The Sun.
London, England, 1868-07-04 00:00:00

SPIRIT OP T:

The London Review deals with the woman's rights
question in an admirably written article. Suppose, it
says, a law was proposed in Parliament that ne man
should ever be out later than ten o'clock at night ; that
butcher's meat • should never be more than sixpence a
pound (with a proviso excepting early lamb perhaps) ;
that clubs should be abolished ; that the price of baby
flannel should be fixed at two shillings maximum; that
there should be a censorship of the press ; that no servant
should be allowed to wear a chignon when she went out
with her young man ; and that the clergy should be
appointed household inspectors in every parish. Suppose,
again, that there was a dissolution of Parliament before
the bill was carried. Suppose, again, that women bad
votes. Does anybody doubt that the majority of the
ladies in the constituency of the member who had proposed
this measure would rush to the poll in their thousands, as
the stump has it, and vote for that member? Those who
think it most just that women should share political
power with men—those who have the strongest and most
distinctly wrought ppinion that there is a woman's side to
every subject, and that life can never be well regulated
until that side is represented in the administration of
affairs—those who would not even think it right to refuse
votes to women, if they were decisively demanded, might
well give them with a trembling hand. Women may say,
" You, the men, have kept us out of our right places
83 long, hindering our culture, and in various ways
degrading us, that even if we are not your equals in
intelligence and in equity of sentiment, you are to blame
for it. Give us the same opportunities as you have your-
s Ares, and we Shall equal you, and be just as fit to exer-
cise political power." But if we had no other means what-
ever of settling in a rough way the question of the
inequality of the sexes in intellectual power, there is ono
at hand, as old as the hills, but quite decisive. It is
notorious that women have not the originating faculty.
Whately, as we most of us remember, used to say that the
only case in which he ever knew of a woman's originating
anything was that of a lady in some Irish city, who intro-
duced a certain improvement in the making of soda-water.
There is not a trace of a tradition, so far as we know, that
a woman ever invented a domestic implement, or a'
domestic process, or started any great improvement in
dress. She has invented nothing in spinning, weaving, or
sewing. It was men who invented stocking-machinery.
It was a man who invented the sewing-machine. Is 14
known that any woman ever suggested an improvement in
printing, in writing, in painting, in music, in dancing, or
in science? For all the thousands of years the world has
existed, we have never bad from a woman anything like
high music or high dramatic writing. We have never, so
far as we remember, had any attempt by a woman to
create a philosophy. We profoundly doubt whether it
was a woman who first thought of such a thing as a

LAW AND POLICE.

