The Sun.
London, England, 1827-09-10 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The Journals of the Holy Alliance Opposi-
tion are working doggedly at the political tread-
mill, to which their offences against truth and
decency, and their confessed unfitness for any
honest employment, have confined them. Con-
sistency is the last point of honour with a des-
perado ; and these men are consistent in their
way, for they lie on stoutly, when there are
none to believe, and slander after having lost
the power of wounding. The latest fabrication
is dire, ted against a distinguished advocate and
Member of Parliament, charging him with some
base intrigue against a judicial personage of the
highest rank and merit. This, we need scarcely
say, is a calumny even more foul than that which
accused die Members of the Cabinet generally of
a factious spirit of mutual circumvention and
hostility, because it would involve the reproach
of hypocrisy and treachery, of which, if there be
a man on earth incapable, it is the eminent gen-
tleman alluded to. But as we have already con-
tradicted, in terms the most absolute, the
groundless imputations of Friday last against the
Ministry as a whole, we now declare that yes-
terday's statement (made by a notorious weekly
libeller) is, from beginning to end, a shameful
calamny. In the mean time there are, if report
speaks truth, preparations making for war upon
his Majesty's Government of a different order
from' newspaper squibs and gossippings. The
Tory magnates are beating up for fresh recruits
to fight their battles, and are about to discard a
.majority of their ancient vassals as unserviceable.
A certain enlightened Duke, for example,
threatens to take into pay no less than ten or
eleven of well-trained and selected Swiss, to
wear the liveries, of his present ineffective bur-
gesses, and to bay and bark at Mr. Huskisson,
without a minute's rest, from the Opposition
sfxle of St. Stephen's Chapel. That his Grace
should require an accession of talent for the suc-
cess undertaking that he engages in, is
most melanfiholy ; that he should be conscious
of the want, 5C61119 difficult of belief. We had
supposed that such a reinforcement, to such an
enlightened quarter, would be but " carrying
coals to Newcastle."—Times.

The Report to the Lord Lieutenant of Ire-
land, on the subject of the Richmond Peniten-
tiary, Dublin, ordered by the House of Corn.
awns to be printed 14th of May, 1827, has just
been a;etributed. Our readers may recollect the
paragrapi; C which appeared in the late Etoile
newspaper, hespecting the singular means
adopted in this Penitentiary, to manufacture
Catholics into Protestants. The Commis-
sioners, with every disposition to give a fa-
vourable turn to the conduct of the Governor,
are forced to admit that the system pursued in
the Penitentiary could have no other effect than
the producing pretended conversions from Ca-
tholicism to Protestantism. They observe, that
from the opening of the Prison in 1820, to the
present time (May, 1827), the Governor and
all the Officers of the Prison (except the Nurse
or Mistress of the Hospital, and the Apothecary)
have been Protestants, and, as far as they have
been able to discover, sincerely religious per-
eons ; that during the first four years, of the
prisoners who entered the house, the Roman
Catholics were to the Protestants in the propor-
tion of 37 to 10, and " out of the great number
of Roman Catholics who came in within that
veriod, notwithstanding all the effects of reading
the Bible, instruction of the Protestants, their
argu;Nents with the Roman Catholic prisoners, I
and the ether causes assigned, there were during
that time but thirty Roman Catholics con-
verted ; and theere were probably conversions, and
perhaps equally numerous, the other way."
