The Sun.
London, England, 1829-07-06 00:00:00

But a case came, only a day or two ago, before
the Court of Aldermen, in which those sages
themselves appear to have considered that the
powers exercised by their chief Law Officer are
somewhat greater than they should be. But
then, to mend the matter, they appear to think
that they ought to possess the power in question
themselves—a consequence to which we must
beg leave to demur. It seems that to the last
Old Bailey Sessions a man was committed for
robbing his employers, in whose confidence he
had been to an almost unlimited extent. No
less than 33 distinct cases of peculation were
proved against him to the satisfaction of the
committing Magistrate, but he was indicted only
upon two, on both of which, upon being ar-
raigned before the Recorder, he pleaded guilty,
and that Learned Judge then " marked" him,
as it is called, for two years' imprisonment.
When called up for judgment, however, he was,
by the same Judge, fined one shilling and
discharged. Of this sentence, or rather virtual
acquittal, the prosecutors complain to the
Court of Aldermen ; and they migh just as well,
we should think, have complained to Gog and
Magog ; for what right either. the Recorder or
the Court of Aldermen can have to dispense the
highest privilege of the Crown—its prerogative
of mercy—we are totally at a loss to imagine.
But," say the Aldermen, " the Sentence
Paper at the Old Bailey ought to be handed up
to us, we are the proper judges of the punish-
ments or the mercy which culprits ought to un-
dergo or experience." Verily, gentlemen, if
that be the case, why should the Recorder
report the capital convicts to the King in
Council ; and if it be necessary that he should
report these, what right have he or you to usurp
the King's prerogative in minor cases, if that
which we have mentioned can be so considered?
Why is the King to have the odium of exe-
cuting a dozen of his subjects, while the Re-
corder of London (chosen by the most incompe-
tent of all incompetent people for such a pur-
pose) is to have the merit of pardoning twice as
many ? In this case, for instance, the Judge
thinks (and who could differ from him ?) two
years imprisonment a fit punishment for the of-
fence in question. Of course, if any features of
extenuation afterwards appeared, on application
to the fountain of mercy, mercy would have
been shown. But no—the King of England
is to lie nobody within the sound of Bow bell,
and the brightest jewel of his Crown is to be
usurped by a parcel of tradesmen, or their no-
minee. We do not use the term tradesmen in-
vidiously ; but we feel fully justified in using it
as we do on this occasion. These very persons
have, within these few weeks, instructed their
Counsel, before a Committee of the House of
Lords, to throw their own calling in the teeth of
a most respectable witness, who was told that,
because he was a tradesman, he was not a fit

person to form an opinion about a bridge
across the Thames. And are these the
people who are to call for the " Sen-

. .
tence Paper" at the Old Bailey, to assume the
King's prerogative, or to elect the Judges in
whose hands it shall be placed ? 'We trust that
a few such instances as these will convince those
in whose hand the power of correction lies that
there is something which wants correcting in
this particular. We have no wish to see the
City of London, or any other corporate body,
shorn of their just privileges ; but when pri-
vilege runs riot, and assumes a tone quite fo-
reign to what it ought to possess, we trust that
there is both the power and the courage in the
proper quarter to check and to coutroul it.—
E id.

The various items of the Quarter's Revenue
were added, and the official statement itself made
up, on Saturday last ; and, as every one who
had paid the slightest attention to the state of the
country,—to the extreme depression under which
trade had laboured,—and the melancholy reduc-
tion in the wages and comforts of the working
classes—had anticipated, there is a great falling
off, as compared with the corresponding quarter
of 1828. In that year the Revenue of the
quarter ending the sth of July amounted, in
round numbers, to 12,364,0001. This yearit does
not much exceed 12,000,0001., leaving a defici-
ency in the present quarter, as compared with
the quarter for 1828, of about 350,0001.
The great cause of the deficiency is to be
found, as might have been anticipated, in
the two departments of Revenue which have been
justly considered as the best tests of the real
state of the community—the Customs and the
Excise—the former being deficient to the
amount of about 350,0001., and the Excise in
a sum of about 150,0001. In the taxes also

