The Sun.
London, England, 1844-05-07 00:00:00

in their mode of election, particularly with respect to the elec-
tion of the Chairman and Deputy-Chairman. The present
mode was one of nomination, which he thought was not re-
spectful either to the Directors or the Proprietors.
The GOVERNOR said, that when ha read the resolution,
he stated that it would be submitted to the Court in
due time. Neither himself nor the Board of Directors
had the slightest objection to postpone the discussion. He
would state that measures would be taken to have the papers
printed and in the possession of the Proprietors to-morrow.
All he begged was that they would consider calmly and de-
liberately the proposal contained in them. If the proposals
were sound, they would bear consideration.
After a short discussion, in which some further explanation
of the plan was given,
Mr. LEVY said, that though they might talk of being
hardly dealt with, yet they should remember that they still
were to have 3 per cent. for eleven millions of money. That
was a great boon, and ought to be borne in mind by them.
Mr. BLacxwxu., after several attempts to speak, stated
that they had at present but very imperfect information on
the subject, and he advised a delay, for the purpose of consi-
deration.

A PROPRIETOR asked whether, if the Government was to
have the profit on the circulation of notes above
14,000,0001., it had provided for the expenses of that issue ?
The GOVERNOR said that the profits the Government was
to take were the net profits.
Mr. SALADION wished to know if the 120,0001. and the
60,0001. to be paid under the new arrangement were the same
amount as paid at present?
The GovEnwou—Precisely the same.
Mr. SALLlfort—Has the Bank any power to increase its
issues beyond the fourteen millions?
The GovEnxon—lt has the power, with the consent of the
First Lord of the Treasury, the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
and the Master of the Mint.

Mr. CLARKE said that the questions which had just been
put convinced him of the propriety of ailjouming the discus-
sion, in order to give the Proprietors an opportunity of care-
fully perusing the correspondence.
After a Jew words from Mr. FIELDER, the debate was ad-

journed to Monday next at Eleven for Twelve.
It was announced that the printed papers, consisting of the
correspondence between the Directors and the Chancellor of
the Exchequer, and of the resolutions proposed by Sir R. Peel
to the House of Commons last evening, would be ready to-
morrow morning in the Bank Stock Office.

