The Sun.
London, England, 1827-08-25 00:00:00

stirtif OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

A pamphlet has been sent to us from a quar-
ter described to be " A Tory, " and his work is
called " A Remonstrance to the Right Hon.
Robert Peel." The subject of this remonstrance
being Mr. Peel's resignation, and refusal—if he
did refuse—to join the Canning Ministry, we
conceive the publication of the author's senti-
ments to come a few months too late ; and we
are free to say, that considering with what tem-
per the Right Hon. Gentleman, so long Secre-
tary for the Home Department, demeaned him-
self since Mr. Canning's appointment, and how
he countenanced, or used no influeiwe to pre-
vent, the furious and malignant, though imbecile,
attacks of some of his immediate connections,
not merely on Mr. Canning personally, but on
that constitutional and upright principle which
formed the link of union between the late Prime
Minister and the Whigs, we cannot join the
writer of the pamphlet in his expressions of com-
plaint or regret that Mr. Peel excluded himself
from any share in a liberal, and to him an un-
congenial, Government. It matters little, to our
apprehension, whether Mr. Peel's attempts at
reforming some branches of the law of England
were or were not stimulated (as the author avers)
by envy of the respect and admiration enjoyed
by Mr. Canning for the sake of his enlightened
foreign policy. Every man must have a motive,
and there are worse in the world than that of
honest emulation. But upon the unwillingness
of Mr. Peel to serve under a statesman so in-
comparably his superior as was Mr. Canning,
after his plain confession to his Majesty, that on
the narrow principle of Catholic exclusion he
was himself unable to form one, there can be
but a single opinion, and that an opinion by no
means flattering to Mr. Peel. We see at least
one subject of rejoicing in the continued im-
practicability of a Peel Administration—that is
to say, an Administration at once incapable and
narrow ; while the country makes advances so
wonderful every day, in that knowledge which
qualifies even the humblest of the industrious
orders to forma iust estimate of men, and their
capacities as public servants.--Times.
The Committee of the Society for the Im-
provement of Prison Discipline, in their Seventh
Report, have some excellent observat
11;0119 on the
mischiefs resulting from the want of intiTe fre-
quent Gaol Deliveries. • " It will be in the re-
collection of many of our readers, that when-
Howard was engaged in visiting the Prisons of
Germany, the Emperor desired to see him. I
have sent for you,' said the Monarch, to know
your opinion on the state of the prisons in my
dominions, and to desire that you will point out
those rievances-which most urgently demand
reform. Your Majesty (replied Howard)
has, throughout your empire, prisoners who
have been for two years immured in dungeons,
awaiting their trial ; and should they be found
innocent of the crimes laid to their charge, it is
not in the power of your Majesty to make them
reparation for the injuries they have sustained.
With some abatement of its strength, might the
same language be addressed to the Legislature
of England. You have, in this country, gaols,
whose inmates have been confined in cells, unfit

for human habitation, for the space of twelve
months before they have been brought to trial,
and they have been eventually acquitted as inno-
cent of crime. You have torn them from their
homes—vou have taken from their families the
main pillars of their support—you have blasted
their reputation—you have debased their mo-
rals—you have inflicted on them a greater pu-
nishment than that to which if, declared guilty,
they would have been adjudged; and you dis-
charge them from your prisons ruined and de-
praved, bereft of the means of honest maintenance,
to subsist upon the property, to disturb the order,
and corrupt the morals of society: Would that
this remonstrance, though but ideal, might be fol-
lowed by the success which attended Howard's
appeal to the Emperor Joseph ! To the
eternal honour of that great Monarch be it re-
corded, that he instantly caused a law to be
enacted by which the grievance might be re-
dressed. « In the month of December, 1822, a
Special Commission was issued for a third
Assize throughout the Horne Circuit. The
Assize has been continued every succeeding
winter ; and the numbers liberated on these oc-
casions are the best evidence of the effee'ts of
the excellence of the measure. From the official
statements which have been published, it appears
that nearly one-third of the annual commitments
in this Circuit have been tried at the third
Assize. The commitments for capital offences
alone in 1824, on this Circuit, amounted to
1,109; and of these 363 were tried at the
Winter Assize : these persons were conse-
quently saved the hardship of three months' im-
Fisonment before trial. On reference to the
Returns for the last seven years, it appears that,
with the exception of London and Middlesex,
the numbers committed for trial on the Home
Circuit were in proportion to those committed
on the other Circuits, as 13,056 to 63,280, or
about one fifth. If, therefore, the third Assize
had been general for the last seven years, one-
proportion
of three
months' imprisonment. If the commitments on
third of the latter number, or above 20,000 per-
sons, would on the other Circuits have been
be butspared thea loianredsltio fiipsavieid,
this moral
small injury
the Home Circuit to those on the other Circuits
shows that the interests of justice are deeply
concerned in extending the benefits of a
third gaol delivery throughout the kingdom.**
—lt is surely high time to remedy so
gross a defect as this. Committees of the
House of Commons are busied in inquiries
respecting the cause of the amazing increase
of crime ; Judges on their Circuits deliver elo-
quent addresses to Grand Juries on the law of
nature having in many parte of the country
gained a mastery over the law of the land ; and
yet this, the obvious cure for a considerable part
of the evil—more General Gaol Deliveries—is
delayed year after year, for no intelligible cause.
Mr. Western obtained a third Assize for the
Home Circuit, after much difficulty ; but, in
spite of the benefits with which the experiment
has been attended in the Home Counties, there
seems no disposition to follow it up by corre-
sponding changes elsewhere. When it was pro-
posed some time
ago to have additional Sessions
at Salford, to clear more frequently the crowded
Prisons of Manchester of their inmates,
it was
objected, we understand, by Mr. Peel, to the
change, that were Sessions more frequent, it
would not repay Barristers to attend them ; and
that, without the check afforded
by the presence
of Barristers, the administration of provincial jus-
tice would be intolerable. It would thus appear
our prisons are crowded with numbers who
ought to be at large, be cause we have so wretched
a description of Magistracy that they must be
terrified into good conduct, like children. Ira
fact, on the subject
of the Game Laws, now ac.
knowledged to be one of the
main causes of the
increase of crime and the commitments under

