The Sun.
London, England, 1844-10-21 00:00:00

gib
Urnin -411 t

LONDON, MONDAY, OCTOBER n, 1844.

At a late meeting of the Bucks magistrates, at
which the demoralizing Game-laws were made the
subject of discussion, Sir 11. VEliliST boldly stated as
a fact which could not be gainsayed—and to which
no one present ventured to offer the slightest contra-
diction—that one-fourth of the Buckinghamshire
crops was annually destroyed by game ; and that of
five hundred and thirty individuals committed to the
county gaol, one hundred and sixty-nine were for
offences against the Game-laws ! The worthy
Baronet concluded by proposing that Government
should be memorialised on the subject, but the pro-
posal was rejected by a large majority. This
is no more than we should have anticipated, for
it is astonishing with what tenacity the aristo-
cracy—and more especially the squirearchy—
of England, cling to those injurious laws, which are
among the last remains of the oppressive feudal
system. In their partial eyes they are everything
that is just and beneficent in legislation, happily
adapted to the tastes of the age in general, and to
their own special interests in particular ; consequently
whoever offends against them must be the most
egregious and inexcusable of criminals. We really
believe there is no offence—not even arson or murder
b—of which our provincial magistrates entertain so
great a horror, or which they punish with such re-
morseless severity, as an offence against the Game-
laws. A poacher is, in their estimation, a
miracle of depravity—a species of vermin
which deserves to be exterminated without mercy. If
they could have their own will in Parliament,
they would make the laws against him more strin-
gent than ever, and banish him for life to one of our
penal settlements, there to meditate in anguish and
solitude, on the atrocity of the crime he had perpe-
trated in snaring one of the 'Squire's superfluous
hares, or making free with one of the hundreds of
pheasants to be found in his well-stocked preserves.
Of course the majority of our readers are well aware
of the causes of the antipathy which our rural magis-
tracy entertain towards poaching. Most of them are
themselves keen sportsmen—preservers of game with
the utmost strictness ; consequently their sense of
justice is wondrously sharpened by their sense of
self-interest. Generally speaking, we do not accuse
them of undue severity in the administration of
the laws entrusted to them ; they are consi-
derate, tolerant—we wish we could add that
they are remarkable for :sagacity—anti by no
means indisposed to visit with lenity such offenders
as they may be called on to punish ; but let an un-
happy poacher once be brought before them, and
away goes all their toleration—all their forbearance—
all their lenity; the frown deepens on their brow,
and Justice puts on her most inexorable expression of
countenance, to mark her sense of the atrocious act
committed by the criminal on whom she is called to
adjudicate. This undue severity is deeply to be la-
te en. ted, for it is productive of the most in-
JUIIOIIB consequences by tending to widen the
breach—already quite wide .•
enough—between the
labouring classes and their superiors ; but still more
go be lamented is the existencelofitth he Game-laws
With their present tyrannical form.
all their harsh-
ries, they fail of putting a stop to the offence of
poaching—and they would fail to do so,werecomtheyl
ten times as stringent as they are—while they
the humbler orders to regard those who support the':
sa legal despots and oppressors of the most petty and'
vexatious character. It must ever be a difficult—
&most, indeed, an impossible—task to convince the
destitute labourer who may not be furnished with
=leans enough to provide himself and his family with
the day's meal, and who, moreover, from scarcity of

work, may have more time on his hands than he
knows how to employ ;—it must always, we say, be
a difficult task to convince such a man, who is, not
unfrequently, among the most ignorant of the com-
munity, that in taking a hare or a pheasant, or a
partridge, from a neighbouring preserve that con-
tains hundreds of them, reared with no other view
than to contribute to their owner's amusement, he is
committing such a flagrant outrage against so-
ciety as his inexorable judges uniformly assure
him is the case. Bitterly—most bitterly he resents
the punishment awarded him for his transgression
against the demoralizing Game-laws ; and when the
period of his imprisonment has expired, and he again
comes forth into the word, a free man, his whole na-
ture has undergone a change ; he feels that he has
been made the victim, not so much of justice, as of
arbitrary, self-interested authority ; and this conviction
renders him reckless—desperate—and eager to revenge
on society the wrongs which he conceives he has sus-
tained at its hands. How many a criminal of the blackest
die, who has held the blazing torch of " Swing," and
even shed the blood of his fellow-creatures, may trace
his ruin to the day when he was first convicted of
poaching, and punished for the offence with as much
remorseless severity as if he had perpetrated an act of
the most atrocious character !

