Star.
London, England, 1826-08-05 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.

BODKIN. Aua. I.

Thomas Stone was indicted for making a signal to a
smuggling vessel off Cawsand Bay, on the night of the
‘29tifoof March. The charge was clearly proved by the
Preventive Service men, who saw the prisoner giving
an intimation," as the legislative phrase is, to a small
boat which was out in the Bay on the night in question ;
and which, when afterwards seized, was found to con-
tain several casks of gin and brandy. The 41 intimation"
consisted in the causing of several sparks, it was.be,
tieved, merely by Hint and steel, but which one of the
witnesses said might have been sem at the distance of
half a mile. The prisoner did not deny the charge, nor
would he admit that he had been guilty of any crime.
He requested that his having been some months in con-
finement would be taken into consideration.—He was
found Guilty, and sentenced to imprisonment and bard
labour for three calendar months.
trillium More was indicted for stealing a mare, the property of
John Hooper, on the 27th of May last.
• The Jury acquitted the prisoner.
WILLS V. HITCIIfNS.

This was an action to recover damages for the loss
sustained by the plaintiff in the seduction of his daughter
by the defendant, and consequently in the loss of her
service. The plaintiff is a small farmer, having several
sons and daughters. The defendant is a tallow chandler
at,. St. Austell, in which town the plaintiff's daughter
recently carried on the business of a milliner with one
of her sisters, paying occasional visits at her father's.
The legal case was clearly proved by the daughter,
Elizabeth Wells, apparently about 30 years of age; and
although it was embellished by an able address. from
Mr. Erskine, for the plaiaiiff, and by another from Mr.
sergeant Wilde, for the defendant, it was ',cry bare of
any circumstance of aggravation, or of any one fact
which could give it any interest. The former was
indeed noticed by the Learned Judge in his charge to
the Jury. There was no witness but the daughter her.
; and front her statement it, of course, appeared
t' at Vie def. ndant had not prevailed until he had
promised marriage. She could give no date to the first
ect of intercourse between herself and the defendant,
th,,ugh she was very specific as to the last, which she
fixed to the 4th of June, 1825. It was certainly, she
admitted, a long time since the first act took place,
tit ~rgh she could give no clue whatever to the date.—
I he paces were fixed upon with some tolerable certainty,
ter rii.vy were the fields round the town of Sr. Austell ;
rn uire of which the defendant succeeded in his object,
Atter having given (as the witness declared) a solemn
promise of marriage. No interruption took place as to'
these exclusions- in the fields of St. Austell until she
.became pregnant; she informed the defendant of this,
and never saw him afterwards.
The Jury rimmed a verdict for the plaintiff,with Eighty Pounds
cla!Lages, at which .the Learned Judge himself shewed some sur-
prise ; fur he asked them if they said Eighty Pounds? They re-
-14 Ive. they did ; and this vercct was of course recorded.

CARLISLE, AvousT 3.

ARMSTRONG V. JOIIDAN.-7SLANDER AGAINST AN AT.

TOIINET.

Mr. Jos:Es opened the pleadings. The declaration
stated, that this was an action against the defendant for
slander, in 'be month of April last. The defendant put
in no justification.
Mr. BROUGHAM stated the plaintiff's case to the
Jury, and said that Mr. Armstrong, the plaintiff, was
an Attorney of great respectability, who had formerly
lived in, and indeed was a native of, Carlisle, but had
removed to Liverpool, where he had a good ptac'ice.
The defendant was a grocer in the town, and, it would
appear, had a somewhat loose and slanderous tongue,
which he was inclined to exercise in vituperating his
late townsman, and for which he was now about to be
brought to account. The slander was this. He said,
at the King's Arms Inn, to a person named Irving,
with whom he was in conversation, that " Armstrong
(the plaintiff) was a villainous scoundrel, and a blond-
sucking petty fogging Attorney, and had robbed Eked.
Beaumont of 71." which was understood as alluding to
some action at law, conducted by the plaintiff, in which
Mr. Beaumont • was a party. The Learned Counsel
called a witness to prove his case.
Mr. Scam.evr addressed the Jury for the defendant.
Mr. Baron Hum.ocx said, he was of opinion that the
words " petty fogging Attorney" were certainly action-
able, and the platraiff was entitled to a verdict.
The Jury consulted for a few minutes, and returned a verdict for
the plaintiff—Damages, One Shilling.
Betty Scott was indicted, on the Coroner's Inqoisition,
and on the finding of the Grand Jury, for the wilful
murder of her female bastard child. The prisoner
pleaded Not Guilty.
Mr. CO6RTRNAY opened the case to the Jury. It was
one of the usual description, and it appeared that the
tosfortunate woman at the bar had become pregnant,
and was taken before the Magistrates in order that an
affiliation might issue; however, she solemnly denied
her pregnancy, and the parish did .not further inquire
into the matter until the 2d or 3d bf June last, when
the sudden decrea e of the size of her person attracted
the neighbours' notice, and they having seen her and
her mother employed about a heap of ashes, suspected
something was wrong, made a search, and. found a
female child with various wounds about the head. She
was consequently apprehended, and the child was ex-
amined by some surgeons, who were not decidedly of
opinion that the child lived after its birth, and said the
wounds in the head might have been produced by other
causes than violence, consequently the Jury acquitted
her of the murder, but found her guilty of the misde-
meanor in concealing the birth of the infant, which, for
nearly two hundred years, till the year 1803, was made
punishable by death.
Mr. Justice Pau sentenced ber to six months' imprisonment to
hard labour in the House of Correction.