The Sun.
London, England, 1845-07-03 00:00:00

ki3)avilingUiL

LONDON. THURSDAY, JULY 3, 1845.

The House of Lords did not meet yesterday.

The Commons assembled at four o'clock.

On the order of the day being read for bringing up
the report on the Lunatics Asylum and Lunatic Pau-
per Bills. _ _

Mr. T. DU:WO:NUM moved that the report be received
th dis -ix rn.oshs.

ASHT.F.Y. ‘fr. F. BARING, Mr. M. GIBSON, and
fs,l ,)111,,r Member:;, urged the Hon. Member
'll-,:bury to withdraw his motion, which Ivas on a
thvisicinrojectf-d by a majority of 102, the number being
tr r.: It3NTCOMDE'S motion, 15 ; against it, 117.
Mr. DtvF.TT presented a petition from a gentleman
nainf.d BARRETT, complaining that an action had been
brought again“ him for evidence which he had given
b. fore the Select Committee on the Medical Bill, and
praying the 11.,use to afford him protection. The
• ws, ortio:o.l to be printed, and to be taken into
tr-rLurrow (this day.)
resolved itself into Committee on
th;, Fig d Gar !L Bill,

Mr. HOEDUCA expressed his determined hostility to
the inea,ure, and for the purpose of defeating it, moved
that the (A-mil-man do leave the chair.
After a long conversation the Committee divided, and
Mr. RoF.Luctes proposition was rejected; the numbers
being--f,r it, 19; ?gainst it, 42.
Mr. C:.;RT;', 4 proposed that instead of three parsons
,1 to call a parish meeting, to put this
ilia in (;p3oLiir,i• six should be necessary. This
!v:,-, ':er a short discussion, agreed to.
Mr, liENLEI in,,4ed, that each requisitionist should
rat,rl •a. UV., on a division this was rejected,
the numbers being for Mr. HENLEY'S proposition 17,
against it 26.

The remaining clauses of the Bill were then passed,
th, rrport ~rdpred to be brought up this day.
The ituu4e afterwerda went into Committee on the

Lunatics Asylum and Pauper Lunatics Bill, and 43
clauses were agreed to. The Chairman then reported
progress, and the other orders of the day having been
disposed of, the House adjourned at Two o'clock.

