alttrofolto.

The Court of Common Council on Thursday found itself obliged to re- fer back to the Committee the bill for reforming the City franchise, the Recorder having intimated his opinion that some of the clauses were in 'a shape that would prevent their getting through the House df Commons. There was much dramatic conversation on the incident. Mr. Anderton took the bill in his hand, tore it in two, and, exclaiming, "This Court will never reform itself—there goes your bill !" he threw the fragments violently on the floor. But the Recorder said that the delay would have no effect on the ultimate progress of the measure ; " no danger " need be apprehended. A petition presented by Alderman Wire from some hundreds of' inha- bitants of the borough of Southwark, to be merged in, instead df merely annexed to, the city of London, created some interest. After favourable discussion, it was referred to the Committee of Freedoms.

A crowded meeting of the merchants of London, and of gentlemen de- puted from the great mercantile ports of the North of England and Scot- land, in favour of Reform in the Customs, was held at the London Tavern on Wednesday. The large room was completely filled. Among those present were the Mayor, and the Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce of Hull, the Dean of the Guild of Merchants at Aberdeen, the Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce at Southampton, Mr. John Clay M.'P., Mr. T. A. Mitchell M.P., Sir James Duke M.P., Mr. Masterman M.P., Mr. Alderman Thompson M.P., Mr. Grenfell M.P., Mr. M'Gregor M.P., and Sir John Lubbock. The list of leading merchants who attended, would fill half of this column and it would include almost every name of com- mercial eminence in the City. Baron Rothschild, and several other men of influence, wrote expressing regret that they were prevented from attend- ing. Mr. Masterman M.P. presided.

Mr. Sidney Smith read the report of the Committee of London Mer- chants. It recommended the following scheme of reform for public con- sideration.

" 1. The number of Commissioners may be advantageously reduced to four or five, whereof one should be in Parliament, and therefore moveable with the Government, as the Secretaries of the Treasury, Admiralty, Presidents of the Board of Trade, Poor-law Commissioner, &c. are in other departments. " 2. One member of the Board at least should be taken from the commercial body, and one or more drafted from the superior practical officers of the Customs. "3. Promotion should be not only open but certain to all meritorious officers; nor should there be any restriction which would prevoit useful officers mono de- partment from being removed into another. " 4. Higher qualifications, a longer probation, and a much more protracted and systematic training of all officers, should be required, than are at present exacted ; and a strict examination of every permanent officer should be made by a board of officers called for the purpose. " 5. Ad valorem duties should be abolished ; and such duties as must be retained to meet equivalent excise imposts, or fixed duties on other articles of a like class, should be converted into specific duties. "6. The authorities charged with the adjudication of any case of a merchant or trader, should in all cases be bound to hear him personally on demand; and all questions at issue between the merchant and the Board should be tried and decided in open court, on requisition by the parties.

"7. No officer should be competent to seize, stop, or detain the ship, goods, or person of a subject, until the person against whom the act has been adopted has been served by him in writing with a formal statement of the cause of seizure, de- tention, or as the case may be. " S. The Crown should not be exempt from costs ; and every subject should have the right to defend his person or property against the suit of 'the Crown, without being called upon in limine to find security either for costs, fines, or penalties. "9. Merchants, shipowners, and others, should not be made responsible for the crimes or offences of their servants or crews, except where guilty knowledge or the most culpable negligence is clearly traced home to them.

"10. 1 he system of fines and satisfactions to the officers, and the infliction of ex- cessive penalties, should he entirely abolished. "11. Prescription should run against the Crown equally as against the private subject; and in all cases, the delivery of goods from bond 'under duty certificate, should be final as to the claims of the Crown, unless fraud on the part of 'the mer- chant be proved.

" 12. All detentions, fines, and seizures for entries, or declarations referable only to statistical purposes, and not involving questions of revenue, should be hence- forth prohibited; the examination, entry, and deliveries'of free goods should be sim- plified; and such a system should be devised in reference to goods passing4hrough this country in transit, as shall relieve trade of the difficulties and loss to which the present provisions for transshipments subject it

The meeting was addressed by Mr. J. J. 'Prayers, Mr. W. Williams M.P., Mr. J. Clay M.P. Mr. W. S. Lindsay, Mr. Gassiott, Mr. M. Clarke, Mr. Grenfell M.P. Mr. W. Hawes Mr. J. D. Powles, Mr.

