The Sun.
London, England, 1845-01-24 00:00:00

E SUN,' LONDON,

and of game, in ominous combination, among the most
prolific sources of supply from whence the inmates of
the prisons in the northern and north-eastern dis-
tricts of England—are furnished. The law of debt
was certainly ameliorated to a certain extent, if, as
we believe, to mitigate its severity was to ameliorate
it ; by the remarkable acts of the two last sessions of
Parliament. But the vicious principle, we are fully

prepared to show, still remains in full vitality, which
assumes the fact of debt to raise the inference of
crime. For debt is still visited, irrespective of any
considerations of the circumstances under which it may
have been contracted, with a penalty at least as severe
as that awarded to very heinous offences and mis-
demeanours, with this aggravation of its intensity—
namely, that the unhappy debtor who has endured
the ruinous infliction of personal imprisonment (with
all its concomitants of severance from his family and
friends, disorganisation of his household, exile from
his home, loss of time, health, spirits, and good re-
pute in society, and does not clear himself even if he
be so fortunate as to collect the wherewith to pay the
debt he is incarcerated for. Twenty shillings in the
pound will not suffice; twenty-five shillings more in
the pound are frequently the amount of law ex-
penses incurred under our humane and honest system
—ten shillings
.more, or fifty per cent., is quite a
common supplementary claim on this account. If he
cannot pay these expenses, he may rot in his prison,
notwithstanding that he could pay his debt. A re-
turn from all the prisons and "lock-ups" in the king-
dom of those who still remain in confinement for
costs, after finding the means and making the offer
to settle their principal debts, would be a most fear-
ful one. Now this, again, is an anomaly ; the fur-
ther imprisonment of men whom you have clapped
up for not paying twenty shillings justly due from
them, till they have paid ten shillings more for the
luxury of being clapped up. But it is not mere re-
markable than that which, to the commission of a
larceny with violence in a dwelling-house, assigns a
far less period of imprisonment, on the average of
cases, than is usually endured by a declining but
well-principled tradesman who is precluded, by cir-
cumstances beyond his control, from promptly satisfy-
ing the demands of his creditor. This inconsistency,
which is a feature common both to the law of debt
and the law of game, is heightened, in the case of
the former, by its reaction on the social affections. We
may thus advert—it would be painful to dwell upon
—the exhibition which Mr. Commissioner FON-
BLANQUE'S Court presented in the beginning of this
week. Lord HUNTINGTOWER being again brought
before that jurisdiction, his counsel indignantly di-
rected the attention of the judge to the fact that that
very foolish, but much harassed person, was in the
receipt of no other moneys but the allowance which
he derived from the spontaneous kindness of his mo-
ther, the Countess of DYSART, out of her separate
maintenance. The Earl, his father, who was present
at this appeal, is stated to have returned for answer—
" a smile ;" although as the Commissioner observed,
Lord lIUNTINGTOWER was known to all the world in
the relations of his son and heir. Conduct like this
is so truly paternal—this solicitude of a parent to
withdraw his son from being made, as it was em-
phatically styled, " a public spectacle"—is so im-
pressive, that we should have concluded the Noble
Earl had been one of the young Lord's most fa-
niished and eager creditors, had we not the authority
of DEBRETT and BURKE to confirm the recognition
of Commissioner FONBLANCtUE. But the Earl of
DYSART is by no means singular in his animosity for
debtors, or his notions of the treatment which is
proper for them. The intelligent officer whose
" Report" is now before us, Captain WILLIams,
shows us that debtors who probably are not amenable
to such charges of wanton extravagance, absurd and
childish credulity, and reckless desperation in in-
curring embarrassment, as have been imputed to
Lord lIUNTINGTowER, aro subjected, in our north-
eastern districts, to the same sweeping construction
of meditated bad faith which we suppose to be alone
adequate to the justification of imprisonment as the
penalty of debt. Captain WILLIAMS says—
" The condition of many of the lock-ups in this dis-
trict, and the treatment of prisoners when detained in
them, has occupied much of my attention ; and I have
not failed to visit those which opportunity or convenience
Isrought within my reach. I regret to report that a
number of these places are wholly unfit for the reception
of human beings; and that the treatment of prisoners,
while in custody of constables, is in many cases very far
from satisfactory. In many instances they are unpro-
vided with bedding or artificial heat; and the allowance
of food to prisoners is arbitrary and irregular, although
in most places ample provision is made by the justices
through the agency of the keepers. The insecurity,
danger to health, and inadequacy of many of these lock-
ups, are more clearly shown by the fact, that prisoners,
