The Sun.
London, England, 1856-03-03 00:00:00

THE SUN,_ LONDON, MONDAY EVENING. MARCH 3, t 56,

TIIE TIPPERARY JOINT-STOCK BANK.

Every day there are fresh indications of the ruin
impending over the shareholders of the unfortunate
Tipperary Bank. There is a wide-spread feeling
of pity for the position of Mr. James Sadleir, the
chief victim of his brother's frauds, and upon whose
shoulders will fall the full weight of the suicide's
transgressions. The member for Tipperary is, in
fact, a ruined man, and it is said that he has al-
ready broken up his establishment, parted with
servants, equipage, (t.c., and is prepared to meet
with becoming fortitude the sad reverse which has
cruelly crushed his wordly prospects. In a com-
munication to his own journal Mr. J. F. Maguire,
M.P., writes as follows :

"There is scarcely any topic now in the city save that
of John Sadleir and his victims. The war itself is a
subject of subordinate interest at this moment. Who is
the new victim ? is now the question—one, toe, that
fills many a breast with the most terrible apprehension ;
for what are securities—what are deeds—what are mort-
gages—what are shares, if they be nothing better than
counterfeits ? There is ne one who has bad dealings of
this nature with him for a long time that has not reason
for some doubt. In fact, no language can describe the
consternation which the recent disclosures have caused,
and which it will take a long time to dispel. The share-
holders of the Tipperary Bank are to be pitied, but more
especially those who Mime anything to lose ; for it is said
that not a few of them are persons of no means. If so,
those who have means must meet every deficiency. There
is no more fearful screw in the whole legal armoury than
the process now being set in operation. It was under
the Joint-Stock Winding-up Act that the victims of the
St. George Company got the coup de grace, In that
blessed concern, not only was the original property, the
fully paid up capital lost, but everything of the debts
was squeezed out of those who were able to pay. You
lost your 1001. share, or your 20 shares, as the case
might be ; and you had to pay up an equal amount of
liabilities. Nor does the list which you published the
other day, as that of the shareholders of the bank, at all
represent the whole of those liable; as, according to the
law regulating banks, a shareholder who has retired six
or 12 months before the smash is as liable as the man
who had not transferred his shares up to the last mo-
mmt. I know that. there are some people in Ireland,
of very prominent standing in the country, who are in
this position, and who, though not in the present list,
are still liable. I believe the liability continues for so
long a period as three years after retirement. The lia-
bilities of the bank are said to be immense, inasmuch as
it had great influence, and its high rate of interest on
deposits offered inducements which it required astonish-
ing prudence to resist. It must have been the full view
of the utter ruin which he had brought upon hundreds
of families, then reposing in fancied security, that wrung
from the wretched suicide those words which sound like
groans, and look tears of blood."

PROMOTION IN TEE ARMY.

(Front the Times of this day.)

