The Sun.
London, England, 1851-07-22 00:00:00

irt%* 'l4
' -
SUN OFFICE, Seven o'Cloch.

ScutuonotlGH.—The election for this borough,
which took place on Saturday last, will not pass without
being called into question. The Protectionist triumph is
likely to be short. A petition is in preparation ; and the in-
vestigation will show how the success of Mr. G. F. Young
was accomplished. The intimidation and other corrupt
practices whl:h prevailed at the election exceed all prece-
dent, and will be clearly exposed•

THE GREAT EXHIBITION.
(THIS DAY.)
The numbers admitted to the Crystal Palace up to
four o'clock were as follows :-
10 to 11
11 to 12
12 to 1
1 to 2
2 to 3
3 tO 4

. 19,533
. 22,088
. 12,325
. 6,047
. 5,616
. 2,968

Total .

. 68,577

IMPERIAL PARLIAIUENT.

(THIS DAY.)

HOUSE OF LORDS.
Their Lordships assembled at Five o'clock.
PETITIONS.
The Earl of WINCHILSEA presented several peti-
tions in favour of the Ecclesiastical Titles Assumption
Bill.

The Duke of NEWCASTLE presented one petition
against the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill.
The Duke of ARGYLL presented 67 petitions from
places in Lane ashire in favour of the Ecclesiastical Titles
Assumption Bill.
Some privy to Bills were, on the motion of Lord
REDESDALH, forwarded a stage.
ECCLES' AS'.CICAL TITLES ASSUMPTION BILL-
The Earl of WINCHILSEA rose to renew then d-
journed debate on this Bill, and in doing so he cld
assure their Lordships that he had no intention,
in what he said, of wounding the feelings
of auy Noble Lord. Since the passing of the
Raman Catholi c Relief Bill he had cautiously abstained
from alluding to that subject. In his opposition to that
measure he ntid had no personal feelings; among the
supporters of that measure were several of hisintimate
friends, and to retain their friendship. he would have
made any sacrifice short of a sacrifice of principle;
it was becaus,3 be felt that the pr.inciple? of the Church
of Rome were absolutely destructive of civil and religious
liberty that he bad opposed the Relief Bill. The object
of the Church cf Rome was to obtain political power.—
(Hear, hear.) He had then maintained that an
equality of civil rights would never satisfy that
Church, and that if the relief sought by that Bill were
granted it would be made only the foundation for ag-
gression. lie hod at that time been scouted as a nar-
row-minded bigot; three and twenty years had
since elapsed, and he now asked if he
was not right? The. Roman Catholics had been
placed upon an equality with the Protestants in this
country, and now they sought for more than
equality. Rome never seceded from her arrogant
pretensions of supremacy. Those pretensions might be
placed in abeyance at the time, but they were sure
eventually to be renewed. He would not insist upon
what had. been since done, upon the sacrifice of our faith,
of the bishops of the Established Church in Ireland,
upon the exclesion of the Scriptures from the national
schools, upon the opposition of the Roman Catholic
hierarchy to the Queen's Colleges. The fruits
of all this truckling to Rome had been to invite this daring
aggression. They had been deceived with regard to the
proportions of the Romish and Protestant population of
Ireland, and he had no doubt but that if there were a
cessation of the dreadful persecution to which the popu-
lation of Ireland was subjected by the priests, the people
would by thousands embrace Protestantism, and
the number of Protestants would equal the number of
Romanists. Never had such an insult been offered to a
nation as that which had been offered to the English
nation by this aggression of the Pope. It should have been
met with strong measures. The Roman Catholic
Church enjoyed every liberty, and he denied that
the appointments of bishops in , ordinary was
necessary to the free exercise of the Roman
Catholic religion•—(Hear.) The vicars-apostolic were
sufficient. This appointment of bishops was therefore
an aggression and an insult to our Sovereign and her
people.

(LEFT SPEAKING.)

HOUSE OF COMMONS.
The SPEAKER took the Chair at Twelve o'clock.
PRIVATE BUSINESS.

The St. Andrew's and Quebec Railway Bill was con-
sidered and agreed to.
PETITIONS.

Several petitions were presected in favour of the con
tinuauce of the Crystal Paldee.

CASE OF ERNEST JONES.

