The Sun.
London, England, 1851-09-03 00:00:00

Jeninix -' UAL

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 185

What are " the rights of property ?" They have
been spoken of for many centuries ; they are familiar
to our ears, but we believe they have never been very
accurately defined. The statute law is simple enough,
but there appears to be an " unwritten code" of a
shifting and variable character, which knows no
limitation save the will of " the lord of the soil."
His behests may be of the most illegal and unwarrant-
able character, but woe to the unfortunate cottier
who opposes the slightest resistance, who does not yield
a ready and servile obedience. It is true that the
landed proprietor no longer possesses a power of life
and death over his tenantry. He cannot order the
execution or even the flagellation of any contuma-
cious occupier. The " serfs" and " villeins" have
been nominally emancipated, and patriots rejoice in
the supposition that slavery no longer exists in the
United Kingdom. We fear, however, that this is
but an empty boast, so far as one of the British
islands is concerned; for we find that a despotic
authority is exercised in some parts of Ireland
exceeding anything known in the middle ages, when
the feudal system was at its utmost height, partaking
of a spiritual, as well as a merely temporal power,
and authorizing not only the landowner, but his lowest
bailiff, or driver, to excommunicate any miserable
wretch who may incur such formidable resentment,
and to forbid the slightest assistance being accorded,
however pressing may be the exigencies or potent the
claims of the sufferer. All the sympathies of the
heart must be closed up. The most barbarous
cruelties must be enacted—cruelties that
would disgrace a nation of savages, if the
driver announce that the victim is tabooed, that
he is not to receive shelter or aid in the district.
Although the Irish peasantry have been familiar with
misery in its most appalling aspects, although they
have seen friends and relations perishing—literally
perishing—from hunger, while they were unable to
afford the much-required relief, they are still a warm-
hearted race, who, if they had anything, however
trifling, in their power, would be contented to stint
themselves in order to assist a stranger, much less one
of their " own blood." We may, therefore, judge of
the potency of the spell under which they are en-
thralled when we hear of conduct such as that to
which the Hon. and Rev. J. G. OSBORNE—one of the
most earnest and devoted philanthropists of the age—
has just directed the public attention.
The case to which the Reverend Gentleman has
alluded, is one resting on no doubtful authority—
it cannot be an attempt on the public credulity.
It has been established on unquestionable tes-
timony in a court of justice, and verified by the
unanimous verdict of a jury. The instruments of
the crime, the small fry who were caught within the
meshes of the law, are expiating the horrible out-
rage of which, in cam ing out the commands of the
representatives of their landlords, they were guilty ;
and although the larger game, who might almost
be considered as " accessaries before the fact,"
escaped with impunity, the language of the learned
and amiable judge who presided at the trial, and
pronounced the sentence, showed that the parties
legally responsible had no personal ill-feeling
against the unfortunate deceased, but merely acted in
obedience "to the threats of those in authority,"
that is to say, of some one or more of the drivers or
sub agents on the estate of the Marquis of LANS-
DOWNE.

We cannot for a moment suppose that the Noble

Marquis was at all cognizant of the orders that were

issued in his name, of the extreme and tyrannical ex-
tent to which his authority was carried. The
high and unblemished character which he has
sustained for so many years forbid the suppo-
sition. We trust, however, that his attention
being directed to the subject, he may cause such in-
quiries to be instituted as may lead to the detection of
the parties morally, if not legally, responsible ; and
may issue a stringent prohibition against such an
undue assumption of power for the future in any part
of his extensive estates—a power not allowed even to
the SOVEREIGN of these realms, unless under the
sanction and by the sentence of a judge of the land.
The case itself, to which we have alluded, is one
of a very simple but painful character. An unfortunate
child named DENIS SHEA, aged 12 years, had been
guilty of some petty thefts, and in consequence fell
under the ban of the driver on the estate, who issued
an order that he was " not to be harboured in the
district." The command was in one instance dis-
obeyed. The grandmother of the miserable orphan
had received him ; but summary punishment awaited
the contumacious opposition, and the agjd woman
was turned from her humble holding for not having
disregarded the voice of nature when in opposi-
tion to the commands of a driver I The
example Was one that ensured future submission.
Few persons in this happy land can understand the
fearful consequences of being " evicted" from a
holding in the south or west of Ireland, particularly
in a district where there has been an order that "no
lodgers are to be admitted under any pretext."
Everything, in fact, is at stake, and charitable feelings
can only be indulged at a risk which even the boldest
and most reckless might fear to encounter—the danger
of sharing the lot of the suppliant. The miserable
starving boy, thus deprived of his only surviving pro-
tector, wandered from door to door, driven from
each in succession. He came at length to that in
which his
uncle resided, and where it might be sup-
posed that he would have at least received a single
meal, even if shelter were denied. But no ; the com-
mands of the driver were too stringent, the results of
resistance too hazardous. The child was beaten from
the door, his hands tied behind his back, and, thus in-
jured and bound, he was driven from the inhospitable
threshold, and in the morning was found dead ! ?
the hands being still bound. The uncle •and
aunt were tried and convicted of manslaughter,
and received the very lenient sentence of two years'
imprisonment, with hard labour. Who is there, how-
ever, who can say that those who issued, or even
tacitly connived at such illegal, such barbarous
orders, are free from blame, or that orders for the
banishment or expulsion of obnoxious individuals
from particular districts, exposing the denounced to
the most intense suffering, perchance even to the
loss of life itself, fall within the legitimate or recog-
nised exercise of " the rights of property ?"

It has been long since universally admitted that the
invention of a signal by which the passenger travel-
ling in a railway carriage should be enabled at once
to communicate with the guard or with the engine-