The Sun.
London, England, 1802-12-28 00:00:00

SITTINGS AT GUILDHALL

THOMP..ON v. ROWCROFT.

..TH Is was an action brought by the-Plaintiff, as
an Underwriter, on the freight of the ship Theseus,
in the Russian trade, and who had paid the full
amount of it to the Defendant, her Owner, upon her
being detained by the late Emperor of Russia, by
the EmbaTLo on British Shipping, upon his aban-
donment. of his interest.. n it ; but who afterwards,
on the Embargo being taken off; completed his
voyage, and received the freight from the Clatterer
of the Ship. The defence was made upon the ground
that the tight to the freight was in the Under-
writers on die Ship, to whom the Defendant had
also almndonod his interest, and who, it was con-
tended, were, therefore, entitled to this freight'.

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In opening the case, Mr. ER.SKINE said
~to the
Jury 'nearly as follows :—" This cause arises out of
a coniuedure equally new and extraordinary to the
moral, the political, and the legal world. It arises
from • the violence and injustice of that detested
and departed Tyrant, the late Emperor of Russia,
who, for reasons beyond the reach of human inves-
tigation, was permitted, for a season, to have
supreme power and dominion over so large a por-
tion of the earth ; who, after having been, en-
gaged ia the pursuit of the same public objects
as Great Britain; and bound to her by the most so-
lemn ties of friendship and alliance, turned suddenly
round upon her with all the versatility and impetuo-
sity of a whirlwind, to lay waste, in the destruCtior)
of her trade, ate +in the denial of her privileges, the
mighty fabric of ber prosperity and power. In this.
parokisto of fury and wickedness, whilst our friendly
flags were flying in his harbours, he seized and confis_
cated our ships, with their cargoes; and marched
into an ignominious and perilous exile, the most
deserving of the Subjeas of our Country. A blacker
cloud never hung over this .Island, or the world,
than at that awful period, because this violence was
intended as an attack upon the acknowledged Laws
of the civilized world, and was in the prosecution
of a conspiracy against the maritime greatness of
England. If the Cause had not been to be tried upon
adtnission,, I should have brought before you, by
the testimony of the Captain of the Theseus, a
most affeCting pidure' of this tyrannical proceeding ;
indeed, I was greatly affected by his Letter, in
which he represented it to his Owners, and which
forms a striking view of the general charader-
istic of our Country. This honest man, a pri-
soner in a distant and unfriendly ,Country, just
setting out to a dreary and inhospitable desart,
from whence there was but a feeble hope of his ever
returning, expresses the confidence of a martyr in
the peotedion of the Almighty, and says, that
some' how or other, out of all this evil, he would
bring forth good. Gentlemen, his Christian confi.
_dente was net disappointed ; the tyrant suddenly fell
to the ground, ar•d, like the sun rising after a storm,
his place was occupied by a successor, the direct re-
'verse in every principle and feeling which goes
to the consfittetion of the human character. Our
Ships were restored, the seals dropped from our con-
fiscated property, and the chains fell off from the
limbs of OUT delivered couutrymen ; and he return-
ed, as he anticipated, to the bosom of his family,
and the delights of his Country. Gentlemen, in
speaking of this young Monate!), I do .not speak of
him altogether from this first at of his Govern-
ment, nor from the general report of his character,
but from other evidence of it, which has fallen in my
way by accident, but which is perfedly satisfadory
to my mind upon the subject. I anticipate that he
will continue to fill up; by his virtues, the breaches
in society which his father's vices had opened, and
that we shall see, more and more, a friendly inter-
course between Russia and Great Britain ; because,
devoted, as I believe he i 3, to humanize and civilize
his remote, and, in many parts, almost barbarous
Empire, how can he so well accomplish his truly
glorious purpose, as by cultivating a friendship with
our Nation, which has humanized and civilized the
world. It may be said, that all this is a useless
preface, as the event is so notorious, but if it be not
a duty, it is at least a privilege which I enjoy
from my situation, to acknowledge thus publicly the
beneficence of the Divine Providence, when its dis-
pensations have been so propitious to our Country
and our kind. -