From May, 1824, of the persons entering the
Penitentiary, instead of the proportion of Ca-
tholics being as thirty-seven to ten, the Catho-
lics became to the Protestants as only in the
proportion of eight to twenty-seven, a change in
one week of nineteen out of thirty-five.—
" And how," say the Commissioners, " has
ibis change been effected ? Not by reading, for
they had no books, and perhaps, if they had,
could not read them ; not by argument, for they
had not seen any person capable of using it ;
and to believe that their own reflections could
have enabled them in one week to discover
errors in dee Roman Catholic religion, which
they had never seen before, or merits in the
Protestant religion., of whose tenets they were
probably quite ignorant, would be too much for
any credulity ; it follows that these nineteen
conversions were all insincere, and from tempo-
ral reotfves—so that out of twenty-seven de-
clared Protestants, nineteen, so far as they had
any religion, were really Roman Catholics ; and
if we suppose that one out of the nineteen has
been since convinced by the arguments they have
heard, it would result that at this day, out of
every 27 persons who, since May 1824, have
come in and declared themselves Protestants,
eighteen are really not so, And nine only are sin-
cere ; and that of all who, for two years and a
half past, have declared themselves Protestants,
two-thirds are still insincere."—One thing is
pretty dear, that though the Governor of this
Penitentiary may be a most excellent Protestant,
he is a very unsuitable person to be a.the head
of a prison. The change which suddenly' took
place in May, 1824, in the relative numbers of
the Protestants and Catholics, is attributed by
the Commissioners to a rule then made, that no
prjsoner should be interrogated on the subject of
religion until the expiration of a full week from
the time of arrival. Had the question respect-
ng their religion been put on the first en-
erance of the prisoners, they would, of course,
have declared in pretty nearly the same propor-
tions after. May, 1824; that they did before; but
since the passing. of the Regulation, allowing
them a week's interval befoiT declaring, they,
no doubt, in the interval, were some way
or other led to suppose that it would be a better
speculation to become Protestants, than to re.
man Catholics. Mr. Rowan, the present Go-
yarn& of the Richmond Penitentiary, entered
or office early in 1823. The proportion of
Cati':olics entering the Penitentiary to Protestants
contim:ed from .1829 to May 1824, as 37 to
W. The rule made by in May, 1824, at
once alters the proportions, ao4 in place of a
large Catholic majority gives a large Protestantl
.majority. If he Lied possessed a grain of saga- i
city, he would have instantly been struck with
the phenomenon, and placed it to the account of
fraud on the part of the entrants. The next step
would have been to inquire what measure had
been adopted about the time this wonderful
l
change took place, and to impute the change to
the etact of such measures. If Mr. Rowan was
not strttck by the change, and never dreamt
Af
the idea of
any connection between his regula-
tion of May, 1824, and the sudden increase of
fraudulent declarations of Protestantism, we can
9eily conchide that his head is very oddly con-
structed. The Commissioners leave it to be
inferred, that the conduct of Mr. Rowan is tie

result of sheer stupidity. We may readily con-
cede, that the intellect of the man who was not
struck with this wonderful change in the propor-
tions of Catholics and Protestants entering the
Penitentiary, must have been of the most obtuse
description. But it does not follow that he was
not struck with the change, and aware of the
cause of it. He mav, for instance, have been
actuated by a zeal for 'Protestantism which could
lead him to practice pious frauds with a view it
gain converts. He may have been aware that
eighteen out of the nineteen declaring them-
selves Protestants were really Catholics, but
have calculated on the effect of the Bible
reading, and exhortations by the Protestant in-
structors, in producing in time a real conversion,
and connived therefore at the fraud committed in
the first instance on the making the declaration,
with a view to the facility which it would give to
the future attempts at conversion. But whether
we suppose Mr. Itowan to have been merely
stupid, or to have been actuated by immoderate
zeal, it is on either supposition clear that lie was
one of the most unfit persons in the world to be
at the head of a Penitentiary. We have a great
respect for the zsal which leads men to attempt
conversions. But a prison is the very last place
in the world ill which we should wish to see
this zeal exercised. A very slight encourage-
ment would, in general, convert prisoners to any
conceivable religion, and no reliance whatever
can be placed on the professions of people in
their situation. How far improvement of any
kind can be effected in the character and dispo-
sition of persons in prison, is a point on which
there is a variety of opinion. The opinion
which now begins to prevail, however, is, that a
prison should be viewed as a place of punish-
ment, and not of reform. All are agreed, that
the idea that men might be improved in prisons
has, under the existing state of our prisons, been
productive of great mischief, by rendering Ma-
gistrates less averse to sentencing men to impri-
sonment for trifling offences than they otherwise
might have been.—Morning Chronicle.
