had lost the £200 for which the acceptance was forged, the man's blood could give him no compensation, though, if he were of a vindictive disposition, it might gratify his revenge; but the law should not minister to that which the religion we profess, and the morality which we ought to practise, teach us to class among the most dangerous and degrading of human passions.

The other charge on which Macdonough was tried, was for having forged, on the 30th of September, 1829, an order for the delivery of ten packs of linen, with intent to defraud, &c. For the former offence of forging the acceptance, where no money was obtained, we are quite sure even the Government to which Sir Robert PEEL belonged, could never think of taking the man's life, after extending mercy to the Rev. Peter Fenn, Mr. Savary, of Bristol, and other great delinquents in this species of criminality; but, perhaps, it was thought that a second conviction for a similar offence might induce the Government to select him as the first victim to that Peel's Act,' which, in consistency with their very strong opinions when out of office, they ought to have made it one of the express duties of their Administration to repeal.

But let us see what is this second conviction: it is a conviction for a crime which is no longer capital. By PEEL'S Bill the penalty of death was repealed for the offence of forging an order for the delivery of goods, although it still continues applicable to the forging an order for money. If the date be correctly given, the offence was capital when it was committed; for Peel's Act did not come into operation until the 23d of July, 1830. The law is bad enough; but surely the Government would never think of punishing capitally, at the present time, an offence which, under that law, has ceased to be capital, and which could only be punished with death by reviving a law of blood, that public opinion compelled even a Tory Administration to abolish.*

The sentence of Macdonough was subsequently commuted.

It is a shame to England that the United States of America have abolished the punishment of death in all cases of forgery, and almost all the capital Statutes respecting property which they received from this country, strong as the influence of the commercial spirit is among them. But they are proceeding farther in the work of enlightened legislation, as will be seen by the following extract from the New York Journal of Commerce, of the 13th of March, 1832:- State • Legislature, 8th of March-Mr. STILWELL, from the Com<mittee, made a very long and able report on capital punish‹ment, and introduced a Bill to abolish such punishment. It • provides that, for such crimes as are now punishable with ' death, confinement in the State prison shall be substituted. < Three times the usual number of the report were ordered to ← be printed.' If we still cling to our own favourite barbarisms, we must be content to be left behind in the race of civilization.-Morning Herald, Monday, April 30, 1832.

Observations upon the Letter of Mr. Alderman HUGHES, regarding his Bill to extend the Act, for RECORDING Sentence of Death at the Old Bailey.

We have received a letter from Alderman HUGHES, relative to our remarks on his Bill for allowing the sentence of death to be recorded at the Old Bailey. The Hon. Gentleman disclaims all intention of interfering with THE KING's prerogative, and says—

'It is well known that generally three, but always two of the JUDGES of the land are appointed to assist in each delivery of the 'gaol of Newgate, and that those learned personages try the capital offenders, and not the RECORDER, who, as respects such ❝ offenders, is the mere mouth-piece of the Judges, in passing, at the 'close of the sessions, the sentences they may have awarded. Surely, then, what our Judges are authorized to do each Circuit, at every • Assize town in the kingdom, two or three of these learned individuals, 'sitting together, might safely be intrusted to perform at the Old "Bailey Sessions.'

In this passage there is more than one error into which a legislator and a Magistrate of London ought not to have fallen.

It is true that two, and sometimes three, of the King's Judges assist in each gaol delivery at the Old Bailey; but it is quite incorrect to say that the Corporation Judge, alias the RECORDER, does not try capital offences. The unfortunate man, Macdonough, now lying under sentence of death, and to whose case we particularly adverted in the very article which drew forth this letter from Mr. Hughes HUGHES, was tried by the RECORDER, and not by one of the King's Judges. The remarks which were reported to have fallen from the RECORDER, at the close of that case, induced us to say that we felt our objections strengthened to a change in the law, which would give that Learned Personage more power than he already possessed, in deciding upon the fate of criminals.

Mr. HUGHES is also incorrect in stating that—

The RECORDER is the mere mouth-piece of the Judges, in passing at the close of the session the sentences they may have ' awarded.'

