The Sun.
London, England, 1859-01-04 00:00:00

DIRE•TORO

CHAIRMAN-JAMES TI-101‘ N, Esq. (Messrs. Line
and Co., Madras), Deputy G rnor of the Agra Bank,
I,V
and late Chairman of the Cha er of Commerce, Madras,
and President of the Madras Bank.
Colonel Philip Anstruther, C. 8., Madras Artillery.
The lion. Philip Pleydell Bouverie, M.P. (Messrs. Ran-
som, Bouverie, and Co.)
Lieutenant-Colonel Grimes; Madras Army, Chairman of the
Oriental Inland Steam Company.
Colonel Atwell Lake, C. 8., late Superintending Engineer
of the Kistnah Irrigation Works.
Lieutenant-Colonel Onslow, late of the Commission for
governing Mysore.
Lieutenant-General Sir 43peorge Pollock, G.C.8., F.R.G.S.,
&c.
Major-General Westrow Watkins, Madras Army.

CONSULTING ENGINEER.
Col. J. T. Smith, Madras Engineers, F.R.S., &c.
AUDITORS --James Bonar' Esq. (Messrs. Small and Co.
Old Jewry).
BANKERS.—Messrs. Ransom, Bouverie, and Co.,
Pall-Mall East.

SOLICITOR.—John Mackrell, Esq., 34, Cannon-street West
SECRETARY.—John Westwood, Esq.
Offices-27, Cannon-street, London, E.C.

Full Prospectuses and Forms of applications for shares
may now be had on application at the Company's Offices,
27, Cannon-street, London, E.C. ; of the bankers, Messrs.
Ransom, Bouverie, and Co., 1, Pall-Mall East; and of the
solicitor, John Mackrell, Esq., 34, Cannon-street West,
E.C., London ; but no application will be considered unless
a deposit of £1 on each share applied for is previously
made to Messrs. Ransom, Bouverie, and Co., bankers of
the company. The deposit will be returned if the applica•
tion is not acceded to.

Extract from Minutes of Consultation transmitted by the
Government of Madras, on the 15th May, 1858, to the
late Court of Directors of the East India Company :
The Government express their unanimous, strong, and
earnest advocacy that all irrigation works which, on a com-
prehensive view of the wants of the country, may be deemed
necessary to develop its undoubtedly great resources, be
commenced at once boldly and on a large scale, be pressed
forward throughout all times and under all circumstances,
and be looked on, and be practically treated, as in fact they
really are, as the most economical, because the most pro-
fitable, undertakings in which the Government could pos-
sibly engage. It is needless now again to bring forward
the innumerable instances in which money has in the Pre-
sidency been most advantageously invested in irrigation
works. The proceedings of Government have, in this re-
spect, been only too desultory and vacillating, and it is
confidently asserted that India could be placed in s
position to pay all her own expenses, and gradually dis-
charge her debt far more readily and speedily by a judicious
expenditure than by any scheme of retrenchment or reduc-
t ion .

THE MADRAS IRRIGATION and CANAL
COMPANY.
Office-27, Cannon-street, E.C.
NOTICE.—No further application for Shares in this Com-
pany will be received after, Wednesday, the sth day of
January, 1859.

By order.
JOHN WESTWOOD, Secretary.

Dec. 31, 1858.

THE REPRIEVED CONVICT WILHELM.

