The Press. — London, England, 1857-03-28 00:00:00

MARCH 28,1857. Herat was taken by Persia, but evacuated through the remonstrances of our Minister, Colonel SHELL, without the necessity of any hostile demonstration. The Treaty of the great Powers guaranteeing the independence of Greece was altered by making it obligatory for the future Sovereigns to profess the same religion as their subjects, thus placing the Treaty in accordance with the Constitution. The great rivers of South America, the Panama and Paraguay, were opened to Euro pean commerce by a special mission under Sir CHARLES HoTtrAm, who concluded a convention with the riverain States. This was done at the suggestion of England and in unison with France. Lord DERBY'S Government came into office three months after the coup •d'etat in Paris. It was .evident that the President would make himself Emperor. The great Powers foresaw that they would be obliged to recognise him in the face of the Vienna treaties, which bound them to oppose the dynasty of Bonaparte. They urged England to wait until Russia and Austria should make the recognition simul taneously with us, but Lord DERBY'S Govern ment thought it more becoming to take an in• dependent course on that occasion. Their recognition was frankly made three weeks before that of the other Powers, and this was really the bolt which clenched our alliance with France. In the face of this fact it re quired no little hardihood for the Post of the 20th inst. to assert that the accession of Lord DERBY to power would endanger the French alliance, and place England at the mercy of "a pitiful, feeble, halting" foreign policy. During the negotiations with France which preceded the recognition of the Empire, Lord DERBY'S Cabinet obtained a distinct declara tion from the French Government that the assumed titletof Napoleon lll.was an historical fact, and that the new Emperor acknowledged all the rulers of France since 1814 and their public acts. Yet at that time Lord DERBY'S Government was accused by the Times, the Peelite Chronicle, and the Radical papers with truckling to NAPOLEON and the despotic Powers. No term of abuse was too strong for the Em peror and " his tool," Lord MALMESBURY. We have already stated the results of this policy. When Lord MALMESBURY quitted the Foreign•ofpice, there was not a State in the world with which England was not on terms of amity. It will not do to ascribe the success of Lord DERBY'S Administration in so many different departments to chance. If his colleagues were the feeble persons the Nlinisterialists malignantly represent, the Noble Earl himself must have possessed extraordinary adminis trative powers to have guided them so success fully. But the fair conclusion is, that the various offices of Government must have been filled by competent men ; and that the success of the Administration was owing to the union which prevailed in the Cabinet, and to the wise resolve of the Ministers to devote their• energies to the prosecution of practical and salutary measures. PARLIAMENT AND PARTIES. THE history of the late Parliament is sugges tive of many grave reflections. The ease with which characters were won and lost, the reck lessness with which the public entertained the most serious charges against statesmen of ability and experience, and the remarkable increase in the number of independent mem bers who belong to neither party for the pur pose of getting what they can out of both, are features in the present state of politics which may well excite our solicitude. But, threaten ing as these appearances are, we might perhaps flatter ourselves that they were merely transient clouds, were it not for the presence of an aggravating symptom in that general contempt of party ol , ligations which has marked every session of the defunct assembly. We never recollect so marked a determination on the part of so many leading statesmen to devote themselves exclusively to their own private ends, as Parliament has shown since the last general election. Before THE PRESS that time, indeed, the evil had begun to unfold itself—the continued isolation of the Peelites was an impediment to all measures of public utility; and the Government of Lord Jolly RUSSELL was finally overthrown by a vote which, however good in its results, was as clearly the offspring of private pique as the violence of a child in the nursery. And here it is curious to observe that the Government of Lord DERBY was conducted to power by the conduct of a statesman who had long been their determined enemy, and was driven from power by the conduct of another statesman, who had long been their firm adherent. These alone are striking illus trations of our theory, but it is since the year 1853 that political infidelity has become most strikingly apparent. We had a War Minister who disbelieved in war, but who sacrificed his convictions to his interests, and the interests of the country to his convictions. We had the motion of Mr. ROEBUCK carried by an extraordinary majority, in which it is noto rious that numbers voted rather because they dared not run counter to the torrent of public excitement, than because they believed in the sweeping accusations it conveyed. We had next the spectacle of a distinguished and veteran statesman deliberately calculating how far it would answer his purpose to betray his party, and descending to subterfuges. on which we will not comment, to gain time for consideration. And, lastly, we have seen that identical Leader so careless of ancient obliga tions, and so callous to the true dignity of the statesman's character, as to boast of that which moss men would blush to confess—that he " makes his game " out of conflicting prin ciples, that he plays one party against an other, and, like Mr. CHARLES MATHEWS in The Game of Speculation, laughs in his sleeve at both, and chuckles over his dirty dexterity. The Parliament which began with Lord ABERDEEN and went out with Lord PALMERS TON, respectively the Pecksniff and the Skim pole of politics, will not occupy a high place in the history of the future, in which perhaps the succession of Parliaments may be adopted as landmarks rather than the duration of reigns. With what resolution then must the new Parliament assemble if it would avoid the faults of its predecessor? It