The question touching the claims set up by the
Government of Spain, through their Minister at this
Court, the Duke de SOTOMAYOR, for the admission of
its colonial grown sugars, on terms equally advantageous
with those awarded to the free-labour produce of Vene-
zuela and the United States, is one of a very remarkable
character. It has elicited two memorable state papers
—the one from the Spanish Minister in London, the
other (in reply to it) from the Earl of ABERDEEN, as
Foreign Secretary of her Majesty. The claim advanced
on the part of Spain is to have her Cuba and Porto
Rico sugars admitted—irrespectively altogether of the
consideration of slave or free-labour produce—on
the same terms as those " of the mcst favoured nations."
The demand is based on an article in the treaty of
Utrecht, in the year 1713, and the analogy sought to be
established with the recent admissions of Venezuela and
United States' produce, into the British market under
certificates of origin. Now the general proposition into
which the answers of Lord ABERDEEN to the several
arguments with which the Duke of SOTOMAYOR endea-
vours to justify the pretensions of Spain in this affair,
resolves itself into this : that the obligation on the Go-
vernment of Great Britain, under the treaty referred
to is, that the " subjects " of Spain shall be treated as
the " subjects" of the most favoured nation—not that
Great Britain shall treat the " produce" of Spain as she
shall be accustomed to treat the "produce of the most
favoured nations." This proposition which, on a cur-
sory statement of it may seem to sound as mere special
pleading, is, in fact, a very substantial and well sustained
rebutter to the plea of Spain. The remonstrance of the
Spanish Minister is certainly drawn with equal temper
and ability. But the reply of Lord ABERDEEN does ap-
pear to us, not only a successful but a conclusive reply.
Whether the Duke has not reason on his side, when
(speaking of the reasons assigned for the latitude re-
cently given by the Government to the construction or
force of Conventions in the two instances we have just
cited), he suggests that certain existing but ancient
treaties between this country and Spain must have been
forgotten ;we will not undertake to say. Our own im-
pression is, that to this extent the Spanish Minister is
right. The origin and history of Mr. GLADSTONE'S
scheme about these certificated growths, his identifica-
tion with, defeat upon, and retirement from
office on account of it—always a political
mystery—seems to admit of no more probable
explanation than that, in fact, these anterior treaties to
which the Spanish Duke adverts (those of 1658, 1679,
1689, and 1713) had been forgotten in Downing-street
or at Whitehall. We are bound to concede to Spain a
sort of traditionary credit for good faith in its observance
of treaties, and we are far from wondering that
the Duke should skilfully bring the merits of
the Spanish Crown in that respect under Lord
ABERDEEN'S notice. And we go further. So far
as the mere letter of the stipulations is concerned, the
Duke proves his case. It is impossible to deny that the
rights of Spanish commerce to the favour we have con-
ceded to that of Venezuela and of the United States, as to
bringing sugar into our home market, are forcibly
put and emphatically illustrated. Even under the
treaty of 1783, which renewed all the conditions affecting
the relations of the two Crowns that were comprised in
that of 1713, the Duke of SOTOMAYOR is justified in
maintaining that these are terms which would include
the present demands of Spain, to the extent in which
they had been allowed before. But here is precisely the
point which Lord ABERDEEN puts in issue ; and we can-
not see how the Spanish Minister is to escape from it.
He demonstrates that whilst the treaties of 1617 and
1713 secure to thesubjects of Spain and England recipro-
cally, each from the Government of the other the same
privileges as were then enjoyed by the most favoured
nations ; there were, in respect of the trade of the West
India colonies of either Monarchy, no favoured foreign
nations. By a reference to the language of the very
at ticle in the treaty of 1670, on which the Duke most
confidently relies, the Earl of ABERDEEN, with
equal diplomatic tact, and more historical accuracy,
clearly proves that it was the darling object of each of
the two Sovereigns, at the very date of the instrument,
to guard scrupulously against, and sternly to prohibit,
the subjects of the other from visiting that part of his
dominions. Other stipulations were concurrently in
force that expressly excepted them from the scope of
any " privileges" accorded to foreign subjects in rela-
tion to any other countries, These West Indian pos-
sessions Lord ABERDEEN, therefore, insists, never came
within the spirit or meaning of any of these treaties.
The force of this reasoning is much enhanced by the
facts—First, that in 1814, at the close of the war, it
was stipulated, that in the event of the Spanish colonies
in America being opened to foreign trade, that of Great
Britain should be on the footing of the most favoured
nation. But it is an admitted fact between both parties
that, up to that time, Spain had not opened her colonial
trade. How does the Duke of SOTOMAYOR escape from
the necessary inference to be deduced from the circum-
stance of Spain, in 1814, not having fulfilled, on her own
part, those conditions, in virtue of which alone she can
exact from us the execution of our contract according to
her interpretation? He brings forward the decree of the
Spanish Government in 1824, declaring (when she had
no longer any power to restrain them) that the
Spanish colonies in America were open to all nations.
But in the result of their political struggles with the
mother country they had in the meantime thrown off the
yoke, as Lord ABERDEEN, with more truth than deli-
cacy, terms it, of Spain. Mr. CANNING, in 1822, having
called " his new world into existence," had executed
treaties with them as independent States. If, therefore,
there had previously existed, either in letter or spirit, a
bond fide compact upon this point between the two
Crowns, Spain had torn the seal from the bond. She
had no longer that to give which she had stipulated
in its recital to bestow. This seems to us the short
justification of that conduct in the British Go-
vernment, which his Lordship has ably vindicated. The
Foreign Secretary rather hints at than enters into
other considerations to be alleged for the favour shown
to the sugar of Venezuela and the United States, over
those of Porto Rico and Cuba. Though given under
treaty by anticipation only, it might have been intended
as an inducement to the former States to abolish slave-
trading. In any case, Lord ABERDEEN has clearly felt
the imperative necessity of establishing our own cha-
racter for good faith and honour in respect of these ne-
gotiations, and has done justice to the great duty
which it devolved upon him to discharge.