The variety of incidents connected with royal pro-
gresses and royal visits which, for some weeks—or
months—past, it has become our duty to record—
may account for—but, we must honestly confess,
can scarcely excuse the postponement of other
matters of more serious import to the welfare of the
public, as affecting the health and the moral condi-
tion of vast masses of our population. Among the
topics which we have long been anxious to bring pro-
minently under the consideration of our readers, are
those suggested by the recent Reports of the
" llealths of Towns Commissioners." For—so long
as the maintenance and protection of human life in
the communities committed to their charge shall
form paramount objects of solicitude with rulers and
legislators, so long must the knowledge and control,
the modification, or the removal of the causes which
predispose those masses (composing the "lower
orders," as they are called) to disease and death, be
considered to assert the strongest possible claims on
the sympathising attention of their fellow-country-
men of all ranks and conditions. In the " First
Report" of these Commissioners " for inquiring into
the state of large Towns and Populous Districts,"
e find so many unsuspected and appalling phases of
social misery among the swarming multitudes who
throng the squalid suburbs of our mighty manufac-
turing emporia, or vegetate in neglected wretched-
ness and want among the nameless alleys and obscure
districts that radiate from this metropolis, as a centre,
of which the concentrated magnificence is hideously
contrasted with the gaunt and sordid aspect of its far-
outlying and scattered extremities ;—we find so many
revolting but impressive pictures of abject destitu-
tion, filth, and corruption, physical and moral, that
we know not which first to present for consideration,
as a memorable lesson upon the gigantic distress that
sits ever brooding, like their evil genius, over the
humblest quarters of gigantic cities. The first illus-
trations, therefore, which we have elsewhere selected
for extract, regard the condition of certain inferior
sections of this imperial city in which we write—of
the tenements that disgrace them —of the almost
fantastic forms in which the utter desolation of their
their ill-starred inhabitants develope itself; of the vile
nuisances, the noisome stench, the intense misery,
the privations, the polluted and infectious atmos-
phere, the contagious disorders, the " pestilence and
famine"—in, and amidst, and against all which,
human existence may maintain a precarious and con-
trasted tenure !

