THE KELLY SYMPATHISERS
[BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH]
(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT)
BEECHWORTH, Wednesday
When the Kelly sympathisers were brought up yesterday, and Superintendent Furnell asked for a further remand, Mr Foster said it was his duty to act independently, and to do that which to his conscience seemed just and legal, and he did not feel justified in granting a further remand; he should there fore discharge the accused. The whole of the men were then formally discharged. Isaiah Wright was brought up last, when Mr Foster said :-" Isaiah Wright, your fellow prisoners have been discharged, and I propose to discharge you also. Several weeks since you, when in that dock, were foolish enough and cowardly enough to threaten me - foolish, because what you said could but prejudice your position; a coward, because you attempted to intimidate me when simply doing my duty, and that a very unpleasant one. My acts were official ones, and done in the interest of society, and it was a cowardly thing to make them the subject of personal enmity. It has been a subject of serious reflection with me whether I ought not to place you under substantial bonds to keep the peace, but this would probably cause your return to gaol, where you have so long been; and, trusting that the words were uttered in the heat of the moment, and that there is no ulterior intention of wrong, I discharge you." Wright said "Thank you," and left the court.
Editorial
The position of affairs in connexion with the Mansfield outrages was never more unsatisfactory than it is to-day. The police are eluded, if not laughed at, and the courts of justice fare no better. Certainly nothing could be more ridiculous than Mr Foster's pathetic remonstrance with the fellow known as "Wild Wright" for threatening him, as reported in todays telegram from Beechworth, on the occasion of the discharge of the Kelly sympathisers. The only persons who suffer would appear to be those settlers who have shown an honest sympathy with the law and a detestation of the crime of murder. Not one of our readers, we are sure, but must have felt a thrill of indignation upon perusing from time to time the accounts we have given of the treatment which has fallen to the lot of Mr Edward Monk, the proprietor of the Wombat sawmills, who assisted the police in the search for the bodies of Sergeant Kennedy and his fellow victims.
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