The Sun.
London, England, 1859-02-23 00:00:00

COURT OF COMMON PLEAS.

(Before the Lord Chief Justice, Sir A. Cockburn, and a
Special Jury.)
GARDNER V. GODFREY.

This trial was resumed this morning, the court being, as
on all former occasions, crowded to excess.
The learned judge having summed up,

The jury retired at 20 minutes to four, and after an ab-
sence of one hour, returned a verdict for the defendant, but
stated that they fully exculpated the father and son from
the calumnies that had been uttered against them.

SHERIFFS' COURT.
(Before Mr. Prendergast, Q.C.)
IMPORTANT TO SUITORS.-IN RE SPYERS.

Plaintiff is a solicitor of extensive practice, carrying on
business in Broad-street -buildings, and this morning he
attended the Court and made the following observations :
Sir,—l have to make a complaint of great negligence on
the part of some of your Honour's officers. The subject is
one of great importance to the suitors of this Court, and
the negligence might have caused great inconvenience
and annoyance to myself. On Monday week I was
plaintiff in a suit (Spyers v. Briant), and your Honour
thought proper to nonsuit me. Upon that nonsuib I was
condemned in certain costs, and should in due course have
received the order. No order has been to this day served,
and I find an application through one of my clerks that I
am ordered to pay on the 21st. Now, your Honour must
see that I was liable to have an execution put in my office
for these costs.

His Honour requested Mr. Aikman to assign some cause
for the non-service, and it was ascertained that the bailiff
who was instructed to serve the order was so ill that he had
been unable to perform his duty.
Mr. Spyers—That is no consolation to me. Surely, some
one else should have served the order.

His Honour—By law we are not bound to serve you with
an order at all, but we do so. You were in court when the
order was made, and should have made inquiries.
Mr. Spyers—Suitors, knowing the rule of the Court to
serve orders, as a matter of course wait for the same, and is
the case of a poor person the matter might be serious.
His Honour said the matter was a proper one to mention
certainly, but in the case of Mr. Spyers the result was not
serious.

Mr. Spyers—lf my adversaries had been vindictive I
should have been a serious sufferer. (Laughter.)
The matter then dropped.

POLICE INTELLIGENCE.-(THIS DAY.)

MARLBOROUGH-STREET.

APPLICATION UNDER THE DIVORCE AND MATRIMO-
NIAL CAUSES ACT.—A respectably-attired female applied
to Mr. Beadon, the sitting magistrate, under the following
circumstances :

The applicant said she had separated from her husband
by mutual consent about 14 years ago, since which time
she had had a situation, and had also lived with a person
as his wife. She had acquired a little property, and she
wished it protected as her husband wanted a reunion.
Mr. Beadon said he could not assist the applicant. If
her husband had deserted her in the first instance he could
have done so, but not in a case where a mutual separation
had taken place. She could apply to the Court for Divorce
and Matrimonial Causes if she thought proper, and see
what they could do for her, but he did not think they could
help her as they were acting under the same law as himself.

The applicant having thanked his Worship for his advice,
retired,

THAMES.

TURNPIKE TOLLS IN THE COMMERCIAL-ROAD.—John
Sutton, jun., a cab-driver, of No. 11, White Horse-street,
Stepney, appeared before Mr. Yardley to answer two sum-
monses. The first charged him with refusing and neglect-
ing to pay to Frederick Horn, toll-collector at the Lime-
house gate, the sum of 3d. for passing through the gate
with his horse and cab on Thursday night last, and the
second summons charged the defendant with assaulting
and beating the complainant.
This prosecution was instituted by order of the Trustees
of the Commercial-road, to put an end to a fraudulent sys-
tem of evading payment of tolls which has been adopted by
many cabmen. The defendant passed through the Step-
ney gate on Thursday evening without a fare, and toll
was not demanded of him ; but he took up a
fare about one hundred yards eastward of the
gate and drove through the Limehouse-gate and called out
the letter printed on the turnpike tickets of the day. The
complainant believing that the defendant had already paid
toll at the Stepney-gate permitted him to pass, but soon
afterwards received a message from James Campbell, the
collector at the Stepney-gate, that the defendant had not
paid the toll there. On the defendant's return to the Lime-
house-gate with his cab empty, the toll was demanded and
Sutton said he had paid toll in the morning and had no
right to pay it again. Horn insisted on the toll, and the
defendant cut at him with his whip, and struck him upon
the hand. A scuffle ensued and the cab driver attempted
to strike the complainant a second time with his whip.
Horn caught the handle of the whip and it was broken.

The defendant endeavoured to shuffle out of the case by
saying that empty cabs were always exempted from toll, and
that ho had never paid toll unless he had a fare; upon
which it was explained that if toll was once paid on a cab
passing any of the gates with a fare, the toll was not de-
manded a second time on the same day, unless the driver
had a fresh fare.

Mr. Yardley said the defendant ought to have paid the
toll when he passed the Limehouse gate with a fare, and
that he was bound to pay the toll every time he passed
along the road with a fare.
The defendant—Must I pay the toll ?

Mr. Yardley—Your fare must pay it.

The defendant then said that when he passed through
the Limehouse gate with his fare, the complainant was
drinking in a public-house.

The complainant gave a solemn denial to this statement,
and said he was collecting the toll a few yards from the
gate from the driver of a London Parcels Delivery cart at
the time the defendant passed through the gate with a fare
in his cab. He was confirmed in every particular by George
Pearcy, the driver of the cart, who said he invariably pulled
up at the corner of Salmon's-lane, twenty yards from the
gate, to sort his parcels for the locality, and saw the cab
passing along behind an omnibus, and heard the defendant
call out the letter of the day.

Mr. Robert Scovey, foreman of the toll-collectors, said
that similar evasions by cabmen, who charged their fares
with the tolls, were frequent.

Mr. Yardley said the defendant had been guilty of a
fraud on the toll-collector, who was in the discharge of his
duty, though not actually at the gate when the cab passed
through with his fare, and the toll ought then to have been
paid. He must put a stop to these evasions, and the toll-
collectors must be protected in the discharge of their
duties. He fined the defendant 10s. upon each summons
and the costs.
The money was paid.

PUNCH!

A timely whisper in the ear of the First Lord of
the Admiralty is audible to-day in the midst of the
" hard hits," administerQd as usual right and left
by the baton of our London Charivari. It
is a whisper apropos of the Navy Estimates coming
on on Friday evening, and one that we sincerely
hope will be taken to heart by—Boat-Builder
Pakington

THE LATE IMPRISONMENT FOR HOP DUTY.—
We are glad to find that John Wells, whose imprisonment
in Horsemonger-gaol, for non-payment of hop duty, was
brought under our notice by Mr. Nash, Rochester, a week
or two since, has been released. Mr. Nash himself first ap-
pealed to the Inland Revenue authorities on Wells's behalf
but this proving unsuccessful, he made known the circum-
stances to J. LBriscoe, Esq., one of the members for West
Surrey, who memorialised the Treasury, and Wells's libe.
ration was thus ultimately obtained.—South Eastern
Gazette.