The Sun.
London, England, 1827-05-25 00:00:00

ment stands. The Hon. and Learned Gentle-
man, in moving for the Bill, observed that there
were in the last year, no less than 1,520 persons
arrested on mesne procesS, of whom 500 were
thus deprived of their liberty for sums under
201. The circumstance of such a Bill being in-
troduced. into Parliament, and that, too, without
any opposition, shows that the principles of
common sense and humanity are making some
progress, however small, in beneficially inno-
vating upon those usages of our law which
are at variance with the • spirit of enlightened
legislation. We agree, however, with Lord
Althorp, that this Bill does not go far enough.
For our own part, we think society would de-
rive great advantage if the power of arrest for debt
were done away altogether. It would make people
circumspect in giving credit. They would not like
to give it to those whose means they were ignorant
of, or whose income they knew to be more limited
than their expenditure. The consequence would
be, that the habits of that wholesome frugality which
adapts a man's expenses, not to his desires, but to
his means of defraying them, would become more
prevalent in society than it at present is. We should
not see so many thousands of families as we do now,
tempted by easy credit, allowing their vanity and
love of pleasure to overcome their prudence, making
them indulge in luxuries and finery beyond what
their resources can ever meet, until a troop of duns
besiege their doors, and they find themselves in a
state of helpless insolvency. Hence how much
crime ! how many dreadful scenes of human misery
and despair ! Nothing breaks down the regular ha-
bits and economy of the working classes more than
this system of credit; and truly did the Attorney-
General say, that "if there was no credit the me-
chanic would take his money home, and would not
spend it in a public-house. But knowing now that
he would have an account with the butcher, the
baker, &c., he cared not about his week's wages ;"
—and what is the result ?—he is thrown into prison,
and his family go to the workhouse, or starve.—
Morn ing Herald.

We recur to a subject to which we briefly ad-
verted on Wednesday--the excessive hardship
entailed on the poor by the exaction of bail for
petty offences. We are induced to do so, in
consequence of a case which was reported to us
yesterday, and which displays very clearly, both
the direct and collateral evils which flow from
the system. A poor man was accused of an
assault—perhaps truly—and he was held to bail,
and to give twenty-four hours' notice, which, be
it observed, necessarily supposes twenty-four
hours' confinement. He had no bail, and,
therefore, his twenty-four hours must have ex-
tended to the day of trial, when, in all probabi-
lity, he would have been fined five shillings.
This is the first and the direct evil of the case ;
but it is not the only one. Naturalists remark,
that there is not a parasitical insect which
does not in turn pay tithe of its substance,
to a parasite yet more minute. It is so in
social life. Every one has his sucker. Ths
suckers of the poor are as numerous as sum-
mer fry, about all our Police-offices. Some of
these procure evidence, and some procure bail ;
the consideration being, of course, proportionate
to the magnitude of the offence, and the means
of the offender. In the case of the man to
whose case we have alluded, the sum demanded
was ten shillings—a sum, in order to ascertain
the value of which, we should, as Franklin said
of a penny, advise our readers to go and borrow
it. The ten shillings were raised by the pawn-
ing of every rag which the miserable wife of the
accused possessed. This is the second and
indirect, though not the less necessarily conse-
quential, evil of the system which we deprecate.
In the first place, there is imprisoment, in all'
probability, for three times as long a period as
would have been inflicted in the event of con-
demnation, and, next, a pecuniary mulct of at
least twice the amount that a Jury would have
imposed. Had the prisoner been a wealthy
man, notice of bail would hardly have been re•
quired, and if it had, 24 hours would have
been the maximum of imprisonment, and no
mulct would have been suffered at all. Only let
us look how the present law works. A merchant
on 'Change is obstructed by a porter ; he gives him
a caning. What follows ? The fellow swears
an assault; his worship appe.:r before the
Mayor, or, rather, he appears in the Mayor's private
room ; his friends are in waiting, if bail be required;
or he withdraws, with liberty to confer with the
complainant. We impute no blame here ; but, look
to the other side of the picture. A labourer walks
into a tap-room; gets noisy and quarrelsome; deals
round blows with very exemplary impartiality; is
half beaten to death for his pains; charged with an
assault and riot ; and handed over to the tnrnkey
for a fortnight or three weeks; and his wife and
children beg or go to the workhouse. If there be
no other remedy, it certainly would be better to
allow the Police Magistrate a final judgment, in
cases where persons are so poor, that holding them
to bail and imprisonment are •ynonimous. But ai
we think it most improbable, that any man, however
poor, should break bail where the offence is a petty
one, and that is the only description of offences that
we are contemplating, we should deem it much bet-
ter,
in all such cases, to take personal bail, or to fix
on so small a sum, that some compassionate house-
holder, even at the risk of losing it, might be in-
duced to come forward to rescue a poor wretch
from confinement, and his family from starvation.—
Yew Times.

Silt T. LAW RENCE.—A work under the title
of " English Fashionables Abroad," gives the fol-
lowing interesting anecdote of this celebrated
painter ;_--" L is the pride of England, that
wherever she chooses to direct the force of her
genius, there she is always paramount. Italian
painters freely acknowledge that no other school
can compare with ours in the three branches of
the art, water colour, miniature, and p mtrait-
painting ; and the name of Harlow is' alone suf-
ficient to establish our claims to excellence even
beyond these. Sir Thomas Lawrence has done
still more ; for he has proved, not only the supe-
riority of our school, but of his own pre-emi-
nent talent, in the manner in which he took the
late Pope's likeness, as well as in its execution.
The Pepe having sent for him, put on his robes
as the painter requested, and then entered into a
gracious conversation with him, in the pleasures of
which both seemed to forget the purpose of the
visit ; till Sir Thomas suddenly starting up, with
little more than three touches of his pencil, put
in an-eye and nose ; and then making a bow of
thanks, released the pontiff from any further at-
tention. On that occasion, as on every other,
the Pope left his visitors instead of their quitting
his presence ; and no sooner was he gone, than
Sir Thomas, seating one of the Biships who had
been in attendance (oh, the ascendancy of ge-
nius !) on the papal chair so lately vacated, and
clothing him with the robes of State, copied
their folded intricacies as rapidlyas he had caught
inspiration from the Pontiff's eye. That even-
ing, the Romans flocked to see- the portrait of
their beloved Sovereign, which to their delighted
eyes, seemed as great a miracle as that of the
Virgin painted by herself at Florence ; six more
such sittings were all the painter asked,
.and his
finished work has not disappointed its early
promise."