The Sun.
London, England, 1845-11-12 00:00:00

SDAY MORNING

NOVEMBE

the magistrate a standing order of the House of Common-,
requiring that notices of contemplated improvements shou!d
be posted on the doors of the parish church.
Mr. BAND said, that the order did not apply to this case,
as Westminster Abbey was not the parish church. It wi s
extra-parochial.
A gentleman, who represented the Dean and Chapter, said
they were not desirous of pressing this case, but, if it were
repeated, they must do so. He could not refrain from ex-
pressing his opinion, however, that it was very improper to
select a Sunday as the day to affix these notices, and more
especially the time in which divine service was being per-
formed.
Mr. BOND concurred ; and, having cautioned the defendant
against a repetition of the offence, discharged him.

WORSHIP-STREET.
On Monday a young man named William Beale, described
as a professional singer, was placed at the bar before Mr.
Broughton, charged with having forcibv administered a
certain white powder, supposed to be poison, to a little girl
only eleven years of age, named Jane Eastman, the daughter
of an undertaker in Somerset-place, East-road, Holton.
The complainant, a pretty and intelligent child, who gave
her evidence with remarkable clearness and fluency, stated,
that while passing down Peerless-row, City-road, at a quarter
past eight o'clock on Friday evening she was accosted by the
prisoner, of whom she had some slight previous knowledge,
and who, saving that he was going to see his brother, asked
her to accompany him a short distance, promising, if she
did so, to give her a mince pie. After walking a few yards
in his company, she told him that she had been sent on a
message by her mother, and that she could not proceed any
fu,ther, upon which the prisoner threw his arm round her
neck, and partly carried and partly dragged her nearly half
the length of the street. She struggled violently to extricate
herself, aad the prisoner at length set her down, but had no
sooner done so than he seized her by the throat, and compressing
it violently with his fingers, compelled her to open her mouth,
when he instantly puled from his pocket a small packet con-
taining some white powder, which he forced into her mouth,
and the greater portion of which she involuntarily swallowed,
on seeing which the prisoner took to his heels and escaped.
During the whole of the time she was being forced along and
the powder was being thrust into her mouth, she screamed
loudly for assistance, and her cries ultimately attracted the
notice of a lady who was passing, and who kindly assisted her
to the house of her parents. The witness added, that the mo-
ment she had swallowed the powder she felt a burning sensa-
tion in her throat and stomach, from aehich she endured the
most excruciating pain, and that since then she had been con-
fined at home under the care of a surgeon.
In cross-examination by Mr. Heritage, who attended for
the prisoner, the witness positively persisted in her identifica-
tion of the latter as the man who had assailed her in the
manner described, and stated that she had seen him only on
two previous occasions, the first of which was on her calling
at a shop he kept about ten months before for some sweet-
meats, and the second five months since, when he called with
his wife to look at some apartments to be let in the house of
her parents.
The mother of the complainant. stated, that about nine
o'clock on the evening in question her daughter returned
home in a state of great alarm and agitation, and observing
that her eyes and face were much swollen and her throat
discoloured, she questioned her as to what had happened,
when she immediately communicated to her the particulars
she had already given in evidence, and described her as-
sailant as the man who had called some time before to look
at the vacant rooms. The child appeared to be in agonizing
pain, and complained that her inside was swollen and
scorched, on which the witness took her to the house of
Mr. Young, a surgeon in the East-road, who at !once pro-
nounced it as his opinion that she was suffering from the
effects of poison, and administered two powerful emetics at
short intervals to remove the contents of the stomach,
which now remained in his possession. The surgeon directed
the child to bs instantly taken home and placed in bed,
which having been done, she continued in a state of partial
delirium and acute suffering the whole of the night, and had
not yet entirely recovered from the effects of the treatment
she had received.
Mr. Arthur Hayes, assistant to Mr. Young, proved that

on the complainani being brought to his enplciyer's house
she manifested all the appearances a person labouring under
the effects of an active poison would exhibit, and that Mr.
Young, who had since subjected a portion of the contents of
the stomach to chemical agents, had detected the existence
of an acrid poison of a powerful description, but that he was
anxious to have more time allowed him to enable him to
complete the analysis.
Mr. BROUGHTON said that it was very essential for the
ends of justice that the chemical examination should be per-
formed with extreme- care, and, as Mr. Young's other profes-
sional engagements might disable him from paving that at-
tention to the analys.ition that was imperative, the rejected
contents must be carefully preserved, and submitted to Dr.
Leeson, the chemical lecturer at St. Thomas's Hospital.
'Sergeant Brannan stated that information of the occurrence
having been forwarded to the station-house on Saturday
evening, together with a description of the prisoner's personal
appearance, he proceeded in company with the complainant
to a public-house in Holborn, where he had ascertained that
the prisoner was engaged as a singer, and, on going up stairs
to a concert-room, in which there were about thirty persons
assembled, the little girl immediately, and without the
slightest hesitation, pointed out the prisoner, who was seated
amongst the company, as the person who had committed the
offence. The witness accordingly called him out of the room,
and having apprised him of the nature of the charge against
him, the prisoner expressed the utmost surprise, and declared
that he could prove that he was a considerable distance off at
the time-the transaction was alleged to have taken place.
The prisoner, through his solicitor, denied most positively
that there were any grounds for the charge.
Evidence was then gone into for the purpose of proving an
alibi, which
Mr. BROUGHTON considered to have entirely failed.
The prisoner was ultimately held to bail in two sureties of
1001. each, to appear in a week to answer the charge against
him.