The Sun.
London, England, 1826-01-12 00:00:00

[THE TIMES.]

Advices from St. Petersburg!) of the 28th ult.
relate a most extraordinary scene which is said
to hate occurred in that city a few hours before
the ptoclumation of Nicholas as Emperor, and
which stained that ceremonial deeply with the
blood of the Russian soldiery. It appears that
the Empress Mother, Muria Feodoruwna, bud
called upon the officers of all the regiments quar-
tered in Petersburg!), to assist in the proclama-
tion, and to transfer to Nicholas that oath of al-
iegience which they and the troops under their
command had recently rendered to his brother.—
All the regiments assented to this, with one ex-
ceptiun, which was that of the Regiment of Mos-
cow, belonging to Constantine himself, and the
only one of his regiments then in Petershurgli.
The Officers are said not only to have demurred
to the Empress's command, but to have re.
presented, in strong but respectful language,
that only a few days had elapsed since
they had sworn fealty to Constantine as
their , Emperor ; that it was wholly incon-
sistent with that oath to transfer it to any other
person, unless in the event of his death, or at his
express order; that it would be disturbing the
order of the succession to act otherwise ; and
that nothing less than Constantine's own 'appear-
once, and en order from his mouth, would induce
them to consent. This deternduation, it is added,
was reported to the Empress Mother, who lw-
came,extremety indignant at this resistance to
bete tvitl, and conscious of the dnilger even of a
delay of obedience in a Russian soldiery, gave
orders that the refractory regiment should belm•
mediately fired upon, if their consent was not at
once tendered. Her spirit and proMptness'
of determination on this trying occasion, if the
eccouuts may be relied on, could not have
been surpassed by Catherine herself.' Her
orders were obeyed, and a slaughter instantly'
commenced of the resisting regiment, of
whom between ,200 and 300 are said to have
been sacrificed, before the remainder submitted..
it has even been stated, but in this respect there'
is much ambiguity hi the accounts, that the
troops of Constantine's regiment returned the,
firty,--and-thatin -consequence great nilfilbers of
;the other regiments fell. All agree, however, in:
the loss of lives sustained by the adherents to
Ceristatttitie. The above appears to us to be the
most accurate version,
,after carefully comparing
the statements on the subject current in the most!
respectable :quarters, of the latest news from
Petersburgh ; but the difficulty of obtaining real
laforioation from thence, especially at a crisis!
info the present, is so great," that'Our readers will.
do w ill to exercise caution in adopting any. The
most' dutioue part of the preceding intelligence is

undoubtedly the insight given by it into the cha-
racter of the Empress Maria, which is here deve-
loped as that of a bold ambitious woman, who
must, with a character such as that of Nicholas is
described to be, obtain the ascendancy in the con-
duct of public affairs. We hear further, from
a source which will not allow us to doubt
the fact, that her hatred of Constantine's
wife has been one of the leading motives of the
part she has taken in the exclusion of Constan-
tine himself from the throne; and that a vow
made never to permit her residence in the same
city with herself, has impelled her now to assume
that energy to prevent its being broken, which
was not to be found in the disposition of the
timid and irresolute Nicholas. Another account
which we have seen since the above was in print,
states that the mutinous regiment was joined by
parties from the regiments of the line, and that
they attempted to proclaim Constantine anew,
in opposition to the attempt of the Empress to
have Nicholas announced as Emperor. It is
added, that a General Officer was among the
killed during the conflict which ensued. Nicholas
is said to have headed the attack on the muti-
neers in persons.

[NEW TIMES.]
The Etoile, dated Tuesday, reached us at a
late hour last night, by Express from Paris.
There remains no doubt but that Constantine
has definitively renounced the Empire ; but as to
the motives which led to this extraordinary step,
or the conditions under which it may have been
taken, the world has yet much to learn. We ex-
tract, a passage rather curious from the Journal
des Debats of Sunday—(See another column of
Swi.)—The Editor was not then aware of
the fact that Nicholas had been proclaimed, but
he knew that Constantine had renounced the
throne, and he gave several reasons for believ.
ing that that Prince would persevere in the re.
nunciation. The chief reason was ' founded on
the fact which we stated on Saturday, namely,
that Constantine bears to the Lady whom he has
married a most ardent affection, and that there
are circumstances in her situation which would
render his elevation to the Imperial Throne any
thing to her but a gratification. Not only is she
of a rank by birth which would not permit her
to enjoy all the honours of an Empress, but there
is a more serious obstacle in her religion, for she
is a Roman Catholic, and without embracing the
Greek communion, she could not be permitted to
share the throne. It is asserted also that,
with a proper degree of pride, she repelled be-
fore marriage the idea of forming an alliance
which might in any event preclude her sharing
her husband's rank. Under these circumstances,
it is perhaps not very surprising that the Grand
Duke Constantine, ardently attached to an ac-
complished and virtuous lady, should willingly
sacrifice to affection the contingent succession to
a Throne; especially as that contingency was by
no means a very probable one,he being only two
years younger than his brother Alexander, and
the latter being at an age when he might possi-
bly have a numerous offspring.

