Star.
London, England, 1831-01-13 00:00:00

LIEUTENANT, but earnestly recommending patience, and
abstinence from all illegal acts. The new tribute, it is stated,
goes on rapidly, and 50,0001. was estimated as the
amount of one Sunday's collection through the country.

It seems strange. that at this distance of time, since the
passing of the Libel Bill, Juries, in London at least, should
not be fully aware, that when they find only the mere
fact of publication, they are specially empowered
by that law, to bring in a general verdict of Nov
GUILTY. The law, moreover, directs the Judge not to re-
quire a verdict of Guilty on mere proof of publication.
Libel Law is assimilated to Homicide Law—the
mere fact of killing does not constitute murder ;
but the fact may be justifiable homicide, manslaughter, or,
wilful murder. So in Libel, the fact of publication ins-
plies no guilt ; for publishing is oftener meritorious than
criminal. If therefore a jury return a verdict guilty of pub-
fishing, it is in effect a verdict of Acquittal ; but Mr. Fox's
bill enables them in that cue to convert it into Not Guilty,
generally. To justify a verdict of GUILTY, the Jury are,
1. To satisfy themselves of the fact of publication. 2. To
feel a conviction of the seditious tendency of the libel. And
3. To be convinced that it was published by the defendant
with a malicious and wicked intention ; and without being
satisfied as to these THREE POINTS, they are by law em-
powered to acquit. To accomplish this object was the labour of
our oldest patriots for half a century ; and the law is now the
corner stone of our liberties, and the bulwark of
the freedom of the press, for which in truth, there would
be little security, if Juries do not understand it, or
are puzzled by legal technicalities. In one word
they are, since Mr. Fox's Bill, constituted the
judges of the fact and the intentions, both of the matters
charged, and of the defendant. Before the /taming of that
Bill they found only on the fact, and the intentions
were left to the Court. Now the Jury are supreme.

FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE.

ZZCLIISIVL

PARIS, Jiw. 10.
POLAN D.—Envoys are on the. route fur France and Eng-
land, in order to invoke the mediation of those Powers.
They flatter themselves that Prussia and even Asians will
be in favour of Poland, in spite of their ordinary system.
Nothing is more evident than the utility of an independent
kingdom, intermediate between the West, agitated in all
senses, and the great Immovable colossus of the East. It
is probably as much to the interest of Russia, as to that of
the rest of Europe, that the former bulwark between the
States of the West and East, whose systems are so different,
that Poland should be re-constituted.—Gazette de Aug:-
burgh.

Manifest of the Emperor Nicholas to his subjects. " Ni-
cholas-morbus has fallen upon his subjects with a heavy ma-
nifest against the infamous Poles, and their abominable
treason. That which all nations must admire, and all en-
lightened powers approve—that which eternal human reason
proslaims as the most holy of duties, Nicholas-morbus would
brand with the imperial hot iron of his majestic indignation.
It is that Nicholas-morbus cannot conceive how a people,
goaded by oppression, will no longer submit to be
muscled by legitimate authorities ; it is that he cannot
conceive why the inhabitants of the borders of the
Vistula will not receive the traditional knout with
the same love and the same complaisance with which it is
received on the banks of the Dnieper and the Neva. " Thus,
my good and faithful subjects," says Nicholas Morbus to his
people, " you who receive the knout with love and gratitude,
go with me and aid me to exterminate that execrable na-
tion who dares to rebel against my paternal govevnment ;
and GOD, by whose grace I am your Autocrat, will give
us vigour to crush the wretches with a single blow."—Le
Corwin.

The Journal du Commerce, in commenting on the pro-
clamation of NICHOLAS, speaks thus :—" The Emperor
Nicholas has, in his quality of King of Poland, addressed
a proclamation to the Poles : that proclamation breathes
nothing but rage and menaced; : the King only leaves
to his revolted subjects the choice between an entire
submission, or a terrible chastisement : be leaves
them no hope of any redress of their griefs, if they
deign to reply to any of the grievances expressed in
the name of the Polish People, the complaint is to be
a crime independent of insurrection. As for the rest,
the Proclamation contains that fiction always employed
in manifestoes of absolute governments against the people.
In spite of these threats, it is easy to see in the Proclama-
tion of the 17th December, a complete ruptute between
Poland and Nicholas. It is not the Kng wbo speaks, but
the Csar ; the war when it commences will be a war of State
against State.

Our correspondence from Warsaw this day offers a 14.
interest. The circumstance of the nomination of the Dic-
tator, the sitting of the senate, the sudden and spontaneous
adhesion of the two principal bodies of the army to that in-
vestiture uf an immense unequalled power and without equal,
characterises better the Polish revolution than all the words
we could utter. The discourse of Gen. Cldopicki and his
proclamation replying to those who had charged him with in-
capacity, shows all his energy. The security of the Poles
in this moment of crisis must strike all minds ; their activity
and the vigour of their measures of defence sufficiently
witness that that security is not founded upon ignorance of
danger, but upon the notion entertained of the situation
of their enemies. In that the sentiment is admirable ;
it reveals the intelligence of that nation so similar to our
own ; it is a voucher of the conduct they will bold in the
war which is preparing. The Emperor Nichols' will pro-
bably hesitate before he engages in such au enterprise, and
creating embarrassments in Lithuania, when the frontiers of
Persia and Turkey are far from being calm.. We know that
he has more of a Russian General than the of Su-
yarrow to hinder sleep ; but the words of M '
sad
the conduct of Cblopicki, show that Poland is not wanting
in energetic men to oppose them. Besides, it is net
with impunity, for a despot, that two Wins
submitting to the same yoke, abide for a brag
time together. Who knows but the sojourn at Waren/
may not throw the_germs of liberty in the Russian armies ;
the movements at Wilna lead us to think upon that nosier
sod probably there is something prophetic in the judgment
of our Polish correspondent upon the Russians. " They
have at at our mble, they have eaten our bread, and wo
have had sufficient knowledge of them to reader then dds
justice, that they are sufficiently worthy of a goverment
' more in affinity with their intelligence and disk principles.
—Le Tampa.

The following address wee published at Warsaw :
Appeal to the brave French.—# Frenchmen! Our Al-
lies, people. who are ardent for liberty and independence, it
is for yea that the Poles address themselves; we have a right