The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1868-03-03 00:00:00

Baud Can't! &Fs.

TUESDAY, MARCEi 3,188 i.

NOTES OF THE WEEK.

We are often told that they do soh or such a
thing better in Prance, or that the American' have
far outstripped us in cortain political matters. Looking,
however, at the way in whioh high public officinal
are appointed in Prance and the United States, and
in this country, respectively, we do not fear to
challenge comparison la this matter. The great
servants of the State in this country are neither
appointed by the will of a despotic monarch, nor are
they directly elected by the fluctuating voice of the
people. Yet our appointments are as easily and as
readily made as those of a despotic State; and while
we escape all the conhvion of frequently recurring•
Prendential elections, we always have at the head of
affairs the most eligible man for the time being.
When our highest Ministerial offioe becomes vacant,
a kind of tacit election takes place without noise or
excitement, and the man whom at least three-fourths
of the counte7 would have voted into power, under
the actual political circumstances of the day, is
quietly "sent for" by the Soveseigs, and entrusted
with the mines a the aoorowoomoD. Novo wisao
the Amerioans are already excited with preparations
for electing a DOW President, who will not be called
upon to take offioe for a fall twelvc•month, we can
see the ad vantagesof our constitutional practice in the
quiet elevation by popular election of Mr. Disraeli
to the Premiership. Had we bad to fill the place
from which Lord Derby has retired amid the
sympathy of his countrymen, the result could not
posably have been more satisfactory than at prevent,
while it might have been much lees convenient.
It is understood that there are several aspirants to
the Premiership in the Conservative ranks, among
whom are conspicuous Lards Stanley and Cranborns.
Were our highest Otiose filled by popular election,
basted of being bestowed on a system whin* takes
Into account at once public opinion, political con-
venience, eocial courtesy, and a loners] sense of the
fitness cf things, it is e that the present
Ministry might have been broken up by the appoint-
ment of some other person than Mr. Disraeli to
snowed his late chieL That right honou,able gentle-
man, who has the qualifications of great natural
ability, political experience, seniority in years, and
loog-standing service to his party, and who in each
of the Conservative administrations of later times
has held the mood position, oonkl not have been
expected to retain office while a junior was promoted
over his head, and his party and the country would
therefore have lost his services. Lord Stanley,
undoubtedly, has every qualification necessary
for a Prime Minister, and so perhaps has
Lord Croborne ; and the former especially
could have minted an such large support that he
would have been perfectly justified in booming a
candidate were our Prenderebip elective; but as
under our system of Government a claim to this
office assumes a man's qualification for it as superior
to those of any other claimant, even the well.
qualified claimant oourtsonely refrains from smarting
his claims in promos of superior merit Thus
Mr. Disraeli sand. Lord Stanley acted har-
moniously together in reomtnaning the Cabinet,
instead of indulging in rivalry, and the eminent
abilities of neither are lost to the country. Then,
if we look at the way in which the Lord Chancellor.
ship has been filled, on the retirement of Lord
Chelmsford, we shall and the very man appointed
whom every unprejudiced person would have desig-
nated for the post; and Lord Cairns, elevated to M
chief judicial post in the United Kingdom, may feel
himself none the lees chosen by public opinion
because he hse not run the puntlet of a gimi
political pointer election, like an American Chief
Justice MOM The consequent promotion of
fin William Page Wood to a Lord Justioeship of
Appeal in Chancery is • striking simple of
the difference between the British and the
Americee system of patronage. In the United
Skates a President would have been deemed
guilty of treason to his party who should
have given such an appointment to a supporter
of the opposite Me. But here, within a few
dam welmo two ores of Idgh Judicial appoint-
meate—llist of Vios-Clismilor Wood end that of
Mr. Hansen to succeed Mr. Justice Bbee—eonferred
by a Conservative Government upon pronounced
political opponents. We are glad to see such ons
on the pert of the Executive, which will win them
more support than extending patronage to ineligible
members of their ows party. Of coons, other
things being equal, it is natural that the tried sup-
porters of • party should enjoy its Governmental
romp even in non-political appointments; but
it is satuifactory to find that when more eligible can-
didates for such °film are to be fe.nd in the
opposite ranks, a British Cabinet does not heating
to select from them. As for the aphlsoent of Mr.
as Ward Hunt Chancellor of the .g nor, Onal•
people object to it as the elevation of • comparatively
new and untried man to an important pod. Bat to
such objectors we may my, that all men must be
untried until they are tried; and that we can dis-
cover the full comity of a man's abilities only by
trying them in spheres enommlvely higher. Mr.
Ward Hunt may disappoint the expectations of his
oolloraisoyr be may prove as great • incomes as
Lord , Sir Stafford Noriltoote, Lord Cron-
borne, and Mr. Hardy, have been to those who
asked where the Conservatives would find adminis-
trators, when the long innings of the Whigs had
prevented the opportunity of testing most of the
leading men of the opposite party.