[MORNING lIERALD..I

The perfection of law should be, we should
think, the perfection of reason ; and that on
which the liberty, the property, and the life of
every man depends, should be governed by prin.
ciples which admit of no dispute, and such as are
at once apparent to the common sense and under-
standings of mankind. Such ought law to be in
the abstract ; and such, we doubt not, it would
have been, had it not, like religion, been made to
bend to the crafty, interested designs of its pro-
fessors, as the other has to that of its priests.--
Instead of remaining plain and intelligible, the
law has been rendered an obscure jargon, so full
of subtleties, refinements, and contradictions, that
a plain, unsophisticuted mind must look upon
more than half its dogmas rather as the results
of lunacy than of legislation. One instance
of the nonsense and sophistry with which it
abounds, and in the extremes of which its profes-
sors, both high and low, seem to rival each other,
appears in a paper of Sunday last, in which it is
stated that some Magistrates had refused to grant
a warrant to search for stolen bills and papers, as
not being of that description of property which
they had the power to recover or bring to light.
The case, we understand, was this:--the, pro-
prietor of a house of business had been robbed
by his confidential clerk to a large amount,
and, among other things, of various bills of ex-
change and other negociable securities not come
to maturity ; and that on the apprehension of
the supposed offender, the application in ques-
tion was made and refused. Now, had he been
accused of possessing the stockings, linen, or
leather of his employer, the search-warrant
would have issued as a matter of course, upon the
necessary oath being token ; but because it con-
sista of another description of property, just as
plain, tangible, and easy of identity, by some
precious conundrum, which they who broach it
can neither define nor understand, an implied li-
cence is held out to breaches of trust of the most
Ifeinous and extvnsive nature, and time in given
to the supposed thief to dispose of or destroy pro-
perty of the most valuable and important descrip-
tion. The idea of distinguishing between bills,
notes, and other securities for money, and money
itself, or any other kind of property, on such an
occasion, is so manifestly absurd, that nothing but
the crooked obliquity which special pleading
gives to the vision of persons otherwise sensible
and clear sighted, can in any way account for it.
Were such a doctrine seriously tenable, it would
follow (hut bankers, stock and bill brokers,
and indeed every dealer in and holder of paper
currency, might be robbed with impunity ; and
which impjutily would, of course, extend to
money itself, as well as to the representatives of
it. The rule of common sense in such matters is
this—that wherever the Magistrate can issue his
warrant for the arrest of the thief, he can autho-
rise a search for the stolen property: and, on the
other hand, it would follow, that if the property
cannot be searched for, it cannot be the sub-
ject of felony, or the taker of it dealt with
as a felon. We are aware that this is only
one among a hundred similar absurdities with
which modern lawyers insalt and stultify reason

and common sense. We wish we could see some
great mind start up in the profession—some second
Romilly, with independence and courage to shake
off the shackles which he finds prepared for him,
and with talent, industry, zeal, and decision, to
expose, eradirate, and throw off abuses which
deform and disgrace a profession, the science and
practice of which would otherwise be, as they
ought to be, the pride and admiration of the world.

[THE PUBLIC LEDGER.]
The Court intrigue, which has been played off
in Russia, since the death of the Emperor Alex-
ander, has already given birth to a numerous
progeny of alarming rumours. The report of
yesterday was, that the Proclamation of Nicholas
was the immediate signal of a mutiny amongst
the troops of the Capital, in which the Grand
Duke Constantine's regiment took so active a
part, that it was found necessary, at last, to sub-
ject it to military execution. This had the effect
of reducing it to submission, but not before it had
lost 400 men ; and as a proof of the great credit
that was attached to this rumour, it had the effect
of lowering the funds considerably, which never
rallied afterwards throughout the day. The de,
pression of all descriptions of Foreign Securities
was still more marked, with the single exception,
we believe, of Spanish Bonds—a pretty good il-
lustration of the influence which these incipient
troubles are likely to have on the conflict between
liberty and despotism. We could not, however,
trace the rumour to.nny source ; and the result
of our inquiries is, that an express arrived yester-
day morning, but whence it came, or to whom
directed, we could not learn. True or false, this
rumour, however, is an excellent commentary upon
the practical wisdom of breaking through the
regular order of succession. By this arrangement,
the late Emperor may be truly said to have
cancelled ell the claims he had established by all
his other acts, to the gratitude of the Russian na-
tion; and if this burning torch, which he has
flung into its bosom, be extinguished without fur-
ther mischief than that stated in the report, the
credit of it will not certainly belong to him, but
to the Prince whom he capriciously excluded
from the throne. In the mean time, the senti-
m •nts of the latter are a perfect mystery, •except
to that order of political writers,who always regu-
late their belief or disbelief according to the judg-
ment of others. To suppose, however, that he has
resigned his birthright in the way commonly
stated, is an instance of human credulity not to be
matched but by the
chief hero in romantic self-denial of the
this political drama. How Constan-
tine will conduct himself in the singular circum-
stances in which he has been evidently placed
by Court intrigue, our information is far too
scanty to hazard any thing like a positive opi-
nion
; though we are convinced he will not in
his deportment exhibit a single trait of that phi-
losophical indiffer.ence for which he has all at
once got such large credit.

