The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-10-03 00:00:00

found coming forward to protect both the com-
mercial community and the working classes from
the oppressive exactions which bullionism enables
the capitalist to levy upon both.

It is an unfortunate propensity in most men, who
have discovered a grievance or an offence, to prose-
cute it, in the first instance, with a too indiscrimi-
nate severity. Thus, the Town Council of Liver-
pool have recently discovered that the practice of
giving short weight, by the use of false balances
and other similar devices, prevailed more exten-
sively among our market people and petty shop-
keepers than they had previously dreamt of; and
that the inspectors and machinery provided for the
suppression of such practices, by which our working
classes especially were scandalously robbed, were
totally inefficient for its suppression. Very pro-
perly they took the necessary measures for meeting
the evil, by an increase in the staff of officers, and
by insisting upon a more rigid performance of their
duties. So far, we repeat, they were right; for
wilful fraud, or even palpable negligence, which
deprives our neighbour of his just weight or mea-
sure for his just money, should he visited with
severe punishment, and is equally inexcusable,
whether it is committed by the petty huckster in
the street, or in a cellar, or by the large shopkeeper
or extensive merchant.

But right and just as was the movement of the
authorities, we must express our opinion that it
has, within the past few weeks, been pushed to a
tyrannical extreme by their officers. The law itself
is a very severe and exacting one; and, when it is
acknowledged that the supervision, in the matter of
weights and measures, has been hitherto rather lax,
there was room for some degree of leniency in en-
forcing its provisions in cases where fraud was not
wilfully premeditated. There are cases, too, which
its provisions may be stretched to meet, against
which it is almost impossible to guard, and where
the idea that the party offending has sought any
benefit for himself is completely out of the question.
We shall give an instance of the litter description
of cases.

On Thursday last, Mr. Richard Harbord, one of
the most extensive of our warehouse-keepers, was
summoned before his Worship the Mayor, for
having on one of his premises an incorrect
" weighing-machine." We may explain to such
of our readers as are not familiar with the ware-
housing business, that the " machine" in question
was simply a pair of large scales, capable of weighing
such heavy articles as bales of cotton and hogs-
heads of sugar, kept by him for the convenience of
merchants and brokers warehousing with him, in
the weighing and reweighing of their produce.
They were not at all used by him, as in the case of
ordinary tradesmen, for weighing his own goods;
and he could not have the slightest interest in their
being incorrect. Such scales have large wooden
bottoms, which are continually liable to absorb the
moisture of a damp floor, or of any damp or adhe-
sive substance weighed in them ; and are besides
continually being worn by the friction of casks, &c.
rolled into them, and from other causes. Hence it
is the constant practice, as well of the Queen's
servants as of others, to adjust them from time to
time, by a weight of some sort, attached to what-
ever scale might be found lighter than the other.
We believe the reader would find such scales so
adjusted used by the Custom House officers, on the
quays of any of our docks, or in any large establish-
ment requiring them. In the case to which we re-
fer the beam itself was correct, having been recently
adjusted by the officers of weights and measures;
but large wooden scales, not having been in use for
twelve months, did not balance at the time that the
inspector called to survey them ; and Mr. Harbord
was fined 205.; the Mayor, however, in adjudging
the penalty, remarked that he left the court without
the slightest imputation on his character.
Now ' this does really seem a little too bad.
There is probably not a large balance of the sort—
and they are indispensibly necessary—which, from
a week's disuse, would not require the simple sort
of adjustment which is practised, and the owner of
which might not be fined nine times out of ten
that any inconsiderate official chose to pay him a
visit. It is common, as every merchant knows, that
they are nearly always corrected in the presence of
the buyers' and sellers' servants, previously to
goods being weighed in them; and the utmost dif-
ference probably which could occur in case of tri-
fling incorrections, would be an error of a pound's
weight, under or over, in a bale of cotton or a
hogshead of sugar. Yet in such trivial and una-
voidable cases, if proved, the magistrate, we un-
derstand, is compelled to inflict a penalty !
In another case which has come to our know-
ledge, the officers, on visiting the shop of a re-
spectable widow lady in the unceremonious man-
ner which, we learn, is now adopted with little
discrimination of persons, were shown one weight,
which she informed them she knew was incorrect,
and had consequently laid aside for twelve months
past. She was summoned, notwithstanding this
information volunteered by her, the information
being for having " a weight deficient ; but on at-
tending to explain the case, as she concluded she
could do satisfactorily, she found that the charge
she had to answer was for having nine weights de-
ficient. She was not prepared, of course, for so
sweeping a charge ; and was fined in a mitigated
penalty. Obviously there had been in this case
not only extreme severity but gross blundering.
We would really suggest to the authorities, and
to their officers, whether by their over zeal, and by
rendering the real offence to be put down one
which only the very greatest caution can guard
against, they are not rendering the penalties in-
flicted, and the notoriety with which they are
attended, no longer a punishment.

