Zbe Agletropolic The new Sheriffs, Alderman Musgrove and Mr. Francis
Graham Moon, were presented to the Cursitor Baron of the Court of Exchequer on Saturday. The Sheriffs were introduced by the Recorder ; who gave a sketch of the civic life of each. Mr. Musgrove was the son of a highly respected citizen, and had for years carried on a most extensive business in the transfer and sale of landed and other property. Mr. Moon's splendid exertions in causing great works to be engraved, in imitation of Alderman Boydell, had procured him the approbation of three Sovereigns in this country, and of the Sovereigns of France, Russia, and Hanover. Mr. Baron Bankes congratulated the Livery on the choice they had made. The late Sheriffs presented their accounts ; Alderman Gibbs performed the usual ceremony of chopping sticks and counting six horse-shoes and sixty-one hob-nails ; and the Recorder invited the Baron to the Sheriffs' dinner.
The dinner took place at Clothworkers Hall ; the Lord Mayor presiding, and about two hundred persons sitting down to table. Among the guests were Sir W. Newton, Mr. C. R. Leslie, and Mr. D. Roberts, artists whom the elevation of the great printseller to the Shrievalty had called to the civic board.
The poll for the nomination of candidates for the Mayoralty closed yesterday ; when the numbers were—for Maguey, .853; Humphery, 149; Wood, 82.
Mr. Thomas Challis was elected Alderman for Cripplegate Ward, yesterday, without opposition.
Mr. Payne, the City Coroner, who has for some time fulfilled the duties of Chief Clerk at Guildhall, has sent in his resignation ; as he intends to practise in the Superior Courts at Westminster.
A Court of Conservancy of the River Thames was held at the Swan Hotel, near Westminster Bridge on Saturday. A long presentment against the Tunnel Pier was handed in, alleging that it protruded one hundred feet into the river, and obstructed the navigation. On the application of Mr. John Sullivan, a lessee under the Thames Tunnel Company, the case was traversed to the next Court, in November.
The adjourned Vestry-meeting of St. Stephen's Walbrook was held on Thursday. Alderman Gibbs sent a note, protesting against the meeting as illegal, and stating that he had convened the Select Vestry tbr the next day. A resolution was passed, censuring the non-production of the accounts ; and the Vestry adjourned for a week.
The Select Vestry met yesterday ; but the other parishioners also entered, and much irregular discussion arose : Alderman Gibbs refused to give any account to the parish ; the Select Vestrymen refused to proceed in the presence of any other persons; and the inhabitants refused to leave the room. Eventually, both parties retired from the field, departing simultaneously without any formal motion for adjournment ; leaving the meeting without result.
At the Mansionhouse, on Monday, John Stanley Humphery was reexamined on a charge of defrauding several tradesmen. He represented himself to be the resident Director of " the City of London Convalescent Fund Pension Society and Savings Bank," at 32, Queen Street, Cheapside. He ordered clothes of tailors ; among them, Mr. Earp of Cheapside, Mr. Doudney, and Mr. Joseph Clarke of Blackfriars Road : two of those gentlemen were too sharp for him ; but Mr. Doudney's messenger indiscreetly left some clothes without payment, and the man appeared in court in a coat thus obtained. One tailor he told to make the pockets strong, as he often carried a great deal of other people's money! Besides the Directorship, one of his expedients was to claim relation with high people, especially Lord Mayor Humphery and Lord Stanley. At the examination, on Monday, he behaved with the most confident coolness : he undertook to pay all his creditors ; adding—" But not while I am in thraldom ! I shall pay no man until I am at liberty! Oh no!" The Lord Mayor asked him if he was the same person as a reader in the printing-house of Mr. Spottiswoode, named linnaphery, who had been insolvent 2—but this he refused to answer. When the Lord Mayor inquired as to the disposal of subscriptions to the Society, Mr. Htimphery gave an evasive answer, and raised an objection to the Magistrate's interference— Prisoner—" You ought not to sit in judgment here, my Lord Mayor, for you have a bias against me. I have done nothing at all against the law." The Lord Mayor—" You have put me down in your book as President of your Society, and you have endeavoured to impose upon tradesmen by stating that I am your uncle: is there not something like fraudulent intention there ?' Prisoner—" What! and am I not related to you ? am I not your cousin ? " (Great laughter.) The Lord Mayor—" I never saw or heard of you before you were brought before me as a common swindler."
