The Sun.
London, England, 1858-03-24 00:00:00

loaded as it wag, and in the absence of the passen-
gers the devastation had been committed by the
native servants of the Peninsular and Oriental
Company.

PROSECUTION FOR A LIBEL ON THE
EMPEROR OF THE FRENCH.

Yesterday afternoon a Polish refugee, named
Stanislas Tchorzewski, keeping a bookseller's shop
at 39, Rupert-street, Haymarket, was brought be-
fore Mr. Jardine at the Bow-street Police-court,

upon a warrant executed by Inspector Whither, of
the detective force, charging him with having, on
the Ist of March inst., unlawfully printed andpub-
lished a certain false, scandalous, malicious, sedi-
tious, and defamatory libel, concerning his Ma-
jesty the Emperor of the French, with intent to
incite divers persons to assassinate his said Ma-

jesty.
Mr. Bodkin conducted the prosecution on the

part of the Crown, and Mr. Leverson, an attorney,
aqended for the defendant.
The alleged libel is a small pamphlet in French,
bearing the signatures of " Le Comite de la Com-
mune Revolutionnaire, Felix Pyat, Beason, and
A. Tallandier," and to which the attention of the
Home Secretary was called in the ,Sun of the Ist
inst.

Mr. Bodkin said—These proceedings are taken
by the direction of her Majesty's Attorney-General
against the prisoner at the bar, who has been ap-
prehended on the charge of publishing and selling
the pamphlet which I hold in my hand. It is
written in the French language, and like another
which has been also the subject of a late prosecu-
ton, it teaches, enforces, and justifies the crime of
assassination. The prisoner, although a foreigner,
resides in England, and enjoys the protection of
our English laws ; and it is not to be tolerated
that a person in such a situation should break and
defy those laws with impunity. I shall prove that
the publication in question was purchased at the
prisoner's house, with five or six other copies, the
same having been advertised as on sale at his place
of business. I.shall have several passages of the
book translated, and when your worship has seen
what the character of the publication really is, I
doubt not you will feel it your duty to hold the
prisoner to bail on the present charge.
JonathanWhicher deposed thathe was an inspector
of the Loudon detective police. On the Ist of the
present month he went to a small book-shop in
Rupert-street, called the " Librairie Polonaise."
There was a boy there, and the prisoner came in
afterwards. Witness asked prisoner if he was the
proprietor of the shop, and he replied " Yes."
Saw several copies of the work now produced lying
about on the counter, and askcd the price of them.
The prisoner said the large ones were 3d., and the
others 2d. each. Witness then purchased three of
each size, and paid him is. 3d. for them. He re-
quested a memorandum, as they were not for him-
self, upon which prisoner wrote as follows on a
strip of papers—" 39, Rupert-street. Lettre au
Parlement et it la Theme ; six copies."
The memorandum and pamphlet were both pro-
duced, and Sergeant Rogers, an officer of the C
division of police, translated the passages upon
which the prosecution was founded. They were to
the following effect :
" Has Bonaparte attempted at the Court, as at
the Assembly, as at the law, as at the people I
forced every resistance andevery right, assassinated
citizens and representatives, arrested, exiled, trans.
ported, executed the defenders of the Constitution,
and compelled the remainder to vote with the
bayonet at their ribs ? Is all this a fable, a story,
or a dream ? Have we dreamt it, invented it, ima-
gined it for the requirements of our opinions, or of
our passions, as mentioned in the Walewaki note ?
Is it a real, recent, patent, public, historical; and
judicial fact ?—undeniable by the author himself,
who boasts of it—crying aloud and bleeding in the
memory of all, demanding vengeance from God and
man, deserving chastisement from below as from
above—from everybody and every arm, unpunished
because triumphant . . . At the ordinary
assizes the garter would rise to his neck (serve to
hang him). This Emperor is an assassin. Then
the question is, if an assassin, who is also an Em-
peror, may be killed ? A great question we know,
ever ridiculous, pregnant with yes' and no' ac-
cording to place and time, an old question, having
all its beard and teeth (arrived at maturity) like the
Supreme being—an especially idle question, which
arose with the first tyrant, and can only be solved
with the last. Constitutional kings are reported
inviolable, they having responsible ministers :
yet they sometimes pay with their persons ; but are
tyrants also inviolable ? There are some of the
worst species in the oldest and most odious accep-
tation of the word—such an one, for example, who
would have fallen under the guillotine had he not
by the forge of murder risen above it—had he been
less criminal, less assassin. Let us suppose that a
_Ling of Enbi—a—thi. bus been seen—weary of his
council, of his Parliament, of Eis press—of all the
rights acquired without contest in our time—took'
it into his head on a fine December night also to
make a coup d'etat, to outrage all public liberties,
to stifle them all in the blood of the people, to be
what is c tiled a perfect Emperor. What would
the English people do if they could? What they
have already done. We will no longer discuss the
right of regicide. In the country of Charles I. it is
superfluous. . . . . Are not ten thousand
muskets and a hundred cannons worth four bombs
They are of the same value with him. It is he,
always be, who presides at the executions from
which Rome never ceases to bleed. It is he, and he
alone, the chief and author of invasion and occupa-
tion, of civil and religious despotism ; the enemy,
we say, the confirmed enemy, forewarned by his
own act—the pi incipal and mortal enemy—the
enemy armed and encamped in the bosom of the
country. Has not every citizen the right and the
duty to serve his country—to strike the enemy
wherever he may be—say ? And yet the Italian
patriots did not attack him in London, where he
anie as if to insult by his presence all the pro-
scribed. They respected the neutral and free coun-
try. They would not stain the hospitable soil with
such blood. They made the attempt on Bonaparte
in his own country, on his own ground, in his
camp, amongst and in spite of his soldiers and his
police, as if better to prove to him this mathema-
tical truth, this word of Gospel spoke by the very
Lamb of resignation, ' Who lives by the swordshall
perish by the sword.' The Italians, then, are not
assassins, they are combatants. They have rendered,
tooth for tooth, grenade for grenade. They are pri-
soners whose throats the savages are to cut. They
ate vanquished—they will not be punished. The
enemy may kill but cannot judge them. All the
poison of Cheix d'Est Ange can never tat nigh them.
They may die, but cannot be disgraced. Punish-
ment for them, disgrace for others. They die for
their country. As for us, unfortunately, we have
no pretension to the merit of their work. We have
not the honour to participate in their enterprise.
But the cock would crow thrice if a French voice
did not salute them before the judgment-seat.
Friends, unknown, but not misunderstood, we
salute you ! You shall be avenged. If our means
differ, our cause is the same."
Mr. Bodkin, observing that the passages just
quoted sufficed for the present, now asked that the
prisoner might be committed for trial. A full tran-
slation of the pamphlet would be produced at the
trial.

