The Press. — London, England, 1855-04-28 00:00:00

~. .• ' . ___A A C.---• / 1 -1 141")4-I 1."'l . -.„ .. ... ... ... -...........—.............— ' • .i .' • : .a•+l.'4 1. , . (0 0 liati, , b t „ 1 R 4 ' 1 1 , • ~, rt 1+ No. 104.—VoL. 111 LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1855. PRICE SIXPENCE. Cly Vrtss. by clerkly incapacity to a mere contingent, is wasted on a barren height; and even the glory of our fleets, whose invincibility the nation clung to with the passion of idolatrous belief, seems suddenly blasted, as if the withering breath of Ministerial feebleness had passed over them, and deprived our meteor flag of its lustre and its terrors. LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1855. "PRESS" OFFICE, Friday Night, April 27. His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of the FRENCH has renounced his intention of re- There must be an end of this system, or there must be an end of our glory ; it is tco monstrous to last. It is more like the hideous delusion of a nightmare than the reality of open day. Is not the country too strong for faction? Is not the spirit of Englishmen too proud and high to tamely submit to a conti nuance of humiliation and defeat ? In times like these the nation is the Government—the Government is the nation. The two cannot be separated. If still our strength is to be represented by a more than septuagenarian placeman at the head of the Executive, by a gouty valetudinarian at the War-office, by a military mind in decay at the Horse Guards, and by administrators in every department of the State chosen for the sole reason of up holding the great Whig principle of family connection—we may as well cast ashes on our head at once, and abjure the station as a people we have heretofore held. With a deerepid Administrative our na tional resources and vigour are all vain. The heart of the empire is sound, but its faculties for action are lost while they are represented by the present occupants of office. There is no outward force which can respond to the innate strength of the people ; and while this anomaly is suffered to continue, England must remain powerless, or exhaust itself through the excitement of the body failing to animate the palsied limbs. No Government can be strong which does not represent some national elements. Far abler men than Lord PALMERSTON has brought together would fail to fulfil the wants of the time, if they had no principle to animate large masses of the community to stand by them. Power, save iu its most degraded shape, does not consist in the possession of office; it consists in the respect of allies, and the fear of enemies—in the opinion entertained of its stability and vigilance—in the confidence of the Legislature, and the support of at least a considerable portion of the country. We are playing into the hands of our foes, and in volving the State in difficulties which may prove inextricable, by tolerating a Government which has no one element of strength. If the unhappy divisions of political opinion render the formation of a strong Minist►y imprac ticable, it would be true wisdom to constitute Westminster School our Legislature, and choose a Cabinet. from the first-form boys. Inexperience would be better than dotage. Nothing can be worse than to continue drift ing on, without plan or policy, while trade declines, while mountains of debt accumulate, while the public are disheartened, and while military success seems continually more distant. The memory of our past greatness, with perhaps some anticipation of the rising up of our old spirit, alone save us from the derision of the world. pairing to the CRIMEA. The negotiations for peace are con tinued. (By Electric Telegraph.) PARIS, Friday Evening. It is credibly stated that negotiations have been re-opened at Vienna, and that intelli gence has been received by the Emperor here favorable to peace. WE are in a condition now to estimate the cost to the country of that manoeuvre which ejected the Government of Lord DERBY from office little more than two years buck. Political crimes or political errors must not hope to escape their just consequence, and the country which sanctions or suffers them must be pre pared to pay their penalty. Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S insatiable eagerness for power was the main cause of that combi nation which overthrew a Government of prin ciple to replace it by a Government of in trigue. The Whig party followed his lead from the knowledge that he has the keenest scent of the pack ; they follow it now, and they will follow it to the end of the chapter. Nothing but the indignant sense of the country will put an end to that pernicious system of maintaining the governmental supremacy of what CHATHAM justly termed " a few too power " ful families," by concession to democratic cries and corrupt influences,—a system which has all the vices of oligarchy without its strength, and all the dangers of democracy without its public spirit. The system is purely Whig in its origin and its growth ; it becomes more perilous as it becomes more degenerate, and combines the opposite dis advantages of making the Government weak and the country turbulent. Twenty years of official power during the last quarter of a century were not enough for Lord JOHN and his great Whig families. The most enlightened members of his party had, indeed, the sense to perceive that it was breaking down by its inveterate place-hunting. They conceived that a probationary period in Opposition would be useful to it to recruit its popularity and even to give the country the advantage—an advantage not to be over-esti mated in a balanced Government like ours — of possessing a second set of statesmen. But such considerations were too delicate for Lord JOHN'S perception. He saw nothing but his mess of pottage steaming under his nose. He would have it, cost what it might. The Duke of BEDFORD was consulted, the Coalition was formed, the Tory Government was ousted, and we are now gathering the fruits of Whig victory. Lord JOHN is returning from Vienna with the last laurel he has won in diplomacy on his brow. His first was his memorable reply to the despatch of Sir HAMILTON SEY moun, expressing total disbelief in the proba bility of Russian aggression. Still the tute lary genius of the State, he comes to cheer the drooping spirit of the nation—to prompt his Premier—and, perhaps, from the univer sality of his talents to find some specific for curing Lord PANMURE of the gout, and for propping up the decrepid ricketty reputation of his party. The " mihi plaudo ipse domi " will not be wanting to him while he keeps in Sir CHARLES WOOD at the Admiralty, and Sir G. CORNEWAI.L LEWIS at the Exchequer. Let the people scoff as they please, and the nation de cline as it may, what are hisses and disaster to the solid benefits he confers on the fami lies included in his compact by his admirable tact and his insatiable rapacity? His past successes are beacons to future triumphs, and perhaps he desires nothing at this moment so much as some fresh opportunity of posturing in a new part, and of again appealing to the City of London. For the country the prospect is less cheer ing. We are engaged in a contest which is adding at least twenty millions a year to our national debt—which is arresting all progress —draining the best life blood of our popula tion—yet of which no one can explain the object or foresee the termination. The benefits of Whig rule have at last reached their apogee ; by all means let us erect a triumphal arch, with a figure of Lord JOHN RUSSELL for its summit, holding his despatch to Sir HAMILTON SEYMOUR in one hand, and his new Reform Bill in the other. No satire can be too keen for the nation which, pretending to the title of great, suffers itself to be juggled of its power by tricks it discerns and mounte banks it despises By what confusion and mismanagement it is that the Vienna conferences have come to i naught, we pretend not at this moment to know. Their failure is humiliating. They must have been commenced on insufficient grounds, or they must have miscarried through deplorable blundering. We see only that Austria reaps all the advantages of the war, while still evading participation in it. Her forces occupy the Principalities. For the last two years we have had nothing but assurances from the men in power of her sincerity„,and zeal, without one single act to justify tHem. Is it possible that the Parliament will not now, when it may be almost said that, from the failure of negotiations, we are entering on a new war, demand some distinct explanation of the policy which is to be pursued? If a confederation of nations, inspired by a diabolic cunning, were to determine on the ruin of the British empire, it could take no more effectual means to fulfil its purpose than those which the Administration of "old " old Whigs," with the persistence of fatuity, is following out at this hour. Our expenditure, by admissions on all sides, has become " un controllable;" it is the incontestable verdict of experience that national debt once contracted is never paid off; the force of our army, reduced THE BUDGET. WE stated last week, inlan article written before the Budget was brought forward, that wo thought the first financial operation of Sir Gm= CORNEWALL LEWIS unpromising. We