Prisoner—" Now, I can bring forward vied veer testimony as well as a pedigree to establish our relationship: but, indeed, it is a thing I don't wish to brag of, and not at all worth a thought." (Laughter.)
The Lord Mayor—" I understand you claim relationship to Lord Stanley. whose name also appears in your list of contributors ? "
Prisoner—" I am a relative of Lord Stanley's: my mother was a Stanley, but my father was a Rumphery. (Great laughter.) I have vied voce and pedigree evidence of the fact that is irrefragable. I am related to both of you— cousin to the two." (Laughter.) The Lord Mayor= Well, his Lordship and I have cause to be proud of you. It would appear from your list, in which we are put down as contributors of 251. each, that you cousined both of us before; but I am sure this is my first time. (Laughter.) Is there any other person to say any thing in disparagement of my cousin and nephew ?" (Roars of laughter.)
The Lord Mayor offered to take bail, to the amount of 100/. each, of any two of the other Directors advertised in the prospectus of the Society—Baron Rothschild, Sir Augustus d'Este, Sir Francis Burdett, or Mr. Hume. The prisoner considered the bail " excessive " ; and, protesting that he was ready to pay every proper demand, but not till he should be at liberty, he was remanded for a week.
At the Mansionhouse, on Tuesday, Mr. William Tune, the Master of the City of Boulogne steamer, reappeared in order to the further hearing of the charges against him. Mr. Clarkson stated on behalf of the New Commercial Steam Packet Company, that they wished Mr. Tune to be discharged : his innocence was strongly asserted by his solicitor and friend Mr. Bush ; there was at present no further evidence to adduce ; and the Company had instituted an inquiry to discover the real purloiners of the money and securities which had been intrusted to him. Mr. Tune was therefore released.
Yesterday, Thomas Rowe was placed before the Lord Mayor, on a charge of shooting at and wounding Mr. Thomas Waller, a winemerchant, of Cross Lane, St. Mary-at-Hill. The man, who said that he was seventy-seven years old, had recently been discharged from Mr. Waller's service, after having been employed as a cellarman for twentyfour years ; and because be could not be reinstated, he obtained an in terview with his master, and fired a pistol at him. He stands remanded.
At Bow Street Police-office, on Saturday, Mr. Barnard Gregory reappeared in answer to the summons of Miss Burgess for detaining some letters and other things. After a good deal of talk, Mr. Twyford said, that he considered it to be proved that the things were in possession of Mr. Gregory ; and he ordered him to restore them. Mr. Gregory said that he could not restore that which he did not possess, or over which he had no control. Construing that answer into a refusal, Mr. Twyford ordered him to pay 7l., the estimated value of the things so far
as a value could be set upon them within the cognizance of the Court. The money was paid forthwith. It was intimated, however, that an action would be brought for the recovery of the papers.
At Worship Street, on Thursday, William Haynes, a respectable oil and colourman of Martha Street, Haggerstone, was committed for trial on a charge of poisoning his wife : he had administered to her two ounces of sulphate of potass, on the advice of a quack medical book, to prevent an anticipated increase of their family. The defence was that the wife had taken the drug voluntarily. A Coroner's Jury, who had previously sat on the body, returned a verdict of" Wilful Murder." At Hammersmith, on Thursday, Thomas Etty, who had called himself the Honourable Thomas Adolphus Talbot, was committed for trial on a charge of stealing from his lodgings, and two other charges of a like kind. The woman who passed for his wife was held to bail, her real husband being surety for her.