The Press. — London, England, 1858-01-02 00:00:00

county divisions the return fur Devonshire Stands thus : DEVONSHIRE Annual Value. Population. Northern Diviaion.... £785,341 .... 150,1:04 Southern Divibion 1,128,709 .... 217,884 e 1,894,110 .... 371,013 And its boroughs appear thus in the return : DEVON : Almbre. Annual Value. Population. 1 Ashburton 2 Itarnetaple 1 Dartmouth 15,002 .. .. 4,b08 2 Devotiport 2 Exeter ( City ) 2 11 nn iron , 9 1 1 1 v month 2 Tay:yowl 9 Tiverton 41,800 .. .. 11,144 1 T unless 1719,842 191,155 That is to say, seventeen members are assigned to the property and population of the Devon shire boroughs, though more than double the amount in the county have only four members ! Or look at Gloucestershire. The county has four members, its returns standing thus : GLOUCESTERSHILE : Annual Value. Population. Eastern Division Western Division %Mali .... 138,159 X 1,469,123 237,943 And the boroughs, w ith nine members between thorn, are thus returned : Mmbrs. Annual WU& Population. 1 Cheltenham .. X21)0,988 15,051 2 Cirencester .6,098 2 Gloucester (City) 81,770 .... 17,572 9 Stroud 2 Tewkesbury £453,604 101,1363 These figures tell their own tale. We could thus go through the whole return, and show the enormous disproportion between the number of members assigned to the landed interest and the property and population of counties, taken in contrast with the cl►ims of towns estimated by the standard of property and population. The Parliamentary Govern ment of England has thus be.'n thrown almost entirely upon the towns, and au intense " out oldoors " pressure has thus been placed upon the Queen's Cabinet for the time being. The constitutional consequences from such a dis proportion between the Conservative and Liberal elements of English society are ex tremely serious, and suggest most important considerations, and we shall have to dwell at length upon them on another occasion. LORDPALMERSTON'S"PROTESTANTISM" IN IRE. AND. TUE Whigs have ever been famous for their jobbery in Ireland. We all know by this time what was the extent and the significance of the Lichfield-house Compact. It was an understanding which involved mutual sacri fices, and secured reciprocal advantages. Both parties came to the conclusion that place was the cardinal aim of the philosophic politician. This was the pursuit which was to subjugate the power of principle, and override the con victions of conscience. The Whigs entered the market as buyers—the Romanist faction entered it as sellers. The bargain was effected, and it has been ratified by the interchange of countless favours. The Whigs have fondled Roman Catholicism, and the Roman Catholics have served the Whigs. But of late years this disreputable state of things has been aggravated. Lord PALMERSTON has signa lised his Premiership by a truckling to the Romanist body, which casts all the deeds of his predecessors into the shade. Matters have come to such a pass in the sister country now, that no one has a chance of promotion unless he be a warm Papist or a cold Protes tant. He may be anything else, or nothing else—a lawyer without practice, or a practi tioner without law—a dull gentleman, or a sharp adventurer. So long as he is a sworn enemy of the Irish Church, his credentials are THE PRESS, JANUARY 2, 1858. endorsed, and he is certain of a comfortable provision. At the time we write every one knows that professional merit, that legal status, has as little to do with a man's advance ment in Ireland as being one of the " Inevita bles " of a Cabinet has to do with ability or with character. It seems, indeed, as if the object of the Minister must be to pave the way for the destruction of the independence of the Irish courts of law, by bringing them into sovereign contempt with the community. We propose to cite some examples in illus tration and support of our opinion, that the vacancies on the Irish Bench are likely to redound to the exclusive advantage of Roman Catholicism. It was only the other day Mr. CORBALLis was appointed Chairman of the County Kilkenny—an office of great impor tance, involving the discharge of judicial duties of a high order, and requiring an accu rate knowledge of criminal jurisprudence. The principle on which he was nominated to this post was identical with that which caused him to be made Law Adviser to the Castle. He was a Roman Catholic ; and though, in his personal relations, entitled to respect, without one single professional pretension to the re sponsible position in which he has been placed. In former times each party had its eminent men, and from a goodly phalanx the most distinguished were selected on either side, to receive the rewards of an honourable ambition. In these days the Whigs pursue a very different course. There has been a plethora of places, and there is a poverty of talent. So many members of the clique have been provided for, that soon, instead of find ing berths for the Romanists, they will have to find Romanists for the berths. Mr. LAWsoN was nominated law adviser in the room of Mr. CORRALLis. He is, no doubt, an able lawyer; but we do not understand how he can on this account be a good selec tion, for Mr. CoRBALLis gave such satisfaction in the same sphere of duty that he was made a present of an office of 1,2001. a year. So that the inference is that the work to be done requires no legal learning whatsoever. But we have this further to say in the matter—Mr. LAWsON's reputation has been made in the courts of equity. Out of them he is not a man of eminence. Now it so happens that the duties of a law adviser at the Castle are con nected with criminal law, with the powers and functions of the magistracy, the police, and other kindred subjects. So that we are jus• tiled in concluding that Mr. LAWSON was chosen because, in the cant of the day, he was a Liberal Protestant, who had distui bed the University with