TOPICS •Ok THE DAY.
There is reason to fear that much ignorance of the legal conse- quences of their deeds prevails among those who have participated in the late disturbances. Let us instruct them. An Act of Par- liament, passed in the late reign, declares the malicious burning of any place of worship, house, or outbuildings, op Any building.; used for carrying on any trade or manufacture, to be felony, and the punishment DEATH. The same statute also enacts that per- sons who in riotous assembly shall demolish any of the above-men. tioned erections, or destroy machinery, shall be guilty of felony, and suffer the punishment of DEATH. The setting fire to corn, grain, pulse, straw, hay, or wood, is also declared to Le felony, and the punishment DEATH. Few—possibly not so much as one —of the poor creatures who expose themselves weekly to the dreadful penalty of these enactments, ever 'saw the SPECTATOR; but there are many other ways in which the knowledge may be cir- culated ; and we throw out the hint to our own readers, only to re- mind them of one of their duties to the ignorantly misled.
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