The Sun.
London, England, 1869-02-01 00:00:00

LAW AND POLICE,

A BILL AGAINST MR. BRIGHT.—In the Court of Appeal
on Saturday, before the Lord Chancellor, the case of
Moxon v. Bright was heard. A bill was filed against
Messrs. John Bright (now the Right Hon. John Bright,
Aix.) and Jacob Bright, and against a Mr. Hall, for an
account of the profits made by them respectively by the use
of a patent for looms claimed by the plaintiff. Vice-Chancel-
lor Giffard dismissed the bill, and hence the appeal. The
Lord Chancellor said that the plaintiff's remedy, if any,
was clearly at law, and the appeal must therefore be dis-
missed with costs.

A POINT OF CRIMINAL LAW.—In the Court of Criminal
Appeal the case of William Summers was considered
by the justices. He was sentenced at the Middle-
sex Sessions to five years' penal servitude for
injuring a policeman, and it was suggested that the sen-
tence should have been for seven years, under the statute
27 and 28 Vict., which enacted that the least sentence of
penal servitude awarded after a previous conviction should
be for seven years. The indictment did not contain any
allegation of a previous conviction of felony, and the
court held that the sentence was right.
THE 1 ONDON IRISH VOLUNTEERS.—A rule has been
granted in the Bail Court against the printer and
Publisher of the West En-2 News for a libel reflecting
on the London Irish Volunteers and their colonel, the
Marquis of Donegan. The article objected to professed give
an account of the recent funeral of a member of the corps,
and denounced the company in the most unmeasured terms.
The matter having been brought to the notice of the
marquis, he instructed his solicitor to demand a retracts.
tion and an apology. A retractation on the part of the
writer was inserted, but no apology on the part of the pro.
prietors, and, this being deemed insufficient, the rule wa'
applied for.

PENSION TO MRS. LINCOLN.-111 the Senate, at
Washington, a resolution has been offered and referred to
the Committee on Pensions, providing that a life pension
be granted to Mrs. Lincoln, as widow of the commander.
in-chief of the armies of the United States.

A Goitrous CEREMONY.— In the year 1794, oil
he 3rd of August, Mary Wragg, relict of a City merchant,
resident in Beckenham, departed this life, leaving behind
her a bequest to the poor of the parish, who were annually
to receive bread, fiour, and coals on the 28th of January,
on which day also a dinner was to be provided for the
vicar, wardens, and tradesmen out of money devised fur
that purpose. These benefits were dependent on her
coffin, which is deposited in a vault under the church,
being yearly dusted on the day in question. Should this
interesting operation be omitted on any occasion the
bequest passes to the adjoining parish of Bromley. Thurs-
day being the 28th January, the sexton, in the presence
of the vicar, the Rev. F. Chalmers, the wardens, Messrs.
Purvis and Coodheart, and a large number of spectators,
descended into the vault and dusted the coffin, which is of
peculiar construction, the lid n.lt being flat, but ridged
like a church roof. It Is made of cedar wood, strongly
bolted together. The gifts were then distributed. to the
poor, and in the evening the vicar, wardens, and tradesmen
diked at the George Hotel.--South London Journal.

SPIRIT OP THE-PDBLIC JOTTRITILLS.