On many occasions we have had to call the attention
of our readers to the flagrant enormity of the dispropor-
tion between the legalised costs decreed against offenders
over whom the Magistrates exercise summary jurisdic-
tion, and the amount of damages found against or fine
levied upon the same parties. But the cases WO have
hitherto adduced on such occasions are comparatively
trivial in the character of their vexatiousness, and the
disparity of the penalty to the offence, when put side by
side with that which we noticed in our paper of yester-
day. A poor man was charged on Wednesday last, be-
fore the Magistrates of the Egham division of the
County of Surrey, with having cut down grass of the
value of four farthings, on the edge of a ditch upon the
farm of one LANE. The man, ROSE, was convicted of
having committed damage to the extent of four far-
things—no doubt an exceedingly heinous offence, and
far be it from us to palliate it. If a penny saved
be a" penny gained, according to the assurance of
the old proverb, a penny insidiously purloined from the
sacred purlieus of a man's ditch, must be at least the
square of four pennies ; and that is a large allowance.
But what was the sum of the costs actually decreed
against this formidable agrarian felon who bad, out of
an overweening affection for his donkey, we presume,
clandestinely, but in a moment of reckless sympathy,
cut down a part of the valuable growing crop which
adorned and gave importance to the brink of a fosse ?
Some 150 times the amount of the assessed damage.
Thirteen shillings and sixpence was the modest demand,
en nomine erpensarum, of the enlightened bench, conse-
quent on damages assessed of the amount of one penny.
Within the memory of most living men, we believe that
the price of hay has not risen to such a price as it was
fetching in the Spring, 71. a load. Supposing that the
present season promised no better grass crop than that
of last year, and that this rustic plunderer had cut down,
that is if he could, so much of the matchless bordering of
this inviolable ditch-bank as would have amounted to the
equivalent, dried, of a truss of hay ; the Egham bench
having ordered him to pay 4s. ft.r the "damages," ought
to have sentenced him, on their own rules of proportion,
to 150 times four shillings as costs—say 301. sterling.
This may seem very absurd to uninformed people, who
have never learned to believe with the earlier sages
among our legal commentators, " that the law is the
perfection of common sense." But to talk, after this,
of agricultural protection ? 'What is the necessity for
it ? Any speculative farmer who has surrounded his
homestead, like some retired burgomaster in the suburbs
of Leyden, or a rich Landdrost in his canal-encircled
domain in Batavia, with a ditch of banks as verdant as
its waters, may realise upon a few roods of land a more
profitable return than other men can derive in these
times from ten well cultivated acres. Let him only
leave his gates open o' nights, so that whether "at early
dawn or on dewy eve," these wayfaring interlopers may
test the quality of the neglected herbage on the borders