The evidence to which the public will not fail to
attach a primary share of importance, is that of Dr.
SOUTI/WOOD SMITH, the Physician of the London
Fever Hospital. Dr. SOUTHWOOD SMITH is a gen-
tleman whose residence in the eastern districts of the
metropolis has necessarily brought him much into
contact with the victims of penury and disease in
their most fearful aggravation, and amidst the
hovels and cellars of their most profound and most
helpless wretchedness. He appears to have addressed
himself to his benevolent, but sickening task, with
the enthusiastic perseverance of a philanthropist, but
with the acute and vigilant research, also, of a
scientific observer. lie has collected an enormous
aggregation of facts with an industry which will
astonish, and a method that must gratify, those even
who may not be able to appreciate the enlightened
and philosophic spirit in which he has generalised,
and reasoned upon, their results. We have never
perused a paper suggestive of conditions more singu-
lar in themselves, more important in their relations
to the general working of our whole social system,
than that which is occupied by the Doctor's evidence.
His replies to the Commissioners, in cases where the
interrogatories must have evidently been unpre-
meditated and asked off-hand, seem to us all distin-
guished by the same fine power ;—a matured and
disciplined habit of reflection, so familiar with the
matters upon which it has concentrated its energies,
in all their aspects, that it is never at a loss how to
deal with them, in whatever forms, and however
abruptly they may be exhibited to him. But we
must not content ourselves by stopping short of one
important moral which the perusal of such evidence
will press on the most languid or torpid sensibility.
Let the contrast of these scenes of want and crime—
of these abodes of sorrow, sickness, and degradation
—these unlighted, unventilated, undrained, damp,
dirty, noxious, horrifying receptacles of men whom
misery has degraded from the rank of sentient beings
to the level of grovelling, torpid animals, animated by
brute appetites and instincts, but cursed with the in-
ability to gratify the cravings of them ;—let this
terrible contrast awaken wholesome reflection and
stimulate slumbering charity in others, of destiny
more fortunate and moving within the sphere of that
wealth, luxury, refinement, of the healthful homes
and well-ordered establishments, the plenty, elegance,
and cleanliness, which are nowhere more widely dif-
fused than in London. Let all who have so lately
been absorbed by the glittering pageantry of courts,
the splendid hospitality of palaces, and the regal pomp
and banquetings which have so recently celebrated
the friendly greetings of two mighty Sovereigns in
this capital, now turn a benevolent ear, and hold out
a helping hand, to the vvailings of desolate poverty
and to their feebleness, whose very wants are so
abject and overmastering as to preclude them from the
power of putting forth those efforts they would be but
too willing to make to improve their own pitiable and
disconsolate condition. We shall endeavour to offer
some suggestions as to the mode in which such relief
might be advantageously and extensively afforded on
recurring to the subject of this report.

Madrid jouanals of the 12th and 13th instant have
been received. The Chamber of Deputies met again
on the 13th, and, after some routine business, ad-
journed. After the adjournment, about 150 Deputies
assembled at the residence of M. SALAMANCA, and it
was unanimously agreed to support M. CASTRY
OROZCO for the Presidency of the Chamber. It is
said that a considerable number of Deputies desire a
modification of the Cabinet, which would preserve
General NARVAEZ. The other fractions of the
Chamber, who do not desire a change of Ministers,
will support M. ISTURIZ for the Presidency. The
following gloomy picture of the state of parties in
the new Cortes appears in the Clamor Publico of
the 13th :

" New dissensions, and serious divisions, are about to
separate the men who represent the fatal period through
which Spain is at present progressing. The question of
reform is for those men a point agreed upon, but they
are neither agreed on the manner of accomplishing it,
nor upoa the period at which it ought to take place.
The Cabinet, alarmed at the fate which menaces it,
regards as urgent the destruction of the constitutional
basis of the fundamental law, and the conversion of
the Ministerial plans into organic laws, promulgated in
haste to enchain public opinion, which repels them as
an attempt against public liberty, and the laws and
guarantees of the Spanish people. The Carlist faction
requires the restitution of the Church property, and the
marriage of the son of Don Carlos with Queen Isabella
11., in order afterwards to declare the intervention of the
Cortes incompatible with the dignity of the throne. The
Franco-Spanish party wish for an enlightened despotism
in place of the Constitution of 1837, and desire that the
present Ministry should retain office. There remains a
very small fraction of Moderados who make a show of
being opposed to the Government of the sabre, but who
eansdureofit. Don
They reject the marriage of the Queen with
Carlos, but
approvetheyof flatter the partisans of
thaton
They a Parliament,
principlebut they
of
detest popular institutions. the They national sovereignty, and p condemnrese_ntbu theincoherentt an
assemblage--a handful of men without a will of their
own, or without a principle. Such are the elements of ,

SPAIN :-

tfik SUN, LONI)ON, MONDAY E

which the Spanish Cortex are composed which assembled 1
en the day when Queen Isabella 11. attained the age
presdribed by the Constitution for ascending the throne
Of her ancestors, The middle elasses *ill hate no re-
presentatives in the Chambers. It may easily be ton,
ceived that all these heterogeneous elements, this dif-
ference of opinions, of principles, of exigencies, and of
miserable jealousies, will convert the Chamber into a re-
gular camp of Agramont, and that the work which will
result from all these exalted passions can neither bear
the stamp of wisdom or of stability which becomes the
code destined to define the political rights of a civilised
nation."
The Herald() of the 12th instant states that the
Stock Exchange was seriously affected by the decrees
published on the 9th instant. The Minister of
Finance had completely deceived himself. The
hopes of the State creditors had been frustrated, and
a disastrous fall in the funds was the consequence.