James Hall, Sir James Duke M.P., and Mr.'ItPeregor. M.P. The tone of the speakers was 'extremely •earnest, but chiefly directed to the general question of Customs reform, as distinct -from the particular ,contests be- tween the Board of Customs and the two great Dock Companies. At the same time, a strong opinion of the part taken in that contest by the official boards was not concealed. Mr. Crawford said, that after the trickery shown by the Treasury in its correspondence recently published, any assurance of the Commissioners of the Customs would henceforth be of no value in the City of London unless it was acoompanied by a bond under seal. Mr. Travers stated, that his sympathies as a merchant had at first been with the Cbstoms ; but in the end he is of opinion that whether the Dock Companies were right or wrong, the conduct of Government is not to be justified. So long as the present system is unaltered no man can feel safe ; perhaps not one person present had not at one time or other suffered under its des- potism. The Chairman, Mr. Lindsay, and Mr. M'Gregor, said that, how- ever tolerable the system might have been in past times, it is no longer tolerable in the present time, after the growth of commerceand the change of all systems in the last twenty-five years.

Resolutions were passed unanimously to adopt the report and its re- commendations, and to forward them to all commercial trading and ship- ping associations in the kingdom ; and to request., by deputation to Lord John Russell, the reappointment next session of the Select Committee on the Customs.

A deputation from Manchester and Salford,—consisting of Mr. William Entwisle, the Reverend.; Canon 'Clifton, Mr. Oliver Heywood, Mr. John Peel, Mr. Samuel Fletcher, and the Reverend Mr. Osborne, Wesleyan minister,—had an interview with Lord John Russell on Thursday, on the subject of the bill to be laid before Parliament for carrying into effect the educational system known as the Manchester and Salford scheme. In the course of the interview, Lord John sent to the Home Office for Sir George Grey, and Sir George soon arrived. When Mr. Entwisle had ex- plained the plan, Lord John Russell mooted "the religious difficulty." With regard to new schools, Protestant Dissenters would not perhaps raise any difficulty ; but then came the Roman Catholic objection to the mere reading of the authorized version of the Scriptures. "I want to know what answer you have to give to that? " The substance of Mr. Entwislc's reply was, that an offer to allow the Roman Catholics the use of their Douay version had been made to them, and had been refused by them.

Mr. Entwisle--" The only way, therefore, in which the promoters could hope to meet the views of the Roman Catholics, would be to have no pro- vision for religious teaching at all."

The Reverend Canon Clifton—" And that would even exclude them, for they would not Consent to instruction without religion."

Mr. Entwisle said, that the difficulty about the Jewish schools is to be left for Parliament to settle. "We are not prepared to make any specific provision in the hill to apply to their case, believing that the point will be decided for them in the Legislature." Lord John Russell undertook to consider the hill : he offered to answer any specific question, and being unquestioned, dismissed the deputation with thanks.

The Court of Exchequer gave judgment on Monday in the celebrated case of Regina versus Bradbury and Evans. Mr. Charles Dickens's weekly pub- lication, Household Words, is accompanied by a monthly publication en- titled The Household Narrative of Current Events, which in the nature of its contents is a monthly newspaper, but it is published without a news- paper stamp ; and the question was, whether or not the Stamp-office could insist on its being stamped. The judgment has been pending many months : there are other publications in existence, or awaiting resurrection after sup- pression, whose fate depended on the decision, the publication in question having been selected to determine the general question. It seems that the-Court has been divided in opinion. Mr. Baron Parke held that the Household Narrative is liable to the stamp-duty, and the other Judges held the zontrary. The judges gave their opinions separately. The question depends on the interpretation given to the schedule at the end of the last Newspaper Stamp Act, the 6th and 7th William IV, cap. 76. That schedule gave definitions of the publications in the United Kingdom liable to the newspaper stamp, to the following effect-1. any paper containing public news, intelligence, or occurrences ; 2. also, any paper printed weekly or oftener, or at intervals not exceeding twenty-six days, containing only or principally advertisements; 3. and also, any paper containing any public news, intelligence, or occurrences, or any remarks or observations thereon, published periodically, or in part: or numbers, at intervals not exceeding twenty-six days, where any of such parts or numbers shall not exceed two sheets, or where the price shall not exceed sixpence. The first and third of these three definitions are the two concerned in the present case; the second is introduced only to explain an argument used by the Judges. The defendant claimed exemption on the ground that the third definition restricts the first.

Baron Martin first delivered his judgment, in favour of the defendants. The first statute imposing a duty on newspapers was the 10th Anne, cap. 19 ; and from that act the words of the first definition is borrowed almost verbatim.

