The Sun.
London, England, 1827-02-12 00:00:00

(To be continued.)

. MRS. JORNSTONE.—The author of Elizabeth de
Bruce is a lady of the name of Johnstone. Mr. Johnstone, her
husband by a second marriage, kept for some years a respectable
seminary at Dunfermline, Fifeshire. He removed from Dunferm-
line, eight or ten years ago, to Inverness, where he, or rather his
lady had charge for seven or eight years of one of the best conducted
countiy newspapers in Scotland. For a lady to manage the details,
and to pen the leading articles of a political journal, is not very
consistent with our notions of female genius and female pursuits
ve;
yet the truth, we have every reason to believe, is exactly as
removed
stated.
tAobEouditntbwnorgyhe.ars.wagelial%%!
the publication
pen since her arrival in that capital previous
Janus,
a miscellany
of Elizabeth, except a few contributions to
superintendence of Pro-
published by Oliver and Boyd, under the.
l'urPt Dr. Maginn and
effo is
fessor John Wilson, to which Jr.
ersi; o tj olhi:asrtdo noeft
anyd husband
ahnecil
's former -work, Clan-Albin,
have contributed. Mrs. Johnstone 's
with peculiar difficulties, part
though its publication was attended
in
of it being printed in London and part Edinburgh,was, every
Mr. Carlysle, the translator of Wilhelm Meister, are also said to
thing considered, very successful. We have heard that the authors
share of the profits was above a hundred pounds a volume ; and it
has proved a valuable bargain to the young and enterprising pub-
lishers Messrs. Afacredie and Co. Clan-Albin was followed almost
immediately by the first of the series of wonderful works which
have stamped a character on the literature of the age—we allude
to the Waverley Novels. It is more than probable that the splen-
did productions of Scott were the cause of the long silence of the
author of Elizabeth; for it is matter of common observation, that
the labours of overpowering genius, while they call into light a
numerous fry of petty authorlings, imitatorum sermon peens, have
a tendency to repress, through despair of rivaling them, the efforts
of those nobler spirits which are touched with a spark of the same
fire. However this may be, we have the fact before us, that sonic
dozen of years elapsed between Clan-Albin and Elizabeth de
Bruce, and we know that every attempt was in that interval made
by her first publishers to set Mrs. Johnstone's pen once more in
motion. We have only to add, from the universal consent of her
acquaintance, that Mrs. Johnstone is a woman of lady-like pre-
is not so very ticklish a subject as that of a
Bence, and very fascinating manners. The age of a married lady
sup-
pose Mrs. J. may baboutf t• y. rather more than
terary Gazette, spinster. We
e.

• • The Report of the Commission on the Project-.
of the
Law of the Press, was presented by N. Bonnet, the
Chairman of the Committee. The CornniissiOn
.....
commended an ,alteration of nearly all.the articles ~of the
- " •
ministerial project; but _so inveterate and incorrigible
would appear to have been thq evil inherent in its-original
.
essence, that it has diffused its taint' oier the.antended:bill,
and must render it offensive and MisehievousAO ihe
na-
tion. Out of the 23 articles of the-Project; as-it. ciinielrom
the office of the Minister of Justice,-three are entirely sup-
pressed, 15 or 16 are essentially amended,-antl.tinly four
are retained in the state in which they were presented
to the Chamber: but even in this new shape; so -far is
the proposed law from' giVitig general satisfaCtion,
that we find some of- the Members of the' Commission
inscribing their names to speak 'against it. ' The first ar-
w ic, etc the interval between the deposit
to€t ie- svitle'authorities, and thepublicatign of
k,-is unfortunately retained;-'though the elicep-
tions to its application are greatly extended. The 'ridicu-
lous and extray'agatte•tax proposed to be levied on pam-
phlets of five sheets and under is suppressed, and a re-
strictive regulation is substituted, .with.the desiga:of-ope-
rating as a check on the issue of works whose; etrculation
that tax was intended to limit. -. These offensive ;works
have of late generally assumed the shape of e*,3glpip, and
the commission conceiving that-the 'spirit of .mischief
be-
comes more deadly when concentrated into so-,small' a
space, recommends that nothing • shall' be-published of, a
less size than on an 18mo, .without the permissioti'of the
constituted authorities. 'As this latter form seems-small
enough for the existing race and generation of men,
there probably can be no .great reason to 'quarrel with
the proscription of the pigmy volumes; in- 32m0 ; but,
on the other hand, who can scarcely speak with-gravity
of a legislative effort to arrest the progress of immorality,
irreligion, or sedition, by regulating the size 'of the page
on which works of such a tendency are printed r, The
article which rendered the original project of law inexe-
eutable with respect to printing-offices, by prohibiting the
issue of a sheet even to be dried or stitched, till the de-
posit was made of the entire copy, has been amended so
as to include under the character of printing-offices, all
the establishments necessary to complete the preparation
of the work for publication. The provision of the erigi-
nal measure which restricted the proprietors of a journal to
live, has been abolished, and an amended, clause inserted,
requiring one, two, or three proprietors, representing ,a
third part of the property, to register their names. as re-
sponsible for the contents of the publication. , Thus a
proprietor redactear will; come in place of the fictitious
person called at present a respon,sible editor... Females
and minors are not proscribed as in
-the. original project,
except from the portion of the property .which is reguitereti
in the name. of the proprietor or proprietoriti respo4itile
for the conduct of the journal. The last important
amendment which we have room to notice, is,
.that which
regards the prosecution of libel on private character.
By the original project, the mere offensive introdue,tion
of the name of a private individual into a publk'ation
might be punished by fine, and prosecuted on an e.r officio
information, without the request, and even contrary to
the wish, of the aggrieved party. The Cortunission re-
rains the first part of the article, but renders the consent
of the defamed person necessary to the commencement of
proceedings against his libeller. The responsibility of
printers, against which so loud a clamour has been raised
n the French capital, is still retained, but a discretionary
power is vested in the Court to discharge them from their
liability, according to circumstances. There is no question
that these amendments, if they pass, will render the law
against the press in France less mischievous or objection-
able than it appeared on its first introduction;' but the
most enlightened portion of the French people declare,
that no new restrictive measure at all was necessary; that the
check on licentious writings was already sufficient in the
existing code; that the Courts had, by its aid, suppres-
sed the defamatory libels which appeared under the title of
Biographies, and punished their authOrti;
that a project
like that of Peyronnet could not be altered. by the com-
mission so as to be rendered innoxious'; -and that the noun
•
rasura would have been better thtn a thousand amend-
ments. From what foreigners can see and learn of the
(.o,nud appeardltictofthet French b
ree the
nchpmeroisotdiccoarlrepert.ess, this last judgment
,yo

