The Sun.
London, England, 1833-12-21 00:00:00

DEc. 19.

THE KING OF SPAIN V. MACHADO.
The arguments in this case were resumed this
morning.
Mr. KNIGHT, who followed on the same side
with the Attorney-General and Sir C. Wetherell,
contended that as there was a bill and cross bill
filed by the King of Spain and Mendizabel, that the
Court could not order the payment of the money
which was the subject of dispute to Mendizabel.
He then proceeded to draw the attention of the
Court to the circumstances connected with the trial
of the cause in the Court of Common Pleas. The
action commenced in 1825, but was not brought be-
fore a jury till 1832. Now where was the expla-
nation for this delay ? None had been assigned by
the opposite Counsel. Look at the facts of the
case. Here is a fund set apart by the convention
of Paris and Vienna, for the payment of certain
claimants, and the object of the parties here is to
appropriate that fund to another purpose. By a
decree of the King of Spain in 1822, a Board was
appointed to pay over this money to the claimants,
but in June, 1823, owing to an alteration having
taken place in the political character of the Spanish
Government, an ordinance was made under which
Mr. Mendizabel claims. The laws of Spain ar e
like other laws, revokable; and accordingly, in
October, 1823, a different order of things took
place in Spain ; a new ordinance issued which an-
nulled the law of the previous June, so that from
Oct., 1823, Mr. Mendizabel ceased to have any legal
claim upon the fund in question. All this time the
money belonging to the fund was in France. The law
of Spain cut off Mr. Mendizabel from any claim on
the fund before he became possessed of the property.
It was admitted that the question here must be
tried by the law of Spain, and if so, he contended
that the Court would be obliged to pronounce
against the order claimed by Mr. Mendizabel. From
1823 up to 1826 there existed the greatest hos-
tility between Mendizabel and Machado; indeed
the latter called the former by no very enviable
titles; yet, after some years this very individual,
instead of resisting upon the trial every effort on
the part of the plaintiff to recover money from him
of which he was merely the trustee, actually facili-
tated the plaintiff's case. Did not this furnish a
strong ground of suspicion that there was a collusion
between these parties to arrange the action for their
mutual advantage, and at the expense of the King
of Spain ? He contended that Mendizabel had no
ground of action whatever against Machado.

Sir E. SUGDEN said, that as to the affidavit made
on the other side respecting collusion, it was, in
fact, only a fishing affidavit, and was only made as
a trap to catch them. He did not at all agree in
the votement made as to the law of Spain. He
admitted that there was collusion on the part of
Machado, to the extent of admitting certain docu-
ment, but these documents could have been had by
the plaintiff, by an outlay of money. It was admitted
that there was no collusion up to 1827 or 1828,
and from that time up, they were swearing to a be.
lief of collusion merely to enable them to adopt
new proceedings, viz., by filing another bill of in-
junction, and this was done upon the principle that
a King never dies. It was quite true that a King
never dies ; but in this Court the King of Spain
was looked upon as an ordinary individual, and
therefore, the principle upon which this new bill
was filed was defective.
The LORD CHANCELLOR said that it was not
enough that there should be a mere suspicion of
collusion ; that would not be sufficient. Lord Eldon
would, he conceived, have required evidence to raise
a case of probable collusion. He admitted that
there was strong suspicion that some understanding
existed between Mendizabel and Machado respect-
ing the trial, but he was not to decide upon a mere
suspicion of collusion. He bad looked into the
evidence as given at the trial in the Common Pleas,
and had considered the manner in which Mr. Kelly
conducted the case for the defendant. He had
further to observe, that he had read all the affidavits.
Having done all this he must declare, that he saw
nothing at all in the case to justify the charge of
collusion. He was of opinion, therefore, that Lord
Eldon would have taken off this stop, and, there-
fore, his opinion was, that it ought to be taken off.
However, considering the large sum of money in
question, and the possibility of Mr. Mendizabel car-
rying the money out of the country, he would take
until Saturday morning to consider the case in all its
bearings.

An extraordinary abstraction of one thousand
sovereigns has recently been made from a box containing
twenty thousand pounds in notes and gold, sent from the
'navy Pay Office in London to their Pay Clerks at Ply
mouth by the mail-conch. The gentlemen at Plymouth
having given a receipt for the full amount have been made
to pay the loss, though it i 4 fully believed that the theft
was made before the box left Somerset liouse.—Hump-
shire Telessraph.