The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-11-22 00:00:00

WIGAN.-MONDAY NIGHT

DARING ROBBERY.—A daring robbery was committed on
the night of Monday last, the 14th inst., or early on Tues-
day the 15th, from the magazine attached to Orrel Colliery.
It was perceived in the morning of Tuesday, when the men
came to work, that the place had been broken open, and, on
searching, it was found that one barrel of blasting gunpowder,
six new spades, and 5 lbs. of colliers' pit candles had been
stolen. A reward of £2 was offered for the apprehension of
the offenders, and police-officers, Smith and Radcliffe. were
led to search the premises of an old offender, named Henry
Highton, who lives in the Scholes. On searching the bed
room the spades were found. and the officers apprehended
Highton on the charge on Thursday last. He was brought
before John Woodcock, Esq., county magistrate, on Friday,
and committed to take his trial at the nest Kirkdale Sessions.
MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT.—One of the most melancholy
occurrences ever known we have now to records by which
one of our highly respectable townsmen has met with his
death. On Friday, afternoon last, Mr. Henry Latham went
to the Commercial Inn, and having occasion to go down the
yard, went out about five o'clock, in the direction of the re-
servoir supplying the flour mill of Messrs. Potter with water.
It would appear that, after passing through the Commercial
hall gates, Mr. Latham went round the enclosed area and
through a door at the corner, opening on a passage, along
which runs a stream of boiling water from the engine house
attached to the flour mill. Shortly afterwards the engineer
of the mill heard a scream and loud groans following it, but
was some time before he could ascertain from whence the
sound proceeded. Guided by the groaning he searched
along the channel of hot water, but from the steam arising
so thickly on it, he was some time ere he could find the de-
ceased, lying in the water and almost parboiled. Mr. Lathom
was taken into the Commercial Inn, and stripped of his satu-
rated garments, with which his skin came off when being un-
dressed. He was conveyed home as soon as possible, where
he lingered until Saturday night in a most agonizing state.
Mr. L. was a gentleman who bore a high character for his
integrity, and was accountant to the Wigan Saving's Bank
for a number of years' past.

A MATTER OF OPINION.—A good wife, the other day
taking up a Manchester paper, said to her loving husband—
" This is just as it should be ; the marriages are put before
the births. The Guardian always has the births first, and I
thing that very awkward." The husband gave opinion in
favour of the Guardian, as he thought " people were born
before they were married." The wife, however, persisted in
the correctness of her views of the matter, and preferred the
Manchester arrangement, as it was " a very ugly thing to
have a birth before marriage." The deaths, it would appear,
were each put in the right place, for they always came last.
MOP LAw.—A servant girl named Mary Morgan was re-
cently brought before the Cheltenham magistrates for run-
ning away from service. She had been hired at Cirencester
" mop" for a year certain on the 17th of October, and went
away two days after. Her excuse was, that she " did not
like the ways of the house." " Why ?" said the magistrate's
clerk. After some coyness, and " because I don't like such
ways," came out, " because I had to go through the man's
bedroom to my room!" Mr. Ballinger said, "this is a com-
mon thing in farm-houses." and the girl was sent to North-
leach gaol for 14 days.— Worcester Journal.

THE WORTH OF A LIFE.—
.On Sunday last (says the
Prepagateur de l'Aube) two young,journeymen, on arriving
at the upper gallery of the theatre of Troyes, found only one
vacant place, which they both pertinaciously claimed. A
quarrel ensued, during which the stouter gave the weaker a
push, which sent him headlong into the gallery below, whence
he rolled into the amphitheatre. The people present fully
expected to find the fallen youth with some of his limbs bro-
ken, or at least severely bruised. He, however, immediately
got up; and exclaimed, whilst fumbling in his pockets—
" Diable ! this is very unlucky! " Those around him obser-
ved that he might have been killed. "Ah bah!" replied he,
" I wish that had been the worst of it—l have lost four sous
out of my pocket."
ROYAL "BICKER."—Among the various presents made
to her Majesty during her tour in Scotland, one, and that not
the least interesting, which has remained unnoticed till now,
was a bicker or quaich, presented to her by the Earl of Mans-
field during her short sojourn at Scone Palace. The quaich
was sent to the earl by Mr. M' Robie, lapidary, George-street,
for presentation to her Majesty, who after accepting it, ex-
amined it cat efully, and expressed her admiration of the in-
genious manner in which it was fashioned. It was made of
500 pieces of four different kinds of wood, of Scottish
growth, and did infinite credit to the artist who put it to-
ggther, an individual, we believe, belonging to the Carse of
Gowrie. Her Majesty and Prince Albert, we understand,
partook of dock-an-dhorris out of the bicker, immediately
previous to the royal carriage leaving the palace.—Perth
Courier.