which form so large a proportion of tie whole
commitments of the country, sfustices of Peace
would not stick at any means, however un-
just, to convict a suspected poacher. They
are no more to be trusted, in such eases;
than a hungry cat ought to be trusted with the
care of a mouse. They are so blinded by passion,
that reason has no chance vvhatever with them.
If Mr. Peel was anxions to have them watched
by Barristers, it is but due to the Magistrates to
observe, that they are equally anxious to Ise rid
of the presence of Barristers; and we itM asured
by several who attend Sessions, that so much do
Magistrates feel their presence as a restraint,
that there has been for some time a regular
con-
snisaey in many. 'comities to drive away Counsel.
Chief Justice Best appealed with much unction
to the feelings of the 'Squires on the subject of
hattus. He seems to think that that kind-
hearted race of men are in perfect ignorance that
preserves have any thing to do with the increase
of poaching, and, consequently, with th in-
crease of crime ; and that when convinced by him
of the evil, of which they have unwillingly been
the authors, they will cease to preserve game.
Without meaning to question the powerful effect
of the Chief Justice's eloquence on the Country
'Squires, we confess we rely much more on the
effects to which the very extent of the evil has
now led in many parts of the country. We are
assured that the poachers of extensive districts
have organized themselves in such a way, that
they always assemble on a given point, in a
strength far beyond that of the keepers, who dare
not interfere with them. The keepers are igno-
rant of the spot which the combination may select
for the scene of operations, and cannot leave their
respective estates. So completely effective have
these combinations of English Itockites become,
that we have no doubt it will soon be found ne-
cessary to call in the military in aid of the keepers,
and thus we shall for a time witness an attempt
to enforce the Game Laws by the bayonet. This
state of things, however, cannot go on long ;
though the 'Squires may resent the e 1 „queues
of Sir Win. Best, they will be for to yield to
an overruling necessity.—Mnswing Chronicle.
The public have ',mud, but only a small
portion can have seen, that great doings are going
on in St. .lames's Park. Not less than 1,000
workmen are said to be employed there ; but
whether for good or evil—whether in good taste
tar in had, remains to be seen. We confess we
very much doubt the former ; and at all events,
would recommend the public to keep an eve
upon the spot, as we strongly suspect that what
is called improvement, is to be accompanied by
encroachment, which we, above all things, de-
precate. This work of encroachment, however,
seems to us to have begun. The road which
formed the northern extremity of the Mall, is al:
ready broken up, and is, we suspect, to be des
dicated to the houses which are building on the
site of Carlton Palace—a spot itself, on which
we are assured, no less than half a million has
been from the first to the last, expended ; but
which has now vanished into air—" into thin
air." Every thing which tends to circumscribe
the kw remaining open spaces in an overgrown
metropolis like ours, ought to be deprecated ;
and we will never cease to do our utmost to pre-
vent it. Of the alterations going on in and
about the canal, it is as yet impossible to form
any correct idea. As far, however, as we can
judge of them, they appear to us to be somewhat
un-English, if not nonsensical. The wonder is
where the money comes from. Every one, how.
ever, must be glad to see so much active labour
at work ; and provided no lessening of the public
convenience and pleasure occurs, we must excuse
a little Frenchified taste which sets so many
people to work, especially since, after all, if it
does not answer, the same means will restore
things to their original, or, at any rate, to a more
national state.—Morning Herald.
We have already exposed the artifice, in seve-
ral of its most scandalous and disgusting parts,
by which it is attempted at the present moment
to direct public gratitude on account of several
modifications, supposed to be beneficial, which
the policy of England has of late undergone, to
one individual or to one particular class, to the
total and unjust exclusion of other Statesmen,
who in reality had the greatest share in pioduc-
ing them, and to whom the entire merit is un-
questionably due of having introduced that cau-
tion and circumspection into the National Coun-
cils, without the highest degree of which such
changes must have been attended with the great-
est inconvenience and injury, and the principles
upon which they rested have been doomed for
an indefinite period to popular hatred or suspi-
cion. It is evident, that the dissent of England
from the principles of that celebrated Alliance
which bound together all the other great Euro-
pean Nations, for objects which England per-
ceived to be inimical to the intellectual advance-
ment and the social happiness of mankind, is
to be ascribed, if to any single man, to the late
Marquis of Londonderry, more justly than to
any other. It is still more evident, that the
feelings of distrust or hostility which this dis-
sent might naturally have engendered were ob-
viated only by the high character which that
eminent Statesman, as well as the more power-
ful among his Colleagues, bore throughout
Europe. for wise moderation and noble
frankness, It is evident, likewise, that the
practical measures adopted by England in
pursuance of those principles which the
other
_European Governments had com-
bined to resist, were resolved on from the
beginning, not only because they must neces-
sarily emanate from the principles which she had
asserted as peculiarly hers, but because the reso-
lution to adopt them was distinctly avowed in
the face of the opposing confederates. But it is,
if possible, still more evident that these measures,
we mean the successive recognition of several of
the independent States of South America, if
adopted with precipitation-1f adopted before in-
terests exclusively English of sufficient magni-
tude and importance had required them, would
have drawn upon England the suspicion of fa-
vouring revolution for its own sake, and with it,
as an inevitable consequence, the bitter and
rooted enmity of every established Government.
To whom is England, then, indebted for the
successful progress of this branch of her atrair_s?
i
To the individual who happened to be in office
when the proper moment arrived for exposing in
action her well-considered and predetermined
policy ? We answer no—or, if at all, in a
very inferior degree. We boldly claim the
highest gratitude of the nation for others, for the
Statesmen by whom that system of policy which
has proved
se successful was devised, and who
resisted with 'Patriotic self-denial the dangerous
temptation to develope it prematurely. There is
still another subject upon which the most stre-
nuous efforts have been made to mislead public
opinion, and to divert the current of national
gratitude and affection from their legitimate and
most deserving objects. We allude to the altera-
tions which have been effected in our cQuium.

