court.
What distinction can be drawn between subse-
quently repeating what is heard in a court, to
an indefinite number of persons, among whom
the hearer may afterwards find himself in com-
pany, and diffusing the same report through
that larger and equally indefinite number of
persons which constitute the public, through the
medium of a written or printed report ? The
extent of the communication is not alleged to
constitute the offence, but the fact of the
objectionable matter being communicated. If
One communication therefore be illegal, the
other is. What is this but the pretence to
an inquisitorial power—hoe beit unexerted—to
question the right of conversation at the din-
ner table or at the fireside ? Encroachment on
social privileges and rights often creeps on by
degrees—till gaining strength, it throws off
its disguise, and exhibits the odious features
of that spirit of judicial tyranny which sug-
gested his " ear" to Dyonisius, and his " couvre-
feu" to the Norman bastard. It is, how-
ever, clear that those who contend against the
legality of reporting ex parte proceedings, or
allegations in the Courts, would he driven into
an absurdity, unless or until they could show
cause for excluding the whole public. Publicity
of judicial proceedings, we maintain, is a fun-
damental part of the Constitution. The press,
by representing accurately what is said and done

in the Courts, imparts to the dense population
of modern times, the unmutilated advantages
which Alfred and the Saxon monarchs, who
established open Courts for the administration
of justice, originally contemplated when the
country was more thinly peopled. It supplies
to all compensation for the physical incapability
of personal presence. It furnishes the great
body of the public with an ear and eye to hear
lnd see what is going on, a circumstance sup-
uosed by the Constitution, but otherwise physi-
cally impracticable. In a word, to comment

airly on all that concerns himself and his fellow

itizens, is an Englishman's inalienable right, a
right which no judicial despot or ministerial
satrap (though he may question) can invalidate,
diminish, or withdraw.—Morning Advertiser.

While on the one hand we condemn the
courtesy of the Whigs to Mr. O'Connell, we
must not be supposed on the other to admire
their ferocity against his subalterns. While we
despise them for their civility to the libeller, we
must not be thought to applaud their dislike of
the libel. We will not discus now the merits

or the demerits of the Pilot, against which the
Government has renewed the prosecution which
seemed to have abandoned. Nor will we be

led into a discussion of the abstract advantage
or disadvantage of the present state of our libel
law. If our libel law is conceded to be excel-

lent—if the Pilot is a most proper victim to its
severity—still the attack upon the Pilot by the
Government is, in the Government, an act which
it would he charity to term a blunder. Between
the characters in which the author and the pub-
lisl er of the prosecuted letter appear there is
no comparison. Mr. O'Connell is the avowed
and recognized captain of agitation in Ireland.
He is the man upon whose hand, head, and
heart a greater weight of guilt is laid than has
been 1)01 ne by any of his predecessors in the task
of political disturbance ; the man through whose
instigation character is daily traduced, property
plundered, law despised. The publisher of the
Pilot newspaper is—the publisher of the Pilot

. .
newspaper ; and he is nothing more. Between
the parts which the author and the publisher of
the prosecuted letter had in the criminality of
he action there is no comparison. Mr. O'Con-
nell has supplied the intellectual ability, the
literary labour ; he has contributed the bitterness
of the sarcasm, the falsehood of the statement,
the virulence of the invective. The publisher of
the Pilot newspaper has added his compositors
and his press. And he has added nothing more.
Between the objects which the author and the
publisher of the prosecuted letter had in view
there is no comparison. Mr. O'Connell writes,
that by his writings he may excite discontent,
may promulgate sedition, may exasperate dis-
cord. The publisher of the Pilot newspaper
publishes, that by the publication of Mr.
O'Connell's rhetoric he may sell a larger number
of copies than he would sell without it. And
he publishes for no more culpable motive. Of
two criminals the Whigs have selected the lesser

for punishment, and have left the greater un-
assailed. It would have been far better to have

extended a similar impunity to both. Truckling
to Mr. O'Connell, and tyrannizing over Mr.
O'Connell's myrmidons, they only add caprice
to imbecility, oppression to subserviency. There

s no more certain rule than this : wherever

conciliation is cowardice, authority is persecu-
tion.—Morning Post.

A SCOTCH CLIMAX.--The presiding Judge
in the High Court of Justiciary, of Edinburgh, while
addressing a prisoner who had barely escaped conviction,
and admonishing him to he careful for the future, gave
utterance to the following outrageous specimen of the anti-
climax Recollect, Sir, that although you have escaped
this time, your next misdemeanor will, in all probability,
be arrested by the strong arm of the law ; for I caution
.ou to bear in mind, that the all seeing and all searching
eye of God ;Ind of the Edinburgh police is upon you."

