The Sun.
London, England, 1811-10-22 00:00:00

TO THE EDIIVRPF THE V.IN.

•
Sin —.As the vitlear error- that a creditor has
*
riOt ro priest the dean body of likdebt or. has I ate-
ly been, tiered upon, the history of tliai may
nut be Uilatnusitig to your readers... Herodotus tells
usst.hat Asychis, the grandson of Chees,,to ;facilitate
borroa ingot money, allowed -the Egyptiatis to
pledge the dead bodies of their .parents, whieti;
rill
tit redeemed by die payment of the sums ralvaticed,
,could not be depeoited, in. the sepulchres ot their
fathers. Upon the supposition that a sitnilar
law prevailed in Burgundy, 11lassmger has built his
play,of the. Fatal Dowry, from whim Rowe stole
the 'Fair Penitent. But none of the nations of Eu-
rope are now so stupid as to make the dead body of
a debtor a pledge to bs creditors,. -my of im pcis
not even admit of arrest in the, Inst instance for
"sitist, but • only .in execution ; 'and it; bx.law, the
.dead roan-were,to be kept in prison till ;his son ,paid
alebts, it is onviotis- that every gaol [Mist, ,be - also
At:vitiator.. But in the King's Bench Prison:there
is nothing so Common AS CU.bear of a'wooden habeas, .
a cant term ter a coffin; by which the prisoner is,
released from all cootioement in this world, .hating ,
satisfied all creditors as to every claim opou his per-
sun by paying:the great debt ot • Moore:
.and the
maxim of the _English law is, that actin pc7sonalis
muritur, pe.,-rsuicl. Otte would, !tato thought
that any notion to the contrary was mina. At
Westminster Abbey, the guide who shows the curi-
osities of the place, exhibits, in a small chapel or cell
near to Henry the -Seventh's brazen tomb, a couple
of old coffins, 'covered with red velvet, which he
gravi~ly 'tolls you contain the bodies of two Ambas-
sadors, whose remains were arrested for debt, and
not suffered to be buried; wherefore they are now
'n'ot placed in A vault or tomb, . Now, in the first
place,,by the law of nations, the persons of Ambas-
sadors are sacred and inviolable, dead or living; and
in the next, it is hard to say these men were denied
christiati burial, when toeir Coffins. are carefully
placed in that sacred temple. in, which are deposited
in a similar manner the ashes of a long race: of
'kings and heroes. In order, hoWever;•-to relieve
'the public from all doubt upon this sublet& now;
'lntl that every one May retire to rest without stay
apprehensions that his-precious relieues, when
If he is dead, may be violated with justice by the
rode. hands of bailiffs, 1 shall extratt from a mo-
dern: book of reports, the words of the present
Chief Justieee of England, Lord Eflcnboroudh, upon
the subject : in which his Lordship held, that even
promise to pay a debt, extorted from a perem
trough fear of a dead body being arrested, was il-
Hl;gal, being without consideration, and void ; which
sit: could not be, it the ihreateoed arrest welt:
" Now as to the case of Quick v. Copplestone ;
in that cast the promise was made thrutih fear of
being arrested ; and it is so stated in the , deawati.
On. 'And Hyde, C. J. held that a lorbearaiiee to
sue one who fears to be sued is a good considera.
lion ;' and he cited a case in the Common Pleas,
when be sat there, whete a woman, who feared that
the dud body other son would be arrested tor deal,
promised in consideration tit thrbearance, to pay ;
and it was adjudged against her, although she was
neither executor nor administrator.. But the other
Judges doubted of this ; and I think it, would be
bad, even after a vercliCf; tor it appears vicious upon
the face of it. Such means Of extorting a promise
.is not to be•eridured. It is impossible to look upon
that as a. good promise Which is absolutely made in
consideration that a periots will forbear to do a
violent injury to the feelings of all the relations
of the deceased." See t stoith's Rep..i gS. Jones
v. Ashburnham, B. 'B. Hilary Term, 1804. See
also East's Reports, H. 44 Geo. 111. S. C.
Upon- the- whole, this barbarotts law may have
obtained in. Egypt, but it never did in any modern
State, There it.was customary to etnbalm the bo-
dies of the deceased, or make mummies. of then;
and it is probable that he who possessed the must
of these precious remains was held in the highest
ha-
tnour for 'his high birth and lung riches'. 'Lie mum-
my was a movable, and Ornamental piece of lurid.
lure, and a valuable testimonial of Debility, like the
statues of the Roman patricians; audao pledge this,
was to give a an an actual security for the me-
;ney,• which was advanced . expressly on that pledge,
and apportioned to the inherent value at it. But
athis was a stipulated. pledge by' the son, not an ordi-
nary e%ectuion upon the body of the father ;. And,
nhowevir odious.it may now appear in the spends
ittirift heir, was' snore' reasonable than the pledge
':which the law is supposed to give of the dead body
of the debtor, which must necessarily impose upon
the creditor, who was• to keep it unburied, (pal ti-
cularly during this hot ;weather), the' task et reviv-
ing, not the dead bettly, but the long lost art ot em-
balming, which is nearly as hopeless an expeti-
Ment.

Oa. IS,

I am, Sir, Sze.

"L'be lietetlit,try ot. Bavaria was (layered
ott the 701 ult. ut a Sun, infant blessed with
a prolusion of names, having been txtptlatti Charles,
Aotliony, Maximilian, Joachim, Zephirin)Fredeiic,
Nieinard.

The village of Wongen, duchy of Luneburg was
lately swept away, by the sudden overflowing of the
Elbe. Of e.so.peasants, its, inhabitants, scarcely 4
dozen escaped; and they owed their preservation to
geing to, the upper stories of their, cottages. Many .
of the ncarly entire, with some dead
bodies, were floated, and picked up at a distance of
forty miles from the spot where they before stood.
At Guildhall, on' Saturday, a woman, named
Sheppard, Whose husband keeps a recruiting Mice,
was brought up in consevence of a warrant granted.
to search her house for some property which had
been stolen, belonging to a Mrs: Tyler. Some
small pietes of silver coin were (timid 'among *wpm
wood, but none of the property specified in the war-
rant. The prehitling•Aldetinim, however, conceiving
that she did not give a good account 'a how she be.
'came possessed of this, was on the point of 'Com mitt ing
•,'lrer, when a)oung man retpieSted that her etat9init-
lion might be posfpotted, tor that-a boy of about 7
years. of age, the ,sou of Mrs.- Scott,- who lodged
with the proiteoutrix, had been seen at play with
small itilvereninv-bitudarto tinge found. She was
therefore retuandetk