there is a small deficiency ; and thus the proof is
complete, that, instead of the Revenue in-
creasing, as it ought to do, and as invariably
happens, in a thriving community, it is decreas-
ing, and that the national capital is daily under-
going diminution. The sums which we have
mentioned as decrease of Revenue on the quar-
ter, as compared with the corresponding quarter
of 1828, amount to upwards of half a million ;
but in other departments, which frequently speak
as much to the distress as to the comfort of any
part of the community—the Stamps, the Post-
office, and some other departments—there is a
trifling increase; so that deducting the increase on
the latter from the decrease on the former, there
will remain, as we have already observed, a total
decrease on the quarter as compared with 1828, of
about 350,0001. Far be it from us, in making
these statements, to impute any blame to his
Majesty's Ministers. The foundation of the
evil was laid before they came into office ; and
the evil itself, we fear, is of that serious and per-
manent nature which will only admit of being
remedied by a series of judicious measures, for
the application and success of which time is in-
dispensably necessary. But it is not a little
amusing to witness the means employed by the
Government organs to persuade the country
when it is " ill " that it is really " well "—when
it is "sick " that it is " in sound health "—when

it is " utterly distressed " that it is " very thriv-
ing." One of these organs finding that a com-
parison of the Revenue for the quarter ended
yesterday with the corresponding quarter of
last year, tells so severely against a pros-
perous condition of the country, reverts to
the year 1827, and finds an immense fund
of consolation for its readers in the fact that the
Revenue of the present quarter is only less than
the corresponding quarter of 1827 by about
50,000/. ! This ruse de guerre will probably
remind our readers of certain Gallic commanders
about the middle of the last century, who, instead
of adding to the national laurels by the achievement
of splendid victories, first contented themselves
with saving as many of the carcasses of their
soldiers as they well eould, and at length, from
utter inability to accomplish more, not only con-
sidered it a fine thing to effect a retreat,
but actually congratulated their Sovereign
on the brilliant retreats they had been able
to effect Our cotemporary next refers

to the expectations held out by the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer ;—as if any one
cared a straw about the expectations, or the
fears, or the statements of that Gentleman ; and
finally informs us in well-set phrase, and rounded
period, that " the depression is temporary," (it
has already lasted four years!)—that it arises more
" from want of commercial confidence than from
any real want of capital," (which means, we take
it, that there is at the present time no profitable
employment for capital, and that those who have
money will not in consequence lend it !)—and,
lastly, that when the present " temporary depres-
sion" is "removed, our resources will be found un-
impaired, and our commercial and manufacturing
interests placed on a more sound and safe founda-
tion than they have hitherto stood !" What the
last sentence means we have really no means of
ascertaining; unless, like a late Archdeacon in the
East, who, after trying himself to the utmost to
define " confirmation," concluded at last by de-
claring that " confirmation" was "confirmation,"
our cotemporary intended gravely to inform the
public, that when the country has again returned
to a state of prosperity it will be again prosper-
ous—a truism on which it did not require even
his authority to satisfy it. But to conclude.
The Revenue is i❑ a declining state, and if it
were not, the public would still refuse to be
convinced that it was not. It knows but too
well that the state of the country is not what it
ought to be ; and it knows also that this state
is not attributable either to the present Ministry,
or the Ministry which went before it, but to
an extravagant expenditure of the national
wealth during upwards of thirty years—
to ruinous wars, and to a total want of eco-
nomy in almost every department of the State
during years of peace—to bad management of
the public funds—to iniquitous interference with
the natural course of trade, and many other
causes which might easily be enumerated ; and
it knows also that what our cotemporary deno-
minates " a temporary depression, is a " per-
manent depression," which cannot be removed
either in a day or a year, and for which the best,
and indeed the only feasible, remedies, ate a
judicious use of the public income—a reduction
of taxes, and the opening of new markets for the
manufactures and produce of the country. The
public, we say, knows these things, and it might
have been wiser in consequence, on the part of
our contemporary, to have directed the attention
of Government to those matters, instead of hold-
ing forth grounds of consolation to the public
which can neither impose upon it, nor in any
way alleviate the pressure of the difficulties under
which it labours.—Morning Advertiser.

POLICE INTELLIGENCE.

MANSION.HOUSE.