dal system. Many of these alterations had become
indispensable from the altered circumstances of
the world. Some of them, p',trinipS, have the
higher atkthority Of 'principles which may be
justly 'Considered as of universal and eternal ap-
plication. No man of the present age can
claim, however, as discoveries pf,: his own the
principles upon which sniy these alterations
proceeded. It in, '•.it"ti their timely and judicious
apei•eation only that we have to do when we
would compare modern Statesmen with each
other. And of all modern Statesmen, the late
Premier had probably the least part prunioting
or effecting the changes in question. Let them
prove eventually beneficial or injurious (for it is
but fair to say that the character of some of them
is yet undecided), no considerable portion either
of praise or of blame rani be awarded to him.
Lord Goderich i 3 the Statesman who, if we were
to
,iylgt merely from the circumstance of official
, station, would seem entitled to the largest share
whether of censure or of praise. Vint AS Presi-
dent of the Board of Trade, and afterwards as
Chancellor of the L'xeliequer, he has throughout
the Whole series of changes had officially a most
intimate and influential connection with the
trade of the country. But Lord Goderich is
not, we vestnne, a man in whose mind changes
of p.ny kind are very likely to originate, for cer-
tainly, during the whole period in which he has
held high office, whatever changes have been ef-
fected have invariably been ascribed to some other
than himself. The name of Wallace resounded
more loudly than that of Robinson at the
eminnenceinent of these changes, as that
of Huskisson has overpowered it more re-
cently. There can be no doubt that the fit-
ture historian, in recording these changes, will
feel bound to mention Mr. Wallace and Mr.
Huskisson as the men to whom they are princi-
pally to be ascribed. And if in weighing the
merits of different Statesmen in reference to this
steojeet, Mr. Huskisson is now claimed as the
representative of the present Administration, we
may, with at least equal confidence and pride, re-
fer to Mr. Wallace as the representative of the
last. Mr. Wallace adopts the same commercial
principles as Mr. Huskisson, and the only cha-
racteristic distinction between the two is, that the
former in applying them to practice, has been
disposed to proceed with greater caution, and
with a- more earnest and timid regard to existing
interests. The career of improvement was com-
menced by Mr. Wallace ; and all the changes
introduced by him are now, after some years of
trial, universally admitted to have been really im-
provements ; while the value of some of the
changes introduced by Mr. Huskisson remains
yet in dispute. Nor has the comparative suc-
cess of the two Statesmen been other than might
have been anticipated, from the dissimilarity in
the character of their minds, which we have ven-
tured to point out. So long as the mind of Mr. j
Wallace directed the mighty movements of
British Commerce, the country advanced in a
progressive and unchecked course of prosperity ; j
while, on the other hand, the career of the
bolder experimentalist has been marked by a
commercial convulsion more appalling in its pa,
ture and wider and more destructive in its con-
sequences than any which had before visited the
mercantile world.—Morning Post.
We made a few remarks, the other day, on a
case that was tried at Bridgewater, not so much
with a view to the peculiarities of the case itself,
as to the general rule on which the condemna-
tion proceeded. We have now to notice what
we conceive a still greater deviation from the
principles of general justice. It has been pressed