Whatever may be the " march of intellect"
among us, there are some points deeply affecting
the well-being of a nation, on which we might
with advantage take lessons from a people whose
habits and institutions our writers and politicians
are accustomed to treat with supercilious con-
tempt. We are often told that while our Euro-
pean intellect is advancing in a " rapid growth
of astonishing improvement," the Chinese IITI•
derstanding remains stationary, and has done so
for some thousands of years—yet if a proficiency
in some of the " elegant vices" constitute a fair
claim to civilization, we think this ancient and
peculiar people can prove to the satisfaction of
the most " finished circles" at the west end of
the town, that they have purged away the stain
of original barbarism. It appears that gambling
is as favourite an accomplishment in Canton as
in London, and that the region of Pall-mall and
St. James's-street is not better supplied with
" hells," and their attendant demons, than the
fashionable places of resort in the cities of the
" Celestial Empire." There is a considerable
difference, however, in the mode of treatment which
this refined art of robbery receives at the hands of the
Government in both countries. Here we have laws,
indeed, against gambling, but it is not thought expe-
dient to execute them, except occasionally against
the minor establishments, when it is thought
necessary to keep up a show of activity in the
police, without offending any persons of high
consideration—but as to " hells" on a grand
and magnificent scale,___ they -are as inviolable un-
der the nose of the Executive Power, and in the
broad face of day, as they could possibly be
within the dusky realms of that jet-black sove-
reign of whose kingdom they are the type and
expressive abridgment. The rulers of China,
however, are not vet capable of understanding
the advantage of conniving at a vice among the
mat nitich, wherever it prevails, destroys all
b
private and public virtue—all domestic happi-
ness—extinguishes every generous quality—de-
bases the intellect—tears prosperity up by the
roots, and drives its victims too often to crime,
madness, or suicide l The proclamation which
we published last week from the Governor of
Canton against this odious vice, has some
emphatic passages, which it would be well if our
Christian Statesmen imprinted on their memory
while they copied his energetic example. Among
other things, he speaks of " the great gambling-
houses, in which both time and fortune are lost,
which often lead the unhappy victims to robbery
and murder." And he complains that " the
police charged with the prevention of gambling
receive money, and become so corrupt as to en-
courage this infraction of the laws." It appears
from this that the police, at least, are quite as
accomplished a body of men in China as in Eng-
land. Nor does the Governor feel any absurd
squeamishness in telling this delinquent police of
their corruption ; and he wisely adds, " If I do
not catch and punish such severely, how can I
manifest the laws to the people, and correct de-
pravity ?" How, indeed t If the watch-dogs
connive at the wolves, how are the sheep to
escape 2 In another part of his proclamation he
state " that rsamblers should assemble together
and gamble is the great injury of any country. I
have lately established laws against garabling,which
if the soldiers and people will break, 1 will first
examine whether their offence be heavy or light,
and afterwards put them in the collar,
or punish
them with the bamboo, or banish therd for life,
or for such time as 'the established law pro-
nounces." And again, " vagabonds and lazy
fellows are enticed, who wear away the time from
their employments, lose all their inheritance, and
ruin their families,
till, in the extremity of dis-
tress and desperation, they become robbers and
banditti, and stab and murder other people ; and,
in fine, there is nothing that they Wilt not do."
Well may the Governor of Canton say there is
nothing which confirmed gamblers will not do ;
and it only shows that wherever this detestable
practice prevails, it works the same effects that
are every day dreadfully realised in England. We
wish our Secrctary of State for the Home De-
partment would imitatc the conduct of the Go•
venior of Canton, with respect po gambling-
houses, and the police who favour them. We
also wish that he had a few of the Chinese
collars and bamboos at his disposal for the bene-
fit of great delinquents as well as for small, and
tho:crcised the same vigorous impartiality
in atthehier
qplice.,..QP,--Morniizg Herald.

CuNNIN-G THlEvEs•—fhere :s ,qcarc.ely anyprotecti.
dexteriiy qt
joiant atghaiei7et the
s.Textraordinarythe
_ They loiter about a camp
harass the sentinels to
at night, and delv.qe
a degree that is almost An47:qlb,le. They imitate,
th wild cry of the jackal, or the hollazf bark of
the Pariah dog so naturally, as utterly to deCeilie
the. most practise ear. Even if caught, it is no
easy matter to detain the4n, 3s they grease their
naked limbs, and thus render themselves as
slippery as cell.---London Weekly Review.