In the ordinary sense of the word newspaper, publication at short intervals is an essential point ; and for this reason, the Annual Register, which brings down the yearly events to the latest days before publication, has never been deemed liable to the duty, though the latest events it includes are as much news as if they appeared in an acknowledged newspaper. But the statute 60th George III, and 1st George IT, cap. 9, clears up all uncertainty, by declaring that the pamphlets and printed papers then published to excite hatred against the Government should be deemed newspapers whenever they are published as often as every twenty-six days, and when they are no bigger than two sheets, or are sold for less than sixpence. Now if the arguments used for the Crown are valid, that a paper published as seldom as monthly (at intervals exceeding twenty-six days) can be " a newspaper," then this enactment would have been unnecessary ; for, a fortiori, a paper published oftener than every twenty-six days would be a newspaper. The same act says that papers published at intervals exceeding twenty-six days, bigger than two sheets, and dearer than twopence, shall be published on the first day of every calendar.month, or within two days before or after that day. The Household Narrative falls within the last description ; and if the law were now being applied only under that statute, the Narrative would not be liable to the duty. But if not then liable, it is certainly not now liable under the 6th and 7th William IV, cap. 76 ; for that law was made to reduce the duty on newspapers, not to extend it on new periodicals.

Baron Platt held, that the whole history, of the legislation on the case shows that the wordmewspaper never included periodicals published at in- tervals exceeding twenty-six days : if the contrary had been the intention, the Gentleman's Magazine and the Quarterly Review would be liable,—a preposterous conclusion.

Baron Parke maintained the opposite conclusion. It is admitted, that by the rules of law a tax .cannot be imposed on the subject except by express words olearly thowing the 'intention of the Legislature to do so : the terms used are plamenougla toshow this intention. Reciting the first definition— "any paper containing public news, intolligonce, or occurrences "—he oh-

served, that upon the ordinary interpretation of these words, the Household Narrative would be within their scope : the scope of the words " containing news" is not, on the one hand, " containing any news," or a history might be made liable ; nor, on the other hand, " containiug only news," or every magazine would be• liable ; but having the "main er general object " of giving-news : the main or general object of the Household Narratine is to give the news of the month. But it is argued that the third definition limits and narrows the first definition, so as to free from the duty all periodicals published at intervals exceeding twenty-six days : on examinatain it will not be found to do so either in its general or in its particular intention. The general intention was to extend the operation of the Stamp-duties to a class of publications which it was deemed proper to restrain, by making subject to duty which they did not before pay. The commencing words " and also" are cumulative, not exceptive or restrictive. The general object was to bring under the law pamphlets against the Government, which contained little or no news, but remarks on the news, or on any matter in church and state ; and with this object, such pamphlets are divided into two classes—those pub- lished at intervals of twenty-six days, and of a certain smallness and cheap- ness, and those published at longer intervals, cud larger or dearer. Of the first class it is enacted, that they shall be deemed news- papers, and be liable to the duty : of the other class it is en- acted, that they shall be published only at the beginning of the month. [The latter provision was obviously intended to prevent any vigorous pam- phlet series from being issued in a more rapid sequence than monthly, by the colourable device of giving a new name to each particular issue.] In this view, the third definition is not a restrictive enactment, intended to nominate a smaller class out of a larger one already named, but an extending enact- ment, to nominate a new class, with fresh characteristics. The definitions are not inconsistent, but supplementary to each other. Thus there are three classes of periodicals liable to duty : periodicals "containing news"—mainly; periodicals containing"principallyq advertisements" [second definition] ; and

ri

peodicals "Containing an }• news," or "any remarks or observations" thereon, though "the chief object be not the giving of news," provided they be of a certain frequency, and of a certain smallness or cheapness. The Household Words does not come within the first definition, but it does within the last, and is therefore liable to the duty. It hue been argued that the Legislature never meant to leave the word news undefined, but meant to define it by saying how often a newspaper must be published : but if they did mean to define news, they would most probably have said that no event should be news after twenty-six days from its occurrence. It was uunecessary to legis- late that periodicals should be prevented from publishing any news only of that age, for the experiment is not likely to be tried. Chief Baron Pollock admitted that the case is doubtful ; especially after Baron Parke's arguments. But he held that the act of George III and William IV, was a legislative recognition that a paper published at in- tervals exceeding twenty-six days has not the character of a newspaper ; though it may be a chronicle of events up to the latest period. If it were not so, then a continuation of Mr. Macaulay's History by himself to this day would be a newspaper. There is nothing in the statutes of any distinction between periodicals chiefly or wholly. consisting of intelligence, and periodi- cals containing such intelligence mixed with other matter ; nor anything about the "main object" of a publication. And the distinction drawn by Baron Parke between the two expressions "containing news," and "con- taining any news," does not warrant his conclusion. The whole question turns on the distinction betweau news and history, and the Legislature has settled that distinction.

The Chief Baron and the two Junior Barons agreeing, judgment was given for the defendants.

