The Sun.
London, England, 1842-01-03 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF SATURDAY.

GLOBE.—The great importance of the subject
affords us sufficient excuse for recurring again to the
system at present pursued in the management of sal-
roads, particu'arly as at the inquest held yesterday, on
the body of another victim to the late horrible catas-
trophe on the Great Western line, certain facts were
adduced in evidence that arc by no means calculated to
restore public confidence in the security of railway tra-
velling. It appears from the testimony of the engineers,
their assistants, and their foremen, that all had done
their duty most rigidly before the accident occurred ; and
that nothing any one of them was able to do could have
possibly prevented its happening. The engineers had
no idea of a slip being likely to take place, because their
assistants had given them no intimation of any thing of
the kind ; and the latter were, of course, wholly blame-
ICSS, b. cause the foremen had made no report to them
which cou:d induce. a supposition that there was reason
to apprehend, in or near the fatal spot, the calamity
which so soon transpired. The foremen were, of course,
innocent, because they (lid not see any thiog which
caused them to expect what afterwards occurred ; and
theref .re there is no one in fault ; and, however deplo-
rable the result, just such another event is likely to occur,
any day in the week, on the best regulated railways.
This would be true enough if the present system is
allowed to continue ; but we would suggest that the
process we have above describe 3, of foremen reporting
to assistant engineers, who report to the principals,
should be entirely reversed, and that the engineers
should report to the assistants, who should in their turn
communicate with the foremen, who are mere work-
men, and as such are well qualified to repair a breach
when it has taken place, but are not likely to be enabled
to make those scientific observations by which its oc-
currence may be foreseen and prevented. The duty now
imposed on the chief engineer is to take a cursory
glance at the line—that of the assistants is to make a
superficial observation—and it is let't to the foremen
to inspect minutely, with the view of ascertain-
ing where there is danger to be apprehended ; and they,
of course, being little better than labourers, are wholly
unable to draw scientific deductions, from which ap-
pearances that are trifles in their eyes would be found to
indicate the contingency of certain disastrous results,
that might, by timely precaution, be altogether obviated.
We cannot take upon purselves to say, that if it had
been Mr. Brunel's duty to inspect minutely instead of
to view superficially the spot where the accident
occurred, it would have been possible for him
to have detected symptoms of the slip, and
to have guarded successfully against it ; but be
would undoubtedly have been more likely to have
done so than the men to whom the duty of inspec-
tion is entrusted, and the public are assuredly entitled
to demand that the greatest precaution possible shall be
taken io a manner so much affecting their safety. If
such things are liable to happen every day, we can only
say that railroad travelling is a more hazardous matter
than we have usually considered it ; since, if accidents
that kill a dozen people at a time are incidents that no
skill can prevent, or no caution guard against, the fashion
of making wills before taking a journey of a few hundred
miles will soon be revived, and insurance offices will
begin to have new ?Les for persons accustomed to
railway travelling.

