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THE REFORM: It>R PI35IA. Xi&33> HAKDiiNC...
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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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Murdelt Won't Out. The Murder Of Mr. Lit...
and while a special watchman guarded the premises . The manner of the inurder indicates a nawsowed class for suspicion . The fkdlice are aided by the money being found or them ; they find the instruments with which , in all I ^ fcelihood , the murder was committed ; and yet they fail in discovering or convicting the murderer . Reserving our opinion ^ we state the facts as they appeared to the jury . A murder was committed by some person who had knowledge of the railway premises ,
and some knowledge of the habits of the murdered man . Money was taken from the room where the murder was committed , and some of this money , clearly identified , is ' found in a privy near the railway premises , and a fcammer and two razors , such as might have been used by the murderer , are found in the canal near the station . The evidence connecting SpoiiiaiiT with the murder is as follows : — -1 . The statement of his two young children that he was from home on the
evening of the murder , and that he was engaged hiding . something down . the chimney of an old forge . , 2 . That his own account of Ms doings on that night , as | he alleges , that he took tea with Ms wife and eldest son , and afterwards took a walk with them , is false , if his children are believed . 3 . The money found and identified as stolen from Mr . IjittiiB ' s room was wrapped up in a piece of lilac calico , said by Spomen ' s young daughter to have belonged to her , ana to have been used as a duster about the house . 4 . One of the razors found in the canal is marked ' Spollin , ' and this
razor is identified by his young son as having belonged to SpoIiI « en . These were the material facts against the man accused ; but the evidence which supported them was suspicious . The two children prevaricated to a considerable degree ; the evidence they gave at the police-court differed in many important ^ points irom their evidence on the final trial . 'The two most damning facts against Spoi . i . ew ([ and they are facts which are almost entirely independent of the evidence of the suspected and prevaricating children ) are , that some of the money stolen from the room of the murdered man was found in the piece of lilac ¦ calico used as a duster about "Ms house . But
, a duster may disappear , and may easily pass into other hands ; and the time when the duster was last seen about his house is uncertain ; for the child Tjuot Sfoi & bsf contradicts herself so grossly about it , that we must dismiss her evidence on thiB point as untrustworthy . The razor found in the canal with Sroixjsr ' s name , and marked with gaps which might have been given in cutting mr . XittweI's throat ( for the razor used was also . drawn across the teeth of the murdered man ) ,
is a fact ivhlch would help to thicken other proofs , but wMch , standing alone , is not sufficient evidence that the owner of the name marked on the razor committed the murder . IFor the razor may not foe Spolleri ' s ( though the evidence of identification is nearly complete ) , and there is the fair suggestion that . a aonan committin , g a . murder would not ; use a -razor marked legibly with his own name .
This / in faet , ; was a , U "tihe evidence leading to connect Spou-eh with the crime . The fact ; that 'he 'had access to the building and peculiar opportiunities of exit and entrance ,, is applicable to some dozen other employe ' s . The Tact that he had special facilities of escape is rather worthless when we find that there was only one watchman on the premises , < and he an oW man ,-whose vigilance might . towie / j > een , easily -defeated .
; Tjbte Dublin autitoritiee have shown in the < / fcridl another allnstration -of ( the unaarvelious , » t « pMlity ijjbey- hare ( displayed tfaronghoBJbfhe invtfiatigafbion . 33 he Aibtflwney-Geacral j > ieods , in ex / meo , that rfcfae JDmblim police are not
aceustomea to iffv © s % ati | igtheseornnesiif | t > , they might have borrowed some English detectives . The learned gentleman himself showed in "his opening speech , a stolid disregard of the clearest way of conveying the narrative , and a most unfortunate tendency to drag into his Btatfcement every minute fact that , in bis opinion , could possibly bear againBt the prisoner . He forgot the very simple rrfie -that -the weakest part of a chain of inferences is the measure of its strength , and that one weak link neutralizes the
strength of the whole . ¥ « shall give two instances of the want of tact displayed by the Attorney-G-eneral . Part of the stolen money was found in a ressel partially filled with Ted lead , and embedded m this red lead was a little common padlock , without any special mark , and suen as are made by the thousands of the same size and pattern in every large lock factory . A padlock of the same pattern is found with the prisoner , and one of the prevaricating children says that the padlock found in the red lead was his
father ' s—identifying it by the letters ' V . JR ., ' and the word ' patent , ' which are on tens of thousands of similar padlocks all over the country . Yet on this fact the Attorney-Gteneral relied as most important' against the prisoner . A second statement of the learned gentleman deserves attention . Near the K iding-place "Wliere ttic » laoB ^ r wftff fannd was a hydraulic ram , used for raising water . To get to the hiding-place without being splashed with the water by the ram at work , it was necessary to stop the ram , which could be easily done by the hand—but to set the task of