Sir De Lacy Evans is to-morrow to bring before the
House of Commons the system of promotion by pur-
chase, and to raise a question which has always been
debated with very natural warmth on both sides. Yet
the mere it is considered, the simpler, though not per-
haps, the easier, will it appear. The inquiry takes the
following form, and we shall perhaps do good service by
a simple and dispassionate statement of the case :—On
what grounds or qualifications should a man receive an
appointment as au officer in the army, or be advanced
from the rank he fills to one of greater authority and re-
sponsibility ? Here is the whole question simply stated,
and, since we see that the military profession does un-
doubtedly require peculiar aptitudes, resolute study,
and, to some extent, scientific talent, there would seem
to be no doubt as to the reply. Obviously, appointments
and promotions should be regulated by competence and
merit ; the men beet fitted for officers should become
officers, and the best of these officers should be advanced
to the highest ranks of the profession. To this plain con-
clusion, however, the objection is raised, that no such
discrimination as would ascertain the relative merits of
officers could possibly be exercised. The distinctions
professedly so made would really be made by favour
only. In time of peace, especially, the means of distin-
guishing the deserts of one officer from those of another
would be so small and so difficult to establish that there
would be unbounded scope for the operation of favour
or interest ; whereas, if nothing but interest or favour
could insure advancement, the state of things would be
worse than it is at present. If military service so far
resembled certain other professions that the infirmities of
age brought with them comparatively few disadvantages;
if generals, like judges, were little the worse for years, or
even the loss of sight, there would be an escape from this
perplexity in the rule of seniority. It might be very
fairly argued that if the merits of officers were so simi-
lar and eo nearly on a level as was alleged, they might
clearly as well be taken in simple rotation. Bnt,
un-
fortunately, the profession of arms requires bodily vigour
as well as military experience, and the acquisitions of a
laborious career are liable to be nullified for the want
of those active energies which rarely last beyond a cer-
tain t.rm of life. Promotion by seniority, therefore,
which would make age the sole condition of advance-
ment, would expose the service to most serious disad-
vantages. Eo the result is, that what must not be left
to favour and cannot be assigned to age is conceded to
money ; not because the principle is either justifiable or
satisfactory, but because the system is practically pre-
ferable to the abuse which would be made out of promo-
tion by merit, and the mischief which would flaw from
promotion by seniority.
if the purchase system, however, is the least in a
cheice of evils, it is small only by such comparison, for
it really operates in other ways seriously to the damage
of the army, Under such a system military officers
roust necessarily, as a general rule, be men of property.
A Parliamentary paper lately published shows that the
value of an ensign's commission in the infantry of the
lige is 4501. ; of a lieutenant's, 7001. ; of a captain's,
1,8001. ; of a major's, 3,2001. ; and of a lieutenant-
colonel's, 4,5001. In the cavalry the prices are consi-
derably higher. Now, such conditions of service put it
met of all question that men from the less opulent classes
or from the Middle ranks of life should, generally speak-
ing, ante: the army as a profession, although they
may be well qualified to excel in it. Moreover, another
mil rtune is induced. Men who can afford to pay
there sums can also, in all proLabilty, afford other ex-
penses, so that the Government pay of an officer, or that
remuneration which is presumed to recompense his la-
bour by providing him with a subsistence, is kept so
small as to answer no such purpose. That no officer be-
low the rank of captain can live on-his pay, or support
his position in the army without some means inde-
pendent of his profession, is a fact perfectly notorious.
Hence flow tvo evils. In the first place, it is quite im-
possible that men who thus, practically speaking, serve
without any fair recompense f r their work should
always render such good service as that which is secured
by good pay. The spirit of honour inherent in English
gentlemen does a great deal, and prevents, in fact, many
of the results which might be otherwise anticipated ;
but it nevertheless is evident that the military profes-
sion is placed altogether in a wrong position. It is made
a matter of amusement rather than of business, and, as
it can be quitted at any time, as it was entere i, by way
of sale and without loss, it is not pursued with that con-
tinuous zeal which in other callings leads to excellence
and success. In fact, where advancement can never be
insured by merit, and may usually be commanded by
money, it is out of all reason to expect, as a rule, any
laborious or systematic exertion. This is one disadvan-
tage contingent on the purchase system ; a second is,
that while the profession of arms is thus made accessory
to the pastime of the opulent, it can offer few openings
; to those who would be ready to follow it in a different
spirit. When it is said that meritorious serjeants ought
to be made ensigns, the answer is promptly forthcoming
that such promotion would only be their ruin, inasmuch
As they would find themselves in a society where some-
thing beyond professional excellence was required to
give position, and where the pay was quite inadequate
for its assumed purpose. In other professions the
career is open from the bottom to the top. Not
only may an attorney's clerk become Lerd Chan-
cellor, or an apothecary's boy a leading surgeon,
but every step in thelr respective advancements is
attended with proportionate gain. In the army,
though a deserving priva'.e may be promoted with
benefit to himself up to the rank of sergeant-major, he
cannot, except at great hazard, be transformed from a
sera eant-major into an ensign.
It is said that a serious obstacle to reform will arise
from the necessity of buying up those interests which
had been created under the existing usages ; and in the
Parliamentary return above queted the total value of all
the regimental commissions in the cavalry and infantry,
Guards included, is estimated at 8,068,5351. The sum
seems enormous, but there is still no reason for passive
acquiescence in the evils which confessedly exist. At
present we actually make the worst instead of the best
of our present means, for, while we recognise the prin-
ciple of seniority on the one side, and the principle of
purchase on the other, we perversely apply each of them
just where it can do the least good and the greatest
harm. If officers were promoted by seniority up to the
rank of captain, the limits of age thus provided could
hardly include much that was objectionable ; and, if pur-
chase were allowed only in those higher ranks where it
was most desirable that seniors should make way f.r
juniors, we should be gaining the advantage of that
system also, with its least amount of harm. But, as it
happens, we do just the reverse, for we push the pur-
chase system to its utniost in the subordinate ranks of
the army, and revert to the system of seniority in the
case of the higher ranks, where it tells most prejudicially.
To get rid of such a system as this any pecuniary sacri-
fice would be trivial, and at the present rate of rapid
promotion it would be very easy—by laying down the
simple principle that no one shall sell a commission who
has not bought it—to reduce the sum required to a very
manageable amount. If we were to respect existing in-
terests, but suffer no new vested interest to be created,
we might, especially in a time of war, soon be able to
deal with the whole system, and to render the British
array, if riot theoretically, at any rate practically, the
best service in the world.