IMPORTANT DECISION.—In the Court of Queen's Bench
he case of Aldous v. Cornwall was called on fur judg-
ment. It was an action on a promissory note, to which
the payee, the plaintiff, had added the words " on
demand." The question was whether this vitiated the
nstrument. Mr. Justice Lush delivered judgment., to
the effect that the alteration did not vitiate the note, as
!t was legally immaterial. It would be repugnant to
justice and to common sense to say that the maker of a
note was discharged from his obligation to pay it merely
because he had put in writing upon it something which the
law itself implied for the instrument. Judgment for the
The Spectator has often wondered why so many men, not (plaintiff.
vicious
HE DEBTS OF M tRRIED WOMEN —ln the Court of
vicious or luxurious or stupid, find it so hard to save, ' ' •
Queen's Bench judgment was also given in the case of
whether it would be possible to implant in lads the spirit Bo 1 Foster, which
lIS
.eY V. which was au action for necessaries
of saving, as it is possible to implant the spirit of study,
supplied for the child of the defendant on the order of his
or ambition, or, as we believe, though this will be denied,
the habit of calculation. No doubt a born instinct las wife, who was living separate from him, and who had the
something :are of the child (who was under seven years of to do with the matter, for there are races which
save age) by virtue of an order in Chancery. 'There
while others squander, just as there are mice which
was some slight evidence that the wife had withdrawn
accumulate grains and mice which starve two days to
from her husband by rev. iou of redst-onduct, and there
gorge themselves on the third. But much must be due to
training and circumstance, else the Saxon in Edinburgh
er support. The question was whether the wasdefendant evidence that she had no separate income adequate to
and the Saxon in Kent, the Frenchman in Brittany and
was liable for the necessaries supplied to her for his child.
the Frenchman in Spitalfields would not differ so violent!
Juetices Blackburn, Mellor, and Lush held net the
as they' do in the accumulative faculty. The evil, the
greatest of the defendant was liable, and that a wife separated from het economical evils in our society, must be curable, and the first step to cure it is to a husband on account of his misconduct was in the same peal.
cause. rtain its
cause. The Times said about a year since it
Lion as if she had been turned out of doors by him, and
was inability
to do multiplication, to remember that a shilling a des was by law allowed to pledge his credit for reasonable
Y is
-sxpenses. As, therefcre, the claim was for reasonable
218 15s. a year ; and the suggestion was shrewd, but it
supplies for herself, it was eearly supportable. The
does not cover the whole case. Nobody saves less than
the man who is always worrying over the details of his Lord Chief Justice was of a different opinion. He
dailyexpenditure, fixed, as it usually is, by circumstancea he tai 1 that it was an established rule of law that a man was
can hardly contr. Llt is not love of luxury, for not legally liable for the support of his children unless by
simple men very often do not save ; and it is not, like y ver
his neglect he brought himself within the poor or criminal
extravagance, due to wilfulness, for the majority Would taw. If in the present case the wife had been living with
like to save if they only saw the way. Patience is, we
;.her husband she could not have pledged his credit con-
strongly suspect, the wanting faculty in non-savers ; but
Crary to his directions. The majority of the court believ-
, ing that the claim was a good one, judgment was for the
that is a very dreary thought, for patience is one of
the virtues which cannot be instilled from the outside. '
Plaintiff for the amount claimed.
Is it) however, possible to secure the results of patience 1 ACTION FOR MALICIOUS ARREST.—In the Court of
without securing the virtue, if it be a virtue, itself ? We Exchequer, in the case of Farhall v. Rivett and
suspect it is, and that a very slight adjustment of our Kimber, which was an action for malicious arrest,
social system would develope the habit in unexpected the jury awarded £lOO damages. The facts of the
strength. The writer had once the fortune to live among case were these. The defendant Rivett is an upholsterer,
an English community in which every man either saves or and a firm of persons, Messrs. Church, Farhall, and Co.,
thinks be will save, or is slightly
.annoyed with himself employed him to furnish their offices in Clement's-lane,
for not saving, and repeatedly saw men instinctively and the furniture not being paid for Mr. Rivett employed
careless of money, born spendthrifts, succeed in the Mr. Kimber, his attorney, to recover the amount
attempt. It was always done in one way, a way anyone due. Mr. Kimber, having heard from souse upon
with an ascertained income or salary can adopt, but
which which he placed reliance that the plaintiff was a
bout to
Englishmen seem to dread as a sort of slavery. mi., was quit England to manage a plantation in South America,
to apply the life-insurance principle to the entire income, caused him to be arrested on a capias issued upon an order
Moat men, indeed all men who begin it, find in themselves to hold to bail, and the plaintiff remained in cos-
the nerve and the patience to pay the premium on life tody till Mr. Church seven days afterwards paid the debt
insurance, and they have only to compel themselves to the and released the plaintiff. The plaintiff's case was that
same practice on a larger scale to make independence he was simply a clerk and not a member of the firm,
certain. Let them pay away into a bank, month by month and had not held himself out as a member of the firm,
or quarter by quarter, the sum they think they can afford, On the other hand,. the defendant Rivett swore that
or rather are determined to afford, as a first charge upon he had always believed that the plaintiff was a member
income, a life insurance, and they live upon the remainder, of the firm, and Mr. Kimber swore that the plaintiff
running into debt, if necessary, rather than break the rule, upon one or two occasions had most distinctly
stated that he was a partner, and having heard upon
It seems somewhat silly advice, and one to be defended
good author:ty that the plaintiff was about to
two years that his ideas of his own wealth are contracted, , quit the
only by experience ; but the man who tries it will find in
country, he, in the interest of his client Mr. Rivett, had
, adopted the only course he could to secure the
payment ol
just as much as if he were paying the same sum to a life
insurance or'a mortgage. ACTION ON AN INSURANCE POLICY.—In the Court of
Common Pleas, the case of Brinkman v. Sir John ... AT
us.
grove, the chairman of the London, Liverpool, and Globe
Insurance Company, was heard. The plaintiff had kept a
1
1 small shooting-gallery, and he sued the chairman of the
i London, Liverpool, and Globe Insurance Company
to recover the amount of loss sustained by his house
being burned. The policy 'WM for £2OO, and the
amount of c'aias sent in £lB7 103., but this
sum was now increased by the addition of several
items. It appeared that communications had passed
between the legal advisers of the parties, and the plain-
, tiff was offered 150 guineas to settle his claim, each
party paying his own costs; but the plaintiff's solicitor
! refused to accept this offer, after saying that his costs
would probably amount to £9O or £:00. After this Mr.
Rees, an agent of the :nsurence company, saw th I plain-
-1 tiff, arid .made an arrangement with him, in wri ing, to
settle on the terms which had been refused by the solicitor,
and paid him the 11;0 guineas. This settlement was now
pleaded as an answer to the action, but the plaintiff said
that he would never have agreed to the arrangement had
lie not been told by hint (Mr. Rees) that the costs would
only be £l2 or £l4. The jury awarded £205 damages.

mirror.