on our attention at this time, by the letter of a
correspondent, who addressed us in reference to
our remarks. He states, as a circumstance that
aggravated the cases of two or three prisoners,
who were subsequently tried at Bridgewater, that
they made an obstinate defence, and denied their
guilt, although afterwards convicted on the
clearest proof. Had none but our corre-
spondent mentioned this as an aggravation, we
should not have noticed it ; but we have, on
many occasions, seen it acted on, both by Judges
and by Juries. Nothing, however, can be con-
ceived so utterly averse from all justice, and, we
may add, from all law. The criminal who is ar-
raigned before a Court, it matters not for what
offence, stands there to be tried for that offence,
and, in certain circumstances, for offences which
may have been committed before it, but in no
case for acts done subsequently to the matter
charged. It is not only the right but it is the
duty of a prisoner to fight his cause with all
the niceties, nay, with all the quirks and
chicanery, if there be such, of the law, in order
to avoid or retard condemnation, on the plain
and obvious principle, that whatever weapon can
be wielded against him, he may lawfully use in
defending himself. If a prisoner overstep the
line of legitimate defence, let him, for that offence
against the Court be judged by the Court; but
let not the Court or the Jury deem it an aggra-
vation of a crime previously committed. It is not
only gross injustice but arrant nonsense to look
on any kind of defence as an aggravation. The
law says, that every man is innocent until he be
proved guilty. To try his guilt is the duty of
the Judge and the Jury. They are appointed
for no other purpose. And if, by reason of the
ability of one criminal, in taking advantage of
legal technicalities, they are kept twelve hours,
while, from the ignorance or indifference of ano-
ther, they arc discharged in twelve minutes, the
guilt of the parties tried is neither lessened nor
increased in consequence. It was their right to
be tried, and it was the duty of the Court to try
them ; the exercise of the right, and the per-
formance of the duty, have no connection, direct
or indirect, with the offence of the criminal.—
We have the stronger wish to dwell on this very
obvious doctrine, because, in about five instances
out of ten where the punishment is discretionary,
we cannot help observing. that the degreeofle-
niency with which a criminal is treated, depends
as much on the face he puts on, and its effect on
the temper of the Judge and Jury, as upon the
merits of the case.—Nets Times.

The opening of the English Theatre at Paris
is announced as shortly to take place, with the assistance of
two of the beat dramatic artists of Great Britain, KEAN
and Miss FOAT.—(Query ? Foam)

SHOCKING ACCIDENT.—On Saturday last,
a melancholy event occurred at the woollen manufactory of
Messrs. Rhodes and Co., situate at Woodhouse Car, near
this town. On the afternoon of that day, Thomas Wil-
loughby, aged nine years, who was employed there as a
piecener to one of the slabbing b;
mac—nes, left his work and
went into another room. He had not been there long,
before a portion of his clothes were caught hold of by an
upright shaft, and by this means be got so entangled that,
after being taken round with it a few evolutions, his body
from having been forced through a comparatively small
space, was literally crushed to pieces, and his head torn
from his shoulders. A Coroner's Inquest was held the
same evening, and a verdict of Accidental Death returned.
The unfortunate youth was interred on the day following.
ia...Letda At(lligencer.