The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-01-15 00:00:00

EXECUTION OF LACENAIRE AND AVRIL,

(Abridged from the Gazette de Tribuneaux of Sunday. Jan. 10.)
At nine o'clock on Friday night Lacenaire was informed at
the prison of the Conciergerie that he must rise from bed, in
order to be transferred to the prison of Bicetre. "Nell, then,"
said he, " I only wish that it may be all over to-morrow." A vril
was sound asleep at the time. When told that he must pre-
pare to go to the Bicetre, he displayed great coolness, and ex-
pressed the same wish that Lacenaire had. It was a quarter
past ten o'clock when the convicts reached the Bicetre. The
reason of this removal had been carefully concealed from them ;
but they declared that "they were not to be duped by any se-
crecy; that they knew well enough that it was for to-morrow.
* • *" And they immediately set to and sang the Parisienne.
The next minute they were locked up in separate cells. At
eleven o'clock the head of the street police visited -the culprits,
with the view of obtaining from them, if possible, fresh disclo-
sures; but they both, on being separately interrogated, declared
that they bad nothing to add to what they had already confessed.
" I have told all that I know," Lacenaire observed. Never-
theless, the procureur-general had commissioned M. Commer-
son, one of the registers of the court in which the convicts were
tried, to receive any disclosures which they might make at the
last moment, and had also directed that gentleman to suspend,
if necessary, the execution. The two culprits, though separately
confined, could, by raising their voices, contrive to address to
each other a few words. Lacenaiie was beard to say to Avril,
" It is cold; it freezes : the ground will be hard and cold to-
morrow." At six o'clock on Saturday morning the Abbe Mon-
tes, general gaol chaplain, and the Abbe Azibert went to the
condemned cells. Lacenaire received the Abbe Monies with
great politeness. "I thank you," said he, addressing the pi jest,
"but I regret the trouble you have put yourself to. You know
that what you have come about does not at all accord with my
manner of looking at things, and your visit is useless." Yet,
with an inconsistency which might appear inexplicable, if, in
the expressions we have just reported, some dregs of the habi-
tue of the courts of assizes might not be discovered, Lacenaire
had, on the previous evening, composed, at the Conciergerie, a
prayer to God, the concluding lines of which are as follow :
" Dieu que j•invoque, ecoute ma priere
:)aide en moo tune on rayon de ta
Carje rougis de n'etre que maitiere,
Et cependant je doute nialgrr". mei
Pardonne-moi' si dans to creature
Mon ceil superbe a 'talent= ta main.
Dieu—le neant—notre ante—la nature—
C'est un secret ;—je le saurai deurain."
"La Conciergerie, 8 Janvier, 1836."

Avril received M. Azihert with greater earnestness. lie
listened to the exhortations of the venerable ecclesiastic with
great resignation, and manifested a strung religious sentiment.
" Monsieur YAW.," said he, " be pleased to fulfil one of my
last wishes:—announce, in your sermon to the prisoners of Bi-
cetre, that I repent what I have done; tell them that my exam-
ple ought to be useful to them. I am very guilty, I know ; if I
had not lost my family when I was quite young, I should not be
in the situation I am now in."

At a quarter to nine o'clock the mournful procession arrived
at the foot of the scaffold, which had been raised at one•o'clock
that morning by torchlight. Lacenaire descended fisst from the
cart; the pallid hue of his face was terrifying, his look was
vague and uncertain; he muttered something, and seemed to
seek for words which his tongue hail not the power of uttering.
Avril, in his turn, got down from the fatal vehicle, but with a
light and firm step, and took a tranquil view of the people as-
sembled around. Constant in his resignation be approached
La—Cent-fire—and embraced him.. old boy, said be,
"I am going to commence the march." He then mounted the
scaffold with a firm step, and was bound to the fatal plank. He
turned round once more, and said " Come, Lacenaire, my old
boy, courage; follow my ezample." These were his last words,
for in another second the fatal knife descended, and his head
rolled on the boards of the scaffold.

