The Sun. — 1827-08-04 (London, England)

EYNA RD. The modifications Made to the Constitution of Epidaure have further objects, the guarantee of the rights of the Civil Laws, and a great extension of the power of the ExecutiVe, and the abolition of titles and distinctions with the institution of Tribunals.  By his Majesty's ship L'Eclair, arrived at Rio de Janeiro from Callao, we have the intelligence that on the 19th March the Colombian troops, to the number of 2,500, left that port in several transports for Guayaquil, escorted 'by the the Peruvian frigates Monteagudo and Libertad. His Majesty's ship Volage, Captain Boucnnn, remains in the Bay. The Blanche was at Callao, and was to sail for Valparaiso and England in a few days. The letters by the L'Eclair are up to the Ist of April, at which time it was considered that the power of BoLivAR in Peru to sustain the Bolivian Constitution, was entirely at an end. The new Congress was to meet early in May.  We request the reader's attention to the confession of Slade the murderer, which we have copied from a Provincial Journal into our Paper of to-day. If properly authenticated in the first place, and .held worthy of credit in the second, it decidedly proves that he has been convicted on erroneous grounds. The three points which Hseemed to weigh most with the Jury who found him Guilty, were the facts of the bill-hook being traced to his possession (or that of his family with wlibm he usually resided) of his shoes corresponding with the marks found in the garden, and beside the stile ,a day or- two after the murder, and the extraordinary confession of Heddings. To controvert the first point, Slade unhesitatingly asserts that the murder was perpetrated with a sword ; the circumstantial evidence of the second is disproved by the fact, that he " pulled off' his shoes when he first went into the garden ;" while the third is equally neutralized by his own unequivocal denial. But, perhaps, the cautious reader may inquire what degree of reliance is to be placed upon Sldde's reported confession ? Let common sense decide the question. Heddings, it is well known; expected to insure a pardon by his story of the murderer's acknowledgment ; while the murderer's own story tells against himself. The one gains all, the other loses all, by his account ; both are equally abandoned, but surely he is most worthy of credit who has made a disinterested, and gratuitous confession of his own guilt. With respect to his • inability to account for himself,' this ought only to weigh when added to a heavier and more convincing mass of circumstantial evidence. He might probably have been intoxicated at the time in question, and passed the night in a field, a ditch, or even by the road-side ; but does it therefore follow that he must, of necessity, have been guilty ? It may heighten probability ; but, when life is at stake, , should never amount to conviction.  The whole case, we think, resolves itself to this; if Slade be hanged, the justice of his punishment must almost entirely depend on his own confession ; and. yet that confession has been made Vier a conviction, whose fallacy it in part confirms. He has, therefore, been first condemned, and afterwards found guilty.  It is reported at Lloyd's that the Potosi (Colombian) of 750 tons, from Talcahuanac to Monte Video, was burnt on the 6th May, in lat. 44. S. ; that the crew took to their boats, one of which arrived at Monte Video on the 19th of May ; the other, containing the chief mate and seven men, had not since been heard of. It is stated that a man, one of the crew, has arrived with this intelligence, without, however, any documents but the address of the owner. He adds, when he left, the master and supercargo were in good health. The Potosi was fortnerly in the Government service, and was called the Abundance store ship. - •