The Press. — London, England, 1858-02-20 00:00:00

170 penses of the Government must be fearfully augmented. Are these circumstances under which the precipitate assumption of Indian liabilities can be justified—a policy which mocks at caution, refuses inquiry, and taunts with factiousness those who demand investi gation ? Had the Government of lg5:1 yielded to the request of the Conservatives, and consented to an inqui►;y into Indian affairs, the Govern ment of 185 S might not have been confronted with a bloody and desperate insurrection. If the Government of 19'►8 act in the same reck less spirit, the country may find itself at the expiration of another five years in the midst of equally great, if widely dissimilar, difli cultiPs. LORD JOHN RUSSELL ON " PRESTIGE." WHEN Lord JOHN RUSSET.L, in the debate of Tuesday, on Mr. BAILLIE% motion, spoke of the "old English policy of doing what is " right," the phrase was greeted with "loud cheers" in the House of Commons. The Noble Member for London seemed to take the cheers as meant for him, instead of really being (in many instances) at him, as any spec tator of the scene might have perceived who watched the manner and heard the tone of some of those " cheer=." There are not a few experienced politicians who sincerely desire that Lord JOHN RUSSELL would conform his own conduct to the standard of " old English policy" indicated by himself, and the public at large have long waited for explanation from his lips of many dark passages in the recent history of his ever-changing public life. In 1834 Lord JOHN RUSSELL Was a leading influence in destroying the great Parliamentary connection of the Reform-Bill Whigs. His conduct to the Radicals in 1839, and the tone of his letter to the electors of Stroud (which was in the style of philosophi cal T,pryism), paralysed his party, and gave a great opportunity for the Conservative Oppo sition. In 1841 Lord JOHN RUSSELL mis managed the economical question of the day ; and subsequent events abundantly demon strated that he knew as little about "corn" as about " Catholics." In Opposition from 1811 to 1846, more than once he spoiled the game of his party, and, reaching office by accident, owing to the schism of 1846, the Noble Lord made several grave blunders, which we need not record. But, coining to his recent boast about " old English policy," we will put a few searching questions, which the Noble Lord must answer before he can stand exempt from the imputation of treachery, which is cer tainly most alien to " old English " sentiments of right and wrong. Gentlemen of opposite parties, who have closely scrutinised the conduct of Lord JOHN RUSSELL, are agreed in thinking that the Noble Lord, on account of three lamentable episodes in his career, is liable to the charge of treachery. His masked and hypwritical policy about the " Durham Letter," his mission to Vienna, 'and his sudden desertion of the Aberdeen Cabinet, leave huge blots on his fair fame, which in the opinion of Conservatives and liberals is fatally clouded by his es capades. The world has not even yet fully beard how deeply the Noble Lord committed Linaself on the occasion of the " Durham Letter." There was nothing more extraordinary on that occasion than that the Roman Catholic officials at Dublin kept their posts without re-igning. Their own religionists despised Them fur their imputel " servility," and many Protestants were amazed at their complacency. 'These Roman Catholic gentlemen were men arrf honour and spirit ; and the world has never known the extent of pressure put on them mot to resign, as they really wished to do. Their names were Mr. HUGHES (now Solicitor- Getkeria for Ireland), Sir THOMAS ReanNoros, K.C.8., Mr MONTESQI;IEU BELLEW (then Lord of the Treasury), and Mr. BALDWIN, Counsel to the Castle. These gentlemen did not address the public at the time, but their friends gave explanations for them which did not originate in Ireland. The " Durham Letter," it seemed, THE PRESS, FEBRUARY 20, 185$. was to be interpreted in two senses. One meaning was that it should teach the English people that the "great Whig party" was as Protestant as in 1685 ;" but in a second sense it was not to be understood as being at all hostile to Roman Catholic pretensions, and the Irish Whig policy was " to go on as usual " without regard to demonstrations of "No Popery" in England ! So that the " Durham Letter" was at one side of St. George's Channel to be interpreted as " Hurrah for the " Whigs and down with Cardinal WisEmax," and at the other side it was to be " Hurrah for the Whigs and up with the Pope." Plain men thought that this was carrying refined policy very far, and that it had not much of the "old English " stamp upon it. But the Irish Roman Catholic officials were cajoled, and they smarted severely for it afterwards. When Lord JOHN RUSSELL accepted office under Lord ABERDEEN, the Noble Member for the City never took the least thought about the Roman Catholic officials, who had stood by him in Ireland in the face of much clamour. He allowed Mr. HENRY G. HUGHES . to be passed over, and Mr. KEOGEI, Mr. BREWSTER, and Mr. FITZGERALD to be promoted over him ! Was that " old English" policy? . . . In his mode of - ,joining the" Coalition" and deserting it, the Noble Lord acted with reck lessness as to consequences. He consented to bit under Lord ABERDEEN, and the whole Government of Ireland was placed in the hands of the party who had given Parliamen tary opposition to the " Papal Titles Act " of 1851. He allowed JOHN SADLEIR to be made a Lord of the Treasury, and ho uttered not a murmur against gentlemen who had reviled him a few months before being placed high in office. He pretended to be a chief, when he was only a subordinate; he affected to be a leader, when he was really a follower. He writhed in his bondage, and forgot at the same time his duty to himself and his country. The war broke out—the national honour was in jeopardy ; his colleagues were not men of experience, but they had been appointed with the connivance of Lord JOHN RUSSELL. He had even thought that their ambition was "com mendable." The public mind