The Sun.
London, England, 1842-01-21 00:00:00

had so farsbeen properly granted. But it appeared that
one of the Magistrates, who had originally signed the
license, had subsequently withdrawn his signature, and
the question arose as to his
.power to do so. The Ma-
gistrates assembled in Sessions having considered the
subjct, dismissed the order subject to a special case. A
certiorari had accordingly been moved for, and the Town
Clerk had, by mistake, omitted-to state in the return the
nature of the special case, but had merely returned that
the order had been dismissed. Under these circunistan-

stances he hoped the Court would grant the application.
Mr. Justice WILLIAMS would grant a rule nisi to show
cause why the return should not be amended, but without
a mandamus.
CRIMINAL INFORMATION AGAINST THE WORCESTERSHIRE
CHRONICLE. THE QUEEN V. ARROWSMITH AND
ANOTHER.

The SOLICITOR-GENERAL moved for a rule calling
upon Isaac Arrowsmith and James Knight, the proprie-
tors of the Worcestershire Chronicle, to show cause why
a criminal information should not be filed against them
for the publication of a libel reflecting on the charac-
ter of Charles. Ellings, Esq., one of the Magistrates
of Worcestershire. This application arose out of cer-
tain proceedings which .had been taken in this Court
against the same parties last term, when a rule nisi for
a criminal information had been obtained against them
for the publication of a libel reflecting on the character
of Mr. Ricketts, one of the county Magistrates for Wor-
cestershire, imputing to him that he had been guilty of
gross jobbing to serve family and political purposes in rela- -
tion to the erection of a station house for the police at
Bromsgrove. When the case came on for argument • the
defendants admitted the falsehood of the imputation they
had cast on that gentleman's character, and apologised
for their conduct ; and Mr. Ricketts consented to the
rule being discharged on payment of costs. The article
against Mr. Ricketts had been headed " From a
Correspondent ;" and Mr. Ricketts had at first refused
to accede to the terms proposed, unless the name
of the author of the article were given up. On
which the defendants stated-that the article in question
was in reality not written by any correspondent, but by
the Editor himself, on certain information which be had
since discovered to be inaccurate. Subsequently to that,
it appeared that Mr. E. Ellings was the person on whose
authority they had made the statement, and they pub-
lished an article charging him with having published an
anonymous slander, and leaving others to be answer-
able for it, stating that they had made the state-
ment on the authority of a brother Magistrate
of Mr. Ricketts's charging that informant with breach
of faith, in having permitted them to pay the costs,
after having himself undertaken to do so, and saying
that having got them into a scrape, he had left
them to get out of it how they could, conduct
disgraceful to a man of honour, a gentleman,
a Magistrate, and, above all, to a Reformer.
The affidavit of Mr, Ellings set forth that he had
volunteered no statement or information whatever to the
proprietors of the paper, but that having occasion to call
on Mr. Arrowsmith. shortly before the publication of the
libel on Mr. Ricketts, Mr. Arrowsmith had asked him if it
was true that Mr. Ricketts had, instead of advertising in
the paper, applied to the Tory tradesmen of Bromsgrove,
and had subsequently employed a Tory tradesman of Droit-
wich to build the station-house, to which he had replied
that he believed such statement to be correct, and he had
also stated that he had reason to believe that the lease had
not been completed, and, in answer to a question from
Arrowsmith, as to whether Mr. Cutter, who had supplied
the bricks, was not a relative of Mr. Ricketts, he had said
•ha was a connexion by marriage ; that Mr. Arrow-
smith had then called for a sheet of paper to make
notes, on which he (Mr. Ellings) had desired
him to recollect that what he had stated was merely in
conversation, and was not to be published. On which
Arrowsmith assured him that his only object in
asking the questions, was to ascertain if the in-
formation which he had previously received was
correct ; and, when Arrowsmith said that his partner
Knight would dress up an article on the subject, he (Mr.
Ellings) warned him to beware what he was about, and
that the statement he had made was not to be
published. He had not seen Arrowsmith again
before the publication of the libel on Mr. Ric-
ketts ; and, from the affidavits on that occasion, it
appeared- that every tittle of the information he had
given was true, all he had stated being simple matters
of fact, which had been distorted by the defendants into a
libel. The affidavit then went on to state that the defend-
ant had received a letter from Mr. Arrowsmith, calling
upon him to bear his quota of the costs, and that
he had expressed his surprise on seeing such a letter,
and had said that if it could be proved that he had stated
anything untrue, or had misled Mr. Arrowsmith
in any way he would pay whatever any third
party might say was an equitable proportion.
Under these circumstances he applied to the Court for
redress.—Rule nisi granted.