The Imperial Review declares that the practical lessons
the Abyssinian expedition has enforced are of no little
value and importance. In the first place, the tendency to
exaggerate difficulties and to under-estimate our capacity
for overcoming them, that is characteristic of many who
hold the position of public advisers, has once more been
displayed, and its want of justification once more mani-
fested by results. When future enterprises are rendered
necessary, and similar objections are urged against the
course that the national honour renders it imperative to
pursue, it will be well to remember the moral that the
present expedition offers on this point. The advantage;
that a Government secur.s by desisting from any attempt
to direct the progress of a warlike exp«lition from home,
and by committing fill nu Iv3rify and unreserved powers
to one able man, have, too, been brought out in strong
relief by the conduct of the present Government. Tho
importance of more complete organisation in the army, to
render it possible for it to take the field at short notice,
has also been manifested. It is evident that the formation
of a transport corps cannot be left with safety to the eve
of a war. If the teachings of the Abyssinian expedition
in these, as w 1 a ; in minor points, is profited by, our
experience will nut have been too dearly purchased

FUNERAL OF A GRANDFATHER AND GRANDSON.
A. day or two ago the funeral took place at Inverness of a
grandfather and grandson, the former having died at the
age of eightyfive, and the latter at twenty-five. They
Iwere followed to the grave by nearly all the inhabitants of
ll the district, where they were much respected. Both w. I 0
named John Gray. The young man came home in in-
health about two years ago. After a long illn6ss he ditd
on Thursday, the 18th ult., and his grandfather died on
the following day. It thus happened that their remains
were interred at the same time and in the same grave.

FRIGIITFITL ACCIDENT AT WOMBWELL'S MENA-
GERIE. —The other evening a seaman, named John Drown,
belonging to her Majesty's ship Duke of Wellington, met
with a frightful accident at Wombwell's menagerie, which
is at present exhibiting at Portsmouth, through an act of
s. He was in company with several of his ship-
znAtes, and
,by way of bravado said he would show them
that he was not afraid of the lions. Ile accordingly thrust
his right hand through tlie bars of the lions' cage, when one
of the animals sprang forward and seized it in its mouth.
The ag'nised cries of the unfortunate man created a most
painful excitement in the menagerie, and it was not until
the keepers had beaten the brute off with an iron bar that
the hand was released. The back of the hand and the
wrist were most horribly lacerated, the flesh having lite-
rally been torn off, As soon as he was extricated from
his painful position Brown fainted away. lie was taken
to the Landport Hospital in a cab, and it was found that
the injuries were of such a serious charac'er that it was
necessary to amputate the limb, which was at once done
and the maimed man is now progressing favourably.

THE HOLEORN VlADUCT.—Wurkmen are actively
engaged in filling up the hollows between the arches with
gravel dredged from the bed of the river and dry brick
rubbish, so as to form a solid foundation preparatory to
being paved with cubic blocks of granite. At the western
terminus of the viaduct a pillar is to be erected with
brackets, each supporting a handsome lantern with four
burners. The place in which the pillar is to stand is of
large diameter, perfectly circular, and is intended to afford
a place of safety to foot passengers crossing the main
thoroughfare.

:C JOURNALS, j IZEMARK.ABLE TRIAL FOR POISONING.

