The Sun.
London, England, 1832-01-07 00:00:00

in this, that the. labourer belongs to a whole
parish, and not to a single estate, and can have a
choice of masters.—Morning Chronicle.
We have conversed with an intelligent English
gentleman, just returned from Italy, where he
has been residing upwards of two years ; and
the account he gives of what is passing fully
confirms the suspicions we were led to entertain
from one or two laboured articles in the Journal
des Debits. He says that the Austrians are now
in high favour with the Italians, who detest the
very name of the French, on account of the
treachery practised towards them by Louis
Philippe. It is well known that the Italians did
not move without consulting the French Govern.
ment, and receiving from that Government the
most solemn assurance that Austrian interven-
tion would not be tolerated. The Italians have
now become sensible that no reliance is to be
placed on the French, and that their only hope
of escape from the miserable anarchy in which
they are placed is to draw to Austria. The
Austrians, on the other hand, have not been
slow to avail themselves of the favourable change
in the sentiments of the people, and have lately
distinguished themselves by the mildness of their
sway. The Italians now generally believe that
nothing would be so beneficial for them as to be
united under the sway of Austria; and they in-
dulge the hope that the Emperor will yield to
their desire to have one of his sons to rule over
them as a separate nation. 'We agree with the
Italians in thinking that the bast thing that
could happen to them would be to become sub-
jects of Austria, and we only hope that the
Government will have firmness enough to second
their wishes. With respect to the Pope and
most of the Italian Princes, they are jealous in
the extreme of Austria, and their only hope is in
French protection.—Morning Chronicle.
The fate of Torrijos and his companions now
appears, by concurrent testimony from various
sources, to have been the result of a contrivance
of the Spanish authorities, who themselves
created the crime for which their victims suffered.
What was that crime ?—the landing of that ill-
fated chief and his followers on the shores of
Spain, some of them having been previously
proscribed. Why did they land there ? Be-
cause, being compelled, as some state, to leave
their place of refuge in Gibraltar, they were
watched for, pursued, and purposely driven on
shore, by some Spanish coast-guard vessels.
Indeed, the official account of the Prefect of the
Spanish police, to which we adverted before, and
which was published under his signature in the
Madrid Gazette, admits the most important of
those facts—namely, that the Spanish vessels in-
tercepted the unfortunate refugees, and com-
pelled them to land ; and also admits that they
sailed under the flag of France, and hoisted that
flag on the inhospitable shores of the tyrant,
whose cruel myrmidons actually tore them from
under its protection, and threw them into the
dungeons which were only opened again to lead
them forth to execution ! It is true the Spanish
officer wishes to make it be believed that those
refugees, who he admits were compelled to land
on a shore which they were endeavouring to
avoid, hoisted the French flag upon the Spanish
soil as a symbol of defiance, or a sign of revolu-
tion. The fidsehood confutes itself. Men who
were endeavouring to fly from the neighbour-
hood of Spain were certainly not prepared to
bid defiance to the Spanish power, and, if they
were, they knew the feelings of the Spaniards
better than to hope to stimulate them to a na-
tional movement by an anti-national symbol.
The French " tri.colour" is associated with far
other than popular recollections in Spain. It
was in fighting against that flag that the Spanish
patriots profusely shed their blood to deliver
their country from the sway of Napoleon, and to
preserve for Ferdinand a sceptre which he has
ever since wielded to crush the brave and
faithful men whose heroic devotion to the
cause and dynasty of Spain led to the ex-
pulsion of his intrusive rival, and conducted
himself from a prison to a throne. Torrijos
knew his countrymen Itoo well not to know
that the French flag would be the most unpo-
pular symbol of defiance to the Government of
the Spanish Nero that he could hoist in Spain.
He knew that, instead of being capable of ex-
citing his countrymen to revolt, it would enlist
their national feeling and national pride on the
side of the worst Government that Spain ever
possessed, as long as that Government was not
a foreign one. No ; the flag was hoisted to
show that the refugees had not come there with
any revolutionary intention—that, in fact, they
did not intend to appeal to Spanish patriotism
but that, having no alternative but to be sunk
at
tshe ae, oaru
tthootrhi
trioe ssv themselves, otnh
etyh e
preferredho spitaliy t
the
latter, and raised the flag of a foreign State in
alliance with that of their own, to prove that
their intentions were peaceable, and. their object
tthhouemsleaaeowki
oy,
ntprotection.haeti
osaneswere
eeßri
eaui
rtme
ssupeeoi
ct
fht
eedmr
st
fhtoleir
et
nr,ivngeellict
welcome
nor
f
tidings of the capture of his prey were carried
to a heart inaccessible to mercy. The savage
mandate went forth. The victims were ready
and despotism never wants for executioners.
The Sabbath was chosen to give peculiar horror
to the human sacrifice. The Ministers of reli-
gion desecrated the hallowed day by celebrating
the sanguinary orgies of revenge—and tile God
whom Christians worship was insulted by the
offerings of hands red with the blood of the
unfortunate, and by the thanksgivings of priests
glorying in acts worthy the inspiration of de-
mons. Such is despotism in the nineteenth
aansdneovemrowrailllsbnep!.
justice
h
century—such
and n i
t s
fi
founded
e always
na
prone
ne to seek the protection of
impenitentt
new acts of violence and
terror.
ngtuvraielsrtt with the massacre of Torrijos
and his friends the merciful treatment which
Ferdinand received when he fell into the hands
of the Constitutionalists—contrast with that
Contrast
massacre the scene that followed the trial of the
convicted Ministers of the Ex-King of France,
when the armed citizens of Paris protected the
lives of the traitors, who had slaughtered their
friends and relations by the sabre and grape-
shot. How incapable does despotism appear of
imitating any good example, or of acting upon
any higher principle than the instinct of a coward
ferocity. Whether the French Government
will take any step to punish the insult to their
flag we cannot positively say ; but it does not
seem likely, from the specimens of energy
which their Government has already given in
its foreign relations, as exemplified in the affairs
of Italy and Poland. But England is bound to
demand satisfaction for the murder of Mr.
Boyd. No law of Ferdinand's making—no
decree of his, can overrule the authority of the
law of nations, which was grossly violated by
the assassination of a British subject. We wish
to know what the British Consul did on that

