The Press. — London, England, 1858-05-08 00:00:00

436 On the whole, we sum up the case in two or three brief observations :- 1. If the Liberals have, as they claim to have, a majority in the House of Commons at present, they owe that majority to the borough-repre sentatives. 2. But these borough-liberals possess an unfair advantage, inasmuch as it has been often shown, that 607,579 of electors, in the rural districts, have only 243 representatives; while 497,138 in the towns have as many as 411. 3. Hence, to bring about a more just and equal representation, it is chiefly to be desired that this advantage given to the boroughs in the present system, shall, in sonic way or other, be discon tinued. Let 100,000 men, or 10,000 electors, residing in the rural districts, have as large a share in the representation as if they dwelt in Leeds or Birmingham,—and soon we shall see the unjust preponderance of Liberals in the House of tommons cease and vanish away. 4. And, as a first step to such a Conservative reform, we ought perhaps to view without any fear or regret the probable success of Mr. LoeKJ KING'S motion. We admit, indeed, that the Conservative feeling of dislike to a frequent meddling with the representation is worthy of respect. But we doubt whether it is possible any longer to remain silent or inactive in this matter. We believe that Lord STANLEY spoke advisedly and discreetly, when he said, at the Lynn election :—" No one denies, in " whatever part of the House he may sit, that " the Reform Bill of 1832 requires some modi " ti cation." And we think, also, that in attempting a reform of the Reform Bill on Conservative principles, an enlargement of the county-constituencies, to be immediately followed, or perhaps accompanied, by an enlargement of the county representation, is the very first step which ought to be taken. THE STORK AND THE CROWS. THE difference of opinion between the Crown lawyers upon the case of the Cagliari af fords, indeed, evidence of the candour and the truth-seeking spirit with which the Eng lish mind searches after right, upon which ever side the national feeling may have been strongly enlisted ; but it by no means tends to a satisfactory solution of the matters which are to be submitted to the judgment of Parliament. The Attorney-General cannot, with a due regard to his professional and constitutional position, combat as he might in a court of law the conclusions from which he dissents; nor can Sir H. CAIRNS, speaking for himself and the Queen's Advocate, enter into a war of words with the eminent lawyer who is a member of the same Administration. In the absence of authoritative declarations, and in the conflict of judgments to which the House has a right to look for information, it is to be feared that members will fall back upon individual views, based less upon the grand principles which it has been the pride and glory of this nation to main tain, than upon the varying standard which each may set up from his own party or private preju dices. To us it appears—and it is with regret that we are forced to the conclusion—that the opinion of Sir JOHN HARDING and Sir 11. CAIRNS is the sounder and more consistent. It is of course at the present juncture more pleasant to think with the Attorney-General that the capture was illegal, and that the State of Sardinia, to which we are bound by every feeling which usually actuates Englishmen, is entirely in the right: but we have to look, when we lay down broad propositions, at other days than these ; and it can hardly be said with truth that our practice has been at any time marked with the forbearance which is now looked for from the Neapolitans. A Parliament which passed what were called the Hovering Acts, and which has on all occasions asserted, where practi- THE PRESS, MAY 8, 1858 . cable, its own maritime supremacy, is not exactly consistent when it demands of a smaller State a strict adherence to boundaries, and a careful respect of the " high seas." We are confident that if the scene had been laid in the Channel instead of the Mediterranean, the united voice of England would have echoed the opinion of the two first-named jurists—that a British naval officer would " not have exceeded his duty" by acting as did the commander of the Tancredi ; and that a Peel or a Keppel would have been received with shouts of acclamation for an act which in the case of the Neapolitan officer is branded as cruel and illegal. But there is one serious difference in the epoch, so to speak, of the transaction, upon which the two opinions are given. The Queen's Advocate and Solicitor-General address themselves to what is indeed in terms the only question sub mitted, " whether the capture of the Cagliari " was legal." They intimate that the condemna tion as prize, upon which they conceive no formal question to be asked, was unjustifiable; but they point out that there were several circumstances of suspicion shown which rendered that capture imperative, inasmuch as the only alternative was that of immediate liberation. Now, the Attorney-General does not seem to have directed his attention so much to the capture per se, as to the whole proceedings : he treats the transaction as one, and disavows a capture with intent to inquiry—a sort of precautionary possession not to be followed by condemnation— as an unwarrantable hypothesis. He appears, indeed, to get over by a sort of petitio principil the circumstances detailed and considered by his colleagues, and to arrive at the conclusion that the subsequent conduct of the Neapolitan Go vernment is necessarily contemplated by the officer making th© capture. Sir F. KELLY assumes : " 2. That the Cagliari was a private merchant vessel well known to the captors as belonging . . . . to the commercial marine of Sardinia. " 3. That under force and duress she had been compelled, &c." Now, upon this it may be remarked upon the other side, " How were the Neapolitans to know that the representation of the master