•
MELANCPICiLY ACCIDENT.---About five o!elock
dyeenstlye_rdglyveaftewranyo,onan,dasaat nleuasintbeerigohftpeur:esroens
precipitated
istka
taei
dt nign
too n
tt
hh
ee
gts see,
ran:v.
aii‘i.r.tihdpsocluFbtßis..
00,
TenuAgueh-etreousat:eidn,
trouh'iienhg principally
as e
canal near the Jews' Harp Tavern, Regent's Park, the ice sud-
xtitrico
tiheenindtrteipiei}d.ityweoref
A baker, who happened to be upon the spot. One body was af-
terwards
for others when the evening closed.
sNdeinEneOrFthAroußoß BREAKFAST.---It FdAisStren,THbiutt ihßal:daerrd
sto
ill
to go without one's breakfast. Upon the strength of that first
and aboriginal meal, one may muster courage to face the difficul-
ties before one, and to dare the worst, but to be roused out of
one's warm bed, and perhaps a profound oblivion of care, with
golden dreams (for poverty does not prevent golden dreams), and
told there is nothing for breakfast, is cold comfort, for which
one's half-strung nerves are not prepared, And throws a damp
upon the prospects of the day. It is a bad beginning. A man
without a breakfast is a poor creature, unfit to go in search of
one, to meet the frown of the world, or to borrow a fh ill ing of a
friend. He may beg at the corner of a street-nothing is too
mean for the tone of his feelings—robhing on the highway is out
of the question, as requiring too much courage, and some opi-
nion of a man's self. It is, indeed, as old Fuller, or some wor-.
thy of that age, expresses it, "the heaviest stone which melan-
choly can throw at a man," to learn, the first thing after he rises
in the morning, or even to be dunned with in bed, that there is
no loaf, tea, or butter, in the, house, and that the baker, the
grocer, and butterrnan, have refused to give any farther credit.
This is taking one sadly at a disadvantage. It is striking at one's
spirit and resolution in their very source, the stomach ; it is at-
tacking one on the side of hunger and mortification at once ; it
is casting one into the very mire of humility, and Slough of
Despond.—Monthly Magazine.
. _

. •
CAUTION.—There is a species of swnadling now in
practice which cannot be made too public, as it has hitherto been
very successful. Two persons,
takingfornting: iitilis,.supposed, pait of a
gang, go from town to town,o pigs in respectable
houses, and advertise for " several respectable young women,
who may be taught a genteel business, at which they,-can, earn
from 15s. to 255. per week, and have constant employment."
The advertisers generally have numerous applications,. from eack
of whom they obtain 11, as a premium for teaching young women
it
ioind
n themselves shoes.
rAbout a
and
Mrs.
B fortnightene ago,
wentet, a m
tae the
a n dhwoman,7,lc
ra lr
14, Philip-street, Bath, and after viewing a suite of apart-
anildife:neotarreiteonaokenttbeomf forthe 1
d2esiteiroiprittileisn cebretiaeitne.
;ofu young
women were engaged to'work at the above -mentioned hefionUcesee ;
andl
after the swindlers had obtained various articles of jevrellelre,
wearing apparel to the amount of about 81. from 3111.. 01"
they decamped, leaving the young women the dupes
artifices, their lodging and every other demand unpaid; and:.
with
with them also several articles of value. Duriolitih!tos
H.
I.lr
Mr. Moore the female requested to have the!t
under the
erased from a dozen silver spoons and otherafarticles,
her first husband.
specious pretext that they were the property
an
abundance of plate
From the. circumstance of the parties havingtere
d of their rev ec
and linen with them, no suspicions were en
bility,— Sherkrne Journal. of their

raw roIEI6N INTELLIGENCE.
bzsa
FRtNCII
• - (From the Etoile, dated Saturday.)
BOURDEAUx, FEEL 6. .According to a letter from Ciu-
dad ROdrigo :received at Bourdeaux, and of the most re-
cent date, the cause of the Portuguese Royalists is nearly
desperate. Three Generals, and a great number of priests
and monks, have arrived in this latter town, while the of-
ficeri and soldiers,. who have remained in Portugal, have
taken advantage of the amnesty to submit to the Constitu-
tional Gavernment.—Memorial Bordelais.
The Commissary-General (Intendant) of the English
Army has given notice that the Commissaries who accom-
pany the brigades and the regiments are authorized to
enter into contracts for the supply of provisions and forage,
for which they will pay in ready money. Contracts are
required for NO to 1,200 oxen, which are to be delivered,
at the rate of 200 per week, at the head-quarters.
Mr. Lamb, the English Ambassador, was ready to set
out from. Madrid, and a report is this moment spread, we
know bot on what foundation, that he set out for London
on the 30th January.—lndicateur de Bordeaux.