a contest, as a supporter of a Government which possesses the confidence of the Roman Catholic body. The rank of sergeant in Ireland is purely honorary. In the good old days it was held by the leading men of the profession, those whose names and abilities were associated with and had adorned tho administration of justice in the land How do matters stand now? Two out of the three sergeants are Romanists, and the third is what., fur want of ,► better term, we will call an accommodating Protestant. Sergeant HOOLEY is a man who never had the semblance of a business in his profession. The records of all the courts in all the great causes may be searched, and will be searched in vain, for the name of Mr. Sergeant HOOLEY. His only claim to the dis tinction he enjoys is that he is a Romanist. Then as to Mr. Sergeant O ' BRIEN, we really protest that if he did not obtain his dignity because of his creed, then his appointment is utterly incomprehensible. So long as he re mained in a modest position, so long as he was content to prose over a few briefs in equity, no one would have wished to deal harshly with him ; but ►when he was dubbed a Knight, invested with special honours, and placed on a pedestal above his fellows, men began to sift his merits and to scrutinise his pre tensions. The result was that Mr. Sergeant O ' BRIEN stood revealed in all the fulness of his ponderous mediocrity. Mr. Sergeant BERWICK is in enjoyment of a lucrative situation—lucrative, but not onerous; for he is able, if report speaks truly, to go cir cuit, and, in virtue of his title, amiably avails himself of the privilege of holding briefs in all cases where the Queen's name appears in the indictment ! We never heard of his success even here, and it is not too much to say that his elevation to the rank of Queen's Sergeant was a reproach to the office and au insult to the profession. We have to add that there are already four Roman Catholics on the Bench, and they fill two out of the three most important and in. iluential seats upon it. They are represented, moreover, by a Masier in Chancery, by the Attorney-General, and by five-sixths of the chairmen of counties, assistant-banisters, sti pendiary and police magistrates, &c., who owo their elevation to the present Government. And will it bo credited, in* the face of these facts, that the Roman Catholics form only one fifth of the Irish Bar? We are quite willing to admit that the Emancipation Act conferred on the Roman Catholic body a right to such a share of State patronage as is proportionate to their num bers, consistent with their merits. But it is quite obvious that the limits of a fair equality have long been passed, and that it is a dan gerous predominance which is now sought. We confess, therefore, we contemplate with the gravest anxiety Lord PALMERSTON'S distribu tion of the valuable patronage now at his dis posal ; and we shall be most agreeably surprised if we can hereafter describe the appointments he shall make as creditable to the Govern ment or just to the country. GUNS AND GUNNERY. ONE kindred and eleven years ago Mr. ROBINS read a paper to the itoyal Society which he concluded in the following remarkable words : I shall therefore close this paper with predicting that whatever States shall thoroughly comprehend the nature and advantages of riled-barrel pieces, and having facili wed and completed their construction, shall introduce into their armies their general use, with a dexterity in the management of them, they will almost equal anything that has been (lone at any time by the particular excellence of any one kind of arms ; and will, perhaps, fall but little short of the wonderful etTeots which historians relate to have keen formerly produced by the first inventors of firearms. These words were spoken in 1746, yet in 1854 Russia lost the battle of Inkermann, because her army had not the rifle, a weapon which England had only a few mouths before taken into general use. In 182 General PAIXHANS published a treatise on the general use of shell-guns for naval purposes, yet America is only now gradually feeling her way towards the adoption of the system, while we content ourselves with following in her footst-ps. We could cite many other instances of in ventions neglected for years by Governments, despotic, constitutional, and republican alike, but the almost insuperable difficulty of in ducing a Government to take up any now in vention is too well known to require any proof. We have mentioned one case in which a great Power suffered most severely in con sequence of this, for us, happy reluctance to avail itself of modern improvements On the other hand, Russia's losses iu the Crimea were balanced in some measure by our compelled inaction in the Baltic. The safety of Cron stadt and Sweaborg may be fairly attributed to the Government insisting upon devoting tO.whole power of our dockyards to the building of huge liners, postpunieg the con struction of gunboats till the war was nearly over. Again, on the other hand, the basry adop tion of the Lancaster gun, and the exaggerated expectations from it, and from our generally improved gunnery, certainly contributed to make us undertake the siege of Sebastopol with ridiculously inadequate means. Thus from two different opposite points, that of rash adoption and reluctant appreciation, we arrive at similar results. The question involved is one of great national importance, and the point, we think, is whether we cannot hit upon some middle course be tween ill-considered experiment, and the total neglect for a century of a principle an earlier appreciation of which might have produced results during our former wars curious to con template. How would the day have gone at Bunker's Hill had our men been armed with the Enfield or Whitworth ride ? The principal objection to a change of arms is that it necessitates vast expense, while, in