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232 The Leader and Saturday Anal yst. [M...
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TRIALS FOR MUEPEB IN THE PAPAL STATES.* ...
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* Tl\e forcgoingr avtiQlo is from our co...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The New Constituencies. In The Wow Refor...
boroughs which are to returnrone member each , are Birkenhead ., Burnfiv , and Staleybri < lge . These places have till now been servants to their nearer and more petted neighbours : . the proposed lieform Bill intends making them their own masters for the future , and rightly too . These towns have long since , to all intents and purposes , out grown their political minority , and lire quite able to speak and act for themselves . Guildford and similar boroughs can well afford to lose one member , and let such member get , if he can , on the back of a broader constituency . The population of Guildford does not reach seven thousand ; its registered electors are six hundred and ninety-nine only . Now Staleybridge , which belongs to the parish and borough of Ashton-uhder-Lyne—a place not greatly its superior —has a ) population ' of fifteen thousand , or thereabouts ; is a busy
market town , and carries on important and extensive manufactures . Mr . it fiLXER Gibson , who represents Ashton-iinder-IJyne , doubtless has it in his power to testify to this ; or take Birkenhead , a large and thriving town on the Mersey , with a population of twenty thousand , and communicating- by rail and by river with every part of the country . Why should Birkenhead be without a member ? It is as distinct from Liverpool as a broad river can make it . Its inhabitants are numerous , intelligent , industrious , ai , d as equally deserving of a representative in Parliament as the constituents ot any bor 6 ii ** h ? n the country ; The members for Liverpool-no more repreof LondonIt is
sent Birkenhead than they represent the City . therefore just that JBirktnliead should have a member of its own . It is the same with Burnley . Here is a population unrepresented which is double that of some other places which have two representatives in Parliament . There is a considerable trade in cotton and woollen fabrics , in brass arid iron , . carried on in Burnley , The people of Birkenhead , BurriU-y , and Staleybridge will now ,, however , feel o-rateful to the coheoctors of the Reform Bill that they did not overlook their just and manifest claims , and they will , we doubt not , accept gladly the boon of a real , not a "fancy , " franchise which is offered to them ; while they console themselves with . thejrerlection
that it is better late than never , . We trust that the places which are to be boroughs and to return one member each to Parliament , will have the good fortune to choose the " right man " to represent them in a coming day . For Staleybxidge we have heard it reported that Mr . Johx Chetitaii is likely to be the first representative , and we are right glad to hear it , for he is a man of great intelligence and energy , well acquainted With public affairs , and one in whom the people of Staleybridge , and indeed the people of England , may place any cdn'fidence . The increased franchise would be a miserable acquisition to any people , if they merely allowed a nominee to come down upon them like " the wolf ' on the f . jld " from a-metropolitan club , and with the
gleaming influence of his gold to succeed in enslaving their minds , perverting their consciences , and handing- them over to spine self-seeking party . We would advise the people of Birkenhead , Burnley , and Staleybridge to be wise and dinn at the outset of their political career , and choose from amongst themselves an Honest representative . ¦ . ¦ ¦
232 The Leader And Saturday Anal Yst. [M...
232 The Leader and Saturday Anal yst . [ March 10 , 1 S 60 .
Trials For Muepeb In The Papal States.* ...
TRIALS FOR MUEPEB IN THE PAPAL STATES . * OF late years , vbimd and about Viterbo , there was a well-known character , Giovanni TJgolixi by name , a sort of itinerant Jaclv-of-ull-trades ; he wandered about from place to place , picking-• up any odd job he could find , and begging when he could turn his hand to nothing' else . He is described in the legal reports asj a tinker and mubrella-mender , but he seems also to have hit out u line , of imsiness—new to us at any rate—^ as tomb and monument scraper . By these various trades he scraped together a good bit of money for a man in his position , some persons said as much aa seventy scudi , that is , about £ 14 odd . On the ^ th of May , 1857 , TJgohni left the little town of Castel Gioigio , with tire avowed
intention of going to Yiterbo that day for the purpose of changing his monies into Tuscan coin . Being belated on his road , he resolved to stop over the night at the cottage of a certain Andrea Volpi , which lay on his road , and where lie had often ulepfc before . On the following morning , aboxit eight o ' clock , ho left Voi . pi ' 3 hov » se > , and went on his way towards Viterbo . Nothing more 13 positively known about him , except that on the same day his body was found on a by-path a little off the direct road to , Viterbo , covered with wounds . No money was discovered about his person , while thovo was every indication of his clothes and pack having been rummaged and rifled .
Assuming , as one must do , the correctness of these facts , there enn be no doubt that n . very brutal xnuvder and robbery had been committed . For some reasons , which we are not told , the suspicions of tho police fell at once on < ono of Vowi ' s sons , called Sbiufino , a lad of about twenty-two , and on a friond of his , a certain Bqnaventuma Starna , about ; two years older than himself , both common labourers , who wero avrestod in oonsequonco on tho 7 th of May . They were not tried , however , till tho 27 th of April in tho year following , when they wevo arraigned before the lay criminal and civil court ; of Vitovbo .