He does not pronounce at the end of the sessions the sentences which the King's Judges award. He pronounces the sentences which the laws award to every person who has been convicted of a capital crime, they being collected together in a promiscuous assemblage, which contains offenders of all the various degrees of guilt, from the child, who, after nightfall, has broken a pane in a pastry-cook's window, and put in his hand to extract burglariously a penny bun-to the veteran delinquent, who has committed robbery with violence only short of murder; for, persons convicted of murder are not reserved to the end of the sessions, but must be hanged within forty-eight hours, by a law which, with a strange inversion of the principle of justice, where the charge is of the most atrocious nature, leaves less chance than in any other case for innocence to escape the fatal consequences

of a precipitate judgment. Had Robert Folkes been convicted of murder, he would have been now in his grave; and the blasting exposure of the polluted and perjured evidence,* on which he was convicted, would have availed nothing to the victim, his destitute widow, and fatherless children. Mr. HUGHES further says

That, if considered necessary, there could be no objection to the ⚫ introduction of a proviso, in the Committee of the Lords, (the Bill ⚫ having passed the Commons,) confining to the Judges of the land the 'power of determining the cases wherein sentence of death should be • recorded, and those in which that awful sentence should be passed.'

Now, Mr. HUGHES must see that such a proviso would not be necessary, if he were correct in stating that the RECORDER is only the mouth-piece in pronouncing the sentences awarded by the King's Judges.

We ask the Hon. Gentleman, whether he would not be much more usefully employed in carrying a Bill through parliament to abolish altogether the punishment of death for offences, which it is both unjust and barbarous to confound with murder, than in attempting to patch up the outward form of a system, which is reprobated by all men of Christian principles and enlightened minds? This, to use an expressive scriptural figure, is the whitening the sepulchres outwardly, while they are within full of dead men's bones, ' and of all uncleanness.'

Mr. HUGHES says the cases of doubt will still be reserved for the decision of THE KING IN COUNCIL. We know not whether he means cases of doubt upon the evidence, or cases of doubt as to whether the capital punishment ought to be inflicted for the particular offence, although the evidence be quite conclusive of guilt. But, whichever it may be, we think it safer that THE KING IN COUNCIL should decide upon all the capital cases, than upon such only as the RECORDER

* Ante, p. 240.

N 4

and his coadjutors may choose to select.*-Morning Herald, Wednesday, May 9, 1832.

Mr. EWART's Bill, før abolishing the Punishment of DEATH in certain cases of Larceny.

[As the introduction of Mr. EWART'S Bill constituted an important era in the progress of Criminal Law Reform, we shall here subjoin the substance of the Hon. Member's speech on that occasion, slightly corrected from the Morning Herald, and the remarks of that Journal.-ED.]+

* The Bill of Alderman HUGHES did not pass the Upper House of Parliament. Its defeat there is mainly to be ascribed to the exertions of the late Lord TENTERDEN, then Chief Justice of the King's Bench, who viewed it as an interference with the Prerogative of the Crown. Virtually it would have operated in this way, and we are therefore glad of its rejection; as well as because it was a piece of mock legislation, calculated to retard substantial improvement. Whatever may have been the principal motive of Lord TENTERDEN,-for certainly he was no advocate of mitigated penal law,—we willingly assign him the merit of an useful act.-Ed.

+ Amongst various subjects introduced last night in the House of Commons, was one in which we have always felt a deep interest-the subject of capital punishments.

It is not our intention to make any observations, at present, on that important question; but we would refer our readers to the speech of Mr. EWART, and the short conversation which ensued, upon his motion for leave to bring in a Bill abolishing capital punishment in ‘horse-stealing, sheep-stealing, cattle-stealing, and stealing in a 'dwelling-house-no person being put in fear therein.'

We were happy to find that, though Mr. EWART's motion did not go far enough, his speech was directed to a much wider range of amelioration and improvement than was embraced in the proposition itself. We may therefore calculate upon his advocacy, at some future, and we hope not distant, period, of a more extensive plan for the improvement of the Criminal Code. The support which Mr. George