The Press. — London, England, 1855-10-06 00:00:00

942 -~•• ~ ~. THE DUKE OF SOMERSET AND HIS VISITORS. IT has often been rematked that great events in history, like the dints of nature, are simultaneous. Revolitioitit in varidtts patti of Europe, and stottni diftlii•eht places, occur at the same tide. this general law has been illustrated in Lcindon withia last few days. The Redan was stormed by Colonel WINDHAM and his brave associates about the same time that the Duke of SOMERSET'S house was attacked by Mr. " A." HAMILTON. In the assault on Sebastopol, for want of supports, the brave British troops had to retire, and Mr. A. HAMILTON found himself in a similar plight. He had overcome the flunkey's re sistance at the door, and had victoriously penetrated into the Duke's room, and there a dreadful struggle commenced, which has, as in former days the penny a-liners used to write, " been bruited on the wings of fame by " the powers of British journalism." The struggle, it seems, though short was decisive. The Duke of SOMERSET was ac quainted with " a Mr. Hamilton," but it does not appear that his majestic Grace was cogni_ sant of a human entity designated as Mr. " A." Hamilton. Our readers will observe that his Grace has taken a distinction between the names of Hamilton with a great and a little "A " before them. The Duke was mistaken, and commanded his adversary to beat a re treat, which his antagonist was compelled to do ; but he took refuge in the columns of journalism. He made a flank march to the Times, and requested the aid of the broadsheet battery against the explosions of the Somer set field-works in the neighbourhood of St. James's. it Pity i s that no Napier or Alison has yet been found to record the dire struggle be tween the houses of " Seymour " without any " A," and of Hamilton with the indefinite article preceding it. FIELDING has burlesqued HOMER in his account of a grand contest in a churchyard, where Molly Seagrim was one of the Amazons, and where skulls and thigh bones were the ammunition. In the present instance, the warlike qualities of Major GREEN were put in requisition by Mr. "A." HAMILTON. The martial prowess of the Gallant Major we do not dispute. His demeanour in the struggle with the chief of the Seymours shows that he belonged to the family of " Jolly Green ;" for no one without such a verdant pedigree could expect that a Seymour without an "a" would condescend to fight a Hamilton with a capital one. It was " rayther" absurd to suppose that a duel must result because a duke was not very polite to "a" Mr. Hamilton. To be serious, we must say that, in our opinion, such ridiculous matters as the mis understanding between his Grace of Somerset, and Mr. HAMILTON of the " National Club," ought not to be recorded by journalism. The fame of Bishop BURNET, with his acknow ledged talents, has not yet recovered from the ridicule poured upon "P. P., Clerk of the " Parish," by the wits of his " own times." British journalism might be reduced to a " Little Pedlington " level, if newspapers gave insertion to trumpery matters, which can have no interest to the general public except for the great names of the personages figuring in them. We have an opinion that such matters are un worthy of general publicity. We must, therefore, decline to discuss the small proportions of the question between the Seymours and Hamiltons. It is a rule of English society that a visit from a perfect stranger ought first be announced by the statement in writing of his object. "Letters "of introduction," or notes soliciting "an interview," are the established, and we must say the natural, modes in such cases. If such a regular system did not prevail, any one would be liable to the intrusion of nonde script people with vague purposes and wild projects. The degree of courtesy with which such persons should be put aside is, of course, an affair of personal manners, and as such we think beyond the jurisdiction of journalists. THE PRESS. " Madam," said the nobleman known as the " proud Duke of SOMERSET," when his second wife slapped him on the back, " my " first wife wag it Niiisk; and she would never " hate tt.lien inch a - liberty." Possibly thb I tt presen Duke ilitain4 ittinewhat of his anolt‘ tor's lo sentiiiienteL i Pti the other hand, * e must re embef that " Hamilton "is nearly as distinaihed I tip.cub it 4 " Seymour," and that a meifiber of the " national Club " code scarcely be ignorant It the correct usages of polite society. But we cannot discuSs such " Pedlington " questions. Let dukes, and dandies, and poli tical dilettanti, settle their affairs as they please without the aid of journalism. INDIAN COMPLI CATIONS. THE plot in India appears to be thickening, and fresh complications would seem by the last mail to be arising on every side ; yet in none of the cases given does it appear to us that the difficulty might not have been very easily avoided by a little manage ment on the part of the Indian Government. Take, for instance, the insurrection of the Santals—the first on the list. It is now clear from the Indian papers that however the feelings of these people may have been out raged by the railway officials, their original exasperation against the Government was caused by an enormous increase on their former land tax, and by the introduction into their district of the oppressive excise on salt. Their land tax had, it seems, been raised from two to twelve annas the begah, or exactly six fold, while the salt excise levies a duty of six teen hundred per cent., ad valorem, on the first necessary of life—a duty which had among the Santals been previously unknown. The salt excise further brings with it a system of police visitation, with a view to prevent illicit impor tation or manufacture, which even those long accustomed to it feel to be vexatious to the very last degree. if the Government of India will deal with people accustomed to the highest degree of freedom in a manner so insensate, what can they expect but that resistance would be the result? It ought to be triumph enough for any reasonable rulers to engage such tribes to settle down peacefully in their hills without reference to the amount of revenue they paid. This would in any case he too trifling in a fiscal sense to be worth