occasion, and what the Government will do
Morning Herald.

It cannot, we fear, be doubted that his Ma-
jesty has been prevailed upon to fix the stigma
of his disapprobation upon that illustrious body
who, despite the menaces and denunciations of
the most outrageous faction that ever infested
the country, nobly resolved to stand forward in
defence of the Constitution which seated, and
has hitherto secured the Royal house of Bruns-
wick on the throne of these realms ; in defence
of the Church, of which his Majesty is the
head ; and of the empire over which he has been
called to rule. The conduct of the House of
Lords, of which the King is about to record his
disapprobation, may be thus described. When
the Reform Bill was brought before their Lord-
ships they considered whether so extensive a
change, proposed so suddenly and with so little
shew of reason, was likely to prove either bene-
ficial or final ; and whether moments of popular
delusion, if not madness, were the precise period
when so great concessions ought to be made to
the democratic party. They considered whether
it was not at such a period that the hereditary
Counsellors of the Crown were expected prac-
tically to rebut the sneers and taunts of Jaco-
binism, and to prove not only to their country-
men, but also to anxious and doubting Europe,
that the Peers of England were not ignorant
of their duty ; and, what is of equal conse-
quence, were not afraid to perform it.
Such seasons we always conceived to be
contemplated in their original creation ; and
if the House of Peers be not an anomaly in the
Constitution, nor a pageant ; if there be indeed
that happy mean between despotism and demo-
cracy ; then was the time for the Peers to prove
that they are not unworthy of the proud situa-
tion in which they are placed. It was then,
when the floods were abroad, and the waters
were rushing in, threatening to overwhelm the
Altar, the Peerage, and the Throne—it was
then that the strength of the bulwarks raised by
the wisdom of our ancestors was put to the test
—then was the trial whether the Peerage
was a useful part of the Government or not.
The Peers did their duty, and the Constitution
was saved. We could not indeed have imagined
that any body of men would be so lost to every
honourable feeling as deliberately to record thci
submission to menace and intimidation, when
the yells of faction had shouted in their ears
that the Reform measure was to diminish their
influence, if not to destroy their constitutional
power as a branch of the Legislature, and thus
render them ridiculous and useless. But beyond
this their Lordships felt that the fate of their
country, perhaps of Europe, was in their hands.
And when they reflected that they were re-
quired to destroy the fairest, freest, and
most perfect Constitution of Government that
ever existed, and that they were commanded to
adopt in its place the crude and vicious project
of the Reformers, a monster even in the eyes of
its parents—when they were called upon with
threats to surrender, with their own honour, that
Constitution which is the proudest inheritance of
Englishmen, and to receive in return the scoffs
and sneers of the multitude, their sense of duty
to the Crown, their country, and themselves
pointed out to them the course which they so
nobly and dauntlessly adopted. It is for this'
that the King has been urged, and, we fear we
must add, has consented to set the seal of con-
demnation upon the House of Lords.—Morn-
ing Post.