Mr. Leverson applied for a remand to Saturday,
to enable him to prepare his client's defence. Re
should oppose the committal on legal grounds,
apart from which he regarded the proceeding as an
atrocious encroachment upon the liberty of the
press. And why was his client arrested on a
warrant ? He suspected and dreaded the facility
with which warrants were now granted in these
cases,- while every obstacle was raised when they
were sought to bring ordinary criminals to justice.
Mr. Bodkin—The warrant is .a mere form. It
remained in the officer's hands until the prisoner
was wanted here, and then he was sent for.
Mr. Jardine—Besides, it is notorious that in half
the assault cases heard in every police-court in
London the defendants are brought up by war-
rants. It is the common practice. If the client's
attorney tells me he is not ready with his defence,
that is ground for a remand, and his application
shall be granted. It is a case in which I can take
Mr. Leverson said he had one of the bail present.
A singular looking individual, with long hair
over his shoulders, and braided coat (evidently a
foreigner), then stepped into the witness-box.
Mr. Bodkin—Ai e you the printer of the pamph-
let which forms the subject of this prosecution ?
Witness—Yes I am.
Mr. Bodkin—Then I object to this person's bail.
Mr. Leverson—Then you will drive me to send
for the greatest philosopher of the age, John Stuart
Mill. He will be bail,
and I will send to the
India House for him. His name will live when
Derby's and Palmerston's are forgotten.
philosopher of the age ?
Mr. Bodkin—Will you oblige me with the pri-
vate address of the greatest
Mr. Leversou did not know it, but he would
undertake to fetch Mr. Mill within 24 hours. He
(Mr. Levers* looked upon these proceedings with
awe—with dread for the liberty of the subject, and
Mr. Bodkin was unable tc understand why men
guilty
the purity of even jlf:
of printing, publishing, and promulgating
doctrines which every right-minded Christian must
loathe and detest, should be treated in the tender
drawing-room style suggested by the prisoner's
He did not oppose the remand, although
object of it was apparent enough.
theat tr rh n e ey
prisoner was then committed in default of
bail, and left in the prison van.