The Sun.
London, England, 1867-05-31 00:00:00

Te!or Hugo and the Fenian.

In compliance •with a request made to him from
Dublin, M. Victor Hugo has addressed the follow.
ing letter to England on the subject of the execu-
tion of Burke and other Fenians

There is anguish in Dublin. Sentences of death
follow fast one upon another. A letter now before
us says :—" The gallows is about to be erected, first
for General Burke ; next will come Capt. APAfferty
and Capt. ISPClure ; then three others, Kelly, Joke,
and Cullinan. There is not a moment to spare.
Women, ycung girls implore you. Will my letter
reach you in time?" • We read this, and do not be-
lieve it. They tell us, the scaffold is rcafly. We
reply, that is not possible—Caicraft bas nothing to
do with politics. It is bad enough that he exists
apart from it. No ; the politie.al scaffold is not
possible in England. When England hailed Kos-
suth, it was not that she might imitate the gibkts
of Hungary—it was not for the purpose of re,,ew-
ing the hangings of Sicily that England glorified
Garibaldi. Else what would signify the barrahs of
London and of Southampton ? Put an end, if it
was so, to all your Polish, Greek, and Italian com-
mittees.

No; England, in 18G7, will not execute Ireland.
That Eliz-tbe• h will not behead that Mary Stuart.

The nineteenth century exists.

Hang Burke ! Impossible ! Go, copy Tallaferro
killing John. Brown, Chacon killing Lopez, Geff-
rard killing young I)elorme, Ferdinand killing
Pisacane!
What! after the English Revolution ! after the
French Pv2volution ! In the great and luminous
epoch in which we live! So then nothing has been
said, nothing written, nothing thought, nothing
proclaimed,' nothing done, within the last forty
y ears.

What ! such things shall be done in the presence
of us who are more than spectators, who are wit-
nesses ! What ! the old savage penalties shall still
subsist ! to this hour such sentences as these shall be
pronounced, " Such a one, on such a day, you shall
be drawn on a hurdle to the place of your punish-
ment ; then your body shall be cut into four quar-
ters, which shall be at the disposal of her Majesty-,
who will command to be done with them according
to her good pleasure !" What !on a May or June
morning, to-day, to-morrow, a man, because he has
a political or national faith, because he has struggled
for that faith, because be has been vanquished, shall
be bound with cords, shall have a black cap drawn
over his face, and be hanged and strangled until
death ensue ! No ! you are not England for that.

You have at present this advantage over France,
that you are a free nation. France, as great as .
England, is not mistress of herself, and that is a sad_
diminution. You pride yourself upon it. Be it so.
But beware. It is possible to go back a century in
one day. To recede even to the political gallows !
You, England ! Then erect a statue. to ,Teffe'rys.
Meanwhile, we-will erect a statue to Voltaire..
Do you give it a thought ? You have Sheridan
and Fox who founded Parliamentary 'eloquence ;
you have Howard, who ventilated the prison and
made punishment merciful; you have Wilberforce,
who abolished slavery ; you have Rowland Hill, who
vivified postal circulation ; you have Cobden, who
created Free Trade ; you have given to the world
the colonising impulse ; you have constructed the
'first Transatlantic cable ; you are in full possession
of political manhood ; you exercise the grand right
of citizenship magnificently in all its forms ; you
have a free press, free speech, freedom of conscience,
freedom of association, free trade, household free-
dom, personal freedom ; you are about, through re-
form, to arrive at universal suffrage; you are_ the.
land of the vote, the poll, the meeting ; you are the
mighty people of the habeas corpus. Well, then, to
all this splendour add this, Burke hanged : and pre-
cisely because you are the greatest of free peoples
you becothe the least.
It is unknown what a ravage one drop of shame
makes in glory. From being first you sink-to be
last. What means this inverte 1 ambition? What
means this thirst for degradation ? In presence of
these gibbets, worthy of the insanity of George 111.,
the Continent would no longer recognise the august
Great Britain of progress. The nations would turn
away their face. A frightful blunder against civi-
lisAion would have been committed, and by whom ?
By England! illigubrions surprise !' Stuuor of
indignation! "What more hideous than a sun whence
all at once night should issue ?
No, no, no ! I repeat, you are not England for
that.

