§ Sir J. JARDINEasked the Secretary for Scotland, with regard to the first batch of cases in the county of Roxburgh, under the Lighting Order No. 1, for failing to obscure sufficiently the lights on the premises of the persons charged, in which Sheriff-substitute Baillie sentenced Mr. Mathew Carstairs Noble to pay a fine of £7 10s. and Mrs. Noble, his wife, to pay a fine of £7 10s.,, whether any previous 1078W conviction or any atrocious or aggravating circumstance was charged, proved, or admitted in either case; whether the learned judge found that Mr. Noble was not at home at the time but in some other place in the burgh of Jedburgh, and that the guilt of Mrs. Noble consisted in negligence; and whether, as no appeal is allowed by the law to a higher judicial tribunal, and as excessive fines are denounced in the Bill and Declaration of Rights for England, and exorbitant and extraordinary fines are denounced in the Declaration of the Estates of the Kingdom of Scotland, containing the Claim of Right and the offer of the Crown to their Majesties King William and Queen Mary, dated 11th April, 1689, he will make inquiry into all the circumstances of these cases to ascertain whether the amounts of these fines should be reduced?
§ Mr. TENNANTFull inquiry was made into these cases by my right hon. Friend who preceded me as Secretary for Scotland, with the result that he found no reason for his interference, and I do not propose to reopen them.