DUBLIN, Thursday.—An inquest was held on Monday,
at Newry, on the body of Captain Kent, paymaster of
the Lancashire Militia, who was accidently poisoned by
a drug negligently supplied him as a medicine by the
assistant of an unlicensed apothelary. The jury found
the following verdict :—" That Aquilla Howe Kent
came by his death on the 24th instant, by reason of his
having drank a quantity of a poisonous drug, called
aconite, negligently supplied to him by Samuel Townley
Connor, assisted by James

TILE GAOL OF _NEE AT:..

A very important and interestiug report, by t'.e Rev.
John Davis, the ordinary of Newgate,. and which was
presented by him to the Court of Aldermen, and ordered
by them to be printed, upon the subject of the interior
arrangements of that prison, was published on Saturday.
The report extends to some length, but the following
extracts contain the more important portions of it. The
rev. gentleman, in the commencement of the report,
says :—" I have long been anxious to bring under no-
tice the consideration of the subject of the defective state
of the interior of Newgate as one of the most prominent,
if not the most prominent, and important gaol in the
empire, but have been induced to defer it by many con-
siderations." With regard to the security of the gaol,
Mr. Davis says :—"As regards the safe custody of pi i-
soners,Newgnee has for ages been proverbial, but the escape
of three convicts of inveterate habit and great crime dur-
ing the past ycar, and the full conviction of those who were
acquainted with all the circumstances that the three might
just as well have been thirty, has banished such illusions,
and shows how vigilant the superintendence of convicts
must be, iind how dangerous it is to place the smallest
confidence in their docility and apparent usefulness in
prison." He proceeds :—" The great and crying evil in
the gaol of Newgate is the want of sufficient means to
separate prisoners who may not be addicted to crime
from those inveterate offenders whose delight is to lead
others deeper and deeper into guilt, and particularly
those who may not be so deeply contamivated as them-
selves. The following classes of persons are frequently
confined in one ward :-1. A burglar, whose habits of
entering houses in the night-time, and his frequent hair-
breadth escapes, render him a diverting companion,
where he ono, in security to himself, describe his pro-
ceedings, as he can in Newgate, and where he becomes
a most dangerous and pernicious associate of others not
so deeply inured in crime. 2. A swell mob's-man,
dressed up as smart as fashionable clothes can make him,
generally with little or no education, but whose dexterity
is chiefly in his fingers and his cool impudence. 3. A.
bank clerk accused of forgery, but steeped to his chin in
licentiousness, profligacy, and vice, and ready to receive
any further instructions in iniquity. 4. A man of bru-
tal and dissolute habits, charged with the manslaughter
of his wife. 5. A receiver of stolen goods, the par-
chaser of the produce of burglaries and crimes of all
kinds, who has for years known all the most successful
thieves of every description, and is well recognised in
the ward where he is placed. 6. An utterer of forged
bank notes. 7. One of a gang of forgers, who for years
have lived and grown rich on the plunder of bankers,
while the dupes they hare employed have been convicted
and transported. 8. A young man charged with em-
bezzling a few shillings, and who is petrified and as-
t evaded with his companions around him. Let us just
imagine what eight such offenders, shut up for 20 hums
out of 24 together, have to talk about. From toe con-
struction of the wards of Newgate it is impossible to
overhear the conversation that takes place, but from
other sources I have been many times informed what it
is, and this; cleplerable as it is, cannot be altered, unless
the prison be differently constructed, or the number of
officers so increased as to render it possible to keep up
vigilant personal superintendence both by day and
night. The burglar will suggest bow they might
escape out of prison, and several of the same class of
offenders are always dangerous i❑ the same ward.
More than once hes a burglar gone to tke chimney