of his walks or the edges of his ditches, and he will
have sown and reaped at once to some purpose. A bench
of county magistrates—perhaps his brother guardians in
the union—it may be his landlord or his customers—
will feel every just degree of indignation on his account ;
every disposition not to wrong the mysterious unknown,
whoever he be, who is the party benefited by these un-
accountable, excessive, overwhelming costs :-13s. 4d.
on a decree of 4 farthings damages I There is one re-
markable allowance to be made, it is true, as a set-off
against such legitimate and equitable profit as might
otherwise accrue to vigilant trespass prosecutors. Pay-
ment ought to follow upon conviction. But it does not
necessarily follow that conviction is followed by pay-
ment—either of damages or costs. The Act of Par-
liament, with singularly ill-judged lenity, has provided
for the course to be taken with the convicted, in " de-
fault of payment." Instead of following up the ad-
mirable principle of apportioning costs after the rate of
150 fold on damages found, by some acts of personal
infliction on the delinquent, as it ought in consistency
to have done, such as drawing out a tooth per week
(from those who have them), during the period of de-
fault, on King John's graduated scale of Jew-dealing ;
or putting them in the pillory once a week, till full
liqu on of debt and costs ; instead of this, the Act
of Parliament directs, for such defaults, a certain equiva-
lent of imprisonment, founded on very uncertain rules.
In the case to which we aro immediately addressing our-
selves, the very bad, who, having committed damages to
the amount of four farthings, is unprepared to pay, in
addition, 160 farthings for eosts, is most properly con-
demned to three weeks' imprisonment. Oh, righteous
law ! Oh ! paternally treated peasantry ! Oh ! land
of equal justice, equal rights, equal penalties ! It must
be a source of peculiar gratification to poor ROSE to
know that had he been of gentle blood and gentle for-
tunes he might, on the very first day of next hunting
season, have gratified himself by riding over the lands of
every Magistrate on the Bench—and in a gallop over
springing corn and young turnips have committed da-
mages with impunity to the amount of four pounds in-
stead of four farthings,—followed by no costs (to himself),
and no consequences on default of paying damages.
Let us hope that he has by this time learned to appre-
ciate the impartial bearing of; magistrate-made laws on
all classes of her Majesty's subjects ; the high protecting
duty of agriculturists, who extract, in enhanced prices for
their own grown corn, millions per annum frcm t he pockets
of our indigent and industrial community,—and the small
ditch-edge grass cropper, who robs a farmer in a single
night of green forage to the amount of four farthings !

The Levant mail brings intelligence from Constantinople
to the 17th, Smyrna the 18th, and Athens and Alexandria
to the 19th ult. The rejoicings at Constantinoble on the
occasion of the marriage of the SunrAN's sister, the Sultana
ADELE, with MEHEMET Ara, Pacha of Tophana, lasted for
three weeks, and were on a scale of oriental magnificence.
The Archduke CONSTANTINE of RUSSIA was to arrive on the
18th. M. DE NESSELRODE, the son of the Russian Minister,
had arrived. The accounts from Syria are unfavourable. The
armistice between the Druses and Maronites had been
broken and the civil war renewed. The accounts from
Alexandria state that the Druses first broke the truce by
pillaging the churches and convents, and murdering the
priests, and now both partias are burning each other's mul-
berry and other trees. The consequence is that thousands of
people are starving. The King and Queen of GREECE had
returned to Athens from their excursion into the provinces.

We have received accounts from Madrid and Barcelona
both to the 25th ult. The Government continue to issue
denunciations against Don CARLOS and his family. A
circular had been issued from the Home-office similar to that
addressed by NARVAEZ to the political chiefs, calling upon
the authorities to take the most prompt and vigorous mea-
sures against all attempts that may be made in favour of
Don CARLOS or his son. The proprietors of the Espectador
journal, against whom an action had been brought for libels
on the Ministry, were acquitted on the 24th ult., by a jury of
twelve, ten of whom voted for acquittal and two for a con-
viction. The verdict was received with loud applause. The
Gazette contains an ordonnance for regulating transactions
on the Bourse and preventing reckless speculation. It ap-
pears from this that the stockbrokers are to be liable for all
time bargains and are to enter into securities for that pur-
pose. The Heraldo recommends the speedy return of the
QUEEN to Madrid, but the reason is not stated. MARTINEZ
DE LA Rosa arrived at Barcelona on the 25th. On the
previous day M. LESSEPS had given a grand entertainment
to Generals NARVAEZ and CONCHA, and several Members of
the diplomatic body, including Mr. PEEL.

MADRID BOURSE.—Three per Cents., 221/, for cash ;
321/2 for Account ; Five per Cents., 21 for cash ; 21% for
Account.