[MORNING POST.]
We received last night, by Express, French
Papers to the 10th inst., and the Dulles of Mon-
day and' Tuesday. The former contains the
same intelligence which we communicated yester-
day respecting the succession of the Grand Duke
Nicholas to the Russian Throne, after a fresh
renutiation on the part of Constantine. The lat-
ter adds, that it was on the ‘2sth of December
that Nicholas read in the Senate the formal
renunciation of the Crown by his brother,
and declared that he himself accepted the
'Throne—when he was immediately proclaim•
ed Emperor. Tho only points hitherto po-
sitively known are, therefore, the succession
of Nicholas, and the date at which it took
place. The statements of the other Journals re-
late to an anterior period ; and, even if they be
correct, only serve to increase the mystery. The
Quolidieline for instance assures us, that before
his death Alexander had written a letter to Con-
stantine, in which he relieved him from the ob-
ligation which he had contracted to resign the
Crown ; and that the first dispatch conveyt d by
the Grand Duke Michael to St. Petersburgh con-
sisted of this communication, and not, 113 it was
reported at the time, of an offer to abdicate. Ac-
cording to this it would appear that instead of be-
ing disposed to renounce his rights, Constantine
was anxious to reign, and availed himself of the
representations given by his friends of Alexander's
last Will, to endeavour to supersede the Act of
renunciation which lie had been made to sign,
and which he feared would be put in force
against him. An article from Frankfort remarks
that the Courts connected by matrimonial ties
with Nicholas, had not allowed the oath of
fidelity to he taken to Constantine, and adds
that foreign diplomacy was taking an active
part in the family question which agitated
the empire of the Czars, and that several Eu-
ropean Cabinets wished that it should be de-
cided in favour of Nicholas. The same
article seems to consider it certain that if
Constantine resigned the Imperial Crown it
would be to retain that of Poland, where he had
acquired extreme popularity, anti had formed with
peculiar care an army of bO,OOO foot, and 20,000
horse, which is said to be the finest in Europe."
It is admitted, at the same time, that neither
Prussia nor Austria would see without anxiety
the revival of Poland in a completely indepen-
dent state—Well aware that with a King of Con.
stantine's disposition, and a faithful and well or.
ganized army, it would not long suffer the pro-
vinces which have been- detached from it, to re-
mail' in the hands of its despoilers. These con-
siderations are said to have acted so strongly
upon those two Powers, that they began to re.
pent the skits %shirt) they had taken to favour
the elevation of Nicholas, and to hope that Con-
stantine would retain the Empire in order thut
"and 'night not emerge from the condition of a
dependency.

The bungling
NOIINING cum:lN cr.r.l
manner in which the business of
legislation is executed in this country has been
curiously exemplified in the different insolvent
Debtor Acts. At present the object of the Legit.-
latureis in many instances utterly defeated by the
substitution of a new Detaining Creditor in the
shape of the Attorney for his Costs. To silos the

manner in which the system works in the Pro-
vinces we shall instance Chelmsford gaol, in which
we find—Stephen Clarke, originally detained for
a debt of 1071. 10s. 6d., but now detained for
his Attorney's taxed bills, amounting to
231. 15s. sd..—Thomas Head, detained for an
Attorney's bill of 11/. 2s.—Abraham Metcalfe
was detained for a debt of about 181., and after
discharge remained in prison for an Attorney's
bill of about 161. His friends at length
raised money to pay the bill, and he ob-
tained his release from prison.—This is an
instructive illustration of the mode in which
the law in this country lays its fangs on every
thing. The debtor merely shakes himself clear
of one creditor, to be at the mercy of another;
and in the mean lime the country is put to a
heavy expence to support him, till the attorney,
finding that friends are unable or unwilling to
come forward, chooses to relent. The thing is,
we believe, managed by the detention of the
discharge on the part of the Attorney, and
the debtor, when without means, must be
supported by the county or starve. if there
was one case in which the mode of proceeding
should have been simple, it was in that of men
who are,supposed to be without a farthing in the
world. Yet here we see the expence of obtain-
ing a discharge for 181. no less than 161. ! We
see taxed accounts for a discharge from 1071. 10s.
6d. of no less amount than 231. 15s. In process
of time we shall have all the perfection of the
Court of Chancery transplanted to every In-
solvent Court throughout the kingdom : a fine
regular built juridical system.