certainly seems to us that when Mr. DISRAELI expressed a hope that in the enstting Parliament Parties would be more clearly defined, he touched upon the real evil. As long as Representative Government continues, the existence of Party is the only guarantee against the turbulence of private ambition. A statesman who stands aloof from Party, takes all the more kindly to himself, and, if not literally selfish, becomes by long brooding over his own projects an impracticable and obstructive enthusiast. Party is the engine by which great abilities are made available for the service of the State,—disciplined and directed, taught self-control, and saved from their own extravagance. Whenever the ties of Party are too weak to effect this end, it is a sign that the body politic is in ill-health, as particular passions which, under the con trol of a sound mind and body are conducive to our good, in a frame weakened by disease or age become dangerous or offensive. The experience of history teaches us that the prominence of individuals in a common wealth is a precursor either of revolution or decay. PERICLES and ALCIBIADES, MARIUS, SYLLA, and POMPEY, CROMWELL, MIRABEAU, and NAPOLEON, are all, more or less, witnesses to this great truth. The stability, and therefore the happiness, of national life depends on institutions. It is only when institutions are tottering that individuals spring into supreme importance ; and institutions seldom are shaken while the assertion of party principle continues to be honest and vigorous. It is when these ideas die out—when the spread of mateiial convenience and a devotion to the pursuits of commerce have wrought their end—when not only the poor but the rich, not only the people but the aristocracy, are ready to cry panem et cireenses—it is then that a nation begins to revile party, and to neglect institutions. It is then that oligar chies, tyrannies, and every abuse of legitimate forms of Government arise. It is then that either one man or a small knot of men sue- 299 ceed in fastening their yoke upon a people, and by specious language and carefully pre. served forms in reconciling them to the loss of that self-government for which they have lost the relish. Such apprehensions may, at the present day, sound like dreams. But we must recollect that apprehensions which are shared by many persons usually avert danger ; while it is precisely those which excite the smiles of the incredulous that are often followed by dis aster. For our part, we consider it to be a great public duty to point out to the country, that Party, if it be an evil in the abstract, is a necessary evil—that is to say, a good in the concrete ; and that, judging both from expe rience and from theory, taking into account the infirmities of human nature, and the im perfections of human politics, we cannot but conclude that Government by Party is the best system that has yet been devised for evoking the energies of citizens, and preserv ing the liberties of nations. WAS THE LORCHA "ARROW " A BRITISH SHIP ? THE Ministerialists still attempt to justify the policy and justice of Sir JOEIN DOWRING'S pro ceedings at Canton by determinedly asserting that the Arrow was a British vessel, and had a right to bear the British flag. To this view the Premier commits himself in his address to the electors of Tiverton. He insists that an " insolent barbarian " at Canton had " violated the British flag." Is this the fact? The question must turn on the single point whether the Arrow had a right to hoist the British flag or not. If she had the right, the flag was the symbol of British power and honour; if she had not the right, it was but a dirty piece of bunting, the symbol of fraud and falsehood. On this question, of the right of the Arrow to bear the British flag, it is notorious that Sir John BOWRING has told two stories—one directly contrary to the other. He wrote to Consul PARKES that " the Arrow had no right " to hoist the British flag," her licence to do so having expired. He writes to Commis sioner YE H, " there is no doubt that the Arrow " lawfully bore the British flag under the " register granted by me." Sir JOHN BOWRING is thus condemned by his own admissions. But the question may be argued on broader grounds. Would the Arrow have had a legal right to hoist the British flag even had her licence not expired ? This ques tion is argued in a masterly manner in a pamphlet recently issued by Sir FITZROY KELLY, indisputably one of the most luminous lawyers that ever illustrated British juris prudence. What is a British ship? Sir FITZROY KELLY clearly shows that under the imperial Acts of Parliament the Arrow could not be considered such, because her owner was neither a natural born nor a naturalised subject of the Queen. The question remains whether the Colonial Ordinance relied upon by Sir JOHN BOWRING gave her that title, and Sir FITZROY informs us that this ordinance, inasmuch as it is directly at variance with the Acts of Parlia ment now in force, could confer no rights inconsistent with those acts. He says : This ordinance was made on the 3rd of March, 1855. By the Acts of Parliament then in force no ship belonging to a Chinese could be registered as a British ship. The ordinance, then, which permitted the Chinese residents of Hong Kong to register their ships as British ships, was in violation of those Acts of Parliament, and illegal and void. But the Merchant Shipping Act of 1851 is also fatal to this ordinance. That act came into operation on the Ist of May, 1855. It expressly applies to all British colonies ; and it contains no exception in favour of any act of any colonial Legislature. If, therefore, the ordinance had legalised the registration of the ship of a foreigner on the 3rd of March, it was repealed and made void by this act on the Ist of May. It is true that by the 547th section the act of 1854 may be repealed, wholly or in part, by a legislative ordinance in any colony as to ships registered in such colony. But the ordinance of repeal must be confirmed by the Queen in Council; and the ordinance in question, besides having been made before the act of 1854 came into operation, has never been confirmed by the Queen in Council. The act of 1854, there fore, expressly rendering the registration of any ship, the