The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-03 00:00:00

thcs town at their mercy. With far more reason
mi ght the chief officers of barracks claim the right
to suspect, to summon to their presence, and to
imprison oil suspicion, those whom they thought
likely to injure the morals of their men.
The case before us, u °twit standing the remarks
of the judge (the remarks, we mean, relating to
the character'of the facts which were to go to the
jury) appears to us one on which an English jury,
unhampered by direction from the bench, would
not long hesitate. Apart from University Charters
and Customs, the facts disclose a gross outrage on
the liberty of a respectable young woman. There
mighthave been reasonable occasion for the kindly
admonitions and warnings of a grave ecclesiastic to
a young girl who was off for a not very judicious
spree, but the idea of fourteen days' imprisonment,
on such a purely constructive offence, constructive
suspicion, we might say, is an outrage on common
sense. EMMA KEMP, the plaintiff, was so far as
all the evidence gives, a respectable young dress-
maker, living at home with her mother. Not a
single fact was adduced to throw suspicion on her
character. Her offence was only that for which she
was sentenced to the fourteen days' confine-
ment—and the offence amounted to no more
than this,—that on the invitation of Mr.
WILLIAM GRAHAM, who proposed to have a
frolic on taking his B.A. degree, she and a number
of other persons were going with him to a ball, at
Shelford, in an omnibus. The house where it was
to be held was one of orderly character, and all the
attendant circumstances went to prove that nothing
more than a " lark" was intended.

Of course, we may admit with all parties the
impropriety of the damsel's joining such a party;
the judge asked whether it was likely the young
man would ever make her fair and honourable pro-
posals, and if so, that the inference could not be to
her advantage. But, on the other hand, if a young
dressmaker, flattered by the request of one of her
superiors, was willing to have a little mirth at his
expense, is it fair to assume that she had any
thought whatever beyond that of enjoying
the fun ? The evidence seems, indeed, as
conclusive as in such a case it well could be, that
nothing commonly understood by the word immoral
in this reference, was contemplated by any party,
anti a very slight investigation might have satis-
fied any one but a Proctor, or a Vice-Chancellor,
that this was the case.

But, allowing the Vice-Chancellor all the legal
authority he could claim, is he not responsible for
using it with ordinary discretion ? That, he did,
in this instance, the jury could not ;be con-
vinced. The Judge did what he could to get
a "yes," or a "no," from them on the question

Did the Vice-Chancellor hear and examine
the plaintiff, and was he satisfied of the
matte,:'s alleged in respect of the proctors P
That they had found her in a carriage and took her
up, reasonably suspecting she was there for im-
moral purposes, j and that the plaintiff had been so
in company with undergraduates for idle and dis-
orderly purposes, as alleged by the proctors.'"
To question the jury could not say yes or no, but
they could, and did unanimously, express their
opinion that the Vice-Chancellor should have made
further inquiries before he imprisoned the plaintiff.
We quite agree with the jury. Taking the law
respecting his powers, as the Court says it stands,
he had no moral, social, equitable, and, we

hope, no legal right to imprison a British
subject, to injure her character, and her health,
too, it appears, by the cold and wretched fare of
his prison, without the fullest inquiry. The in-
quiry, too, would have been easy, as it seems that
both she and her mother had worked at houses of
members of the University. We do not see the
necessity for the University authorities having

power over the inhabitants of the town in which

the University is situated ; they might effect all
their objects by dealing with their own alumni. In
this case, Mr. GRAHAM, who gave his evidence in a
very manly straightforward way, was ready to
bear his own responsibility, and there it ought to
have stopped. The grievance is that the authori-
ties, not content with this, without a particle of
evidence, and after a most indolent and perfunctory
inquiry deprived an innocent British subject of her
liberty. If such really be the laws of England,
then we cannot stand by the old answer—for we do
wish to change them.