VICE-CHANCERY COURT, Nov. ?6,

SPECIAL INJUNCTION-LAWSON V. CUNLIFFE.

Mr. 13uGH applied on behalf of the plaintiff,
James William Lawson, at the rising of the Court,
ex parte for a special injunction to restrain the de-
fendants from negotiating certain bills of exchange.
It appeared from the statement of the Learned
Counsel that a gentleman named Wright applied
to the plaintiff, with whom he was personally ac-
quainted, stating that he was desirous of raising
money, and should consider himself under great
obligations if the plaintiff would accommodate him
with three blank acceptances, pledging himself not
to fill them up for more than 100/. each. Those ac-
ceptances, to prevent the negotiation of which the
prevent motion was made, found their way into the
hands of the defendants in the following curious
manner :—Messrs. Solomonson and Fraser, bill-
brokers, and the agents of Messrs. Canliffe, the
bankers, were acquainted with a person named
Douglas, for whom the Messrs. Cunliffe, at their re-
commendation, discounted several bilk of exchange
to a very large amount. Shortly before those bills be-
came due Douglas absconded, and the bills were ul-
timately discovered to be all forgeries. Solomonson
and Fraser being about to become insolvent, the
defendants, desirous if possible to get reimbursed
the amount they had advanced on the forged bills,
prevailed on Messrs. Solomonson and Fraser to
delay the declaration of their insolvency. in order
that they might obtain as many good bills as would
pay their demand. An agreement was entered
into between them to that effect, and three-fourths
of the amount of the bills it was agreed should
helona• to the defendants. Wright had handed
over the blank acceptances given him by the plain-
tiff to Solomonson and Fraser, who, after filling
them up to the amount of two or three thousand
pounds, gave them to the defendants, together with
a great number of other bills. The Learned Coun-
sel contended that he was entitled to the injunction
he asked on the ground that the acceptances had
round their way into the hands of the defendants
under an agreement to compensate them for the
losses they had sustained from the forged bills of
Douglas.

His HONOUR immediately granted the injunction,

COURT OF KING' 4 BENCH, Nov. 26.

:Middlevex Sittinze at Nisi Prins before Mr. Justice
PATTESON, and a Common Jury.)

FRAUDULENT BILL TRANSACTION.-NECK V. WISE-

MAN.

This was an action brought by the plaintiff, an
attorney in Norfolk-streer, Strand, against the de-
fendant, Alexander Wiseman, Esq., an officer in the
navy, as the acceptor of a bill of exchange, dated
25th April, 1833, payable to John Smith three
months after date. The bill was for 1001.

Mr. Comyn stated that the bill was indorsed by
Smith to Moore, and by him to one Israel, who in-
dorsed it to the plaintiff for the value in cash. All
that he had to do was to prove tile hand-writing of
the parties.

Simeon Metz knew the defendant, Alexander
Wiseman. The acceptance on the bill was the de-
fendant's hand-writing.
John Boozey was clerk to the plaintiff, an at-
torney in Norfolk-street, Strand. He remembered
Smith and Moore coming to the office of his master,
Mr. Neck. They came in con.equence of notice by
letter of the dishonour of the bill. They wanted a
few days to pay the bill.

Cross-examined--He had been with the plaintiff,
Mr. Neck, since June. He (1,(1 nor know that the
plaintiff was in partnership with Mr. Keeling. There
had been many bill transactions in his master's of-
fice. Ha had seen ten bills in the office. He was
not acquainted with J. M. Hart. He saw him this
morning. Mr. Smith who came to the office was
not Mr. Hart. Had seen Lawrence Levy. Did not
know Jacobs or Israel, whose names were on the
bill. He lived in Sidney-street, Mile-end. He
did not know that he was well known there. A
person to oe well known must get well in debt.—
(Laughter.)
Samuel Lee knew Lewis Jacobs. The indorse-
ment on the HI was his hand-writing. He also
knew Israel. The name on the bill was Israel's
writing.

Mr. 'Watson, on the part of the defendant, stated
that the bill had been concocted in fraud, and had
come into the hands of plaintiff under circumstances
which must lead the Jury to find for the defendant.
In the early part of the present year Mr. Wiseman,
who was an officer in the navy, happened to see in
a newspaper an advertisement that he might be
supplied with money on reasonable terms. He
wanted 1001., and went to Cannon-row, West-
minster, where he was introduced to a person who
represented himself to be Mr. Smith. Having some
suspicion of him he reqeested a reference. He was
referred to Mr. John Minter Hart. He went to a
house where he saw J. M. Hart, who told him
Smith was a respectable man. In consequence of
that information he returned to him and gave the
bill which was the subject of the action. He was
to have received the amount subject to a bonus, but
from that time to the present he had never received '
one shilling for the bill. He took a receipt at the
time for the bill. If these facts were proved the
plaintiff could not recover unless he appeared to
stand in the situation of an innocent holder of the
bill. He should prove that J. M. Hart, having
received the bill from Smith, indorsed it to one
Paddy Moore, who gave nothing for it; that Moore
sold it to a sheriff's officer for 20/.; and that it was
discounted by the plaintiff, who received it from
one Israel.