A. JEWISH BARRISTER.—A few days ago a gentleman of
the Jewish persuasion was called to the bar by the Honour-
able Society of the Middle Temple. The gentleman alluded
to is Mr. John Simon, LL.B. The usual forms were gone
through in the presence of a numerous body of the benchers
and banisters, with the exception that the new-made bar-
risters had to be sworn on the Old Testament, and which
sacred volume, written in the Hebrew tongue, had to be sent
for. .Another difficulty arose under the followingf circum-
stances : It is the usual practice in the courts of law for gen-
tlemen of the Jewish persuasion to take the oaths with their
hats ow; but upon this occasion, owing to the size of the
wig with which it was necessary that the head of the honour-
able gentleman should be covered, the hat could not be put
on. In consequence the ceremony was gone through with-
out that customary observance. It is stated that Mr. Simon
is the first Jewish barrister connected with the Middle Tem-
ple.

A PARALLEL TO "THE GRAPES ARE SOUR."—A black
slave in one of the southern states of the American Union,
to whom meat was a rare blessing, one day found in his trap
a plump rabbit. He took him out alive, held him under,his
arm, patted him, and began to speculate on his qualities.
" Oh, how berry fat ! De fattest I ebber did see ! Let us
see how me cook him. Me roast him ? No ; he be so fat,
me lose all de grease. Me fry him ? Ah, he be,so berry fat,
he fry himself. Golly, how fat be be! Den me stew him."
The thought of the savory stew made the nigger forget him-
self, and, in spreading out the feast to his imagination, his
arm relaxed, when off hopped the rabbit, and squatting at a
goodly distance, eyed his last owner with great composure.
The negro knew there was an end of the matter, so, sum-
moning all his philosophy, he thus addressed the rabbit,—
"_You long-eared, white-whiskered, red-eyed rat, you not
.aperry fat after all !"
NAPOLEON'S OPINION OF A WAR WITH CHINA.—The
following extract from O'Meary's "Voice from St. Helena,"
will be read with interest at this moment :—" ' If,' said
Napoleon, alluding to Lord Amherst's embassy ,to China,
I had sent an ambassador to China, I should have ordered
him to make himself acquainted with the ceremonies per-
formed before the Emperor by the first mandarins, and, if
required, to do the same himself. Now, perhaps, you will
lose the friendship of the Chinese nation and great commer-
cial advantages through this piece of nonsense.' I said,'
adds O'Meary, ' that we could easily compel the Chinese to
grant good terms by means of a few ships of war ; that, for
example, we could deprive them altogether of salt by a few
cruisers properly stationed.' Napoleon replied, It would
be the worst thing you have done for a number of years to
go to war with an immense empire like China, and possessing
so many resources. You would, doubtless, at first succeed ,•
take what vessels they have; and destroy their trade and
cities; but you would soon teach them their own strength.
They would be compelled to adopt measures to defend them-
selves against you. They would consider, and say, We
must try to make ourselves equal to this nation. Why
should we suffer a people so far away to do as they please
with us? We must build ships, we must put guns in them,
we must render ourselves equal to them. They would,'
continued the Emperor, get artificers and shipbuilders
from France and America, and even London ; they would
build a fleet, and, in the course of time, defeat you. "