Tho two prisoner ?! are , iiovortholess , not tried on tho same ground . Voi . pi is arraigned by tho public prosecutor on ( ho ejiargo of wilAil nuu'dor , accompanied with tronchory and robbory , while SxABNA ^ ia only accused as an nqoomplico to tho orhno , not as a principal . Before tho actual guilt of either pvisdhor was legally established , tho public prosecutor , that is , the Govonmiont , virtually decided tho
relative amount of their respective hypothetical guilt . The justice of this proceeding may be questioned , but its motive is obvious enough ; There was little or no direct evidence against the prisoners . '' With both of them , " says the sentence of the Conrt , " a criminal motive could be established , in the fact of their avowed poverty ,, they each clearly admitted that neither 'they nor their families possessed anything in . this world , and that they derived the means of their miserable daily sustenance from their own labour alone , . A very close intimacy was proved to have existed between the prispners ; so much so , indeed , that Starxa had frequently been reproved by his parents for his friendship with a man who stood m
such ill repute as Voipi . The fact that the murdered man was , or was believed to be , in possession of money , was shown to be well known amongst the VotPi family . Two of Serafixo Volpi s brothers were reported to have spoken to third parties of UdOLixi ' s savings , and one of them expressed a wish to rob him . Why this brother was never arrested or investigated is one of the many mysteries , by the way , you come across in these Piipal reports . Sekafixo too , had mentioned , himself , to a neighbour , bis suspicions of the tinker's having saved money . On the morning : of the murder . Starxa was shown to have come to V-oj , pi's housv , to
have talked with Seuafixo , and to have left it in his company shortly after Ugolixi's departure . After about an hour's absence , Seeafixo Volpi returned home , and therefore had had thfie enough to commit the murder . He was also shown to have been in possession of a knife which might have inflicted the wounds-found on the corpse , and about which he could give no satisfactory account . ,,, , 1-11 These appear to have been all the facts that could be established against either of the prisoners by direct evidence ; and , at the worst , such facts could only be said to constitute a case for suspicion . Previous , however , to the trial , Staiixa turned what we should call " king's evidence , " and in contradiction to his previous statements made a confession , on which the prosecution practically rested its
case . According to this confession of Starxa , on the morning of the murder he called accidentally at the Volpis' cottage ,, and stopped there till after the departure of the tinker fJoorixr , who was previously an " entire stranger to him . On his preparing to go home himself , Serafixo Voi-pi proposed to accompany him , on the pretext of fetching ; some tool or other . They walked quick , to escape the rain , which was falling , heavily , and shortly overtook Ugoxixi , who exchanged a few words with VoLpi abaut the weather , and thenturned ofF along- a by-road . . Theceupon Serafixo proposed that they should follow , and rob TJgolixx , saying , " lie has got a wholelot of cappers . " Starxa refused to have anything to do with thebusiness , on which Sebafino said he should do itr alone then , and asked Starxa to go and fetch the tool and bring- it to him
wherethey were standing . Starxa then left Seeakko running across the fields to overtake the tinker , aud went to fetch-the tool . Very shortly after , as he was coming back to the appointed meeting-place , he met Serafixo in a great state of agitation , who told him that the job was clone , and the old man ' s throat cut , bait that only twenty pauls' worth of copper money ( about nine shillings ) were . found upon hini . Starxa , then , according to his own story , took eight puuls as liis share of the booty , and told Sekafixo to wash off some spots of blood on his sleeves . He also added that , later in the same day he met Serafino again , and expressed his alarm at what had happened ; on which he received the answer , " If you had been with me , you would not be alive now . " One can hardly conceive a move suspicious story , or one more , to the witness
obviously concocted to give the best colour s own conduct at the expense of his fellow prisoner ,. No evidence whatever appears to have been brought in supports of this confession . The court , ' however , decided that the truth , of this statement was fully established bv internal and external evidence , and therefore declared that the alleged crime was clearly proved iirgainst both the prisoners . " Considering , " nevertheless , " that though Staiixa was an accomplice in the crime , from his ' having assisted Sehafixo , aud froxn having shared in tho booty , by his own admission , yet his guilb was Jess , both in the conception and perpetration of tho crime—as there was no proof that ho hud taken any actual part in tho , murder of TTgoTiIN-i . " Therefore , ' . ' in the most holy name of Gop , " tho Court sentenced Stakna to public exeputiou and Volm to twoiity years at the galleys . . '
_ _ . . . , „ Of course both the prisoners resetted to tho invariable right of appeal , but their case did not come on beioro the lower court of the supreme ( clerical ) tribunal at lloino till upwards of a yeur—name ] y , on tho 17 th of' May , 1859 . At thjs trial , no how facts whatever appear to havo "been adduced . Tho chief object , however , of tho very longrthy sentenco of tho court , recapitulating tho ovidonco already ^ admitted , seems to bo to establish tho compnvativq innocence of Starna , who i ' or some cause or other was favourably regarded , Wo aro told that "tho confession of Starna ia conlinned by a thousand proofs j" that " it is clearly shawm " that Starna in " this confossiou did ript deny his own responsibility—a fact which givoa his statement tho character of an incrhmimtivo and not of an exonerative confession : and that though ho might possibly havo winlied , in liia
statement of the facts , to modify nnd oxtenuato his own shavo 111 tho crime , yot tliore was no voason to su » poct that ho wishpd gratuitouuly to aggvnrntothoyuiifcof hiucoiV » Pttni < > " » " n-udtluit , al ^ o tnlting into oon « idbrati < m tho infamoxis ohavactor of Volpi , it cannot bo doubtod tliat ho was tho principal in tho crime . I gathor incliatijiotly that Volpi ' sdofeiiL ' O was that lie had not lolt his Jt ' atUov'H house on tho morning' of tho murdov at all , but that thin uttoinpt to provo an alibi broke down completely . The Court of Vitorbo had deaidod that tho crime of tho prisoners wivs numlop , ootiplcd with robbery
* Tl\E Forcgoingr Avtiqlo Is From Our Co...
* Tl \ e forcgoingr avtiQlo is from our correspondent tvb Homo , which aGaounta Sov the uso of tlio fli-st poraon . — -En .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 10, 1860, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_10031860/page/12/
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