The Three per Cents. were done at 26- for cash,
and 261 at 60 days ; the Five per Cents. at 20)k for
cash, and 20 5-16 at 60 days.

The Paris papers in general contain articles on the
new Belgian tariff, which they admit is chiefly
directed against English manufactures. They at the
same time, however, condemn a system so ruinous to
commerce. The Constitutionnel thus adverts to it :
"The Belgian Government has organised a customs
agitation. Not a month passes without its publish-
ing some order to modify the entrance duties on cer-
tain goods. At one time it is to frighten Prussia, at
another it is to lay a snare for France, and, again, to
let England see that there are customs in Belgium.
The last changes in the tariff refer to machinery,
chemical produce, cotton and silk goods, tulles, and
lace. The duties on these different articles are aug-
mented in pretty considerable proportions. However,
France and the Zollverein are temporarily excepted
from the measure, and the new duties are not to be
applicable to our cotton tissues until after a year has
elapsed; silk tissues are to enjoy the exemption
during the continuance of the treaty of July 16,
1842, that is about twenty months. With respect to
the Zollverein, the old duty will still subsist for six
years. At the end of a year Belgium will tell us,
without doubt, that the additional tax will affect our
cotton tissues, if we do not make her some new con-
cession, and a little after she will demand the re-
newal of the treaty of July 16, threatening us, in
case of refusal, to increase the duty on our silks.
All this is puerile. It is a bad way of preparing the
road for arriving at a commercial arrangement. If
Belgium totally prohibited our silks and other tissues
we should lose a market of seven or eight millions,
which is very insignificant for our foreign commerce.
If, by way of reprisals, we should close France to
the linen, threads, and cloths of our neighbours, we
should reduce their exports to 18,000,000 or
20,000,000, and should ruin their linen trade. Let
them look at the question in this point of view, and
they will then perhaps renounce this sad system of
tactics, which shows so little experience and good
faith."

The Globe, however, blames the French Govern-
ment
even more than the Belgian, for want of libe-
rality in commercial intercourse. After pointing out
the arrangements and concessions made by both cowl-
tries up to 1838, it says :—" Now, let us see, how
the two Governments have since acted. The Belgian
Government has maintained all the concessions, while
the French Government has successively and almost
completely withdrawn them, so that there remain
scarcely any of those granted by the French ordon-
nances of the Bth of July, 1834 ; 10th of October
and '2Bth of December, 1835 ; by the two laws of the
2d and 3d of July, 1836, except the reductions in
the duties on linen cloths, and even these are almost
annihilated by the ordonnance of the 24th of
September, 1840, and by M. DELESPAUL'S amend-
ment with regard to thread. Things were in this
state when forth came the ordonnance of the 26th of
June, 1842, which, by a general measure, doubled
the entrance duties on threads and linen cloths. Was
it just to impose this aggravation of duties on Bel-
gium, which had paid for the reduction of the duty
upon linen by such numerous and important conces-
sions ? Certainly not. The concession of the 16th
of July, therefore, was not a favour but an act of
justice. We shall not carry our patriotism so far as
to disguise the truth, and we are of opinion that we
render a greater service to our country by pointing
out to it an error or an act of injustice, than by
endeavouring to conceal it."
To say the least of this new system, amounting
almost to prohibition, it shows anything but a
friendly disposition on the part of King LEOPOLD.