the
• The Times, in discussing the return just fssaed by
Poor-law Board, observes that nothing is mere iroportanl
at the present juncture than that the real facts relating to
pauperism should be generally known. There is, o
example, one serious consideration, which is receiving dot,
recognition in other departments of the Governinent,
but is far too much overlooked in the case of the Pool
rates. We hear discussions on all hands of the di'•
culty of levying the present rates and the impossibilitl
of increasing them, but we hear very little of the
practicability of reducing them. We are looking fot,
relief from the weight of Imperial taxation throngi
retrenchment in expenditure ; is there no oPP°,..irtili;
for a similar process with respect to local taxation? vBr
we not make the two ends meet by saving money rathe
than by raising more ? We do not venture to say that the
whole difficulty can be surmounted by this simple proneBg,,,!
but the return we published on Saturday renders it din;
cult to resist the conclusion that a portion of our exPend,l•
ture on the poor is nowconducted on a most extravagant seme•
In commenting about a month ago upon a paper read before
the Social Science Association, we noticed that the chief in
crease in pauperism appeared to be in the recipients of out
door relief. The present return affords astartling confolBlB.
tion of this surmise. Except on official authority it would
have been hardly credible that in twenty-one metropolitan
unions, embracing about three-fourths of London, the totsl
sum expended on outdoor relief has increased within the
last nine years about 130 per cent. In the year ending
Lady-day, 1859, the expense of outdoor relief in these
unions amounted to £llB,OOO ; in the year ending LOP
day, 1868, it reached the amount of more 0781:
£270,000. The rate of increase, moreover, aPP,ear;
alarmingly accelerated within the last three years. Win:
the seven years between 1859 and 1866 the total bad rise'
from £llB,OOO to £154,000, or at the rate of not much
.
more than £5,000 a year. But during 1867 and 1868 07
increase amounted to £60,000 a year. We may obsen
it is not surprising there should have been a sudden
crease between 1866 and 1867, though the amount apPeBll,
extravagant. It was the year of the commercial POO
/
and of the consequent cessation of work in the East °
London. For instance, according to the comParati':
return of metropolitan pauperism published last wee-,
whereas the number of outdoor paupers in the thin'
week of January 1866 was 74,384, in the correspondinf
-week of 1867 it was 132,756. But there was no such
exceptional cause at work between 1867 and 1868, and t
is difficult to attribute the enormous increase in the e:c.
penditure to anything but extravagant administration.
In fact, the sum total of the figures is beyond any exP!,!:
nation. Pauperism in the metropolis has undoubtedly
a
increased during the last nine years ; but it is impossibif
to believe that the legitimate recipients of outdoor rell3oe
have increased at a rate in any degree approaching
per cent., which is the rate of increase in the expenditure'
The Telegraph refers to the important resolution which
n
the Ministers have adopted with respect to the 161/1,
Convocation. Her Majesty's Ministers have adopted 8.
important resolution with respect to the Irish Convocatilt
That assembly is legally incapable, not merely of mating
canons, but even of meeting for the purposes of discuss'?„
without the Royal assent ; and, as we announced 0184
time ago, an application has been made for be
time
requisite permission to resume the long'. discontinued
council of the Irish Church. The request has n°‘y
been declined. The Ministers - having regard tt:
the manifest objects of the applicants, and st
the fact that Convocation represents the clergy io a
inadequately, and the laity not at all-have cletermil
that the Crown cannot properly be advised to convene tot
nearly obsolete body. If it fairly reflected the opinions °
the Protestant Episcopalians-if the Convocation were
desired for the purposes of legitimate debate-there 58a
,
be no doubt that the present Government would readily
afford the required facilities. Mr. Gladstone and hel,
e
colleagues are most assuredly not the men to opPoseframe
and full public discussion with reference to their ftlte7rt
Irish policy ; on the contrary, they anxiouslY
information and suggestions from those who are Prl
cipally interested. A considerable body among the Irish,
clergy and laity see the prudence of making tell;
but another party, including unhappily many nf 'to
bishops and dignitaries of the Church, will not listen
any overtures of peace, and are resolved to fight out thell;
quarrel to the bitter end. What benefit can P°B3lo 0.
accrue from frequent repetitions of the cry of No 5
render ?" Possibly the attitude of stubborn resist8„ce
0
may have had some effect before the recent appeal to
0.
nation ; but that appeal was distinctly made and As
tinctly answered ; and it is now too late to insist on
status quo ante. The party who make snell,„al
demand rival the Bourbons in their celehrap
inability to learn or to forget: But, fortunateii
for the future of the Irish Church, there is anic't iO3:0
more rational party among her friends, whcf, jos
that the time for negotiation with the Governulen" „la
arrived. Their policy may, perhaps, appear weak ;if
injudicious to those who look on politics as a game a cbe to
in which each player seeks merely victory,
studiously conceals his intentions. But the future still),
of the Irish Church involves far more serious consich,t,
tions. Iler true friends are not those who seek to ret°,t
an obviously untenable position, but those who aCCiLree