On the motion for receiving the report of the Com-
mittee of Ways and Means,
Lord DUDLEY STUART called the attention of the
House to the c Ise of Ernest Charles Jones, as st ated in
his petition, presented to this House on 26th May last,
and to move for copies of all rules and regulations which
at any time, from the (year 1840 to the present, have
been in force within the several prisons in Englan,d and
Wales, so far as they may affect prisoners convicted of
political offences. He owed no apology to the Rouse
for bringing this subject forward, for it was the d uty of
every Member to bring a case of injustice befor e the
House whenever it came officially under his
notice. He had been more than two LI onths
attempting to get this motion on, but hitherto it e had
beea unable to obtain an open day, and he had, there-
fore, no elternative but to introduce it as an amendment
to a Government motion. Ernest Charles Joni s was
a barrister-at-law, the son of a major in the army, and a
gentleman of some literary fame. In 1848, he wa 1, com-
mitted to the Tothill-fields prison for a political offence,
and what Mr. Jones complained of in his peti-
tion to the House was, the treatment hes re-
ceived while undergoing his imprisonment. M oat of
the allegations in his petition were admitted by V,: ie au-
thorities of the gaol, and therefore no dispute could
arise on that part of the question. Now these ;a 'lega-
tions were familiar to the House, and he need not re-
mind Hon. Members that the treatment Mr. Jone s had
received was quite contrary to law. More thee, once
he was kept in solitary confinement on bread and •water,
because he refused to pick oakum; and he coal ended
that the order of the visiting justices sane-
tioning that proceeding was totally at variance
with the Act of Parliament. Once he was con-
fined hi that way for no less than four days,
while the Act of Parliament provided that a prisoner
should be kept in solitude on bread and water only.
Two other miserable prisoners, whose names were, fami-
liar to the House, were put into solitary confiners ent on
the same occasion, and for the same cause, and the
result which followed that proceeding was a stai):k upon
the criminal annuls of the country. They died of the
cholera. Ernest Jones escaped that horrible fate, but
the treatment so impaired his health that it was ex-
ceedingly doubtful whether he would ever thoroughly
recover his lost strength. It was useless for the naedical
officers of the prison to say that their prisoneirs did
not suffer from ill health, because in their replies to the
allegations of Mr. Jones they admitted that he suffered
from chronic inflammation of the eyelids ; and on one
occasion when he was placed in the refractory ward he
lost upwards of a atone in his weight. The report of
the governor charged the petitioner with having used
violent language in the letter which he was allo reed to .
write from the prison, and that was the reason why his
permission to write was witheld. Now he (Lord
Dudley Stuart) had looked through all the thirteen let-
ters which Mr. Jones wrote while in prison, and he had
no hesitation in declaring that the report of the governor
was utterly unfounded in truth. He denied that this
treatment of Mr. Jones was at all warranted by law;
he was treated not as a political but as an ordinary of-
fender, and that was contrary to all law and usage.
Cobbett, Ramsbottom, and Lovell, when thy
were committed for sedition, ware treated in
a very different manner. They were tOlowed
full permission to see their friends, and one of them not
only wrote a history of America while he was in, gaol,
but was permitted to be married in prison. Hunt, the
House would remember, was ill-treated while he was
imprisoned, but lie afterwards recovered compensation
from the governor of the gaol, while the Government
took upon
themselves the responsibility of discharging
him for his misconduct. Feargus O'Connor, Cooper,
and O'Connell, when they were imprisoned, met with
treatment which presented a very strung contrast to that
which had fallen to the lot of Mr. Ernest Jones, but
then they were imprisoned under a Conservative and
liberal Government, while Mr. Jones was imprisoned
by a Whig and illiberal Administration. It was the
basest and most stupid act for a Government
to confound political offenders with ordinary criminals.
That Was the opinion of many eminent statesmen and
judges
thought that the pri-
boners
on
niggleudi to enjoybenn andw ° maintain tie well as the
Government who imprisoned them. Henry Vincent's
treatment, in being removed from a provincial gaol and
placed in the Pe • nitennary, where he was compelled to
wear the common dress of the prison, and forbidden to
communicate with his friendcalled forth till;condem-
nation of Mr. justice T
but
what would the Learned utourd and the
Judge Hons.:, ;
have said had tue 0
pick oakum, or piss his time t
pri-
soner, in addition to that
rematurnt, been compehed to
pick solitary confinement,
living upon bread and water?
allowee the use of a knife and ,Moirk. E.at a
hicnes wals notbut
was compelled to devour his food with hishanimdsealle a
beast. What would the Learned Judge or the Marquis
of
.s,rmaney, who laid down rules for the treatment of
Mr. O'Connor when he was imprisoned, have said of
that? Some time ago, the House had an assurance from
the Government that thetyowouuffid introduce a Bill for
regulating the tr.7.tmenremfaineectnderp, but up to this
very day that
g°
Baronetat unfulfilled. Subse-
queerly the Right Hon. the head of the
promised to give directions that political
Home-effice
offenders should be separated from ordinary cri-
minals; but he bad et to learn that the
t
promise had been kel) • Certainly it had not
in the case of Mr. Ernest Jones, and therefore he
could not help thinking that it eves time the House
insisted upon legislating upon this important subject.
How could they hone to change the views9l.oth
d opinionseh
of a political offender by treating him_
w
cruelty as was complained of in this case. lie so much
cruelty
then, that the next session would not be allowed to
Valet without an effort being made to alter the system.
la
one instance which had come to his knowledge, a