The Sun.
London, England, 1868-12-30 00:00:00

SPIRIT OP THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The Times, in examining the views of Mr. Mill on
the treatment of professional criminals, observes that
it is agreed on all sides that some measures should
be adopted for the more effectual proteption
of society against them. There are men, as is per-
fectly notorious, who live by crime, who commit
one crime after another till they are detected and
imprisoned, and who, as soon as they are released
frDm custody, take to crime again. Malefactors of this
class are usually well known to all concerned in the
administration of justice, and no doubt or mystery exists
about their habits or practices. It has been therefore pro-
posed that these declared enemies of society should be t) a
certain extent outlawed. Every man, according to English
law, is held to be innocent till he is found guilty, but with
regard to these habitual offenders, it is recommended that
they should be held guilty till they prove themaelves
innocent ; that they should be compelled to give an
account of themselves and how they are living
when called upon to do so. If they cannot give
satisfactory answers, they are to be kept at work
under surveillance, on the presumption that otherwise he
would live by crime. The police assert that with this
power they could sweep out the nests of crime. Mr.
Mill holds that such a measure would be wrong in prin-
ciple and would not work well in practice. He says that
one man might be getting an honest living by odd jobs,
and yet be unable to prove it. Another might
be seriously injured if his previous history were
betrayed by the police to his fellow-workmen.
But he must be living without visible means of subsistence
before the police interfere with him, and that could not be
the case if he were one of a regular body of workmen.
The man who had casual employment could easily refer to
those who have employed him ; and after all, it must be
remembered, whatever hardships might be incidental to
the course suggested, the sufferers would be only those
who had exposed themselves to the visitation by their own
malpractices. As things go, it is reasonable to presume
that a man who has been not only twice tried, but twice
convicted of crime, must have been living for some con-
siderable time by depredations on society, and such a man
could hardly complain if society in self-defence put him
at some exceptional disadvantage. He would, beyond
doubt, forfeit certain privileges, but would not the forfeit
have been deserved? It is certainly not impossible that
the power thus lodged in the hands of the police might be
occasion ally abused, but the risk, according to Mr. Mill's own
measure, is:very limited. On the point of a man's character,
the word of a policeman would have no authority what-
ever, for the previous convictions must be established by
the records of a court. There is no room, therefore, for
false or mistaken evidence ; while, as to the second point,
the burden of proof thrown on the suspected person can
hardly be very heavy. If the man is not following an
honest livelihood, he deserves to be detained ; if he is, in
ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the proof must be easy.
In the hundredth case it may be just possible to imagine
injustice resulting ; but is that risk sufficient to outweigh
the recommendations of the measure and the claims of
society at large?

The Morning Post says that the question of who shall
succeed Sir Richard Mayne seems to be resolving itself
into a discussion as to whether the Chief Commissioner
should be a lawyer or a soldier, but it appears to us that
it should rest chiefly on personal qUalifications. Sir
Richard Mayne was a barrister, and the complaint made
is that he rendered the force too military. Possibly
the converse might now result if a soldier were elected.
A police magistrate, as being thoroughly versed in criminal
law and the ways of criminals, would probably make "a
capital Commissioner, and there could be no difficulty in
making the selection. A military officer, too, who has
had extensive experience of convicts—and we have several
such—or who has been governor of a prison, would also,
in all likelihood, suit the post. But what is wanted, more
than any special knowledge, is tact, firmness, activity, and
common sense. These qualities, no matter what his pro-
fession, would render the selected Commissioner fit for his
trying position.
The Standard thinks that we have a foretaste of the
blessings which are to follow on Mr. Bright's accession to
office in the threatened abolition of the corps of marines, but
these are the days of advance, and we must not grumble. It
is only consistent with the doctrines of the Peace-at-any-
price Party that they should begin with the force which
is most useful as our instrument of war. It is a high
compliment to the marines that they should be selected as
the first victims to the doctrine that peace is promoted by
defencelessness. Of all the various kinds of force which are
employedby this country there is none which more admirably
fulfil its duties than the marines. It is our finest,
keenest, most useful weapon of war. It can give the best
reason for its existence. It is peculiarly the branch of the
defensive service which is best fitted to the genius of the
country. It is good by sea and good by land. It can go
anywhere and do anything. It is as useful on board ship
as in the field ; as much at home in the dusty plains of
India as in the snows of the Crimea or the swampy valleys
of New Zealand. The roll of the services of the marines
is an epitome of the military glories of England. They
baffled the ambition of Napoleon ; they avenged the death
of Nelson ; they carried succour to Lucknow. They have
been foremost in every service for which they have been
used. For some years past they have done nearly all the
fighting which England has had to do. They are our real
National Guard—the true representative soldiers of the
country.

