BARON GURNEY AT CHESTER.

THE behaviour of Judges presiding at trials of persons charged with political crimes olight always to be narrowly watched. The law is sufficiently severe, but there is seldom wanting a disposition on the part of the Court to strain it against the accused democrats : and it may be noticed as a common practice of Judges to descant in their opening addresses to Grand Juries, on the peculiar enor- mity of offences against the State in a country so well governed as England. Men who side with power and are well to do in the world, like such observations. They are pleased to hear that no-

body is to blame save time wretched prisoners—that the ruling and the privileged have done no wrong—that the discontented have no excuse for turbulence. Thus flattered, they are disposed to act with vigour, and to let time law take its full swing. The Judge speaks directly to the Grand Jury, but the court is crowded with the persons cm t whom the Petty Juries are composed—seldom the

peers of the prisoner, but belonging to a class between whom and the working-people there is deep animosity. Little need of stimu-

lating the prejudices ot' the " shopocrat " against the " operative." Yet that must have been the effect, though of course it could not have been the design, ot' such a charge as 1111'011 GURNEY delivered

at Chester on Monday last. Adverting to the Chartist offences, that learned person is reported to have held the following lan- guage— " There are markv tiventy persons counted in the calendar for having riot- ously assembhul ; but t,./e (1. pasitions which hare been returned to Ine early the

cases much further than these of ordinary cases of riots. They disclose the laborious in:if:Li:mations of evil-minded min to infuse discontent into the minds of the ma-s of the operatives, and indeed of the labouri ]] g classes in general, by teaching them that the higher and middling classes are their tvrants and

oppressors ; that they (the working. people) are miserable, abject, degraded slaves, in a state of wretchedness and of misery ; that it was not intended by

the providence of God that wraith should be so unequally distributed as it is; and that it' they will cNrrt thein4..lves, all this will be at an end. The means they propose to do this is to provide themselves with arms, under the pretence of themselves ; to abstain from labour during, a given time ; to take from the rich that which they had acquired by fair means; and, at last, to assemble it National Convention. It is lamentable that men should be found.

Bo wicked as to attempt such deln,ifeo:, and it is no less lamentable to see Melt BO credulous as to believe them. il'hot poor 711Illt its this country suprs op- pression? IV/mat riche man, if' he lout the will, has the power to billiet it? if any ease of ;aikido& wrong acmes, the courts of justice are open, and the poorest man its the land trill readily find assistance to come into court. Never are the ears either of a judge or jury deaf to the claims of the poorest num for justice."

Is not time practice of transmitting depositions to the Judge very questionable ? The depositions frequently contain statements

which the witnesses venture not to make in open court, and predispose the judgment against the prisoner ; for his ease is not laid at the same time before the person whose opinion must have great influence in determining his fate. The law says that by the evidence given to Court and Jury shall the verdict be ruled; but the mind of the Court may be poisoned before a witness opens his lips.

We pass to that part of the charge where Baron GURNEY asks, what poor man in this country suffers oppression ? The question, if put from a different place and on a less solemn occasioa, would be ludicrous. " What rich man, if lie has the will, has the power to inflict it?"---Emery rich man, Baron Graxav, can use the law as an instrument of oppression. There is no need to search out another. The courts of justice aflbrd to hint who has money ample means of ruining him who has none. " The courts of justice are open !" Most true ; but has Baron GURNEY never heard of Honss TOOKE'S now hackneyed retort—" So is the London Tavern?" " The poorest in the land will readily find assistance to conic into court." Where ?—Everybody knows that the practical denial of justice is a grievance of which the people of England complain

loudly, and have been complaining tbr tummy years : witness the scores of bills annually brought into Parliament with a view to re- medy—but in vain. Yet Baron GURNEY cannot sec any cause of complaint !

We proceed to that part of the Judge's charge in which he ex- pounded the law of conspiracy— "In it conspiraey, as you well know, it is not necessary, nor is it even losable, that all the parties should do ecc and the same thing. A conspiracy is carried into execution by different persons in different places, doing different things, all conducing to the accomplishment of the design in which they are engaged. Some would call meetings ; others would preside ; others speak, ins struct, and inflame. Others would go about privately to stir up ; others dis- tribute publications explanatory of the objects to be obtained, and the means to procure them. Others would ntanufactum arms, and others obtain their disposal. /in• the purpose of era/.yawn a ewmpiraey, it is not necessary that they should hare known of it ; but if; by :moos or these speeches and publica- tions, they are induced to act, though at a distance from each other, in the execution of the same plan, they are still conspirators: the act If one is the net of ell. An act done in this county .1hr the furtherance Vele common design, is an act for whirls they are rill answerable, cren though the punks should ;weer have designed it and though they should reside in another county, they may be properly charged in one and the same indictment."

Baron GURNEY, we presume, spoke sound law; but to unlearned persons his dictum has the appearance of absurdity. To say that

a man is guilty of' conspiring to do that which lie never designed to do, and is punishable fits acts which he himself neither committed nor even heard of, sounds like pure nonsense : but when it is re- membered that on such grounds convictions may be obtained and severe sentences fbllow, time temptation to ridicule disappears be- fore the feeling of shame and sorrow that this should be called law and justice in England.

The convicted mast not expect mercy from Baron GURNEY; who assured the Grand Jury that "the most rigorous punishment should be mnflwlcd on those who cure Jim/ guilty."

After all, the Judge, though he talked in this reprehensible manner, by a bad licence of the bench, may perlbrm the part of "prisoner's counsel," as time old constitutional maxim prescribes, and sec fair play with the Attorney-General.