as to the words in italics were true ? Loaded arms were discovered on board ; some ship's papers, and one at least of the crew on the roll, were not to be found, nor twenty-five of the passengers; and it is alleged that she was not taking her direct course to Naples (although upon this last point there may be some doubt). Now, surely these facts constitute grounds for not too hastily re ceiving the master's account as conclusive." Sir F. KELLY goes on : " 4. That at the time of her capture she was neither de facto nor de jure piratically employed." The chronology is here important. It is ad mitted on all hands that up to the night of the 28th shew as so employed—that_ two cruisers were sent in pursuit, and that on the morning of the 29th they fel l in with her. The few hours of night form rather a small margin to the apprehension of a sailor ; and if a Russian merchant-ship were seized by Norway pirates to commit devastation at Hull or Grimsby, and was the very next morning discovered by an English cruiser some twenty or thirty miles out at sea, small, we trow, would be the consideration of the blue-jacket as to the actual complicity of the persons he found in the peccant vessel. For one pound of smuggled tobacco, by our fiscal laws, all the crew suffer; and it would require the Attorney- General's most finished oratory to explain to the prejudiced mind of the bold lieutenant-com mander, that a " bottom" was indeed reckless and piratical overnight, but had resumed its commercial and guileless character by means of a sort of nautical soda-water in the morning. The old law doctrine of fresh pursuit by the sheriff applies to sea as well as land ; and if it can be fairly established that in hot haste the cruisers came after the Cagliari, and caught her within twelve miles of their coast, not indeed red hand, but a few short hour s a ft er th e pi ra ti ca l exploits, it does not seem a great stretch of autho rity to see her safe into Naples, whither (as remarked by the two law officers) she represented herself to be going at all events. There can be no doubt, as laid down by Sir F. KELLY, that merchant-ships on the high seas are alone subject to their own State, nor that the right of search, as it is called, is belligerent only but the question is here whether the Cagliari au demeaned herself as to be regarded as a merchant, or whether she did not, until some tribunal should have determined it, assume the character of the exception admitted by Sir F. KELLY. Equally incontrovertible is the position that, when a merchant-vessel has escaped, and returned to her lawful occupation, she is not to be dealt with as a pirate ; but how is her pursuer to know this ? And though she does not become liable to be " seized as prize " (and in the insertion of these two last words the whole difference between the "Opinions" consists), she yet may be lawfully detained under such pregnant circumstances of suspicion until the innocence be shown. The three instances cited by the Attorney- General only show that a condemnation under such circumstances is illegal. It does not appear but that all parties were satisfied ; and i 1 upon the demonstration of innocence by the crew in this case, they also had been remitted to their own State, the main difference between the two opinions seems to fall to the ground. We have dwelt longer upon these points than usual. It is very material in the discussion now before us, that the real question should not be overlaid by confounding the end with the means. If the Neapolitan Government had a right to pursue this piratical vessel, and, having captured her, to place the matter in due course for inquiry, what is called the " capture" was not illegal. In such case, if that taking ripened into a final " capture as prize," by a condemnation obtained by illegal and unfair means, then, and not before, is the Neapolitan Government guilty of a viola tion of international law. But if a capture must necessarily involve the cruisers, although they had good ground at the time for making the seizure, in all the consequences of a condemna tion—though the innocence of the vessel be de monstrated, and therefore no condemnation ensue —then it will behove our men-of-war, particu larly on distant stations, diligently to look to themselves, and to take care, lest upon what Sir F. KELLY calls " a suspicion of past unlawful " conduct," they unguardedly mistake the hum ble merchantman of to-day for the daring ruffian of yesterday, and so involve our unlucky finances in a second Chinese war. WANTS OF THE CHURCH. THE Church of England is a wonderful and mysterious thing. It is full of " want" and " destitution,"—this is quite certain ; not merely because the Bishop of EXETER has proved it, in one of his most effective speeches in the House of Lords, but because we know from fifty other sources that hundreds of poor incumbents are lingering on, with incomes of 601. or 701. a year; not knowing how to escape, even if they were so disposed; although they might earn 2001. or 3001. a year apiece, if they were eligible, as " Stewards of the Club," or " Assistant-Secretaries of the Railway." And yet, while this is unquestionably the fact, and while there are still many parishes in the environs of London in which new churches might be built with the fairest prospects of good to the inhabitants,—we take up the Builder of last week, and there we read the following " Tender " and contract : " For alterations and additions to St. Michael's Church, Cornhill. Messrs. U. G. Scott and Herbert Williams, architects : 'J'rollope Hill Brown and Robinson Lucas, Brothers Piper and Son Ashby and Horner Ashby and Sons Wilson (accepted). Now, St. Michael's, Cornhill, is a parish which, like twenty other City parishes, has been of late years stripped of its inhabitants. The houses In Cornhill have become either Assurance-Offices, or mercantile-offices. Its nominal population Is about 400 or 500, but of these one-half fly Into i r