accomplished facts and earnestly consider bow a• tta
Church can be most efficiently organised. Of that beo
and there'°to
spirit there have recently been many satisfactory 512ers
toms, and it is clear that the more thoughtful defers
'
of the Establishment recognise the necessity of confer°
and concession.
0
ar e
In alluding to the disclosures recently made at the e-cip
City trial, the Morning Herald remarks on Mr. EdnrBt of
proceedings, and says that the fortunes and reputationo
Mr. Edwards's employers were alike sacrificed, while, as
h 6
himself confessed, he was paying a year's salary °d
managing partner by whom he had been introduced' ed.
during whose brief reign all these losses were incurs
,-
as
Mr. Edwards, therefore, stands before the world as s ;W,
who, paid on a scale of princely liberality by-one fain
was not above accepting thousands of pounds 036
the other ; who, while professedly watching over
interests of the firm, was receiving presents fromworith
whose proceedings he ought to have scrutinised
~jeg
peculiar jealousy. At the same time he was subsidirotl
the managing partner, from purely large-11:11 had
beneficence. But amid all that has happened be and
suffered nothing. The salary which he had earne'ol
was to have earned by such services as we have deeccooa
was credited to him in the books of the firm, and
tiatil
it an exceptionally Egli rate of interest was Paid' led'
the company was formed and affairs were °verb° 00
Then, wise in his generation, he withdreW a leo
£20,000 to which he had been declared entitled, ned,
his good deeds towards Overend and Gurney unPnblisorch'
until a recital of them was extorted from him by a 6: 000
ing examination before the Lord Mayor and Sir rille the
Gabriel. Well might Mr. Serjeant Ballantine 1.1% /01
language he employed, and well also would it Piton'
society if the real authors of these multitudinous el.; 00
ties could be made answerable for the wrongs the"ditetr
inflicted alike upon the members of the old firm, the ~blio•
tors of the limited company, and upon the general P" ri
The Star is glad to find the advocates of the Inuitiacoltl°
reformers of the metropolis assuming a firm detnete the
No doubt there will be jealousies to surmount beifn'njoo'
municipal system can be fairly carried out in -11-I,are
The Vestry mind will stoutly resist the approaching nmaiol!
The Board of Works will be hostile. p The Corpq-ndh,
of London, too, may be expected to exhibit an unfrlentlie;
feeling owards the proposal to establish ;poll
municipalities which may trench upon the Incf,,Thicit.
71
of efficiency which that Corporation, because it is a -108.
pality, has hitherto enjoyed in local adminstration• pet,
all these obstacles may be got over with a little 011;4
because. however much any local or central bodY,IV
disposed to resist on minor grounds the muntelleif the
scheme, no one can deny the greatness and goodness, Olt
design. The policy of the promoters of the proiec;a3ol,
therefore be to secure prominence for what all vatis% ol'°()
to he good, and to depress into obscurity those points clot
which differences are likely to arise. And the only sv'''ileo
this is to carry on the work with a marked conciliatoryb
for all parties, interests, and even prejudices white „clic);
come, orthreaten to come, into collision with the 11eVoci_0
upon which we may hope to see the government of A thefo
remodelled. Let every one who is tempted to regar.% ol„
projects with a jealous eye reflect how much better
be to secure any minor interests which are at stake,
ranging terms with the promoters of the scheme %all, 'it
Government which has shown itself so friendly'
veto, for the sake of these minor interests, a cbange pliodf
must be fraught with so much good, even to those grass
special interests or amour propre it may for the Tv'
disconcert. 980
de
The Daily News declares that the British JO,?ter
tow,: •
scanty justice from the public opinion of grea:4l
but it is a public disadvantage that the farm
class have not taken a larger part in ot bp,
affairs. affairs. Hitherto, however, their chief Wri,resol°gt
been that of some means of organised exit Ol
and that want seems to have been at 4oe'are
effectually supplied. The Charnbers of Agrien•,,ce---,,lia
fewer than seventy of which are in active existence
already exerting a most important influence ounce
opinion. They are bringing the fresh opint°ll t 3°o
ployers of rural labour to bear upon the greabriaept
problems of the age ; and they are luteiticp
out the strength and vigour of that
,a aibef
element in public life. But one thing: ,teot
hope for from the Chambers of Agriculture S' cerin‘el/
will conquer representative and responsible g 4,9
for the counties. Mr. Adam! said that the 1)05" of 160'
by the Chambers had changed the prospec,ts_f
lation on questions of local taxation. " Instea!i;
culturists being a quiescent body, content wltl.ont,
interchange of feeling between landlord and te.' seveero
were now claiming over the whole country li fari,r,ot.•
centres to take part in legislation." But what ti'‘'t
want is not merely to take part in legislatio!ir`Lespecald
minster, but in the local legislation in the" ricer, e 9
counties. They have their local liberties to colat
they are buckling to the fight. N°W „ ill
have begun to discuss national question' tat° -it t 4
Chambers of Agriculture,'and to exert an imPor sablnott
enco over their settlement, they will not 10 for the
have their local qnestions discussed and settledr to soli
They have stood long enough in stall' pulta,laut
landlords •, and the Liberal opinion of IDaY In tA~
welcome them and help them in any effort they-0.4507C
to assert their manhood, and to talc() t4F4:19-"
r4qlt iAtt? their Wll /1414

unNALO.