Railway travelling, says the Daily News, is fast super-
seding omnibus travelling in London, and it is high time
that it should do so. Quicker and more convenient
methods of intercommunication have become necessary in
consequence of the enormous extension of the metropolis.
It is astonishing that Englishmen will put up for so long
with very defective arrangements in the matter of loco-
motion. London had no coaches until the reign of Eliza-
beth, and one wonders how the London public could have
got on without omnibuses until 1830. The younger genera-
tion has, however, long been impressed with the conviction
that the omnibus service of the metropolis is obsolete to a
great extent. The Metropolitan Railway system is super-
seding it, and every addition to that system removes a
trouble from the minds of many Londoners. The under-
ground line from Paddington to the City has for the
last six years proved an immense boon to the inhabitants
of the northern and north-western parts of the
town. Brompton, Kensington, Notting-hill, and Bays-
water were joined to this system in October ; and
on Christmas Eve the first portion of the " inner
circle," extending from Gloucester-road, Brompton, to
Westminster, and continuing the line from Moorgate-
street, was opened to the public. By these lines, when
completed, the inhabitants of the western suburbs will be
able to travel expeditiously, either to Moorgate•street
by a northerly route, or to the Mansion House by a
southerly route. Even in the present incomplete state
of the system the gain to a large number of travellers
will be very great. You may wait a quarter of
an hour for an omnibus in the mud and rain, to find it full
when at length it arrives. Your omnibus, moreover, is
often a terrible dawdler. On the Metropolitan Railway,

however, the trains run every ten minutes, and the stop-
pages at the stations are of the briefest. Certainty, regu-
larity, and expedition are the three strong points of the
London railway system. The travelling through a long
series of tunnels, with only occasional breaks of light and air,
is doubtless not the most cheerful mode of transit ; yet
there is something that appeals to the imagination in
whizzing under streets and houses through the darkness of
subterranean London, and finding that, after a brief
interval of time, you have been transported from a quiet
suburb to the thick of the City, without, in appearance,
passing through any of the intermediate neighbuurhoods.
And it is to be remembered that it is the multiplication
of means of getting over long town distances rapidly that
makes the continued rapid growth of this immense city
possible.

The Daily Telegraph observes that in all cases of alleged
murder three questions suggest themselves. Has a mur-
der been committed at all ? If so, by whose hand has the
crime been perpetrated, and- what motive has led to its
perpetration? Of late too many cases of murder have been
sent up for trial before the agents for the prosecution have
fully prepared the evidence on which the jury must give
a verdict of life or death. Such are the peculiarities of
our criminal system, that no missing link in a case can
readily be supplied after trial has begun ; and since the
jury often form their judgment on insufficient data, we
have at times discreditable miscarriages of justice.

The Herald, in giving its hearty support to the new
Workshops Regulation Act, observes that no one can
doubt the need of such an enactment. The enormous mis-
chief perpetrated among the milliners and dressmakers
alone by excessive hours of toil is notorious, and has
often been denounced. Thousands of lives have been
sacrificed in this cruel slavery ; the only excuse
being the " pressure of orders." If the sick never left our
large towns, but stopped and died near the scene of their
work, we should know better than we do what is the waste
of life going on in our great hives of commercial and
trading industry. The sick girls go home to die, Nu] the
village register is burdened with their deaths. So it is that
London draws pure blood from the provinces, and sends it
back poisoned. But the sin of overwork does not rest
with London alone, though there it attains its most
gigantic growth. In the little villages of distant counties
there are places where children are made to work to au
extent which the law has long prohibited in factories. • It
is thus that the law inevitably extends itself. If the large
employer is compelled to give his workpeople the benefit
of certain hours per week for rest, why should he be
placed at a disadvantage as compared with the smaller
class? The Factories Acts apply where fifty or more
persons are employed. But the aggregate number
employed in lesser groups is immense, and if Parliament
really means to protect the workers, why should the
smaller groups be passed by? The leisure is good for all,
and air and exercise are as needful for health as pure
water and efficient drainage. The Workshops Regulation
Act is a sanitary measure, if nothing else, but we believe
• ..
it tobelaaadealiwrgi,