•1 ......---o._
No, exclaims the Saturday Review.; "it won't do "—to : The Berlin correspondent of the Daily Hews, writing on
use Lord Shaftesbury's own minatory and dictatorial lam- he Ist inst., says :—" One of those causes dabres has just
gunge in the House of Lords. We are not going to make )een tried at Posen which would almost justify the belief
another Reformation of the Church of England, with the hat men are occasionally born into the world as entirely
Protestant earl for our Henry and Cranmer, Luther, lestitute of all principle of conscience as others are of
Calvin, and Zwingli, all in one. Whatever else the Church ight or hearing. The trial itself presented no particular
of the future is to be, we are not quite prepared to have )(Ants of interest beyond that of clearly establishing the
m
all the work of convocations and synods, Conferences, of hilt of the prisoner, whose crimes almost eclipse those
Savoy and Hampton Court, undone by a short Act excogi- 'f the notorious Palmer of detestable memory. The
tated by a committee in the Adelphi-terrace and subsidised acts are shortly as follows. The master bookbinder
by Mr. Colquhoun's fund. It is just a trifle overdoing it Tit:mann, was accused o. having poisoned six persons in
that we are'to consent to be puritanisedby the Coryphams ix years, namely, his four wives and two children.
of Exeter Hall and the Church, be it of three or thirteen Wittmann had worked as a journeyman for a bookbinder
centuries, unsettled at the dictation of a single person. A tamed Pirsch, oftWollin, where he made the acquaintance
new Act of Uniformity has been presented to the House 4 Marie Gehm, Pirsch's housekeeper. Wittmann was on
of Lords, avowedly founded upon the reports of the I visit at Wahl a-, the end of 1858 and beginning of 1859,
Ritual Commissioners before that commission has con- In January lof which year Pirsch died very suddenly, and
eluded its labours, and it seems without consulting OA irarie Gehm, according to a previous arrangement,
commissioners, and without the sanction of the Govern tame into the possession of all his property. Soon
ment which issued the commission. We make all alloy - Ater this Wittmann commenced business in
ances for the necessities of the committee which has been tVollin, and in February 1860 married Marie
collecting subscriptions to put down Ritualism. They 3 ehm, who in addition to Pirsch's property had
must have something to show for:the money they have got, ;Ise inherited some money through the sudden death of
or got promised, and, looking at Lord Shaftesbury's bill ua aunt. Two sons, John and Paul, were the result
merely as an advertisement for the last Protestant Asso-
A this marriage. Mrs. Wittman died very suddenly
n
elation, it may answer that purpose, but it is not likely to 1862, leaving all her property to her husband and two
thildren, of whom the eldest died in the same mysterious
gain any other. We are not quite ripe for a new Church,
or for facing a new schism at the fag end of the last nanner three months later. In June 1863 Wittmann
n
session of a dying and dishonoured Parliament. Even if married his second wife, Charlotte Hohn, who possessed
some fortune. The latter made her will in the following
nobody else protests against this hot haste, the Ritual
December, leaving everything to her husband, and died
Commissioners themselves may feel aggrieved that the
bread is taken out of their mouths by the very man who i week afterwards. In April 1864 Wittmann married
thought his dignity and consistency would be lost by con-
is third wife, Augustus Kornotzky, who was richer
descending to assist at their inquiries.
ban her predecessor. Her fate may be described in almost
he same words. She died in August 1865, leaving her
?roperty between her husband and her mother. Only
two months after her death, Wittmann married his fourth
ind by far the richest wife, the widow Bose, who had
me child by her first marriage. This child sickened
inmediately after its mother's wedding, and died in a
lay or two, by which the fourth Mrs. Wittmann in-
lerited its property. Wittmann then removed from
warm to Posen. It is hardly necessary to add that the
'ourth Mrs. Wittmann's life was not of very long
iuration, as she died in September 1866, having made a
will in favour of her husband a month or two ,before.
Under the pretext that she had died of cholera Wittmann
iad made arrangements for burying her the day after her
leath. But the extraordinary mortality in the Wittmann
`amity had already excited attention. The police here
;ook the matter up, and their first suspicions were
strengthened when they found that Wittmann had
:ailed in no medical advice. Witmann was ar-
7ested just as the funeral procession was about to
start, and the burial of the body was prohibited.
3n searching the house, a large lump of arsenic, suffi-
zient to poison a hundred persons, was found locked
ap in a chest. All the bodies of Wittmann's former wives,
as also those of his two children, were then exhumed,
Ind submitted to a chemical investigation. The
result was the same in all six cases ; a large quantity
A arsenic was detected, and there could not be tbo
shadow of a doubt that Wittmann had poisoned MS
'our wives and two children. He has been Found guilty
snd sentenced to death. If we consider that the
notice for these crimes was no higher passiwi than)
ivarice, and then remember the relation in which he
stood to his victims, and the deliberate perfidy with which
:le entel ed upon those relations, I doubt if the whole
.record of crime can show a blacker case. Indeed, it is not
Improbable that he committed eight murders, as the very
sailden death of Pirsch during Wittmann's visit, and also
)f his first wife's aunt, are extremely suspicious coinci-
lences under the above circumstances."