The Press. — London, England, 1857-09-12 00:00:00

4e, t tit6s lIM M . _ _ _ STAMPED .. STEPP:NM No. 28 —Vor, V LONDON, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBE R 12,1857. UNSTAMPED ..FIVEPENCE; -J largely increasing the pay and bounty and emoluments of the army ; for the present tem porary enthusiasm will not survive the moment, and the toils awl dangers of Indian service will require further inducements to attract men to it on any considerable scale. There will be, besides all this, the vast expen• diture to provide for which it will entail ; and that must be done by the British Exche quer, for it is preposterous to suppose that the already bankrupt revenues of India can sup port this enormous additional load. If any one has been led to doubt this by the Minis . terial organs, we would advise him to get up a deputation and try and extract a pledge upon the subject from the Pi emier. Such being our position, and such the em barrassments that beset us on every side, the question at once arises whether the constitu tional doctrine of the responsibility of the Ministers shall or shall not be enforced on those who have brought this state of things about. Is this responsibility, in short, to be henceforth a reality or a sham? Or is it to be confined merely to petty acts of administra tion, leaving untouched those great political measures on whose issue the fate of the nation so much depends ? Is the very enormity of their crime or of their error to be made the plea for shielding them from the consequences which the conditions of their offices impose ? For, call it a crime or call it an error, their responsibility to the nation remains the same. England expects in those who voluntarily assume her guidance, not merely an absence of criminal intention, but that sagacity which alone can maintain her in the position among nations which she holds. But ignorance, a valid plea in no case, is wholly inadmissible in this. If ever there was an act deliberately performed it was the act which finally led to the outbreak—the confiscation of Oude. Nor was it the mere affair of a department; it was a matter which claimed and which received the sanction of the Cabinet before it was car ried out. It was one of the highest acts of Government. Indeed, what act of Govern ment could be higher than the deposition of a great native ally, and the annexation of his State ? Nor were the Ministers without suffi cient warning of the effects which it would produce. But they braved the danger ; they set their all upon the venture, and, if report be true, for the basest of all purposes—the conciliating political support for a weak Ad ministration. If such a►► act, so determined on, is to entail no evil consequences on the authors of it, then of course the responsibility of Ministers will be henceforth a myth. The grossest mis management, the most wasteful sacrifice of life and treasure, must pass unpunished. Every guilty, every incapable act of the Go vernment must be held to be condoned by anticipation, no matter what the results of it may be to England's honour or Eng land's safety. To the last man and the last shilling the country will stand pledged, no matter what the cause be, to those who tte rtss. LONDON, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1857. THE dreadful scenes that have been enacted by the mutineers in India and by the miscreant NANA SAHIB do not require the colouring of journalists to heighten their effect. The plain, unvarnished tales of these atrocities as they reach us from the East display their repulsiveness more effectually than all the arts of the most practised pen. Neither does it need the stimulus of the organs of public opinion to incite our soldiers to the vengeance which such crimes deserve. The feelings which nature has implanted in their bosoms are a sufficient guarantee that they will not falter in the terrible retribution which it will be their business [to inflict. Being therefore quite assured on these points, we are content to leave them to their final issue. Our army in the East will do its duty as it has ever done. But there are other con siderations of a more practical import to those whose fate it is to watch the tide of events at home. These are to consider fairly and fully the position in which this revolt has placed us, and to see that the emotions of hatred towards the actors in it, and of pity for the sufferers, be not turned into the means of screening the Ministers in whose gross mis conduct it has had its rise. There are the misery and dishonour it has oc- ' casioned—a misery which has carried mourning into every heart, if not into every home, and a dishonour that will be remembered through all future time. There is a vast army to main tain in India which the Ministerial journals fix at eighty thousand men. If the surmises of Lord MELVILLE should prove correct, it will have; greatly to exceed that number. There will be the continual drain on us for the recruits that will be required to fill up the gaps caused by death and invaliding in so bad a climate and among so large a body. The Transport, Commissariat, and Ordnance De partments will have to be increased in proper• tion, and put on a war footing, for without these aids it will be useless to have the men. Meantime, the more the nation is weakened by the vast force it has to maintain in India, the more Extensively it will have to provide against the possible consequences of this weakness by a proportionate increase in our armaments at home. So great an addition to our military establishments it will be impos sible to keep up for any length of time without entirely changing the position of the labour market, unused as it is to such a drain. Pro bably the first effect will be the necessity of may have been able to attain power by any, even though they be the most dishonest, means. The check which the Constitution has imposed will be entirely removed, the barriers which it has provided against mis government will be wholly broken down. The responsibility of office, which sits lightly enough now, will then have wholly ceased. The dread of retribution, which at present is small enough, will then have entirely passed away. Ministers careless enough as it is of consequences, will become doubly careless then. Opposition will be disregarded, and equally unheeded will be the public voice. Thus things will go on from bad to worse, till ruin overtakes us, ruin alike to the people and to the Crown. Against such a system of careless indolence in the nation we raise our voice. Against this plan of perpetually absolving Ministers from the consequences of their misdeeds we must protest. In the Constitution there is a vitality which has carried us throug h man y a crisis, but it will not continue to do so if we allow its functions to become effete. In no country can the authors of great disasters be safely intrusted with those powers by a judi cious and impartial exercise of which can it only hope to recover from the dire effects of their previous acts. It is not from the in capacity or misconduct that has brought the nation to the verge of ruin that we can look with confidence for those enlightened measures which can alone restore her name. The obstinancy and perverseness which have brought upon us these troubles are only likely to add to them, and the larger the trust con fided in the Administration the greater will be the mischief they will do. At the outset of this revolt it might by wise and energetic management have been speedily subdued ; but the steps the Government adopted, now truckling to mutiny, now exasperating the well affected, have only added fuel to the flame. The country's real danger neither is, nor ever has been, from the mutineers at ' Delhi; but from the gross incompetence—to ' call it by no worse a name—which has swayed, and still sways, the destinies of India at Cal , cutta and at home. THE NEW REFORM BILL. WE feel it to be our duty most earnestly to impress upon the Conservative body through out the country at large that the question about the New Reform Bill is by no means at an end, and that it would be a political error of grave magnitude to fall into the trap that the measure is adjourned. Ministers are too deeply committed by their pledges on this subject to escape from it easily, even if they desired to do so ; and there is a section of them most eager to have the measure settled. Only a small number of the Ministry are officially connected with the actual manage ment of Indian affairs ; and recollecting the immense amount of work that can be per formed by Parliament, it would be a most rasa and precipitate conclusion to suppose that Parliament was unable to deal simultaneously with the India question and with .the New• • Reform Bill. -' • Until the subject of a new Merin ItilVbln decisively settled one way or asotheyroallitlitly i ' is either positively abandoliia or.' ';' . fv V ~..7 I--.,'i.' .i 6..-• .. o• • ,VI .." ''',. • • .• 4 ~: i' . tr: N ‘4 ~ . ... 4:...N 1 . . .: 0....1 OW