QUEEN'S BENCH.—(THIS DAY).
(Sittings in Banco.)
EX PARTE THE DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH.
It being known that a criminal information was this day
to be moved for against Mr. Humfrey, barrister, on the part
of the Duke of Marlborough, for certain alleged calumnious
statements made by that gentleman when a candidate at the
last election for the borough of Woodstock, the Court on
its opening was immediately crowded to excess. The counsel
retained for the noble plaintiff were the Solicitor-General,
Mr. Erle, Q.C., Mr. Fitzroy Kelly, Q.C., and Mr. Robinson.
Mr. Humfrey was in Court in professional costume, and near
to the seat usually occupied by him. Precisely at ten o'clock
the Learned Judges took their seat, when,
The SOLICITOR-GENERAL rose, and said he had been
instructed to apply to the Court for a rule to
show cause why a criminal information should not
he filed against Lebbius Charles Humfrey, Esq., barrister-at-
law, upon the complaint of his Grace the Duke of Marl-
borough. He was sure he need not say that it was with very
considerable pain he rose to perform such a duty towards a
gentleman whom he had known for many years, and for whom
he entertained the greatest respect, it was with the deepest
pain he had found that gentleman so far forgetting himself
as to make his conduct amenable to the jurisdiction of their
Lordships on the bench. The occasion out of which the pre-
sent complaint arose, and the circumstances under which the
statements of which he complained were made, were such as
not only to justify but imperatively to demand their Lord-
ship's interposition. On the 22d of last month an election
took place in the borough of Woodstock. That election was
in the immediate neighbourhood of the Duke of Marlborough's
residence at Blenheim. His Grace was Lord-Lieutenant
of the county and a magistrate for the division within
which the borough of Woodstock is situated. For
many years his Grace had been actively engaged
in the magisterial duties within that division, and the
statements which had been made by Mr. Humfrey
were directed against him in his magisterial capacity, in the
very centre of the division where he exercised those public
functions, before those over whom his magisterial jurisdiction
extended, and at a moment when it was not at all unlikely it
might have been called into action, and under circumstances
not improbably calculated to excite disturbance. At such a
time—a time of election, which was always a time of excite-
ment—yaien his Grace's interference as a magistrate
might have been called for, this attack had been made—an
attack calculated to destroy his efficiency, unless their Lord-
ships should interpose on the present occasion for his protec-
tion. There was, on the occasion alluded to, something
peculiar in the position of Mr. Humfrey. He went down to
the borough of Woodstock, not for the purpose of can-
vassing the electors—not for the purpose of engaging in
any contest for the representation of the borough, for he
had declared all idea of a contest to be utterly hope-
less; and if he had ever had such an intent, he had
wholly abandoned it—and all therefore that he went to the
borough for was for the purpose of being the instrument—he
(the Solicitor General) must be permitted to hope the um
conscious instrument—of the malice and falsehood of many
individuals in that neighbourhood. He (the Solicitor-
General) thought the best mode of discharging his duty upon
that occasion would be by reading to their Lordships various
statements which were made by his Learned Friend on the
occasion in question, and then directing their attention to
those portions of the affidavits which gave a direct and dis-
tinct answer to charges which he must say his Learned
Friend had assuredly been instructed to make. And he was
perfectly certain when his Learned Friend heard the real
state of the facts and circumstances, he would regret as
deeply, if not more deeply than any one, that he should have
usted to representations made to him, and that he should so
incautiously and unguardedly have listened to the persons in
whose hands he was placed, and not have exercised the ordi-
nary caution and discretion in judging of the motives which
instigated them in making, such statements to him. The
speech of his Learned Friend on the occasion alluded
to was one of very great force and vehemence. It
contained a variety of vague and general charges, and in-
sinuations which it was utterly impossible for the Duke to
meet, but amongst them were some specific statements and
details, which his Grace had met in a manner the most dis-
tinct and emrhatic. In order that their Lordships might
appreciate the character of the statements which his friend
had made, he (the Solicitor-General) would read portions of
those general charges, which it was impossible to refute, but
which gave the tone and temper to the whole series of
calumnies. His friend said :—" I assure you, gentlemen, that
I will state nothing harshly, but, after the most industrious
personal inquiry, I am bound to say that I believe there never
was, in the history of this country, a borough so neglected—
(Hear, hear)—a tyranny so oppressive—(Hear, hear)—a
borough in which the poor were so utterly forgotten—the
sick and destitute so unrelieved—(Hear, hear)—whilst the
Duke of Marlborough, living at Blenheim, enjoys all the
honour of his princely rank, all the wealth of his high
station, without doing the slightest good to a borough of
which he claims to be the owner and patron ;" and then
he proceeded with an arraignment of the Duke's conduct in
many particulars, with a series of charges distinctly made.
Now, the first case that he (the Solicitor-General) should
refer to, would be that in which the Duke's character and
conduct, as a magistrate, had been inculpated, and -their