Whilst this appalling scene was passing, Lacenaire stood at
the foot of the scaffold. The Abbe Montes endeavoured to di-
vert his attention from the terrific spectacle. " Ah, bah!" re-
plied Lacenaire in a weak voice; in vain he again tried to as-
sume an appearance of courage which he now no longer pos-
sessed. "Is M. A]ard there ?" he inquired in a still weaker
tune. On being told that he was present, he added, " I am—
I am—very glad." He had previously announced that he in-
tended to address the people, out he had not the strength to do
so; his knees trembled under him, his countenance became
completely changed, he only mounted the steps of the scaffold
with the assistance of the executioner, and the fatal blow soon
put an end to his life and to his sufferings.
At the conclusion of the proceedings at the trial of Lacenaire
several writers have endeavoured to form a correct idea of his
character; we, however,carefully abstained from giving any
opinion at the time, reserving our judgment until more decisive
proofs could be adduced, and our anticipations have not been
deceived.
Some have attempted *to draw the character of Lacenaire
from the line of conduct he pursued since the period of his ar-
rest: he was.falsely judged. Lacenaire was by no means the
person he wished to pass for—a.man conceiving himself unfor-
tunate through the fault of" his fellow men, hesitating between
suicide and crime, and plunging into the latter because society
was unjust an‘cruel towards him; he was certainly not the
systematic assassin:ichiodihnagdhsiisgpnoeidnaarpdalcikt
eagaapinesnt
;soncii,e.trt,idieieskd:
such men exist Such was the Lacenaire
andiug hfoi sr t
thine
aatdel ande w
of the Court of Assize, and such perhaps will be the character
which dramatists and romance writers will attribute to him;
but we must declare, for the honour of human nature, that suet)
was not the man who had just lost his life upon the scaffold.
Lacenaire had plunged into crime because debauchery, gam-
ing, and idle habits would not allow him to seek a different
course as a means of existence. lie was first a robber, then an
assassin, not because they appeared to him lawful and proper
avocations. but for the reason that he was bent upon gratifying
passions which honest labour could not satisfy, and, finally,
because he hoped that the day of retribution would never arrive.
But to a considerable stock of vanity Lacenaire joined a cul-
tivated mind. a rare understanding, and uncommon capacity,
and this was the reason that he found it necessary to give a
certain gloss to his profession of a robber and assassin. Hence

the part which he had undertaken to play, and which he bravely
sustained as long as death seemed at a distance, as long as a
gleam of hope remained; hence originated the character he had
assumed, a character certainly not his, and which belonged to
no one. He could no longer deny his crime; it was too well'
known; there was no justifying it, for the details were but too
horrible. Finding himseif in this predicament, he adopted the
part of an inflexible logician, who would become wicked, not
from depravity, buz from system, who robs and murders because
be had deeply studied the theory of society. Execrable quack-
ery! And this man, whom awkward commentators have held
up as a philosopher, tries to snatch at this species of proffered
sympathy; and this culprit, this assassin, whilst in the dungeons
of the Conciergerie, in the condemned cell becomes a literary
character, lays claim to publicity, and boasts of his talent. He
writes his memoirs. We are unacquainted with their contents;
we cannot say whether he has not once more endeavoured to
develope his frightful theory, but, whatever they may be, there
will be another page to add to these memoirs. It is absolutely
necessary that those who peruse them should be aware of the
last moments of the miserable historian who had placed himself
in so bold and careless a manner in the presence of crime and
of the scaffold.

Lacenaire, the "materialist," the "jovial and poetical" as-
sassin, died trembling. He who would believe in nothing, and
who would not repent, turned pale, and was unable to stand at
the sight of the fatal spot. It was in vain that he exerted him-
self to play his part until the end; his strength failed him en-
tirely. There is something consoling in the thought, that this
criminal could not brave the fate which awaited him as boldly
as he could have wished. His companion, Avril, who had
boasted not of want of fear, who had acknowledged the enor-
mity of his crime, who expressed contrition and hope of pardon
in another world, died with calmness and resignation. At this
trying moment he gave an example to Lacenaire of which no
one ad supposed that the latter stood in need. On the scaffold
he said to Lacenaire—" Come, now is the time to show courage.
It is now your turn to imitate me!"