Mr. Arthur Henderson is again to be brought forward
as a candidate for Scotland Ward.

THE TRAGEDY IN THE PARK.-011 a post mortem exa-
mination it was found that both Howarth and his wife had
taken poison, a smail portion of which it was proved, the
former had bought six weeks ago. An open verdict of
" Found dead" was returned.
The Rev. Jonathan Brooks, senior rector of this parish,
has received from the Bishop of Chester, an intimation of
his appointment to the new Archdeaconry of Liverpool.
Mr. Brooks will still retain his office of senior rector of
Liverpool. There is not at present any pecuniary emolu-
ment attached to the office.

SERIOUS CHARGE.—Yesterday the keeper of the Leeds
and Liverpool weighing machine, near the canal, appeared
before Mr. Rushton to answer a charge against him of
having falsely or shortly weighed several loads of cordage,
&c. It appeared that in one instance a hawser which
weighed 11 cwt. and odd was marked in the ticket as only
6 cwt., and that in another case a weight of 6 cwt. was
stated to be only 3 cwt. 3 qrs. The defendant brought
two witnesses but they did not clear up the charge. Some
witnesses who were wanted had not appeared. and the
case was remanded, Mr. Rushton remarking that it was
of the utmost importance in a town like this that the
inquiry should be gone through with care. He ordered
the informations to be relaid under the new act, which
gives additional power to enforce the attendance of
witnesses.

EMBEZZLEMENT.-At the Intermediate Sessions on
Saturday, Samuel Watson was placed at the bar on the
charge of embezzlement. The prisoner had been em-
ployed by Mr. Ashe, of South Castle-street, and he,
suspecting that from time to time there was a diminution
in his cash receipts, while entrusted to the prisoner, took
the opportunity of sending for a few trifling articles, when
it was understood he had left for the night. On his return
he found none of the articles alluded to entered in the
Cash Sales Book, and as the monies were all marked, a
detective officer was sent for. and on the person of the
prisoner were discovered the several sums. These facts
were proved by Mr. Reay, of the Guardian Society, by
Mr. Wrenn, Mr. Richard Crossley, and others. Mr. H.
T. Atkinson, who defended the prisoner, started several
legal objections, which were so unconnected with the facts
of the case, that they were momentarily overruled by the
Learned Recorder. The jury returned a verdict of guilty,
and the Recorder sentenced the prisoner to four months'
hard labour,—stating that as there was no excuse for the
commission of the crime, nothing could be urged in exte-
nuation. He was respected by his employer, and was in
receipt of a good salary, which from time to time had
been advanced.
SERIOUS COLLISION IN THE RIVER. - About one
o'clock on Sunday last, a serious collision, attended with
considerable damage to a foreign brig, occurred near the
Rock Lighthouse. It appears that at the hour in ques-
tion, the steamer Ayrshire Lassie had in tow two foreign
brigs, called the Pomona and the Ariadne, and that after
having passed the Rip-rap buoy and neared the Rock
Lighthouse, with the intention of proceeding down the
Rock Channel, the Anglo-American packet-ship was ob-
served to be coming up the Crosby Channel. She was
nearly close-hauled at the time, the wind being from
W.S.W., and it being ebb-tide. The parties on board
the Ayrshire Lassie, seeing this to be the position of af-
fairs, cast loose the two ropes belonging to both the brigs,
and then the Ariadne starboarded her helm, and the Po-
mona ported her helm, for the purpose of dividing and
moving in opposite directions to each other. The Anglo-
American had then the Ariadne on her lee-bow, and the
Pomona right ahead. After clearing the Pomona, the
Anglo-American came into collision with the Ariadne;
she ran stem on. carrying away the foremast of the brig
and the whole of the atancheons along the starboard side.
Had it not been for the timely aid afforded by four steam-
boats, the Ariadne must have sunk, but fortunately the
steamers sneceeded in getting her into the Prince's Basin,
where she grounded nearly full of water.