Lordships would be good enough to recollect the particular
occasion on which it occurred—one on which his Grace's cha-
racter, as a magistrate, had been directly and distinctly ar-
raigned. His friend said, " there is a man named Harris—
(Hear, hear)—aye, and that name of Harris is a name which
if it does not haunt the Duke upon his dying-bed, he is
more hard-hearted even than you represent him. Harris
was a respectable man, but poor. He held a cottage under
the Duke, and he kept a poor old horse. One day he had
taken the horse to water to a pond in your town. He had
no right to go to the pond, and the Duke's hayward, Timothy
Slingo, going by, seized the horse to take him to the
pound ; Harris gave the horse a cut with his whip, and it
broke from Slingo, and ran back to the stable. Harris was
summoned for pound breach. He was fined Is. and the
costs, which amounted to 193.6 d. He could not pay, and
he was sent to gaol. Whilst he was in gaol his creditors
came upon him, his goods were taken in execution, and when
he came out of gaol he was a ruined man. At this moment
he is working on your roads.—(Loud cries of " Hear, hear,"
and a voice, " It's all true.") But this is not all. This man
was first of all taken before two magistrates, who at first re-
fused to convict him. (Here was a cry of " Here he is," and
the man Harris, amid a scene of intense excitement, was ele-
vated upon the shoulders of the people at the lower end of
the room.) Mr. Humfrey resumed—Two magistrates re-
fused to convict him. The Duke, a fit judge in his own cause,
was sitting in front of his dog kennel, with a glass of ale in
his hand, when the man was brought before him, and he
himself caused him to be committed to gaol." Now he (Mr.
Thesiger) was in a condition to prove to their Lordships,
that from the beginning to the end of that statement there
was not one particle of truth. In the first place, Harris at
the time was not a tenant of the Duke of Marlborough's.
And it was not the least remarkable circumstance attendant
on this charge that, not before he was convicted, but ten
months after that period, he became, at his own request, a tenant
of that very man who had thus been so wickedly and
wantonly denounced as a tyrant. Sling° was not the Duke's
hayward. He was appointed under the General Highways
Act, by Mr. Webb, the surveyor of the highways, and his
appointment was sanctioned, as it required to be, by two
magistrates, the Duke of Marlborough having neither directly
nor indirectly any part whatever in the affair. He had no
knowledge whatever of that appointment ; and it was utterly
untrue that any raagistrates refused to convict Harris. The
fact was, Harris was taken before Mr. Cox, a magistrate of
the division, by the hayward. The charge was made against
him, the evidence heard—the examination of witnesses was
taken down, but inasmuch as, under the Highway Act, one
magistrate could not convict, Mr. Cox adjourned the case to
the next petty sessions for the division. This was, he be-
lieved, on the sth of May—
Lord DErtarkw—ln what year?
The SOLICITOR-GENERAL—In the year 1841. When the
sth of May arrived, it so happened that Mr. Cox did not at-
tend the petty sessions, and the matter was consequently
adjourned until the 12th. Upon that occasion there were
not two magistrates present, and ultimately it was arranged
to have a hearing at the petty sessions 'on the 2d of June.
Now on that day, the 2d of June, the Oxford Agricultural
Society usually met at Blenheim, and it was arranged that
the meeting should take place at a farm-house called " The
Kennel Farm," and it was strange to observe on what a slen-
der foundation of truth all this falsehood had been raised.
The place of meeting, as he had said, was called " The Ken-
nel Farm," but there was no dog kennel within a dis-
tance of a mile of it. In consequence of the ma-
gistrates attending petty sessions being likely to at-
tend the agricultural meeting, it was arranged by
Mr. Holloway, the clerk to the magistrates, that
instead of meeting at his own house, as they usually did, for
the holding of petty sessions, they should meet at the farm
called the Kennel Farm. Accordingly, on that day, the
Duke, who always attended petty sessions, and who, he
believed, acted as chairman, together with two other magis-
trates, Mr. Murrell and Mr. Leonard Pickering, assembled at
this farm-house for the purpose of holding a petty session.
Harris's case was called on, the examinations previously
taken before Mr. Cox were read over, and, not satisfied
with that, the witnesses, both for and against Harris,
were called in and subjected to examination again. Mr.
North, the Town Clerk, who was very prominent in promot-
ing these attacks on the hustings, and from whom, no
doubt, his Learned Friend had derived his information, at-
tended as attorney for Harris. The case was thoroughly in-
vestigated—the magistrates deliberated, and decided that
Harris had been guilty of rescuing a horse which had been
taken by the hayward for the purpose of being pounded.
The Duke inquired the amount of cots, which were stated to
be Its. 6d., which, with the expense of serving the summons,
and other miner details, would make them in the whole
155., upon which, at the suggestion of the Duke himself, the
fine was mitigated to ls. Harris was called into the
room, and was told lie was fined one shilling penalty and the
costs, on which he said they might send him to a thousand
gaols but the money never should be paid. The magistrates
remonstrated with him, and pointed out the folly of his con-
duct. They also told him they would not proceed against
him for a fortnight, in order that he might be able to get the
money; but they of course also told him that if ho persisted
in refusing to pay the fine what the consequence would be.