before examination, are often retained in custody by the
constables at a public or private house. It must also be
observed, that by the intervals of several days elap.ing
between the holding of petty sessions, prisoners are
liable to bo detained in these places for a considerable
time, and that instances occur of their being kept in
them after conviction or committal, to suit the con-
venience of those charged with the duty of conveying
them to prison. The complaints to me by prisoners of
the sufferings and inconveniences thus imposed upon
them are most frequent, and corroborated by my personal
observations.
" The discreditable condition of the gaols for debtors,
attached to peculiar jurisdictions, and the condition of
their inmates, have long been the subject of animad-
version in these Reports ; and although by the passing
of the 7 and 8 of Victoria, cap. 96, the number of this
description of prisoners has been materially and perma-
nently diminished, yet they still continue liable to re-
ceive debtors in execution for sums above 201.
" The accommodation in many of these prisons is
limited to the bare walls. No respect being paid to re-
ligion by the performance of Divine service ; no medical
assistance in cases of sickness ; no provision of food,
bedding, light, nor fire. No authority exercised by
which the brutal and hardened are restrained from prac-
tising on the weak and better disposed. Idleness and
corrupting influences prevails in all, unchecked and un-
reproved. It is worthy of remark that imprisonment in
the gaols of the Courts of Request at Sheffield was found
to make so little impression, that it was deemed necessary
to heighten its severity, by ordering that prisoners
should not be allowed to employ themselves in any kind
or description of work. I may add, that I never went
into these prisons without finding a party engaged at
cards, or some other idle game."
But the testimony of Captain WILLIAMS—a very
intelligent observer—on the subject of convictions
under the Game-laws, reinforces the argument against
those founded on their anomalous relations to such
as regard all other species and rights of property
among us, by this striking exposition of their utter
futility, as regards the accomplishment of the great
object all penal laws propose to effect—namely, to
deter by example. In spite of Mr. GRANTLEY
BERKELEY'S ecstatic commendations of this bar-
barous feature in our code, convictions for poaching
seem only to multiply poaching offences, and render
callous to punishment or remonstrance offending
poachers :
" While upon the general subject of prison discipline,
I may remark that, however severe in physical restraints
or powerful in moral influence, it signally fails in pro-
ducing any salutary impressions upon offenders con-
victed of infractions of the laws enacted for the pre-
servation of game. These men, while undergoing im-
prisonment, appear possessed with the idea that these
laws are more harshly and inflexibly administered than
in other cases of a more serious character, and that the
punishments awarded are unequal, disproportionate, and
unjust. In support of their views, they instance the
double convictions and cumulative penalties and im-
prisonments under various statutes for one offence, and
the Act against night poaching, under which offenders
are adjudged to hard labour while detained for the want
of sureties, contrasting the law in this respect, with its
different application to those committed for sureties in
assaults and other cases, where the penalty of hard
labour does not attach. The testimony of the chaplains
of prisons will be found to furnish abundant testimony
that argument, admonition, entreaty, are all unavailing
to induce in these offenders any admission of criminality
or a promise of relinquishing this pernicious pursuit.
'There can be no question that the tenacity of this feel-
ing among poachers is in some degree to be traced to
the support and encouragement it receives from the sym-
pathy so notoriously prevailing among the middle and
lower classes of society, and which is well described by
a chaplain in the following terms:—` I have frequently
endeavoured, but quite in vain, to persuade prisoners
convicted of poaching that they offend God in breaking
the laws of their country; they answer, the law is op-
pressive, and they have as much right to the game as
others. The man's neighbours, too, second him in this
feeling when discharged ; they receive him as usual,
saying, " You have been in prison, it is true, but not for
stealing or felony." A man loses no caste by having
committed an offence against the game-laws, but when
discharged, goes into the society of his fellow-men quite
as usual.'"
If these extracts from the " Ninth Report of In-
spectors of Prisons" do not establish against the laws
for the punishment of debt and the protection of game,
the anomalies we speak of, and make out an irre-
sistible demand upon the Legislature for the re-
vision and correction of such outrages on the common
sense and humanity of the country, we shall be at a
loss to conceive what call of graver urgency can be
devised for such an intervention.

The accounts from Madrid are to the 16th inst
The Gazette of that day contains an important docu.