You are England to set an example to the nations
of progress, work, initiative, truth, right, reason,
justice, the tpajesty of freedom. You are England
to present the spectacle of life, and not the example
of death.

Europe recalls you to your duty.
To speak at this moment hi behalf of these con-
demned men is to come to the aid of Ireland; it is
also to come to the aid of England.

The one is in danger as regards her autonomy ;
the other as regards her glory.
The gibbets will not be erected.
Burke, M'Clure, M'Afferty, Kelly, Joice, Culli-
nan shall not die. Wives and daughters who have
written to a proscribed man, it is needless to make
yourselves black robes. Look with confidence on
your children sleeping in ;their cradles. It is a
woman, dressed in mourning who rules England.
A mother will not make orphans, a widow will not
make widows. VICTOR 1110.
llauteville llouse, May 28.

•
BROMPTON CONSUMPTION 110:5P17 AL.
The annual court of governors of this charity
was hell yesterday, the Rev. Sir 11. Foulis, Bart.,
in the chair. After the usual preliminary business,
the report of the committee of management for the
past year was read by the secretary. In this their
26th annual report the committee expressed satisfac-
tion at the amount of benefit conferred by the
charity through the medium of its 210 beds; of in-
patients there were in the hospital on Dec. 31, 1865,
201 ; admitted in 1866, 1,008 ; of whom there were
discharged, many greatly benefited, 879 ; c1ie3,131;
and there remained in the hospital, on Dec. 31,
1866, 202. The measure of relief dispensed amongst
the out-patients had gone on increasing each year.
The past twelve months had formed no exception
to this rule, the number of new ma-patients
cases having been 8,625 in 1866, compared with
8,386 in 1865. These had coins from every part
of London and its suburbs, from all the adjacent
counties, and even from much more distant places,
aided by the railway facilities now afforded. Tho
annual subscriptions in 1866 had been £5,465 13s. ;
donations, £3,198 2s. ; legacies, £2,407 17s. 9d.
(besides stock, £4,390) ; church collections, £874
12s. 4d. The income of the charity from all sources
(exclusive of stock) was £14,295 Bs. 7d. The fol-
lowing legacies had been announced to the corn...
mittee, but a part only (amounting to £1,350) had
been received; Miss Ann Bailey, £5OO consols;
Mrs. Sheldon, 1100 consols ; Mr. W . PoWell, moiety
of residue, amount uncertain ; Mr. IV. Ch:tfyn
Grove, £100; Miss A. Hamilton, one quarter of
residue, amount uncertain ; Mrs. Story,—.Esoo ;
Mr. R. Churchward, £100; Mrs. Henniker Wil-
son, £lOO ; Miss 11. Hopkins, £1,050 ;
903 Mr. C. Ileaehcroft, £5O ;
and Hiss INraternln £3. The committee had
received various contributions in kind which hag
ill. ; ,
much increased the comfort of the patients,
and they thankfully acknowledvtl the gifts, Con-
sisting of choice engravings, dinner ware,
pres-
sure the
consequent great number
cham-
pagne, and other. wine, game, tea, oraee nes, hot-
ohfouaspepgiircaapi:t•ss o
, &n c. I nflut n
andce the
lisd
sure for admission, plans for an extension of the
hospital accommodation had been under considera-
tion, but the sub-committee had turned their atten-
tion to a recommendation of the medical committee
for the establishment of a country house
hospital,
or sana-
torium for the patients of tl •us within au
easy distance from London, and in a warm and
favoured locality. They Lave endeavoured to ob-
tain on hire
, with option of purchasing, a suitable
house and
grounds
for immediate use; as a conva-
lescent institution, or to purchase an eligible site
for an auxiliary hospital, but as yet without suc-
cess. Au intere.itintg report in reference to the
chaplain's ministrations was also read. Dr.
Hamilton Roe was appointed a consulting physician
of this hospital.