• In spite of these words, Lacenaire, when he wrote them,
ePrtainly did not know that his execution would take place on
the following day.

LONDON LAW AND POLICE COURTS.

COURT OF KING'S BENCH-MONDAY.

This being the first day of term, the Judges accompanied the
Lords Commissioners to Westminster Hall, after having taken
breakfast at Lincoln's Inn. The Judges of this Court took
their seats on the bench shortly after one o'clock.

CORPORATION OF IPSWICH-REX V. BRAIN.

Sir William Follett said he was instructed to apply to the
court for a quo warranto, calling upon Mr. Brain to show by
what authority he held the office of mayor bf the borough of
Ipswich. The question, which rested partly on the .old
and partly on the new municipal corporation act, was simply
this—whether the persons who presided at the election of Mr.
Brain were the proper parties? The municipal corporation
act (5 and 6 William IV., c. 76) provided that the first elec-
tions under that act should be held before the mayor who
should be in office at the time the act came into force. The
38th section of the act, after enacting that, existing mayors and
councillors should go out of office on election of councillors
under this act, contained the following proviso, " that in
.every borough in which by statute, charter, by-law, or custom
any election is appointed to be holden between the day of the
passing of this act and the Ist of May next, both inclusive, no
such election shall be holden, but every person holding office
in any borough on the day of the passing of this act shall con-
tinue to hold such office, and to have all the powers as he would
have had if elected to such office between the day of the pass-
ing of this act and the said Ist day of May, and statute, charter,
by-law, or custom notwithstanding." In the borough of
Ipswich there was no mayor, but the chief officers were two
bailiffs, and under the interpretation clause the word " mayor"
was to be construed to mean, the chief officers of the borough
by whatever name they were then called. The question turned
upon the words of the 36th and 38th sections of the act with re-
ference to the parties who presided at the first election of offi-
cers under the act. The borough of Ipswich was erected into
a corporation by a charter poised in the third year of the reign
of Edward IV., and by that charter the burgesses were required
on the Bth September in every year to elect two burgesses for
bailiffs to preside over the corporation for the ensuing year.
There was another charter issued in the 36th year of the reign
of Charles IL, which directed that the election of bailiffs should
take place on the 28th of September, but they should not be
sworn into .office until the 29th of September. There were
other charters which were altogether immaterial to the question.
The charter of Charles was afterwards annulled, and conse-
quently the old charter of the 3d Edward IV. was the govern-
ing charter. It had been the practice for some years to elect
the bailiffs on the Bth of September, under the old-charter, but
not to swear them in until the'29i hof September. The charter
of Edward was silent as to when the bailiffs were to be sworn
in, and he should contend that they ought to be sworn in on the
day of election ; but even supposing the practice to he proper,
the municipal corporation act did not enable the bailiffs elected
in the previous year to continue in office. The day, 9th of
September, on which this act of parliament received the Royal
assent was material in considering this case, as the bailiffs were
not sworn in on the Bth of September, and were not, therefore,,
the " persons holding office on the day of the passing the act."
A rule for a mandamus to swear in the Mayor of Lyme had
been made absolute by this court, and that decision established
the course pursued at Ipswich to be invalid. If the decision in
the Lyme case was correct, the course which should-have been
pursued by the corporation of Ipswich was to apply to this
court fora mandamus. Either the decision in the Lyme case,
or the course adopted at Ipswich was wrong. As there was no
valid election of bailiffs on the Sth of September, iu point of
law, there could be nu person to preside over the fitst election
under the act. He contended the correct course for the corpo-
ration to have followed would have been the same as that
adopted in the case of Lyme. There was another point arising
on another section ofthe act, but with that he would not trouble
the court.—The court granted a rule.