(if any) of Exchequer Bills sold shall be put to the credit of the party by whom such Exchequer or Treasury Bill or Bills shall have been assigned or deposited as aforesaid; and it shall and may be lawful for the said Commissioners to apply such excess in or towards the payment of any other Note or Notes issued by the same person, on the deposit of any Exchequer Bills or Treasury Bills, and which may at any time afterwards be presented for payment at the Office of the said Commissioners; and all such Notes so paid shall be cancelled or destroyed, and shall not be reissued or reissuable after such payment thereof.

That if the Banker liable refuses to indorse the Note for payment by the Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, the holder may protest the same, and the Commissioners shall proceed in satisfying the same accordingly.

That in case of Bankruptcy, the claims of the Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, and of the holders of Circulating Notes, shall have preference on the Stock, &c. transferred and deposited, over those of all other creditors.

That whenever the whole of the Circulating Fund Notes, entered and registered at any or either of the Offices of the said Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, for the purposes of this Act, to any Banker or Bankers having transferred any Stocks, Funds, or Annuities, to the said Commissioners, or baving deposited or assigned any Exchequer Bills or Treasury Bills under the provisions of this Act, shall be returned and delivered up at such Office, by or on behalf of the Banker or Bankers who shall have so transferred such Stocks, Funds, or Annuities, or shall have deposited or assigned such Exchequer Bills or Treasury Bills, or the personal Representatives of such Banker or Bankers, or shall be paid and satisfied by the said Commissioners, in manner required by this Act, it shall and may be lawful for the said Commissioners, and they are hereby authorised and required, to retransfer and deliver up to such Banker or Bankers, or his or their Representatives, all such Stocks, Funds, or Annuities, or Exchequer or Treasury Bills, respectively, as shall have been so transferred to or deposited with the said Commissioners by such Banker or Bankers, for the purposes of this Act, or so much of such Stocks, Funds, or Annuities, or Bills, as shall not have been applied by the said Commissioners in or towards payment or satisfaction of any such Circulating Fund Notes, according to the directions of this Act; and that on payment of any quantity of Notes, the Commissioners may retransfer twice the amount of Stock and deliver up the whole amount of Exchequer Bills; and in case any such Notes shall be lost, mislaid or destroyed, then it shall and may be lawful for the said Commissioners, in their discretion, on satisfactory proof of such circumstance, to retransfer VOL. XVIII. Pam. NO. XXXV.

E

and deliver up to the Banker or Bankers, or his or their Representatives, liable to the payment of such Notes, the whole or any part of the capital of such Stocks, Funds, or Annuities, or the whole or any part of such Exchequer Bills or Treasury Bills, as shall be subject to the payment of such Notes so lost, mislaid or destroyed, according to the directions of this Act; or to permit new Notes to the amount of the Notes so lost, mislaid or destroyed, to be issued in lieu thereof, upon such Security, in either case, and under and subject to such Rules, Regulations and Restrictions, as to the said Commissioners shall seem fitting and convenient, for the avoiding of any loss by the payment of any such Notes so lost, mislaid or destroyed.

That Dividends on Stock transferred under this Act, shall be paid to Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, and by them to the proprietors, deducting for Expenses of this Act.

That Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt may renew Exchequer Bills when paid off.

That a receipt for principal and interest of Bills paid off, shall be given by a person appointed by Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt.

And that the interest received by Commissioners on Exchequer Bills shall be paid to the party depositing them; deducting so much as shall be enjoined, for the purpose of paying the expenses incurred by the Commissioners in carrying into execution the provisions of this Act.

That the Treasury may advance Money to Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, for Expenses of executing this Act; the same to be repaid by Transfer Fee and Deduction out of Dividends, &c.

That Duplicates may be granted of Certificates lost or destroyed, and security be given against the production of the original.

That persons counterfeiting Certificates, Notes, &c. be deemed guilty of Felony.

That no Fee be taken for delivering or receiving any Certificate, under Penalty of 201.

And that annual accounts of Stock transferred, and Notes issued under this Act, shall be laid before Parliament.

AN

ESSAY

ON

CRIMINAL JURISPRUDENCE,

WITH

THE DRAFT

OF A

NEW PENAL CODE;

IN WHICH IT IS ATTEMPTED TO

DEFINE CRIMES AND OFFENCES WITH

CLEARNESS AND BREVITY;

TO RENDER

PENALTIES PROPORTIONATE AND CONSISTENT;

AND

TO PROMOTE A PURE, SPEEDY, AND CHEAP,
ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE.

BY J. T. BARBER BEAUMONT, Esq., F. A. S.

ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S JUSTICES OF THE PEACE FOR

MIDDLESEX AND WESTMINSTER.

LONDON:

PREFACE.

THE Essay on Criminal Jurisprudence attempted in the following pages, owes its origin to a plan which the Author, with some other persons, entertained a few years since, of promoting a settlement of English emigrants in South America. For this purpose, rules for conduct, and for protection against disorders were necessary. The English laws appeared to be any thing but an intelligible and easy guide on the occasion. The other codes of Europe were generally unsatisfactory, and even the French penal code; although a vast improvement in criminal jurisprudence was thought to be deficient in that systematic and luminous arrangement of which the subject was capable. The measures taken by government to facilitate the emigration of our unemployed and suffering countrymen, superseded the necessity of promoting the settlement in South America; but as the necessity of a revision of the English penal laws is acknowledged by all, this work has been pursued in the hope that it might throw some useful light on the subject.

The author does not flatter himself that he has elicited a system of criminal law which is free from error. He is quite sure from the extensiveness of his task, that his propositions must fail to embrace several points of importance, and in other instances, that the rules offered are capable of a still more condensed, or of a clearer expression, but he believes that much of what will appear wanting on a first reading, will be found to be sufficiently provided for on a more careful perusal, and that other expressions which at first seem redundant, will, on further acquaintance, be admitted to be necessary. He has bestowed more pains frequently in endeavouring to condense the meaning of a long expression into a few words, than would have been required to extend the description to the dimensions of a folio page. His attempt is now before the public, and he will deem himself well recompensed for the trouble he has taken, if the hints furnished shall stimulate abler minds to take up the subject, and shall lead to the establishment of that most important, but much neglected desideratum, a simple, clear, and equitable, system of Criminal Jurisprudence.

AN

ESSAY

ON

CRIMINAL JURISPRUDENCE.

CHAPTER I.

OBSERVATIONS ON THE DEFECTS OF THE PENAL LAWS

OF ENGLAND.

THE laws of England are grown into such an immeasurable chaos of wisdom, error, and verbosity, that the longest life, the best judgment, and the most retentive memory, devoted to their study, are insufficient to collect, digest, and retain the ponderous mass.

Such is the declared opinion of the most eminent legal authorities, yet the law presumes that every man has knowledge of all the laws which govern him, a fiction which reason rejects as impossible. If, indeed, our penal laws proceeded upon a breach of the rules of moral duties to a consistent system of proportionate penalties, it might be presumed that the citizen alive to the one, would know how to estimate the other; but the fact is very much otherwise.

Innocent, nay commendable acts, in some instances, incur penalties, and deep vice in others is free from legal censure. Considering, therefore, the inconvenient immensity and acknowledged imperfection of our laws, and also their pernicious effect upon the good order and happiness of society, there may be no very unpardonable presumption in relieving the subject from professional trammels, and treating it as a science subject to the investigations of plain sense, and capable of being restored to the principles of plain dealing.

These principles indicate, that there is no better reason for enveloping rules of conduct in a peculiar and intricate verbage,