John Minter Hart looked at the bill. He had
seen it before. He knew Smith, the drawer, who
resided in King's-row, Chelsea. The witness be-
came acquainted with Mr. Wiseman in April last.
He saw him on the subj.ct of the bill at his resi-
dence, Ulster-place, Regent's Park. He called on
him at the request of Smith, and entered into a
negotiation with him for the advance of 1001.
Terms were agreed on. The bill was given by Mr.
Wiseman, but the money was not advanced to his
knowledge. After the bill was drawn it was
handed to Smith. A few days after the father of
Smith brought the bill to him, and he indorsed it
to Moore. He was to have had from Moore 921.,
but did not receive one farthing from him. He un-
derstood that it was then sold to Lawrence Levy.
He knew Neck, who was an attorney. He did nor
know that Neck was a dealer in bills. Neck was
brother-in-law of Levy. 'Wiseman received nothing
whatever for the bill.

After hearing further evidence, the Jury found
For the defendant.

CONSISTORY COURT, Nov. 26.

(Before Dr. LUSHINGTON.
SERGEAUNT V. SERGEAUNT.

This is a case of divorce promoted by James
Sergeaunt against Harriet, his wife, on the ground
of adultery ; and the charge was met by her with a
recriminatory plea and alleged connivance.
On a former Court day the King's Advocate ap-
peared for the wife in support of the admissibility of
the allegation, and Drs. Phillimore and Addams op-
posed it. The allegation alleged that the husband,
an officer in his Majesty's service, was married in
1825, and soon after joined his regiment, proceeded
with his wife to the Cape of Good Hope, and thence
to India. The allegation proceeded to allege
various acts to support the charge of connivance on
the part of the husband while at the Cape of Good
Hope.
Dr. LUSHINGTON this morning gave judgment,
end was glad he had taken time to consider his
offei Opinon t
red, the
greatest importance. What did the allegation
o the
question
admissibility of the allegation now
involved a principle of the
plead ? That there vas a non-aeknewledgment of
the marriage shortly after it took place ; that the
wife was introduced to bad characters; and tha,
she was exposed to temptations which no man
who was jealous of her honour and character would
submit to. It was alleged that et the Cape of Good

Hope she was exposed to solicitations ; but the alle-
gation only pleaded adultery to have allowed on one
occasion. The question arose how the Court could
deal with this case with reference to the decisions
already given, and those great principles upon which
the purity of the marriage life ought to depend.
There were various circumstances upon which a
decision might be given. If the husband was con-
sentient to his wife's dishonour he could never have
relief from that Court. The decisions in former
times would induce the Court not to weaken the
obligations of the husband to protect the wife; but
if the rule was clear iipon this point that the hus-
band should not avail himself of the adultery of his
wife, having connived at it, it was also clear that if
a doubt existed the husband should have the benefit
of it. In the present case there was no adultery
alleged at which Mr. Sergeaunt connived, and in
the absence of proof it became the Court narrowly
to look to the facts to see if the conduct of the hus-
band came up to what the law held connivance. It
was agreed on all hands that connivance was not
inibfference; it must be a consent by the husband
to the wife's dishonour. If any difficulty in this
case existed he would let the plea go to proof; but
there were no improper familiarities, no proximate
acts, connived at by Mr. Sergeaunt ; and looking
to all the facts, he considered there was nothing
to induce the Court to think the husband had
peen guilty of conniving at his own dishonour.
One fact alone had excited his suspicion, and
that was Mr. Sergeaunt's having left his wife for
three days at Elm Cottage alone with a Captain ;
but it was not alleged that Mrs. Sergeaunt had
there conducted herself improperly, and a fortiori,
the husband had not connived. Indifference arid
neglect could not be considered connivance.
Under all the circumstances of this extraordinary
case, he should direct all facts relative to connivance
to be struck out, as if proved they would not bar
the husband his remedy, and if they went to proof
must occasion great expense and delay. No time
or place was stated for the adultery in India, anti
that must not go to proof. The Court did not re-
commend appeals, but as far as rela•ed to himself
he should be more satisfied to have his judgment
.•ffirmed or reversed, the case being an extraor-
dinary one.

COURT OF EXCHEQUER, Nov. 26.