at night, and mounted as fiTr as—the iron bars would
let him; their removal he has attempted in vain, and
has been compelled to return. The dirt he has wade, and
the soot he• leaves on himself betray him, and he gets
punished for his temerity. But a prop zly•cotistructed
prison gives him no oppottnaity for waking such an ex-
perimeet, the wards or cells are warned by other appa-
ratus, and the fire-place and chimney are dispensed with.
The swell mob'••suaa relates his peculiar adventures; he
travels a good deal ; in fashionable ball rooms, is bank-
ing houses, in churches, and at races, or wherever mem-
bers of the upper classes meet, he is in attendance. lie
tells his companions how he has succeeded, he shows
them the wsy to acc napliih his purpose, and, if they
doubt him, he picks their own pockets to prove it to
them. He ii hem how to fit the attention of the
patty he wants to operate upon, and when that is
rivetted he i pints out the method that succeeds. The
reedier, r of st )1 n goods tells them that if they get off
wi bout punshment he mall be glad t) give them as
much as anybody f r what they gt. He has a crucible
al,veys hot, that it is foolish to run risks for a little
more, and be can do' the r bank notes for them. Iq
fact, he is carrying on his offences within the walls' of
the prison just as effect :ally as if he were at liberty, and
the amount of mischief that he does to incipient offen-
ders does not always end when the seducer is convicted
—it merely c)eninenc ■ should he be acquitted. Thu
utterer of forged notes goes through his adventures. lle
describes the disguises Le assumes—the dupes he has
empli yed, snd, what is worse, the great success he has
met with ; fur it seems fabulous to repeat what such
men say they have acquired. The effects produced by
these end vi or e communications—for it would be silly
to suppose that we can ever get at the worst—are la-
mentable and most disastrous. Humanity, justice, and

judgment alike cry aloud for the extermination of such
evils. They oely exist at florsemonger-laue and New-
gate, bet toe Surrey magistracy is. taking measures
to remedy them ; and, when this is done, Newgat.
will stand alone in the metropolis as a gaol of
association, subjected to the corruptions and contami-
nations of past ages, and unreformed among all the
new and valuable improvements carried out in the
other metropolitan prisons, " After some further re-
marks, the Ordinary makes the following observations
with reference to the ticket-of-leave system. He says :
" We have had, during the last year, a number of these
cases brought into Newgate for trial, and the reason of
their relapse into crime is easily trac!ahle to the ;vent of
• close observation as to those that, when released from
prison regain their poeition, and those who are no sooner
at liberty than they fail back to ways of dishonesty. Cii-
minals who reform, or, at least, do not return again to
prison, are those who deeply feel the degradation of
crime, and leave prison with good purposes of amend,
meat. They are received and encouraged in these hopes
by their friends—they are upheld in times of drifioulty
and distrust, and by a petiei.t coetinuance in well-doing
succeed. These remarks apply to a large number libe-
rated from Newgate. But, on the other wind, when, after
ever so long an imprisonment, an offender returns to cor-
rupt and depraved friends, whatever impression, how,..ver
sincere, may have been made in prison is soon obliterated
and destroyed, and they relapse into cruse. This has been
the explanaion of every case that I have examined where
the giving of tickets-of-leave has failed. With regard to
the first-class of offenders, they way be set free after un-
d rrgoiag 3 or 4 years' imprisonment, without any injury
to the publie rid with greet benefit to themselves and
their families, and with much relief to the prisons, which
require some deliverance. Much more inquiry is required
a-i to the antscedents'ef offenders before they are set at
liberty, and an investigation whether their friends aro fit
to receive tk.em, ready to help, a rat able to protect them
until they legato their posite n or esta;.,liela a new one
for themselves. There are not v anting many instances
where what are termed reformatories ~al-:e this part in th!
restoration of an offender wthers toe personal friends of
others are able to effec'ee If the mired and intention of a
liberated prisoner he right, and he find eerie such shelter
as an a-ylurn affords, he is net unlikely to do well, par-
ticularly if he be willing, and an opportunity he afforded
him to emigrate. But a prisoner liberated e lib a sincere
intention to do right, yet without friends to help bins, is
exactly described in thegospel, when thereformed person is
said to return to his house, and finds it empty, swept,
and garnished ; but having no companions suited to his
altered circumstances, and feeling twee y in his new po-
sition he taketh unto him seven other spirits more wicked
than himself, and the latter end of that Irian is worse
than the beginning. Habitual offenders cars be trusted
with their liberty only at great rick. We have no dif-
ficulty, from long experience at Newgate, in finding out
this class of offenders ; a few minutes conversation dis-
covers them, and once known there should be set before
them one of these two alternatives, personal reformation
or perpetual imprisonment. Sympathy and pity shown
to hypocritical penitents leads to indignation on the par t
of the public at the misplaced and injudicious kindness ;
hit the liberation of others who can rightly use that
blessing ought not to be impeded by the ingratitude arid
depravity of others. Bet the Ellen and ten year men
will now soon be exhausted, and tickets-of-leave will be

