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

THE BISHOP OP GIBRALTAR.

A singular accident befel the Bishop of Gibraltar whilst
travelling iu Asia Minor by train. The bishop's and
thirteen other carriages became detached from the loco-
motive, owing to the coupling chains having parted. The
engine went on, and the detached carriages, being on an
incline, ran back two or three miles. Fortunately the
ninety-and-nine who were thus left in the wilderness
escaped all further injury, and the half-famished travel-
lers, after fighting their way through a pack of starved
jackals, and after a delay of four hours, were picked UD by
a locomotive

FOREIGN NOTES.

LYNCH LAW IN AMEItICA.

The three men who were hanged by a mob at Indiana
had been given up by the Canadian Government, under the
Extradition Treaty, on the charge of robbery. They were
accused, and, according to the Daily News correspondent,
with justice, of having committed the last of a series of
robberies on railway trains containing the strong boxes of
the express companies. In this case the express agents
were ready for them with a guard, and the attack was
repulied, but the conductor of the train was shot in the
knee, and badly wounded, and has since died. The robbers
escaped to Canada, where they were discovered and arrested,
and delivered up by Lord Monk, on receiving a pledge from
the United States that they should be delivered in safety
to the Indiana authorities. This was all that Mr. Seward
promised. He could guarantee that they should be lodged
with the State Governor of Indiana, but not that they
should be kept in safe custody until the trial. The
responsibility of what followed rests, therefore, with the
local government. The prisoners were lodged in
the strongest prison, but the sheriff took no precautions
against the attack of the Ibichers, though he was aware
it was menaced. . .

The Daily News correspondent has no hope that the,
perpetrators will be brought to justice. The organisation
which committed this- outrage has been in existence a long
time, and is still formidable, though its numbers have
diminished of late. It was first formed in consequence of
lax administration of criminal justice in Indiana. Brigand-
age in fact was rife in the provinces. A number of
families with houses, farms, and other outward evidences
of respectability, living in various parts of the
State, but bound together by a regular organisation
of crime, planned robberies in concert, executed
them in large bands, and when any of their number
was arrested, helped them to escape justice by employing
counsel, bribing witnesses to keep out of the way, and
even, it is asserted, corrupting the public prosecutor by
threats of retribution at the polls when he came to be re-
elected. Their favourite depredation was to rob the
night express trains of the company's strong boxes. It
was as much as any man's life was worth to appear against
them in the courts. "At last the public could stand it no
longer, and the 'regulators,' as they called themselves,
were organised, and went to work with a vengeance, after
giving lair notice to all thieves and plunderers to quit the
State. After a reasonable time had elapsed, they seized
and executed such of the more notorious criminals as
failed to heed the warning. 'Within the last two years
they have hanged about thirty persons, of whom some
were undoubtedly innocent ; but the great majority of
them were thieves and, cut-throats of the worst kind."
They justify their proceedings on the ground of neces-
sity, but indiscriminate hanging by mobs, even when the
worst criminals are got rid of, cannot be tolerated
for any length of time in a civilised community.
The public has at. length become alarmed, and has resolved
to regulate the " regulators." The root of the evil, how-
ever, lies in the defective administration of the law ; the
judicial system has broken down, the officials are
wretchedly underpaid, and the right men will not under-
take the right places. Lynching will be difficult to put
down unless the proper substitute be found. In this
instance the " committee " gave timely warning of its
intention to lynch the robbers. The whole story reveals
a strange case of civilisation running wild again.