CHARGE OF FORGERY.—On Saturday a young man
of respectable appearance and connections, named
.._ _

Robert Jones, was charged with having forged and
uttered a cheque for: 1541. on the bank of Messrs.
Williams and Co., Birchin-lane. Mr. Gates, So-
licitor to the Committee of Bankers, attended for
the prosecution, and produced the cheque passed by
the prisoner, dated Nov. 3, 1827, purporting to be
drawn by Charles Woodward, a solicitor, Broad-
street, on Messrs. Williams and Co. for 154/. The
prisoner has been on the Continent ever since he
passed the cheque, till lately, when he returned from
Hamburgh to Hull, near which he had just got into
a comfortable situation, when an officer was sent
down to apprehend him. A clerk in Messrs. Wil-
liams and Co.'s bank proved having paid the cheque
to the prisoner on the day of its date. Mr. Wood-
ward proved that the prisoner was his clerk at the
time of the date of the cheque. The body of the
cheque was in the prisoner's hand-writing; the sig-
nature was in his (Mr. Woodward's) own. He had

never authorised the prisoner to fill up that or any
other cheque, but he (Mr. Woodward) was agent at
the time for the Gas-light Company, and was in
the habit of signing his name to a great many papers,
of which the cheque produced might have been one.
It was stated, that on the sth of November the
prisoner changed the bank-notes he received in pay-
ment of the cheque for sovereigns. Mr. Gates sub-
mitted that the evidence was sufficient for the pri-
soner's committal. The prisoner said he had net
had time to consult his solicitor, and he had a most

important circumstance to state to him. Mr. Gates
consented to have the prisoner remanded, which
was accordingly done. In answer to a question put
to Mr. Woodward, he mentioned that he knew the
prisoner's address while he was on the Continent.

it was mentioned in the Justice-room, that, the
prisoner and Mr. Woodward are brothers-in-law.

BOW-STREET.

ST. MARTIN'S SELECT VESTRY SYSTE3L—This
day was appointed for hearing and deciding upon an
information, which the active reformer of parochial
abuses, Mr. Fenn, the bookseller, of Charing-cross,
had preferred, under the 16th Geo. 11. against the
Overseers of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, in which he
alleged that the defendants had refused to show him
the parish accounts for the last year, although he
had tendered the sum of sixpence, as the statute di-
rects, and they had thereby incurred a penalty.
Mr. MINSHULL said, that he received the infor-
mation on Friday morning, but he had not issued a
summons against the defendants.
Mr. Fenn said, it was understood they were to be
summoned for one o'clock this day.

Mr. MINSIIULL admitted that that was the under-
standing on Friday, and if delaying the case further
would be at all inconvenient, he would issue a sum-
mons for their appearance instanter.
Mr. Fenn observed, that he had no objection to

the postponement of the case till Tuesday next, as
he had no wish to give unnecessary trouble to the
Parish Officers; he merely contended, upon public
grounds, that the rate-payers had a right to see how
their money was expended.
Mr. Mitistwm.—There can be no doubt but they
have that right ; the Act of Parliament says, they
may see the accounts on the payment of sixpence.
Mr. Fenn—But that right is denied to me. I
am shown a book of accounts which has been passed
by the Magistrates in Petty Session.
Mr. Stafford, the chief clerk, observed, that if the
Magistrates in Petty Session had audited and passed
the parish accounts, it was utterly impossible that
two other Magistrates sitting there could entertain
an information calling upon them to review the de-
cision of the former Justices; for if that could be
done, after the present Magistrates had decided,
other Justices might take upon themselves to re-
view their decisions; and so it might go on, ad
infinitum.

Mr. Fenn stated that the accounts had been
passed in private, and the book contained only sums
expended in the lump. For instance, there was a
charge of 700/. and upwards, but what that sum
was paid for did not appear. There was 80/. or 90/.
charged for the use of landaus for the overseers
during the year.
Mr. Stafford said, that he had supposed that
when the accounts were audited and passed by the
Magistrates in Petty Session, that the inhabitants
had an opportunity of attending and objecting to
any of the charges.

Mr. Fenn replied that the auditing and passing of
the accounts was done in private, and the in-
habitants received no previous notice of it.

Mr. MINSHULL declared that the subject should
receive from him every attention, and he appointed
two o'clock on Tuesday for all parties to attend.
The question seems to have created a good deal
of interest in other metropolitan parishes, as we ob-
served gentlemen from St. Paul's, Covent-garden,
St. Giles's-in-the-fields, and St, George's,l3locims-