The Liverpool Mercury gives the following par-

titulars respecting the respite and past history of
Wilhelm, who was recently condemned to suffer
capital punishment for causing the death of a
young woman at Manchester.
On Thursday,. Mr. Walpole, the Home Secre-
tary, would receive two memorials, bearing the sig-
natures of some of the leading foreign commercial
firms of Manchester and Liverpool. if he most im-
portant memorial was that' from Manchester, to
which 40 signatures were attached. The principal
points urged in favour of Wilhelm in both memo-
rials were the facts that he did not design or in-
tend to take the deceased's life, and that it was the
young woman who came to him, and not he who
went to her. These memorials were despatched
from Manchester and Liverpool on Wednesday
evening, and would be received by the Home Se-
cretary during Thursday. The most sanguine
hopefulness must have despaired if nothing
had been heard yesterday morning, and it may
therefore be supposed. that Wilhelm's anxiety
verged on despair. When the fact that he was
respited was communicated to him he was over-
whelmed with gratitude, and fell upon his knees,
earnestly reiterating his thanks, not for man's in-
tercession only, but first and chiefly for the merci-
ful interposition of the Supreme Being to save him
from his impending fate. Afterwards he was con-
siderably revived in spirits, and he was cheerful,
compared with what he had been for some days,
when he was again visited by his wife, who had
been permitted to see him every other day.
In the fact of the acquittal of Stadtmuller as an
approver, in order that he might give evidence,,
without which a conviction might have been im-
possible, there is sufficient to account for a change
of feeling on the part of Wilhelm towards his once
fellow-prisoner, and this must be remembered in
considering what Wilhelm has said since the trial.
He has given a narrative of the circumstances of
the fatal operation at variance with the evidence
and denying his own presence in the rooms until
all- the injury had been done, and partieu!arly that
he used his hand violently in the manner described.
Wilhelm, who is 29 years of age, is a native of
the Duchy of Bernberg, in Germany. A memo-
randum before us—in his own handwriting, which
is distinct, :legible, bold, and very good for a Ger-
man—informs us that he was born on the sth of
April 1829, and that he was married on the 23rd
September 1853, at the parish church of Halifax,
in Yorkshire. One capable of judging, and quali-
fied to speak, considers he is not a man of at all
penetrating abilities, and that he is dull of intellect
rather than shrewd or sharp. Whilst he was very
young he lost his father, and his mother was very
unkind to him. It was intended to make a mer-
chant of him; then that intention was changed,
and he was apprenticed to an apothecary, with
whom he learned his business. In order to avoid
military service, he came to this country from Ham-
burg, about eight years ago, and he first settled in
Leeds, where he made a scanty livelihood by teach-
ing the German language. He next moved to
Halifax, and commenced practice as a surgeon in
Northgate. His firsttrouble occurred in the sum-
mer of 1853, when he was committed to the assizes
at York, on a charge somewhat similar to, but not
so serious as, the present, and on which he was ac-
quitted.
After the acquittal he returned to Halifax, and
resumed his surgical practice, his surgery being in
Northbridge; and from the date already given it
will be seen that in about two months he married
a young woman with whom he had become inti-
mate in Halifax. She was the daughter of respec-
table parents, and Wilhelm's position and prospects
were those of a rising surgeon. He also opened a
chemist's shop, and combined with his practice the
business of chemist and druggist.
In a little more than a year after his marriage a
second misfortune occurred to him. Two days before
Christmas-day there happened a fire, by which his
shop and premises were burned down. He suc-
ceeded, however, in re-establishing himself in busi-
ness, but soon afterwards he was again reduced to
ruin by the consequences of a disastrous flood, which
occurred in July of the year following the fire. He
struggled, but in vain, to retrieve himself from the
effects of the disaster produced .by the inundation.
His professional status having perhaps been shaken
by the trial at the assizes, he found himself unable
to redeem his reputation and credit sufficiently to
conduce to success in business • and after being a
second time confined in York Castle, as a debtor,
he removed to Manchester three years ago. By
economy and industry ho succeeded pretty well in
Manchester, and soon commenced business again as
a chemist. At the end of the first year he found
himself pretty well off, and still better at the end
of the second. His account of his introduction to
his assistant, the approver Carl Stadtmuller, is that
Stadtmuller applied to him, as a fellow-countryman
without means, for assistance. Wilhelm was not
then in actual need of an assistant or partner ; but
as Stadtmuller had received a medical education and
a degree in Germany, it occurred to Wilhelm that
it would be a stioke of policy to secure the services
of Stadtmuller, and so combine, in business, 'the
practice of medicine and surgery with the sale of
drugs. Stadtmuller had been three days with
Wilhelm when the operation was performed which