STANDARD.—We gave yesterday, in our Second
Edition, the whole of the Correspondence between the
British and United States Governments, as to " the
right of search." It may be right to explain that the
" right of search" claimed by Great Britain and the rest
of the civilised nations of the earth is reciprocal, and that
it does not extead beyond the ascertaining, by an in-
spection of a ship's papers, her right to the flag which
she Vainks proper to display. From the acknowledg-
ment of such a right the United States indignantly re-
coils, upon what principle it is impossible to conceive
without admitting suspicions which we are sure must
be undeserved. Happily, the manifest necessity for
the exercise of such a reciprocal right for the suppres-
sion of the slave trade has been so clear to the United
States officers, employed in concert with the British
and other officers on the African coast, that
they have freely exercised it themselves, and
agreed, by a written arrangement, to countenance
its exercise by others. This closes ail com-
plaint as to the past on the side of the United
States. If American vessels have been visited, they
have been visited by the authority of the American
officers on the spot, and volenti non injuria fit.
The United States Government may disavow the
acts of its officers, and there is too much appear-
aoi in the correspondence of an intention to do so ;
but this does not change the state of the case as be-
tween the two countries. After the President shall
have disavowed the acts and engagements of the naval
commander, Great Britain, of course, cannot plead
them ; but all that gentlemen's acts b_fore the dis-
avowal must be treated as the acts of the American
Government. We think "too well of our trans-
Atlantic kinsmen to suppose that this officer can be
seriously condemned. He was sent to aid in suppress-
ing the slave trade—be believed his mission a bona fide
mission, and, acting in good faith, he agreed to an
arrangement absolutely necessary for the execution of
the service upon which he was Let least ostensibly) em-
ployed. Had he refuted his consent to the arrange-
ment for a reciprocal search, it is plain that he would
have acted, not for the suppression, but for the pro-
tection and promotion of the slave trade. We confess
that we cannot at all understand the reasoning cf the
American Minister. We are unable to sea how any
nation compromises her rank and independence by con-
cessions perfectly reciprocal, except the recusant nation
claim a superiority to all others.
COURIER.— It required no very intimate
acquaintance with the precise nature of the instructions
furnished to Lord Ashburton on the subject of his in-
tended mission to the United States, to hazard the
statement so cautiously made yesterday by an evening
contemporary, that " they specially regard three points,
and three points only—the affair of the Caroline—the
boundary question, and the right of search," these being
the precise points of difference between the two Govern-
ments, and upon which so much acerbity and pro-
fitless controversy had been already expended. As
assurance upon this point has been rendered doubly
sure by the revelations of our Contemporary, sand as it is
slow no longer doubtful but that Lord Ashburton's
mission has reference to the objects, with a view to
the accomplishment of which it had been specifically
determined upon, we may be permitted to congratulate
his Lordship, as well as the Government by whom he
has been appointed, on the fact, that even the bitterest
opponents of both are constrained to acknowledge
the wisdom and appropriateness of the choice.
" His appointment (says the Chronicle of this
morning in its City article) has been favourably re-
ceived in commercial circles, and has given a tone of
confidence to the holders of State Stocks. It will be
acceptable to the Americans, as the Messrs. Baring
have been for many years most extensively engaged in
American affairs, and in fact the agents of the American
Government in monetary operations. . His Lordship is
besides a citizen of the great Republic, and one of the
largest landed proprietors, too, in the State of Pennsyl-
vania. His talents as a man of business are well known.
He is one of the largest householders in the United
Statee, and Lady Ashburton (late Miss Bingbam) is
an American by birth. As an executive officer, to
carry out a prescribed line of instructions, few can
equal him ; and such, we presume, will be his position
in the discharge of his special mission." It is rarely
that appointments are so utterly unobjectionable as to
extort from opponents such valuable attestation to their
seasonableness and beneficial tendency as this extract
conveys.

THE LATE ACCIDENT ON THE
GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY.
CORONER'S INQUEST.

READING, FRIDAY NIGHT.—This morning, at ten
o'clock, a Coroner's Jury, consisting of twelve of the
most respectable tradesmen of the town, assembled at
the Royal Berkshire Hospital, to inquire into the cause
of the death of Richard Woolley, one of the passen-
gers by the luggage-train which left Paddington on the
morning of Friday, the 24th inst.
Mr. J. Blandy the Coroner for the borough, pre-
sided.

The Coroner and Jury having viewed the remains of
the deceased, which were in the hospital, immediately
adjourned to the public office in the town, where the
evidence was proceeded with.
The public office was crowded throughout the whole
of these exceedingly lengthened proceedings, which
lasted upwards of ten hours.

Mr. Bartlett, solicitor, of Friar-street, Reading, at-
tended tor the purpose of examining the witnesses and
watching the proceedings, on the part of the friends of
the deceased.

The examination of witnesses then commenced, and
was principally to the same effect as that adduced on
the previous inquest.
Mr. T. Hardy Bertram sworn—l am an asistant en-
gineer in the service of the Great Western Railway
Company, and reside at No. 2, Portland-place, Read-
ing. My duties are to visit that portion of the line under
my charge, generally twice daily, from Reading to Lon-
don. I employ competent foremen upon short distances,
who inspect the line closely, and employ other men, or
gaugers, under them, also to inspect the line in all
weathers. The foremen report to me any unusual ap-
pearance, or requiring anything in the usual processes
of repair. On the Wednesday afternoon before the ac-
cident I remarked that the portion of the line, particu-
larly at Sonning-cutting, and it presented no change in
appearance from the previous three weeks. Mr.
Charles Owen, my assistant, stated that sundry
drains ordered by me had been math!, and that he
had made part of an under drain, in one slip,
which was in the immediate neighbourhood of the
great slip which occurred on Friday. I received no
communication which rendered a detailed examination
on my part, in any part of the cutting, necessary. I
consider the slopes throughout the cutting were equally
safe. Ido not consider the spoil bank on the top of
the cutting accelerated the fall from its own weight, or
contributed at all to the slip. I have examined the slip
since the accident took place. The slip, in my judg-