Russell were broken by the mob, and military and
police were called out. The military were attacked
with stones; five of the dragoons were unhorsed, and
two officers were wounded. The troops had to charge;
and the result was that thirteen persons were next day
under hospital treatment. On the 13th the city seemed
in a state of siege. The streets were paraded by
Artillery with lighted matches, and Dragoons with drawn
swords and carbines loaded. The approaches to the
city in every quarter were occupied by strong detachments
of military and police.

Several cases of Incendiary Fires were tried at the
Bedford Assizes on the 17th. Richard Brown, convicted
of having set fire to five bean stacks, and William
Cooper, convicted of having set fire to a stack of straw,
were sentenced to be transported for life. Alfred
Ingrey and William Gentle, for setting fire to a stack of
haulm, were sentenced to be imprisoned for one year;
and Catherine Butcher, for setting fire to a pigstye, was
ordered to be imprisoned for three years.

At the Derby Assizes, on the 19th, Mr. Blakelock
obtained £500 Damages from the Midland Railway
Company in compensation of an injury he had sustained
by the accident at Clay Cross, on the 19th of May 1851,
when his ankle joint was broken, and he suffered from
a concussion of the brain.

At the Oxford Assizes, on the 16th, Elijah Noon, a
plasterer, was indicted for the Murder of his wife. The
circumstances of the case were very painful. The
principal witness for the prosecution was the prisoner's
daughter, a little girl twelve years of age. She stated that
she lived with her parents in Oxford. In consequence
of her father not returning home on Saturday night,
her mother went to look for him soon after midnight.
They returned together in a few minutes; he was not
sober. Her mother upbraided him with staying out
late. He took some money out and counted it. She
said he could treat other persons and not her. He then
took down a sword from the shelf, pulled it out of the
sheath, and struck the deceased, who was sitting down,
on the back with the flat part of the sword. The child
ran to the door and got outside; the mother got up and
attempted to follow her, and her daughter took hold of
her hand to pull her through. The father was standing
in the room, and according to the child's first account
he went to his wife at the door with the sword, and ran
it into her left side. It appeared, however, that the
witness could not see the actual thrust; but her mother
screaming out, the child pulled her out of the room into
the street, where she fell down. She was then led to a
neighbour's, and was taken back to her own house.
On examination, a wound was found in her left side, of
which she died in about 24 hours. The prisoner paid
every attention to her during her last hours. On being
brought back to the house he took hold of her hand,
and helped her up stairs. She said to him, "Elijah, I
freely forgive you, as I hope the Lord will forgive me;
but always avoid passion.'' In defence it was contended,
that the facts proved were consistent with the supposition
that the deceased, in resisting the effort of her
daughter to remove her from the room, fell back on the
sword, which the prisoner was too much intoxicated to
know was unsheathed. A number of witnesses deposed
to the prisoner's good character. The jury, after
considerable deliberation, returned a verdict of guilty of
manslaughter, and he was sentenced to two years'
imprisonment.

At the York Assizes, on the 20th, Elizabeth Johnson
was indicted for having Ill-used two chidren, of whom
she was the Step-mother. The prosecutor was brought
up by the guardians of the Burlington Union. The
charge was, that she had neglected her duty in not
providing and administering proper food and clothing
to one of two young children, of whom she was the
step-mother, having been married to the father of the
children between two and three years ago. On the
4th of May last, a neighbour found the two children
(one a girl and the other a boy, six and four years of
age respectively) in the corner of a lime-kiln, apparently
suffering from cold and want of food. They were
afraid to go home, and refused to do so; and the person
who found them consequently went to the aunt of the
children, the sister of their own mother, and she went
to Johnson's house, told Mrs. Johnson where the
children had been found, and desired her to fetch them
home. Neither she nor her husband, who is a fisherman,
did fetch them home; and at eleven o'clock at
night they were provided for by the person who had so
humanely taken pity upon them, and next day they
were sent to the workhouse. It appeared that the
woman had frequently ill-used the children, by turning
them out of doors at unreasonable hours, and threatening
to beat them if they returned. They looked starved,
and the neighbours fed and clothed them at times, but
the clothes that they gave them always soon disappeared.
The prisoner had been frequently remonstrated with,
when she expressed herself in unfeeling terms towards
the children, saying on one occasion that "she hated
the little devils, and that she would poison them." The
neighbours had frequently been disturbed at night-time
by the cries of the children, in consequence of the ill-
treatment they experienced; and on one occasion, when
the sound of something falling on the floor had been
heard, it was found afterwards that the prisoner had
been beating the little girl, and had then thrown her
out of bed by the hair of the head. In defence, the
prisoner endeavoured to inculpate her husband, and said
that she had neither food nor clothing to give the
children. The jury found her guilty, and she was
sentenced to two years' imprisonment. John Johnson,
the husband, was also arraigned upon a similar indictment,
but the prosecution offered no evidence, and a
verdict of acquittal having been taken, he was
discharged.

Several cases of Attempted Suicide by women were
investigated at the Worship-street Police Court on the
20th inst. In the first charge, against a good-looking
young Irishwoman, named Anne Spiller, who stood at
the bar with a baby in her arms, it appeared that she
had been seduced by a young man residing in Spitalfields,
and, upon the birth of a child, she took out a
warrant against the putative father to compel him to
support it. The warrant was then dismissed, in consequence,
as she alleged, of the false evidence of a female
relative of the father, who, however, continued to allow
her a small sum weekly, paid by himself personally,
until some time ago, when he discontinued it altogether,
and on Monday evening she called at his lodgings to
obtain the money in arrear. She was told the father
was not at home, and after waiting some time she
suddenly quitted the house, leaving the baby behind her
in the landlord's parlour. She immediately returned,
and raised such a disturbance that a large mob collected,
and it was necessary to send for an officer to compel her
to go. With great difficulty the constable got her into
the street, but she had only proceeded a few yards when
she threw her child down on the pavement, and ran off
with such rapidity that it was only after a long pursuit
that she was overtaken and lodged in the station, as
much for her own protection as for that of the infant.
She was locked up in one of the cells, and appeared
perfectly quiet; but upon a police-sergeant going again
to look at her at a later hour, he found her senseless,
black in the face, and almost lifeless, from her having
twisted her apron tightly round her throat; and it was
only after a considerable period, and with the greatest
care and attention, that she was restored to animation.
When called upon for her defence the prisoner declared
that she was penniless and starving; and as, after
repeatedly calling at her child's father's house, she could
neither see him nor obtain any money, she was driven
to desperation. As she expressed no regret for the act
she had attempted, the magistrate intimated his intention
to send her to the House of Detention for a week,
that she might have time for reflection, upon which the
prisoner bitterly exclaimed, "Then my poor baby shall
not go to prison with me—that I am determined," and
having placed the child down on the floor of the court,
walked into the cell without it, the magistrate subsequently
directing the officer to convey the infant to the
workhouse, until its mother's liberation.—In a second
case, that of a decent-looking married woman, named
Maria Mitchell, it seemed that she was seized with a fit
of jealousy on the preceding evening, which induced
her to drink; and, meeting another woman about ten
o'clock in the Hackney-road, she commenced so