The Journal des Debals has an article blaming, in
rather strong terms, Captain BRUA7 for publishing
dispatches at Otaheite before they had been sub-
mitted to the Government at home. "M. BRUAT,"
it says, " set a bad example, and therefore we thought
it necessary to protest. There cannot be any pri-
vilege for M. BRUAT. Whether he is 4,000 leagues
distant from France or not does not affect the
question. At 4,000 leagues as well as 200 the prin-
ciples are the same. Had M. BRUAT a right to publish
officially his report? Could he make himself a judge,
and the only judge, of the utility and propriety of
this publication ? If this state of things be per-
mitted, what M. BRUAT did all our agents would be
authorised to do ; and not only would they be
authorised to do it, but the Opposition would soon
imperiously require them to do it. M. BRUAT is a
brave officer, but see how he has increased in import-
ance in the eyes of the Opposition since this indis-
creet publication ! He is a hero, and we want to
make a victim of him ! Would it not, in fact, be con-
venient for the Opposition to rev :vivo at the same time
as the Government the dispatches ,of our Ambassadors,
and the reports of our officers by sea and land ?
Would it not be agreeable to appose the Ministry
and sometimes to cut its thr oat with its own
arms, with the documents 11 teeived from its
agents? And then, let the Government take
it into its head to refuse .anything to a
commandant of a province or colony who shall have
transmitted his demand by the channl .1 of his private
Moniteur. All this, we repeat, is n narchy. If M.
BRUAT acted without reflection, we ha we considered it
our duty to reflect on it very serionsly, and if M.
BRUAT is excusable, those who support here a principle
subversive of all government and of ;all order are not
so." The result probably will be hits speedy recal.
The Paris papers contain the following speech
made by the Sub-Prefect to the Ks KG on landing at
Calais :

" Sire, during your absence we havo listened with pro-
found sympathy to the echoes of the -acclamations with
which you were saluted on the frifnidly soil of Great
Britain, and bythe side of her august ~lovereign, to whom
we have offered fram afar our respects and grateful good
wishes. Sire, this memorable day, on which you are
restored to us, will be the finest in the annals of the
faithful city of Calais, and it is in the full effusion of our
hearts that wo exclaim Vive le Roi !"

His MAJESTY thanked him for expressions so conge-
nial to his own feelings, and added that he was happy
to find himself again among the inhabitants of Calais,
who had given him already so many proofs of attach-
ment.

The Journal deg Debals contains the following
curious remarks on the speech of the Queen of

"We find ourselves in the singular position of having
to rectify an erratum.. We have again examined the
original text of the sp,t( •ch delivered by Queen Isabella
at the opening of the C;ortes, and we see there that the
Constitutional Gover o went of Spain expresses a wish
that the field of politi, al discussions should hereafter be
closed. We confess 'tt hat we feel more regret for this
error on account of tl to Spanish Government than we
could have for oursel. .s. If it were simply intended, as
we still believe it was, to express a hope that the prin-
ciple of government El ould be placed beyond discussion,
it is unfortunate that, • terms were not used less capable
of a malevolent intm •pretation. But if it were true,
which we feel it imp Ds sible to imagine, that a Parliamen-
tary Government shoo .1d entertain the idea of convoking
a deliberative assembly to impress upon it the necessity
of maintaining silenced, in that case we should decline to
make an apology for i so strange a manner of compre-
hending free institution is, and we should be compelled to
acknowledge that thin a who feel themselves scandalised
at it are not entirely it i error."
THE BOUM Er--.-SATURDAY, Om 19.

-
First Highest Lowest Last
Price. Price. Price. Price.
French Five per CsntS• • 118 35 118 45 118 30 .. 118 3g
Four-and-a-Ha1f.,... 111 70 111 70 .. 11l 70 .. 111 70
Three per Cents..... 82 20 82 25 .• 82 20 .. 82 25
Bank of France ; 3052 50 —3052 50 ••3052 80 —3052 50
Laffitte Bank, 1,0001. Shares.) 120 ..1120 —ll2O —ll2O
5,0001. Shama 042 •50 ~.8045 —5012 50 ..5045
Belgian Bank ..• ••• • • • 665 .. 665 .. 665 .. 665
Belgian Fives, ! 831.• •• .• 101/ •• 1011 .• IGII •• 1011
1840
1842.........105 105 105 .• 105
Spanish Passive si 5i 51 5
Active ............ 32f .. 32f .. 321 .. 321
Threes.. 35 .. 35 .. 35 .. 35
Portuguese Five per Cents.. i 501 .. 501 .. 501 • • 501
Neapolitan •• • ...... 65 .• 98 65 .• 98 65 .• 98 65
ROM= • lOt • • 106 .. 106 .• 106