The French Chamber of Deputies have passed the railway
Bills for lines between Tours and Nantes, and between Paris
and Strasburg. The lease for the former extends to 35
years and for the latter to 45 years. Both Bills were passed
by large majorities. In the Peers the estimates for the year
were presented by the Finance Minister, and also the Bill
for the suppression of the slave-trade by Admiral 141Ack.au.
The Bill granting 18,140,000 f. for the improvement of various
harbours and fortresses was passed by a majority of 94 to 4 ;
also a grant of 200,000 f. for the celebration of the July
fetes. The carpenters' " strike" still continues. On this
subject the Journal des Debats says :—" The Government
has grounds for suspecting that among the 4,000 carpenters
who have struck their work, the majority are yielding to the
insinuations and even menaces of a comparatively small mi-
nority. This, in fact, is the secret of nearly all such coali-
tions. What has followed? Have they been threatened in
their turn—have they been arrested en masse—have any other
means of constraint been employed? No. If any arrests have
been made they have been very few, and only in cases where
it was necessary to coerce those who dared to proceed to acts
of violence against such of their fellow-workmen as were
unwilling to submit to the injunctions of the coali-
tion, or those whose turbulence led them to pull down
scaffolding. There are in the ranks of the army men
who had been carpenters. The Ministry has allowed a
few hundreds, not more, to be engaged by the builders,
and thus the most urgent works have been carried on. By
this means, also, the more peaceable carpenters, who had
been kept from their work by threats alone, have become as
it were under a protection, and the numbers of those who are
thus enabled to resume their employments will increase as
their fears are lessened. By this means, in fine, the danger
of a general interruption of the progress of building will be
gradually averted. The men of twenty different trades con-
nected with these works may then feel themselves at liberty
to earn their daily bread by their honest industry. And this is
what some people have had the audacity to call tyranny in
the Government. The carpenters will, we do not doubt,
very quickly be convinced that they have been completely
deluded by the declamations of their pretended friends; and,
returning to a right understanding of their own interests,
they will be grateful to the Government for its long forbear-
ance." The " strike" has caused a great demand on the
savings' banks. The sums invested on the 29th and 30th of June
amounted only to 536,120 f., while the amount drawn out
was 1,025,000 f.

The Courrier de l'Afrique of the 21st ult. contains the fol-
lowing intelligence from Oran :—" The negotiations with
Morocco, which appeared to have been interrupted, on
account of the treaty of commerce being connected with the
main treaty, which had for object the regulation of the limits
of the territories, .and the relations of the two contracting
powers, have, we are assured, just been resumed on the old
basis, and the dread of hostilities appears to be entirely at
an end."

The Funds, on Tuesday, were rather more firm on the Paris
Bourse. The Three per Cents. closed at 83f. 65c.; the Five
per Cents. at 1211.65 c. ; Orleans Railroad Shares, 1,167 f. 50c. ;
Rouen, 1,027 f. 10c. ; Vierzon, 750 f. ; Havre, 840 f. ; Avignon,
970 f. ; Basle, 252 f. 50c. ; Spanish Three per Cents, 39i
ex. div.

The following are the quotations for the new lines:—

Orleans and Bordeaux, 1671. 50c. premium ; ' Boulogne,
1101. 50c. ditto ; Troyes and Montereau, 27f. 50c; Paris
and Lyons (Lattte), 20f.; ditto (Calon), par; ditto (Gan-
neron), 7f. 50c. ,• Northern line (Laffitte), 32f. 50c.; ditto
(Rosamel), 6f. 50c. ; Tours and Nantes (Mackenzie), 10f. ;
ditto (Drouillard), par; ditto (O'Neill), sf. ; ditto (Jacques
Lefevre), par ; Lyons and Avignon (Lecointe),l2f. 50c ; ditto
(Talabot), 37f. 50e. ; ditto (Compagnie Meridionale), 7f. 50c. ;
Bordeaux and Toulouse (Mackenzie), 50c. ; ditto and Cette
(Espeleta), 3f. 50c.; Creil and St. Quentin, par; Paris and
Strasbourg (Ganncron), 10f. ; Dijon and Mulhausen, par.