heaved with anger, and a storm was approaching. Without a word of notice either to the Prime Minister, under whom he served, or to his Liberal col leagues, Lord LANSDOWNE, or Lord PALMERSTON, or Lord CLARENDON, the Noble Lord, on Mr. ROEBUCK holding up his finger, ran from the peril, and left the Sovereign to find a Cabinet ! Was that " old English" policy ? _ _ _ Then the Noble Lord, a perf‘ict Marplot in conduct, with a mouth full of maxims of magnanimity, took office under Lord PAL MERSTQN. He went as Ambassador to Vienna, and made proposals for a European ponce. He will not now attempt to deny that he made peaceful propositions of a definite character. He then returned, and found English opinion iu a warlike mood. Keeping silent about what he had tried to do in Vienna, the Noble Lord made a vehement speech in Parliament, echoing the feeling for war. In diplomacy he had been a fortnight previously an ultra-Aber deenite, and in debate the same man was an ultra-Pulmerstonian, although the eventuali ties of the crisis had undergone no change, and though no leading incident had altered the statu quo. Was that "old English" policy ? And this is the Noble 'Lord who affects an indifference to prestige ! So well he might, after conduct that has brought him so low. Prestige is a favourite phrase on the lips of Lord CLARENDON, and in a celebrated article in the Quarterly the late Mr. CHOKER took objection to the employment of the word prestige ; but it is to the thing itself th it Lord JOHN RUSSELL has the most decided aversion. He once had it, and he deliberately destroyed it, acting within the last eight years with double treachery to Protestants and Roman Catholics at the time of the " Aggression," and showing the same recklessness towards his Liberal colleagues, and to the interests of his Sovereign, and then doubly deceiving the Ambassador at Vienna and th e p eo pl e o f Eng land about peace and war. Asa private Member of Parliament, and as an adroit and highly informed debater, Lord JOHN RUSSELL may still have utility; but as a Minister he would only embroil parties, and devise means for " upsetting," not " filo coach," but the Constitution. THE INVECTIVE OF SIR CORNEWALL LEWIS. - - IT is always interesting to watch a man of talent, who has exercised his mind in a par ticular manner, attempting a totally new exercise of his powers. The presumption, in spite of splendid exceptions to the contrary, i 3 that the poet will not . be an historian, or that the profound philosopher will not succeed as a lyrist. The mind, except in peculiar organi sationa, acquires a fixed habit, which cannot be easily altered, and hence there is no part so difficult to play as that of an omitiA honio. Yet that is the identical part in which the present CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER seeks to win the laurel. In the great India debate Sir CORNEWALL LEWIS has appeared as an aspirant to distinction in the line of invective, and his assaults on the memories of Clays and HASTINGS would have done honour to some youthful declaimer in a club stammering through his first philippic. In fact, the Chancellor's speech was intended as a " slashing article " to be printed, instead of being spoken. Never were so many hard words, and so much bitter imputation, uttered with so frigid a deportment. BALZAC, the E reach fictionist, has teen called " an iced Thackeray," and Sir CORNEWALL LEWIS assail ing the East India Company seemed like a frozen Sir Philip Francis. His invective was sedative rather than stimulating; sentences intended to have stirred the passions were soporific in their results. It was impossible not to have felt that the CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER had been " cramming " from the speeches of BURKE, the reports of DuNeAs, and the pamphlets of FRANCIS. He made a rough digest of what those eminent persons had thought and said about the Company seventy years since ; he " macadamised " their productions, and flung his missiles into Leadenhall-street, hoping to produce great effect. But invective, in order to be success• ful, requires talent for language, a rapid play of fancy, and not a little of the fire of genius. Sir CORNEMALL LEWIS watered his rockets before he tried to let them off, so that the result was more damping than dazzling, and his laborious efforts to produce combustion caused more smoke than flame. He was re plied to with great effect by Mr. WHITESIDE in a brilliant and " telling " speech, which, though not altogether expressive of our own views, was thoroughly destructive to Sir CORNEWALL'S. The manner in which Sir CORNEWALL LEWIS treated the memories of CLIVE and HASTINGS was singularly maladroit, inasmuch as he over stated the case against them, and thereby gave a handle to vilifiers of the English name. The truth as to the characters and conduct of those remarkable men lies between the furl. bund wrath of BURKE and his school, and the ttnderness with which they have been treated by Lord MACAULAY. The remark of Mr. Ross MANGLES iS true, that " the political morality " of the age in which they lived should be " recollected by persons sitting in judgment " on CLIVE and HASTINGS." The Member for Guilford referred to the slave trade as an example of his remarks, but ho might have gone further. The middle of the last century SAW Sir FRANCIS DASHWOOD a Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the times in which a man like WHAKEs was accepted as a popular leader could not have been very scrupulous or moral. Penal laws of the most exaggerated character were in force against Roman Catholics of un doubted loyalty, and the times in which Lord GEORGE GORDON produced a ferment were not those in which we could expect examples of high proconsular virtue in our colonial rulers. One of the most zealous impeachers of HAST INGS was the owner of a landed estate, which he got from a relative who had " informed ~ against the hereditary holder as being "a Roman Catholic." The private lives of Fos and SHERIDAN would shatter public repute.• tions in our time, and the universal feeling against a recent Ministerial appointment