RAIT.Ivii;, Y SHARES.
St. Gcrma1n........ ..... .. 915 915 .. 915 .. 915
Versailles, R. 8... ...... .... 3(..47 4 0 •• 397 50 • • 397 50 • • 397 50
L.B.
Rouen • 1025 ..1020 ..1025
. . ~ „
Mum to Rano
-et

—.017 50 ../ois
1016 ..1017 50
Strasburg to Bale•••••• •••• 280 •• 280 •• 277 5.0 . 278 7,5
Avignon to Marseilles— •• 781 25 . 781 25 .. 781 25 .. 781 :5
RAILWAY SHARES FOR THE ACCOUNT, OCTOBER 31.
Versailles, R• 13.. ......••.. 397 50 .• 397 50 .• 397 50 .. 397 50
L. 8•..•••....•. 285 •• 285 .• 280 •• 280
Roucti ~.........1018 75 —1026 25 —lOlB 75 ..1026 25
Rouen to liavre.• •• • • 770 •• 770 .. 768 75 .. 770
Orleans
Strasburg to Bale• • .• •• ...• 277 50 .• 278 75 .. 277 50 .. 278 75
Avignon to Marseilles•• •• 781 25 781 25 . 781 25 .. 781 25

THIS DAY'S NEWS.

CRIMINAL COURT.-(THIS DAY.)
The twelfth session of the present Alayoralty com-
menced this day, before the Recorder, the new Sheriffs,
(Aldermen William Hunter and Sydney), Aldermen
Sir Chapman Marshall, Kelly, and other civic func-
tionaries.
The grand jury having been sworn, were charged by
the Recorder, who said that since the last session there
were 182 persons committed for trial, of whom no less
than six stood charged with the crime of wilful murder.
It would be for the grand jury, however, to say, after
hearing the evidence that would be laid before them,
whether in some of them it would sustain a charge of a
graver offence than that of manslaughter. Having ex-
plained the law of murder, the Recorder alluded to other
serious offences which appeared in the calendar, which,
however, presented no peculiar features ; and having
explained to them the nature of their duties generally,
he dismissed them to their room.
THE CALENDAR.

The following is a summary of the calendar :—Arson,
i
1; bigamy, 1; child dropping n the public street, 2; un-
lawfully uttering counterfeit coin, 3 ; cutting and wound-
ing, 8; embezzelment, 5; horse stealing, 2; larceny, 68;
ditto, in a dwelling-house, 7; ditto, from the person, 15;
ditto, by servants, 31; sending a threatening letter, 1;
manslaughter, 1; misdemeanour, 17; murder, 6; rape,
1; receiving stolen goods, 6; robbery, 6; shooting with
intent to murder, I.—Total, 182.

BOW-STREET.-(THIS DAY.)
John Townsend, a porter, was charged before Mr.
Hall, with stealing a silk pocket-handkerchief, the pro-
perty of James Osborne, Esq., of Gloucestershire.
Mrs. Osborne stated that she had been staying at the
house of Mr. Howard, solicitor, Essex-street, Strand.
Last week she purchased a chest of very peculiar con-
struction, which was fastened with a secret spring. The
prisoner was recommended by the person from whom
she purchased the trunk to pack it, and she agreed to
pay him 12s. for doing so. She had purchased a quan-
tity of plate, and other valuable articles, and the pri-
soner was engaged all day on Saturday in packing the
chest. After this was done, and the chest was fastened
up, she heard the spring of the lid snap. Upon opening
the chest in the afternoon several valuable articles were
missed, and as no one knew how to open the chest but
the prisoner suspicion fell upon him, and a policeman
was sent to his lodgings. Ile at once acknowledged to
having stolen the handkerchief, which he pledged at a
pawnbroker's near to Temple Bar. The other missing
articles had not been found.
The prisoner said nothing in his defence.
Mr. HALL said this was a very serious caso. The
prisoner had been recommended as a confidential per-
son, and had taken advantage of that recommendation to
rob his employer.—He was committed for trial.