MORTALITY IN THE METROPOLIS.—The number
of deaths during the week ending June 28 was 830, exceed-
ing that of the previous week by 27. There has been a
slight increase under the head of diseases of the organs of
respiration, and the number of violent deaths is greatly above
the average, being more than double the usual returns. The
total number is 52, and of these 11 were suicides, 5 from
scalds and burns, and nearly all the rest from accidents. Ten
deaths by small-pox occurred under 15 years of age, and the
remaining two at the respective ages of 38 and 49 years.
The fall of rain in inches was 0.62.

FOOT-RACE ON WATERLOO-BRIDGE.—This morn-
ing the much talked-of running inatch between E. Smith and H.
Webb came off over 140 yards of road on Waterloo.bridge. The
men were matched for 101. a.side, and the betting was in favour of
Smith at 5 to 4 ; the race attracted a vast crowd of spectators. E.
Smith has figured in public foot.racee very numerously, has
had a fair share of success, and is considered as the elite of th'e pro-
fession. Webb has reveral times catered in similar matches.
With some difficulty a line was formed through the concourse of
persons assembled and the men came to the starting mark; several
ineffectual attempts to start were made, each pedestrian making
efforts for an advantage, when ultimately Smith got off at a half
yard lead. Webb was quickly up with him, and at 100 yards the
men were running abreast. Webb made a struggle for the goal,
Smith being on the alert, when after a very quick ran race, Webb
came in the winner by one yard.

THE APOLLO TROOP-SHIP.—It is, perhaps, scarcely
necessary to say, in reference to the rumoured loss of this ship,
that letters were recived yesterday from Plymouth, stating that
the Spartan, Captain Shaperoft, arrived off that port on Monday,
after a quick passage from Newfoundland. Her arrival having
been made known to Lloyd's agent, he promptly repaired on board
to inquire into the reported loss of the Apollo troop-ship. Captain
Shaperoft informed the agent that he sailed from Newfoundland
on the 17th of June; that during his stay there—upwards of three
weeks—he heard nothing about the Apollo or Spartan frigate;
and was confident they had not been lost in that neighbourhood at
the period spoken of.
_ _

LAW APPOINTMENTS.—Mr. Sergeant Shee is to
receive a patent for precedence, Mr. Montagu Chambers Is to be
appointed Queen's Counsel, both of the Home Circuit ; and
Mr. Robert Allen of the Oxford Circuit is to be created sergeant.
at Law,

CALCUTTA NEWS.
(From the Morning Herald.)

The Overland Mail from India, bringing the Government
dispatches, has arrived at Marseilles. The intelligence which
this mail conveys we were enabled to anticipate on Tuesday
last, with the exception of the news from Calcutta, which we
have now received by extraordinary express, and hasten to
lay it before our readers. The letters from Calcutta come
down to the 13th of May, from which we learn that on the
9th a destructive fire broke out in the office buildings of
Messrs. Macvicar, Smith, and Co., which, with all they con-
tained, were entirely destroyed, books, papers, and all. The
fire soon seized the premises of Messrs. Sewers and Co , ad-
joining, which quickly shared the same fate ; here, for-
tunately, a portion of the books, property, &c., was saved.
Messrs. Kilby and Co., also were sufferers, but principally in
household furniture. How the fire originated was not known.
The loss of Macvicar, Smith, and Co. is estimated at about
2i lacs of rupees. The total loss of all, including the build-
ings, is estimated at about sor 6 lacs. Such a fire, it is be-
lieved, has not occurred in Calcutta since it was taken by
Surg-00-dowlah in 1756.
(From the Bengal Hurkaru Price Current.)
CALCUTTA, MAY 10, 1845.

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