MIDDLESEX SESSIONS, DEC. 6.

THE SUN FIRE-OFFICE V. JOHN NICHOLS WATERS.

This was a prosecution on the part of Mr. Pole,
the treasurer of the Sun Insurance Office, against
the defendant, for feloniously inducing Richard James
Pye Steele to set fire to defendant's house, No. 211,
Tottenham-court-road, on the 15th Nov. last.
Mr. ADOLPHUS, in his opening speech, contended,
that in the opinion of the Judges, according to their
recent practice, inducing a person to commit a crime,
whether committed actually or not, was, in the eye
of justice and the law, criminal and indictable.
Edward Atkins proved the original policy of in-
surance granted to the defendant on his house in
Tottenham-court-road on the 31st of August, 1831,
the sum of 2501. being insured on the stock, and 501.
on the house and fixtures of the shop of the defend-
ant, making 3001.
Mr. Cook (also from the Sun Insurance Office)
deposed to his having previously inspected the house;
but he had not looked to what stock the prisoner
had then on hands; but it is sometimes the practice
of insurances to be granted, not for what is on hands,
but prospectively for what is likely to be on hands.
Richard James Pye Steele deposed—He is a me-
dical student, resident with his mother, in Padding-
ton ; he has known the prisoner for two years ; he
was formerly a private soldier in the sth Dragoon
Guards, but previous to that he had practised in
Abergavenny, in Wales ; his father was formerly a
surgeon in the Guards, and died shortly after the
battle of Waterloo ; the prisoner (a medical gentle-
man also) was on intimacy with the witness's mother
also ; on the morning of the 15th of November he
received a note from the prisoner,' requesting an
immediate meeting ; the letter he received about
nine o'clock, and saw the prisoner at his own house
about ten the same morning,who then communicated
his plan of setting fire to his house, and enabling
both to go to France on receiving the insurance
policy ; he specified then, but not minutely, how he
intended to lay combustibles in the shop composed
of turpentine, rosin, and saltpetre, which he re-
quested the witness would use as would be di-
rected ; a jar of oil of turpentine was to be
poured en the ground, and a piece of paper, imbued
with spirits of turpentine ( which also was to be poured
where the fire would be applied), was to be ignited
by the gas, which would be left burning in the shop,
and this paper then to be applied to the parts
where the turpentine was poured ; the paper was to
be found ready on the end of the counter, and the
spirits of turpentine in a bottle, in a drawer, behind
the door of the shop; the witness at that time
made no objection nor observations, though he felt
astonished at the scheme ; the prisoner promised
him 1001. out of his receipts from the Insurance
Company, with weneh iricneht
return, after
ensuing
stwaseuri
ralagf I
sesirpmwri d
spring
tnic)st
uorapnucr
chase chemical drugs, and set up a shop ; and after-
wards prisoner would do the same friendly turn of
e-
3001. should have been effected ; so that they
then he equally deserving of the spoils, and
ob‘mvfuoi rgunhi i
dtn
ggohistosiFlorpani
prose-
cute their studies. Having left the house of the
prisoner after this conversation, about three o'clock,
he went to Mr. Brice, a medical apprentice of Mr.
Bryant, in Edgware-road, and communicated to
him what had passed, as he did also to his mother.
He then went to the house of Mr. llalls, a Police
Magistrate, in Paddington, intending to tell him
also; but on finding Mr. Halls not at home, he told
his tale to a police officer, of the name of Walsh,
whom he met in his way to the coffee-house. Walsh
brought him to the police-station in Hartcourt-
street, and Mr. Lazenby, the Superintendent, then
brought him immediately to the Police Magistrates
at Marylebone office.
CHAIRMAN—But why did the prisoner call on
you when he would be able to do for himself the
affair you relate he requested you to do for him ?
Witness—Because he considered, by his proving
himself during the time of the fire to be out of lus
way, lie would be better enabled to demand and re-
cover the sum of 3001. insured by the Company.
CHAIRMAN—Yes ; but you see he was not out of