CLERKENWELL.—(THIS DAY).
William Cokely, a little boy, about fourteen years of
age, was brought up on a charge of obstructing the foot-
pavement, by crying walnuts.
Mr. GREENWOOD—What was he doing ? Policeman
—Crying walnuts.
Mr. GREENWOOD—I am not aware that crying walnuts
is an offence according to Act of Parliament. Police-
man—But the inhabitants have been complaining of it.
Mr. GREENWOOD—I dare say they have, but as the
offence is not included in the Act of Parliament, I can't
interfere. Policeman—He was making a noise.
Mr. GREENWOOD—Let the boy be discharged.

MARLBOROUGH-STREET.
(THIS DAY.)
Arthur Bowden, a respectably -dressed youth was
charged with stealing a book of the value of 2s. 6d.,
from the shop of Mr. Richard Kimpton. On Saturday
evening last the son of the prosecutor observed the pri-
soner creep under the book-stall and adroitly draw from
it the book in question. He was pursued and taken into
custody but the stolen property was not found in his
possession.
Mr. MALTBY said he should remand the prisoner
until Thursday to ascertain more about him.

MA.RYLEBONE.-(THIS DAY)
Catherine Sullivan, an itinerant seller of fruit, was
fined ss. for exposing a basket of walnuts for sale yes-
terday (Sunday) between twelve and one o'clock, in
Tottenham-court-road.

[How does_ the decision in this case agree with the
decision of Mr. Greenwood in a similar case at Clerken-
well? For the sake of humanity we hope that Mr. Green-
wood's view of the law is the correct one.—En. Sue.]

UNION-HALL.—(THIS DAY.)
Eliza Davis, a well• looking young female, was charged
before Mr. Traill with stealing two sovereigns, some
articles of jewellery, and other property, belonging to
Mr. Wyatt, her master.
Mr. Payne, the barrister, stated the case, from which
it appeared that in June last the prisoner, who was an
inmate of the Female Penitentiary, at Pentonville, was
taken into the service of the complainant. In the ab-
sence of Mrs. Wyatt from town, a criminal intercourse
took place between her husband and the prisoner, which
was continued up to the month of August, when she
absconded, taking with her the above property.
The prisoner, in her defence, declared that the articles
were given to her by the complainant. She produced
three letters, purporting to have been written to her by
the complainant, after she quitted his service. The fact
was, she was enciente by him, and he sought these means
to rain her.
The complainant was handed the letters, and he de-
clared that he was not the writer of them ; and he also
declared that the accusation against this person was not
brought forward for the purpose she had asserted.
The prisoner was remanded till Wednesday.

ROYAL NAVAL BENEVOLENT
SOCIETY.-(THIS DAY.)
A numerous meeting ofthesubscribers and sup-
porters of this charitable institution was held this day
at the Thatched House Tavern, St. James's-street. The
chair was taken shortly after twelve o'clock by Admiral
Lord Radstock. Amongst those present, we noticed
Capt. Feade, Capt. Dickinson, Lieut. Andrews, Lieut.
Thomas Bedford, Capt. H. Hope, Commander T. G.
Dick, Capt. Bettgue, &c. &c. The secretary commenced
by reading a statement of the finances of the society for
the last year.
Sir George White was appointed Vice-President, in
the room of Sir John Beresford, deceased.
After the transaction of some further routine business,
the amount of money to be expended in donations to
officers in the navy, their widows, or their orphans, who
were in distressed circumstances, was stated to be about
5001.
A vote of thanks was then passed with acclamation to
the Chairman, who briefly returned thanks, and the meet-
ing separated.