sparingly used among those sentenced to penal servi-
tude. The conduct of a prisoner in gaol should never,
by itself, be taken as sufficient ground for the extension
of pardon. It may form one element in the cJnsidera-
Lion of this favour—by itself it is very deceptive. Under
the restraint of a prison a small part only of the real
e'aaracter is developed, aad the part there disclosed may
be nothing but hypocrisy. To act upon such evidence
must lead to disappointment, and extensively damage
what I cannot but think a wise and discreet principle.
It is singular that as yet no female convict to whom a
ticket-of-leave Las been given has abused this privilege
so as to excite public indignation." The public is aware
ttpt since this report has been made by Mr. Davis ex-
trUsive alterations have been projected in the formation
of the gaol, which are being proceeded with, in order to
remedy the great evils referred to by the reverend
Ordinary.

His Eminence Cardinal Wiseman has acceded to a
solicitation made by the commitee of the Marylabone
Literary and Scientific, Institution, to deliver a lecture
for its benefit, on Wednesday, April 23. The subject is to
be—The Influence of Words on Thought and on Civili•
8 Ition.

THE DISSENTERS' MARRIAGES BILL—The new bill
brought in by Mr. Pellatt, Mr. Cheetham, and Mr. Had-
field, enacts that no notice of marriage under the pro•
visions of the existing acts shall be read or published
before the Poor-Law guardians, or be transmitted to
their clerks by the registrar. Every notice of marriage
must be accompanied by a solemn 'declaration by one of
the parties that there is no lawful hindrance thereto.
Notice of marriage without licence must be affixed in the
office of the superintendent. ,

TAB AUSTRIAN ORDER OF THE STAR.—The Austrian
order of the Star, the insignia of which have just been
presented to the Empress of the French by Count dr,
Buol, was founded in 1668 by the wife of Leopold I.
of Austria, in honour of the Holy Cross, on the occa-
sion of a fire that took place ie the Imp.-rial castle, and
in which a crucifix remained completely intact. The
insignia are composed of a double eagle surmounted
by the Imperial Crown, and having in the centre a
blue enamelled cross, coming out of a golden heart,
round which is the name of the Saviour. The upper
part of the escutcheon is attached to a white enamelled
ribbon with the inscription "Sallie et Gloria." This
order is not generally conferred, except at the fetes of
the Discovery or of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross,
and exclusively on ladies of the highest rank. The
superior patroness of the order is now the Empress
Dowager Maria Caroline, widow of Francis 1., who,
having been raised to that dignity on her Becebeion ti
the Tluone, preuerveo the title for life.