Lord Campbell and a Special Jury were occupied at Westminster during nearly the whole of Monday and Tuesday in trying the case of the Queen versus Holder A lleyne, M•Geachy Alleyne, and T. D. B. D'Arey ; a prosecution for conspiracy to defraud Robert Blair Kennedy, and to obtain from Min the sum of 73001. by false pretences. The whole of the parties concerned were within the last few years officers in her Majesty's Infantry service. Kennedy- is the son of Colonel Kennedy, and the nephew of Sir R. Blair ; he was edu- cated at Sandhurst, and was there a fellow student with 1140eachy Alleyne. Both these young men obtained commissions iu the Eighty4iintli Regiment of Foot, and joined their corps at Montreal, in Canada, somewhere about 1843. Holder Alleyne was a lieutenant in the Second Light Infantry, also in Canada during 1843; and was introduced to Kennedy by 11,‘Geaeby Alleyne. D'Arey was also an officer in the Eighty-ninth. While in Canada, the young men all gambled, betted, and lived much beyond their income. Kennedy had good expectations. They had all returned to England' iu 1846. Towards the end of 184G, Holder Alleyne made a bet with Kenisedy that a certain mare of his should trot half a mile while a horse of Kennedy's galloped three quarters of a mile. Holder Alleyne stated that he had picked her up at a dealer's, and that she was an English snare of extraordinary mark. By skilful management, Kennedy was at last induced. to bet the following beta against this mare. " The bet that was made was 100/. that the mare could not trot twelve miles with- in the hour, 200/. that she could not trot thirteen miles, 400/. that she could not trot fourteen miles, NO/. that she could not trot lifteenmiles, 1000/. that she-could not trot sixteen miles, 32001. that she could not trot seventeen miles, 501)1. that she could not trot font teen miles, and 500/. that she oould not trot fifteen miles within the hoar —total, 7300!. The match was to come off on or before the 1st of January 1047. Holder Alleyne was to name time and place, and give me one week's notice, and he might withdraw from the bet on payment of a forfeit of 5001. No forfeit was unwed for me to pay." At the time Kennedy made this bet he had never seen the mare, and only took her qualities on Holder Alleyne's representation. He afterwards saw her ; she was of no particular promise in looks; her name was Pigeon. In December, Kennedy received notice to be ready with his money, as Pigeon was fit for the match. But just on the eve of the match, M'Geachy Alleyuc and D'Arey made such strong representations that the mare was -able to do more than she was backed to do, and urged a eompromise so strongly, that at last Kennedy consented to pay the 73tplf. down, and as an off-set to -become half owner of the horse-flesh. The money was therefore paid. About this time, Kennedy was obliged to leave the Army of the Queen ; and after a time his uncle obtained him an East India cadetship. He went to India. On his return, he completed an investigation into what he suspected had been a fraud on himself in these transactions, and the result was thh following in- dictment. It turned out that the English mare Pigeon. aanom ether than the celebrated American trotting mare Fanny Jenks, who had performed a hundred miles in ten hours, and could cover nineteen miles in the hour. It further turned out, that in December 1846 she had suddenly fallen lame, so as to be totally unfit to run a match ; that the compromise urged by M‘Greachy Alleyne and D'Arey was a scheme to save the loss of the wager through the mare's lameness ; and that the money wasdivided between the two Alleynes—and a reverend brother of theirs, Joseph, who was not included in. the indictment—and D'Arey. The whole of these facts were fully proved. The chief witnesses were the prosecutor Kennedy,—whose extraordinary per- spicuity and prompt ability in the witness-box was marvellously contrasted with the trusting simplicity he had shown in the transactions out of which the case arose,—and Ignatius Francis Coyle, who was lately convicted of a bill fraud on MiGeachy Alleyne, and is now enduring his sentence in New- gate. .Coyle was a gambler who was once the "intimate friend " of Holder

Alleyne, and Holder had told him the whole scheme of fraud in confidence. At the present time, M`Geachy Alleyne and D'Arcy were engaged in the manufacture of beer-barrel staves, under a patent, in Bermondsey. The Jury found all the defendants guilty. The prosecutor recommended MVseachy Alleyne to the mercy of the Court, from a belief that he had been corrupted by his brother Holder. Lord Campbell sentenced Holder Alleyne to be imprisoned for two years, D'Arcy for one year, and M'Creachy Alleyne for six months, in the Middlesex House of Correction. Thomas Bare has been finally committed for trial for the murder of his wife.

At the Criminal Court, on Friday, Thomas Robert Mellish and James Douglas were convicted of defrauding the Patent Glass-silvering Company, of which they were servants, by conspiring to make false entries in the books. Sentence of transportation against each ; Mellish ten years, Douglas seven. Glenister, whose real name is Smith, was convicted of murdering the infant child of the woman with whom he cohabited ; but the Jury recommended him to mercy—on the ground that he was intoxicated ! Justice Maule re- corded sentence of death, and did not give the prisoner any hope.