ram going again , was a some difficulty and time . It was sliown in evidence 'that the ram had unaccountably slip ped three or four times during the weeks prior to SpolIiEit ' s arrest , " but , " said the absolute Attorney-G-eneral , " none of these unaccountable stoppages took place after Spomjbn ' s arrest . " This acute advocate insinuates that Spoii-IiEK , when out of gaol , stopped the ram to go to the hiding-place , and that when in gaol he could not do it . The Attorney-General forgets that the public discovery of the money was contemporaneous with SpoIiIiEn ' s arrest , and that the murderer ( supposing Mm not Spoi . i . Esr ) would not be fool enough , to go to
a discovered hiding-place for the sake of recovering removed money . The prosecution failed in another way . The police brought forward their witnesses , not as an array of persons able to clear up -the whole case and to throw light upon the movemerits of the prisoner , but they brouglit up every one who could swear against- SpoeIiEIT , and they kept back all who might have testified to any fad ; in his favour . Thus a great point -was to ascertain the . state of Mt . XiiTTi / s ' a office and neighbourhood on the evening d £ iihe murder , yet Oathebine 'Qjsjm & bbjsX , the Assistant to ifcJb © housekeeper , and who 'knew mare -about ibhe matter than
the housekeeper herself , was not ( examined ., Another poinjt "was to establish whether or not SiPoaDi ^ rasr spoke truth when he said that he ttook tea < wibb . his < wife trad -oldest . son , but > the eldest son who > cDuld haye been examined , was not -examined . It iwaa s & lso ( desirable to have corroborated < fche -evidence of the buspeejbed child aa to -the piece -of lilac calico
which she said she received ; aa a present from ¦ a young < girl ; -but ttihis yiowng girl was not examined . The whole 'oasa for the proseou * ( tion was thus ( tainted with imperfection in enmry part , -aaad < bhe jury - ( leading out of oonsaderatitpm . th © information by the wife , cwroijorated by * he finding of ( faho atloney ias mhe indicated ) were decidedly jbomcbd toaequit .. OboixeiiL . TJbe xnryrsteiry <« F : the aauwfor aiemainiB , how-, ever , a disgrace to itbe Duiblm autharxtaes .
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The Reform: It>R Pi35ia. Xi&33> Hakdiinc...
THE REFORM : It > R PI 35 IA . Xi & 33 > HAKDiiNCn : is understood to have thdught- — % e neyer uttered the ^ opinion in ptiblie ^—that to be safe in India we must have more English soldiers and fewer Sepoys . But it does not follow -that , because the Indian revolt has a military origin , mere military reforms can re-establish the foundations of our Eastern Empire . The ultimate problem is one of . government ; and this , we believe , iBa conviction to which the Cabinet has been forced by the late events in Bengal , It will surprise ihost persons if , next session , some comprehensive proposal is not submitted to 'Parliament , bearing upon the whole subject of our Oriental administration . Semi-official whispers , oozing from the Treasury , are already afloat , indicating a scheme for the supercession of the East India Company , and the appointment of an Indian Secretary of State , exercising ihis powers jointly with an Indian Yiceroy . The time must come when
the Company , framed for commercial purposes and then converted into a political machine , will have to resign a responsibility which has outgrown its powera . The necessity may he regretted , but cannot be resisted . We may repine over the destruction of a _ huge piece of antiquity , especially one- associated with a century of brilliant triumphs ; but if it stops the way it must come down—and there can be little question that the East India Company does stop 1 / hc -way . Wo can no longer It is
govern India through a charter . painful to part with an old servant , but corporations , no less than individuals , are liable to superannuation ; the Bengal army has broken loose irom the Bengal authorities ; we must have firmer guidance for the future . Yet who without a shudder can think of British India delivered over to Downing-street , to Whig cadets and -Court Earls , to hereditary Baronets , to sharp pract itioners in coronets , who would treat Bahar as a perquisite , and
the Carnatic as n good thing for life , with four hundred salaries of six hundred a year to give away , and more than that number of applicants whom it might be useful to conciliate ? If India is to be simply a Cabinet gold medal like the Irish viceroyalty , better reprieve the Company , and save the hundred and fifty millions from Sir Charles Wocds and other squires of even less capacity . We cannot afford to lose India , and we cannot afford , while we retain it , to place in the hands of the Minister an exhaustless power
of patronage and corruption . Unless some method of eheck be devised—a Council , perhaps , the members of which would retire by rotation—; the public will be j ustified in suspecting any proposal to abolish the institution in Leadenhall-street , yoking the three Presidencies with red tape . . But there is one practical change wlncii might be effected without difficulty or hazard —the transfer of the central seat of government in India to Delhi . Calcutta need not he the leas rmwerfullv fortified ; nor Would the
GI-overnor-Gteneral be less secure , since reigning with renewed prestige from the olcl capital of the Moguls , he might convert it into an impregnable military position , connected witu the sea by a railway and a chain of stron D - holds , ana stffl further guarded by a permanent flotilla on the Jumna . The construction of a line from Calcutta to Uivzapove ana thence to Delhi—originally p lanned in laao
by the friends of Sir ¥ iuiam ToWfr- ^ long been determined upon j had it been carried out the mail would have brought far «« - ferent intelligence after forty-seven days o » « Qilita * y inaiuraection in Bengal . It etriliefin » that tfhe . English- wua always toe oo » ff * alien * iia India aa long as they rule from w ¦ edge 0 f iihe sea ; when they do as the Moguw did , and plant their throne in the tfery denw
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 15, 1857, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_15081857/page/14/
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