The Express. — 1857-12-30 (London, England)

OWN COZZAMPONDII3II4  PARIS, TURSIM,T EVSNINO. A remarkable instance of the length to which the doctrine of private vengeance, sanctioned as it has so often been by French juries, is likely to be carried out in practice, has just occurred at Briey, in the department of the Moeelle. The facts remind one forcibly of the Jenfosse case. In the present instance the person who set the example of taking the law into his own hands was the mayor of the commune. He, however, like Madame de Jeufosse, acted by deputy. Instead of an old and faithful servant, Ms own son, acting under his orders, laid in wait to tab a fellow-creature'. life. The name of the mayor is only indicated by an initial in the Droit, which reports the case as follows :—" A young man named Basset, alias Faufan, one day met Mdlle. P—, the daughter of the Mayor of Al], walking In a wood. He induced her to talk with him, made love to her, and succeeded in obtaining a promise of another meeting. The interviews, innocent at first, went on till they wise guilty. For three whole months the maples daughter secretly received Basset in her bed-rasa at night. His habit was to get over a low wall which sepusted the mayor's garden from the street, to use as a ladder the bars of the blinds of the ground-floor windows, and thus to get to the window-sill of the young lady's chamber on the first-floor. Neither the mayor nor his family knew anything of these clandestine meetings till two cousins, of the female sex, ferreted out the affair, and told M. P— of it. On the 22nd of December last, just as the family was going to bed, M. P— ordered his daughter to sleep on the ground•floor instead of her own bed-room. In that bed-room he placed her brother, his son—he put into his hand a loaded double-barrelled gun, and told him to shoot a man whom be would probably see getting in at the window. The young man drew a chair towards the window, sat down upon it, kept his gun cocked in his hand, and remained ready to execute his father's orders. At a quartos past nine o'clock be saw a man's head through the window. Basset, as usual, was at the top of the first blind, expecting to be let in. The mayor's eon rose from his chair, went to the window, opened it, and fired both his barrels at Barnet, who fell dead on the spot. The mayor when the deed was done sent for the gendarmerie to tell them of it, and he was lost in astonishment when they said it was their duty to arrest him on a charge of murder. He bad doubtless read M. Berryer's speech at Emu:, and drawn from the conclusion (which, the premises being admitted, is entirely logical) that because the law excuses homicide upon the person of a man found breaking into a house in the night time, ea the ground that he must be presumed to cone with the intention to rob or murder, therefore it is justifiable to lie in wait to kill a particular individual who is known to come secretly indeed, bat with the sanction of one of the inmates of the dwelling, and with no felonious intention. The Mayor of Ail thought it a matter of course to avenge his daughter's easy virtue by assassinating her favoured lover. He and his son arc in prison, and meat undergo the form of a trial for murder; but if modern doctrines on the veniality of examination are to prevail, they will be acquitted with flying colours."