NAPOLEON'S COMPASS.—A small compass has lately been
offered for sale to the French Government, by a Chevalier
Auriol, to which a curious history is attached. This little
instrument, which is in a plain gilt case, and of English
manufacture, was first sent, with other astronomical instru-
ments, to Louis XVI. by a descendant of Sir Isaac Newton.
It appears that it was afterwards given by the unfortunate
Monarch to the Dauphin, who had it with him in prison, and
while there gave it a faithful dependent who had tried to as-
sist him to escape. This party had been at school at Brienne
with Napoleon, and accompanied him to Egypt. There he
happened to show the little compass to Napoleon, who ad-
mired it, and it was accordingly presented to him. Napoleon,
on returning to France, and having become Emperor, being,

as is well known, superstitious, set great value on the instru-
ment, had the letter " N " and his imperial crown engraved
on it. and made use of it in his campaigns, and never parted
with it until his captivity in St. Helena; and then, either
considering it as a useless talisman, or as the best means of
acknowledging the disinterested kindness of the party, he
presented it to Madame Auriol. Marshal Soult is now in

treaty with the Chevalier d'Auriol for the purchase of it, with
the view of placing this Royal and imperial relic among the
other objects preserved in the Hotel des Invalides, as having
been about the person of Napoleon.

SINGULAR ESCAPE.—The manager of a coal-works near
Dundonald, during, last week, had occasion to keep his men
closer than usual at work in one of the pits which was under-
going some necessary repairs. Previous to leaving home
after dinner to go to the pit, he requested his wife to bring
some refreshment for himself and the men at work. Ac-
cordingly she did so, and on arriving at the pit mouth, in-
sisted on going down into the bowels of the earth to dis-
pense the good things of this life in propria persona. Her
wish was complied with, and down she went in the bucket.
and was received by her husband at the bottom, who ex-
pressed great surprise at her appearance there, and bluntly
statet.this apprehensions of her reaching the upper world in
safety. The husband and wife got into the creel to ascend,
and had been drawn up the shaft about forty feet when the
rope broke, and both, along with the bucket, were precipi-
tated to the bottom. Strange to say, neither of the two were
hurt by the fall ; the only injury received was by the woman,
on whom the broken rope fell, and slightly ruffled the skin
of her neck. The bottom of the pit was boarded over, and
the bucket broke two of the planks by the force of its de-
scent. Had it gone through, the probability is great that we
would have had to record an accident of a fatal character, as,
beneath the boards there was a continuation of the shaft of
about forty fathoms, half filled with water, into which had
they fallen they would never, in al: probability, have been
got out in life.—Ayr Advertiser.

THE WHOLESALE INFANTICIDE IN THE FOREST OF
DEAN.—The inquiry into this extraordinary case termi-
nated on Thursday. Several additional witnesses were ex-
amined, who gave similar testimony to that which has been
already published, and the only difficulty experienced was
the connecting the man Thomas Yapp with a knowledge of
the crime, it being a rule of law that in no case the confes-
sion of a criminal be made available against an accomplice,
unless corroborated by other•evidence. This, however, has
been supplied by the evidence of a man of the name of Wat-
kins, which shows Yapp, in addition to the circumstances of
his having cohabited with the female prisoner during the last
ten or twelve years, during which period the murders have
been committed, and finding of the bodies of five out of the
six infants buried under the kitchen floor, the spot where
the female prisoner says she buried them with Yapp's
assistance, to have had a knowledge of the situation of
the female prisoner at the time she gave birth to her
last child. Watkins states that about last Christmas,
he being. acquainted with Yapp, was in the neighbour-
hood of Roardean, and having met Yapp, was invited
by him to stay and sleep that night at the house occu-
pied by him and the female prisoner; he accepted the
invitation, and slept in the same bed with Yapp in one room
while the prisoner, Frances Bennett, slept in a bed in the
adjoining room ; that at about twelve o'clock at night, and
from that time until between two and three in the morning,
he heard a suppressed moaning. as) of a person in great pain,
in the room where the female prisoner was sleeping; that the
noise kept him awake till between two and three o'clock in
the morning, after which he dropped off to sleep, and did not
wake again until about five o'clock, when the male prisoner,
Thomas Yapp, got up and went down stairs to get a light,
where he appeared to be searching for matches, but said he
could not find any. Yapp then returned up stairs. and went
into Frances Bennett's room, but how long he remained
there witness could not tell, as he again fell asleep and heard
no more. Witness never thought anything more of the cir-
cumstance, but happening to be in the neighbourhood on Sa-
turday last, he saw the female prisoner, Frances Bennett,
who, in conversation, asked Inm if he remembered sleeping
there last Christmas? He replied that he did, upon which
she added, " I deceived you nicely that night, for that was
the very time when my last child was born." This closed
the inquiry, and the jury returned a verdict of " wilful mur-
der" against both the prisoners, who were fully committed
for trial at the next assizes.