The Sun.
London, England, 1827-10-23 00:00:00

There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all Denmark
But:he's a knave—.
.the article is worthy perusal, if only for its pithy
specimen of a Chinese novel, and its translator's
English. " Phillips's State Trials" is a Review
of far higher pretensions ; it shows the master
hand (whoever be its author), and barely does
justice to a work which it was our good fortune
some time since to peruse and notice in terms of
deserved eulogium. The mere mention of the
subject will instantly suggest abundance of ma-
terials for thought and speculation. To trace
the slow rise of jurisprudence in a great nation
and watch it, after flowing for ages in a subter-
ranean current, emerging at length into light and
glory,. is a deeply improving, study, and one to
which the. Reviewer has successfully devoted him-
self. He gives a succinct account of the state of
law both before and since the Revolution :
adroitly mixing up the materials furnished by Mr:
Phillips with his own subject matter. His 'cur-
sory sketch of Sir Matthew Hale, and the rest-
less period at which Jeffries was so disastrously
notorious, evinces both spirit and discernment ;
and we are particularly gratified with his obser-
vations upon Erskine, whom a certain political
charlatan, half Whig half Radical, lately took it
into his head to depreciate. We cannot, - how-
ever, sympathise with the Reviewer's astonish-
ment at the general belief in witchcraft during the
fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries,
when we find that even at the present day it
.is
far from an exploded superstition, as almost
every provincial assizes can testify. We give
the following extract, not so much from its li-
terary as its characteristic value : such scenes
were once " familiar as household words."
Passing to other times, and a very different subject, we
meet with many cases after the Restoration which .depict,
with great force, the precarious condition of human life in
a dissipated capital, where gentlemen wore swords, taverns
were fashionable, and the police was imperfect. In the
trials of Lord Darwick and Lord Mohun, for the murder
of Mr. Coote (1669), we see a party, after a promiscuous
scuffle and tilting at the greyhound tavern in the .Strand,'
setting out in chairs, in the midst of a dark night, for;
Leicester-fields, where a duel immediately takes place, and.
a death-wound is given : the chairmen, who have scarcely
had time to light their pipes; are called to take up the dying
man; one.refuses at first, for (as he states) seeing him
bloody, and Rot able •to . help himself, I said I would not
spoil my chair ;' and the watch being called, declined com-
ing near, observing that it is not their ward.' Lord
Mohun's former trial (for this was his second) disclosed
'circumstances more disgraceful to himself and to the man-
ners of the time. Captain Hill had made loose addresses
to MM. Bracegirdle, the actress, (a woman of character),
but supposed himself to be thwarted in his amour by
Mountford, the celebrated player. Hill and Mohun one
night attempted, in pUblic and by' force, to carry off the
lady from the midst of her friends : baffled in this . gallant
enterprise, they placed' themselves in the street where
Mountford lived, ,which was in view of Mrs. Bracegirdle's
windows, and, with wine and drawn swords, walked up
and down, drinking healthy, till Mountford came- home,
when -Hill attacked, and ran him through. The police
had previously made a faint attempt at preventing imischief,
but seem to have been perplexed ley hearing that they had
,to deal with a n6bleinan and had retired to a public-house
for the purpose of deliberation. Hill fled—Lord Mehuu I
was acquitted. It will be remembered that this famous
duellist* died in his vocation : he fell in a duel with the
Duke of Hamilton, who was also mortally wounded.......
Sometimes the picture of private feud is of a less tragic
cast, as in the case of the valiant Mr. Tiliiam Colepepper,
who being one morning set upon by a bully, armed with
cane and sword, at the corner of Little Drury-lane, throws
the enemy into confusion by hurling his hat and periwig
at him, and beats him off, with the complete approbation
of the crowd.f
The article " On Planting Waste Lands," we
must dismiss with the remark that it proceeds
from the versatile pen of
.Scott, and abounds in
practical intelligence put fOrward ,with the fervor
and decision of a man of genius. It is, how-
ever, sadly too long ; and this is a defect which
it shares in common with the other articles in the
number. A tedious article, on Agriculture, and
another still more tedi.ots on Waste Lands, both
in the same Review, are really too much ; we
want variety, for sameness even though it be
the sameness of perfection, is insufferable.

Who would be doomed to gaze upon • V.
A sky without a cloud or sun ?"
Another and more striking defect in the pre-
sent number is its absence of political opinion
the leading journal of Europe, as we observed
some time since, should have some deeided
dogmas of its own : it should lead, not followin the wake of circumstances ; march forward as
a pioneer, not skulk behind as a retainer in the
political band. But of this more anon.

* Was it owing to a sort of professional -reputation that
Marlborough selected him to carry the only message of that
sort which, so far as we remember, the great Captain
over sent ?

DeneW'sease, 11 Howell.

On Monday night last, a cry of distress was
heard in the park near to Lowther, Castle. Mr.
Bonn and two or three other persons went to the
place, where they found a man tied firmly to a
tree with ropes. His name is Wm. Cuthbert,
and was tried at Carlisle not long ago for stealing
hay, or something of the kind, from Mr. Mar-
shall, of Watermillock. He described himself
as having been tied there by some persons with
whom he had been travelling—a story which is
by no means credited. There is no doubt but
it was a
.piece of imposition, probably to excite
compassion. He must have had an accomplice,
for it was impossible he could have fixed himself

he way he was found.—Carlisle Patriot.

DISTRESSING EVENT.--Friday evening last,
Captain Edward Fraser, Gorthlick, arrived from
Lochness in a vessel laden with timber, at the
upper Lock of Dochgarroch on the Caledonian
Canal. From the pitchy darkness of the night,
and the tempestuous state of the weather, it was
not deemed advisable to bring the vessel further
down at the time.; but Captain Fraser, finding it
necessary to proceed immediately to Inverness,
left her, accompanied by a young woman of the
name of M‘Pherson, a servant to Mr. Tytler,
who had been visiting her friends in the uplands,
and was equally anxious to go on her way. They
had not, alas ! proceeded many yards, when from
the uncertain footing on the margin of the canal,
they fell in—to rise no more in this life. It was
not till Monday morning last that their friends
became seriously alarmed ; and search being then
made, both the bodies were found a little way
below the Dochgarroch Lock, about five or six
yards apart, anti little more than thirty yards from
the place at which they left the vessel. Captain
Fraser has left an amiable wife and eight promis-
ing young children to deplore his loss.—lnver-
ness Courier.