considering, while the bringing them into habits of civilisation was an object that should have been deemed beyond all price. To subject them to the revenue screw was to insure their eventually quarrelling with us and taking to their old courses and their old haunts. It is the same precisely with the semi-barbarous tribes on our north-west frontier. The most serious outbreak that occurred there arose in conse quence of the Government's attempt to impose , upon them this very excise of salt, and all the other perpetually-recurring disturbances in the same quarter have demands by our com missioners for land tax at the bottom of them —land tax which they cannot obtain. The Go vernment organs, to be sure, allege that no Government can be carried on without taxa• tion, and that under the despotic system it is not for the people to decide what taxes shall and what shall not be paid. We grant the premises, but refuse assent to the deduction from them which these organs make. A Go vernment, though right in respect to the ab stract principle, may be entirely wrong in its application of it, and this is precisely the case with the Indian Government in all these in stances. It applies the revenue screw to races of wild hillmen, people who in every quarter of the globe are most impatient of taxation of any kind, and most ready to resent it. It thus alienates the allegiance of hardy mountaineers, who, under a better system, might be brought to afford us aid in men more valuable ten times than any that could be got from them in money. To sum up all, it wastes in useless conflicts with them ten times the amount that, if expended judiciously within their dis tricts, would have made them our most peace ful and prosperous subjects, as well as the SATURDAY, most devoted to our rule. Surely this latter were a more profitable as well as more Chris tian-like Ind humane pity" than dealing with them in a manner *filch must render them for ever enemies to tit, ati4 *hich brutalises and infuriates them td the list degree. To be able to jdclo ate clearly of the effectbf inch injudieio taxation in India, let uti flee *hat *ouiti be result of similar iirocebdittO towurdi ntifil6 yes by the Govern ment it home. How should we like an ad valorem duty of sixteen hundred per cent. on tea for instance, and a sudden increase of the land tax sixfold ? How many hours would a Ministry last that brought forth such a pro- ject ; or how many days would a Parliament last that sanctioned it? If then even John Bull's placid nature would be roused to resent ment by such unheard-of proceedings, are we to be astonished that they have succeeded in awakening all the savage passions of the semi barbarous Santals? For these we are no apologists ; they have appealed to the sword. for the redress of their grievances, and by the sword they must be put down. But guilty though they be, we think those not less guilty whose wanton abuse of power has brought the insurrection about. We do trust, therefore, that no time will be lost after Parliament shall have assembled in ascertaining who it is that has been the real cause of all this mischief by suddenly increasing the Santal land tax six fold and introducing into their hills the galling and most oppressive excise on salt. And we further hope that even at this eleventh hour the Board of Control will do its duty by ren dering such vagaries of power impossible in all times to come. It will not do to be per petually staking the Crown of India in contests for farthings with the Monund and Swat tribes and the naked Santals. NATIONAL THANKSGIVINGS. IT is a delicate question to what extent the Christian pulpit may be legitimately used for the purpose of proclaiming triumph over an enemy. With thanksgiving for the success of our arms, there should always be blended a feeling of humiliation at the dire deeds which war necessitates, and very fervent prayer that the occasion for it may soon cease. A truly Christian temper might even be moved to com passion by the sufferings of our foe, and would avoid expressions likely to embitter the contest. Such phrases as the " Northern tyrant " and the " ambitious despot," do not seen happily chosen for pulpit use. One of the most energetic discourses of Sunday last was delivered by the Rev. TEMPLE FRERE, M.A , at the morning service in Westminster Abbey. He went even beyond the Premier in expressing "satisfaction" at the slaughter and suffering of the enemy. After expressing his hope that He who had fought for us, " would " bend the necks of those who had provoked " this war," and after dwelling on the dis comfiture of the long-cherished schemes and " blasphemous pretensions "of the Czar, the preacher spoke of the great victory of the Bth of September : His numerous, carefully-collected, and expensively ap pointed fleet of the south was destroyed. Nay, worse. His fleet had not suffered defeat in open manly encounter with an antagonist, where, if the power was overmatched, the prowess might be equal ; but his boasted monsters of the deep melted like wax and disappeared like smoke; they were sunk in their own waters and annihilated by an act of self destruction—they perished by the most con- temptible of deaths, a suicidal execution. Even the north fleet only escaped by seeking disgraceful shelter and shrinking from fulfilling the purposes for which it had been stored, armed, and manned. It remained idle and shame-smitten, without capacity to protect their commerce from ruin and their merchant princes from bankruptcy. Turning from his ships to the animated, human, intel lectual beings over whom he was destined to rule, and whom it should be his study to preserve in peace and prosperity, what did we see? Why, in respect of their bodies, they had been led or rather driven to the slaughter, and immolated by thousands and tens of thousands as victims of his unrighteous ambition, whilst those who had the misfortune—for such it was—to escape, remained degraded, dishonoured, and disgraced. The marked emphasis with which we are assured the preacher dwelt on the " misfor tune " of the enemy who succeeded in escap ing, supplies a presumption that he at least was not satisfied with " the immolation of the " thousands and tens of thousands " who perished in the conflict. Setting aside all ILI