The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-02-16 00:00:00

TUESDAY MORNING, .FEBRIIARY 16, 1836

The preliminary proceedings for the trial of DANIEL
O'CONNELL and his unfortunate son commenced in the
House of Commons on Thursday last; and if rigorous
justice be done, especially to the elder accused, the Bri-
tish public will take as deep an interest in the inquiry as
the citizens of Paris seem to take in the guilt, gallantry,
gasconade, sentimentality, and falsehood of the wretched
FIESCHI.

• As yet the petitions containing the charges against
the dictator of Ireland, and the principal supporter of
Lord JOHN RUSSELL and the degraded whigs who still
adhere to him, have only been read in the house. They
were ordered to be printed, and are'now, we presume, in
the hands of the members. To-night Mr. HARDY is to
move for a committee to investigate the said charges;
and the probability is that some considerable and highly
interesting discussion will take place on their merits.
We wait the issue of that debate with some anxiety.
The people of these islands will now have an opportu-
nity of seeing, how the whigs carry their own principles
into practice in a matter conceruing a member of their
own body. We all know what they did last session when
certain persons were brought before them charged with
bribery and corruption. It will be recollected with what
unrelenting rigour that immense patriot Mr. RIGBY
WASON bunted down and sent to gaol certain of the
electors of Ipswich, He knows best how much money
lie expended in the alleged purification of that borough.
Men were voted off to prison simply because they re-
fused to answer questions calculated to criminate them-
selves. The principles of law and equity were inverted
in order to glut the vengeance of these stern hater's Of
bribery. The House of Commons assumed all the pow-
ers of the execrated Star Chamber, in its worst days, in
order to punish suspected persons. WAsoN and HUME,
ROEBUCK and EiYART, BUCKINGHAM. and
Lai and Lord JonN4.4j.-Loidi44.ii, Were
amongst the loudest of its members indenoOicing al,
leged corruption in Ipswich, Leicester, Norwich, Staffordi
Chatham, and other places, and O'CONNELL in particular
defended. theexpediency of whistling off ,to' a dnngeOn.'
one witness who refused to criminate himself:

Now, with the blessing of GOD, we shall see how these
pure patriots and the immaculate Whigs will act when one
of themselves is. caught, is accused, and put upon his
trial, for one of the foulest (if the averments be proved)
and most flagitious' acts of gross corruption that ever
polluted political morals or stained the annals of parlia-
mentary history.
Let us glance at the charge fOr a single moment. A
man called RAPHAEL, by political profession a whig, by
religious profession a Roman catholic, who had been
Sheriff of London, and who had been raised to that ho-
nourable office by the whig faction—by that very liberal
party who would now, if they dared, question his honour
and respectability—this man was applied to by DANIEL
O'CONNELL to know whether he were desirous to obtain
a seat in parliament, and if so, be DANIEL in that case
could recommend him to a "safe speculation," the ho-
nour of representing an Irish county which he RAPHAEL
had never seen, but which he DANIEL could secure to
him on the following terms :-
Ist, RAPHAEL is to pay DANIEL £l,OOO for the honour
of being nominated.
2dl y, RAPHAEL is to pay a second £l,OOO to DANIET in
the fortunate event of his being returned.
3dly, DANIEL covenants and agrees that; "come what
may," as President JACKSON has it, not one farthing,
beyond the £2,000 will be required at the hands of RA-
PHAEL —that he DANIEL will take upon himself the ex-
pense of contesting the return, in case it should be pe-
titioned against", and hear RAPHAEL harmless in all other

. respects.
These terms were accepted by this foolish pigeon of an
ex-sheriff. The articles were drawn out, and signed and
sealed. RAPHAEL, if we may believe him—and we have
no right to doubt his word—has the conditions and the
whole particulars of this curious transaction in the
hand-
writing of DANIEL himself.
•
Now, then, suppose these' facts proved. As concerns
-O'CoNNELL we seek nothing more than this. It is im-
material what he did :with-the money. We stop not to
inquire whether it was or might have been a profitable
bargain to him who originated it. It is of little or no
importance whether DANIEL bagged or pocketed RA-
PHAEL'S money, giving long dated bills upon a brewery'
fur a portion of the purchase money which passed through
his hands. We throw the profit overboard, and the
brewery into the bargain. It is of no moment whether
RAPHAEL'S money was converted into beer or made avail-
able in the purchase of dogs'-meat for the tail in London.
Here we have the money paid—DANIEL the receiver—.
his son JoriN the carrier of the bank notes—the father
fingering the cash—the son conveying it to his honoured
and beloved parent.

This is enough. RAPHAEL was returned through the
interest which the elder O'CoNNELL possessed with the
popish priests of Carlow. As soon as the first £l,OOO
were paid, we find DANIEL writing a declaration and a
strong recommendation to the electors in favour of RA-
PHAEL. It was a most kind, and generous, and truly pa-
triotic recommendation, for DANIEL had received a gui-
nea for every syllable it contained. The electors of
Carlow were told that RAPHAEL, whose very name they
never had heard of in the whole course of their lives,
was a fit and proper person to represent them in parlia-
ment—that he was an highly independent and accom-
plished gentleman—a man of integrity and of sterling'
pat! i otistn—a Roman catholic to boot—one of the aven-
gers of the wrongs of Ireland—who hated the orange-
men, the protestants, and the parsons--whose heart was
entirely Irish—and who would vote for the repeal of the
union, or any other repeal, just to oblige his dear and
esteemed friends of the county of Carlow.

'los* the electors' Of Cat ow mdst have. staled When