Star.
London, England, 1809-05-17 00:00:00

FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE.

'4I;FIPZIC, APRIL LS.
..14
a
A Conner here yesterday morning with the
honourable Convention which the Commander of the
Poli3b army, Prince Poniatowzki, has concluded with
the Archduke Ferdinand. The equally wise and
brave Commander stipulated the evacuation of War-
saw, to save the capital front the horrors of a siege,
and to secure to his army all the honours of war.—
The troops withdrew with their arms and baggage,
and with their colours flying, to the other side of the
Vistula, without entering into any obligation not to
serve. This Convention authorises M. Serra. the
French President, to remove, with all the French he.
may take under his protection. When this Courier
came away, intelligence was every moment expected
of the entrance of the Russians into Gallicia.

PORTUGAL.

LISBON, APRIL.

Letters from the north of Portugal mention that
General Loison was buried in Oporto with great
pomp. It is asserted that a nephew of Marshal Sault
was also killed in an ambuscade. We mention this
only as a report, having no official confirmation of it.
(Of all the French Officers employed in Portugal,
none was so conversant with the military positions of
that country as General • Loison. Our readers will
recollect that this Officer conducted the famous re-
treat from Almeida, when Junot had the chief come
wand.) '
APRIL 28.—1 n the national Theatre of Rua, an
Eulogy was recited on the exalted qualities of Sir A.
'Wellesley When he entered the Theatre he was re-
ceived with loud acclamations, and all the expressions
of ..be most ardent enthusiasm. Soon afterwards
Mar.hal Beresford appeared, and was saluted with
every mark of attachment and respect from a grate-
ful people, sensible of the advantages they enjoyed
from his exertions to organize and improve the disci.
Cline of the Portuguese army.

PARLIAMENTARr PROCEEDINGS.

HOUSE OF LORDS, MAY 16.

WRIT OF ERROR.

Counsel were heard at the bar on the Writ of Er-
ror in the case of. the Sentence on Hart and White,
the printer and cditer of the Independent Whig, now
confined in the jails of Gloucester and Dorchester.
Mr. CLISFoRn contended, at some length, that
the sentence pronounced was irregular, and contrary
to law. For this purpose, he cited various cases,
drawn from different pert, ..!s of our history, from
which he endeavoured to shew that the Court of
King's Bench could, constitutionally, execute its
sentences of imprisonment only in its own prison, or
in the imson of the county where the act was com-
mitted for which punishment was inflicted, or in the
prison of the county where the Court was sitting. It
was, he said, one of the principal grievances alledged •
against the oppressive Court of Star Chamber, that
they sent persons to distant prisons. He maintained,
that in the cases drawn from the best times, where
the Judges had departed from the constitutional prac-
tice, they had almest invariably assigned some parti.l
cular reason for such a deviation. It was only in very
recent times that this practice had become mcee ire-
quent. He then alluded to the cases of Gilbert-
Wakefield, Redhead Yorke, and Kidd Make, and
argued that such instances by no means created pre-1
cedents to justify a practice, if such practice were j
contrary originally to the law and ccnsti:ution of the i
land. hie quoted the words of the late Earl Camden
coocerning general warrants, who ha,i expressly said
that the practice of public Officers, though the in-
stances might have been frequent, and passed over,
were yet not to be considered as sufficient precedents
for their justification, and could not be considered as
the law of the land. la such eases as the present, the
poverty of individuals nriAit frequently prevent/
r'tein from ascertaining the validity of the practice.—
His next great objection was to judgment, as founded
on the wording of the information, which charged the
parties with commenting on the conduct of a Court'
of Justice, without stating whether those comments
were true or false. How would a sentence upon such
an iulornvtion affect an individual with respect to the
severe necessity he was put to of finding security for'
be eood•b:,haviour for five years after his imprison-
ment came to an end ? How difficult might it be to
procure securities when ill behaviour was so loosely
defined in the ini-ormation ? Might it not operate a.s
a kind of perpetual imprisonment ? A man could
hardiy carry on such an occupation as that pursued
by these parties, with the least safety, if he were lia-
ble to be accused of misbehaviour for merely com.
menting on the conduct of a Court of Justice. He
c included iv'th a forcible and eloquent appeal to their
Lordships, who, he trusted, would not .encourage or'
sanction a practice that in worse times was considered
so oppressive and unconstitutial, hut which, pecu.
liarl) under the milder reigns of the House of Bruns-
wick, !.
ought not to be allowed.
The ATTOa,Ey GENERAL replied to Mr. CLIP-
Foßn, and contended that the Judges had done
nothing but what the law of the land fully ena- I
bled them to do, and justified them in doing. He
was almost surprised to find that any text writer had
thought it necessary to declare that they had such a
righ. : yet, however, he found it distinctly stated in
liawkins's Pleas of the Crown (from which he read
an extract) that the Court of King's Bench could
send either to their pwn prison or to any other prison
in England. Indeed, this was the law and the com-
mon sense of the case. The Court of King's Ranch
was the chief and presiding Criminal Cr is the
kingdom, and was not confined after 't' toanner of ,
some inferior county Courts. He ,i..ter roduced a '
great number of instances, to 7rce font persons
.e.,
were punished by imprisonment et a ei.ttrict or county
diitant t!,at in which the Court sat or the offence
was committed. In some ca:.es, persons who had
committed crimes in plac, s es remote as Somerset-
Alike Devoe shire 'were imprisoned in Nervgate, in
the ci y
f London. other cases, sentences pil-
lory' and public ping :•.-ere executed in two or
three places ; as for instance, at Westminster, the
Royal Exchange, arid in Southwark, all in different
idistricm As to the insisting on security for good be-
haviour, it was a constant practice towards libellers,
perpetual hit- ,
and could not merit the appellation of

prisonment ; for if the party could not get a teetritT,
he was at the end of those five years, free, there b
ing then nothing on which the question could attach.
But, if otherwise, it was too much to say that there
was oppression. No : it was the man's own fault, if
his friends were so fearful of his again committing the
offence for which he had suffered the merited punish.
ment of the laws, that they would run no risk to pro-
cure him his liberty. He was confident of the legit.
lity of the sentence, and he thought whatever might,
have been said by Lord Camden respecting the prac-
tices in the office of the Secretary of State, that yet
his Lordship would have talked differently of the de-
cisions of the first Court of Crithinal Jurisprudence.
As to the objection taken against the terms of the in-
formation, be observed that there were other ettrin-
sic circumstances that weighed with the Judges in
considering their sentence. The man himself must
know well what VMS the nature of his fault, and what
was intended by good behaviour In future. He had
been asked questions himself often, by persons who
wished to know what part of a writing intended for
publication could be considered as libellous. If this
man asked the Learned Gentleman such a question,
he hoped he would give such an answer as he himself
had done in such cases; that he would decline giv-
ing him such information as might teach him how
near the wind he could go in the work of libelling,
without coming under the arm of justice. The At-
torney Genera I made a 'tricky of other remarks in
defence of the sentence,
The SOLICITOR GENERAL was about to follow,
when the House adjourned the further hearing till
Thursday neat, at two c'clock,