The length of time which Mr. Disraeli kook
In reoonstrnoting the Ministry provoked roma/ k ;
and even Mr. Gladstone, in the House of Commons,
on prigi,g night, &owed some impatience at the
motion made by Lord Hbinley for $ farther adjourn.
meat to next Thursday. When the chief of the
Opposition declares, that, "so far as his recollection
it is not usual when the Prime Minister hide
g unfortunately compelled to retire, and when
some few thongs@ have taken plant in the Govern-
ment, to adjourn for so long a period as ten days, it
Ii not to be wondered at that people who know
nothing practically of the difficulty of rearranging a
°shins* should imagine that the new Prime Mflistsr
bee not been able nobly to ware the co-operation
of him wafter. But we believe Um* ii not an
skim of ground for Nob • sappoliias, Ms.
DIP* hp* sail wile no pawnal °monition

f

whatever. All his colleagues have readily acknow.
1 his right the Premiership, and have been
:1Z to
to ominous their services under his leader-
ship. The difllonlly with which the new Premier
has had to contend has been one precisely
analogous to that experienced by Earl Rummell and
Mr. Gledatone after the death of Lord Palmerston;
when, had Parliament been sitting, • suspension of
hasinsas moat have occurred which would have
furnished the very precedent which Mr. Gladstone
does not recsollsot. The late Liberal Ministry loot
its balance by the transference of the Premier-
ship to the House of Lords, and, if we remember
rightly, it took several weeks before all the arrange-
ment' were effected for restoring the equilibrium.
By the retirement of Lord Derby (who, like Lord
Palmerstoe, was a host in himself) the present
Ministry, already scantily represented in the Upper
Chamber, gods itself under an absolute necessity of
strengthening itself in the Lords by some re
unta -
t of offices This is the real difficulty
thao.2anDisraeli has had to meet; and anybody
may MI that by a glance at the list of the Cabinet
as recently constituted. Out of eighteen members,
tin were in the Lower House; and these tea
included, besides the Chancellor of the Exchequer
and the First Lord of the Admiralty, four out of the
Eve principal Secretaries of State. If a simple
transfer of the Premiership bad taken place, and the
Chaooellor of the Exchequer been replaced by a new
appointment, the Commons would have had a
monopoly of important member' of the Cabinet,
as well as of Ministerial debating power.
To restore the balance in the latter respect
it was to appoint • new Lord Chancellor;
and to effect the rime object in the former, one or
two elevations to the peerage bourne necessary. It
I. rather carious, by the way, that the last Liberal
Milistry should have found it difficult to remedy
the weakness of it. representation in the Commons,
while the present Conservative Cabinet has • super-
abundance of strength in the Lower Hoses The
French journals who find a triumph of democracy in
Mr. Disraeli's late elevation, might, if they were
able to ampere the constitution of tbe Russell.
Gladstone ministry with that of the premed Cabinet,
very naturally conclude that the former represented
aristocratic and the latter popular intereeta.

From the amounts mat home by the newspaper
"specials," Abyssinia seems to bee very Moe
aventry whoa you have got into it: but ;getting
Into it with an army seems to be almost as difficult
• job as filling • .*eve with water. Hamar
animals can carry • certain weight • certain distawe
in • day ; but im there is no forego to be procured
on the road, • good pert of their burden must
consist of their own food and water, since they can
eat and drink almost as math ae they can carry.
In fact, the moving of oar army up to Senate puts us
in mind of that old protdern in arithemtic about the
man who bad to lay oats hundred eggs • yard apart,
taking only ow at a time from the starting-point
bat now that this tedious work has been woomplished
and the army appears to have reached a country
when, it can obtain provisions and forage for the
mere outlay of money, a rapid advanne on Ma
may be anticipated, espeoially as we nowfdest
Theodore is there withal the captives. The question
of indemnity is now beginning to be canvassed ; and
as the extraction of money out of au Abyssinian
ruler would be about me profitable a proosediag to
attempt as getting" blood out of • stone," material
guarantees are mooted, and there is talk of opening
op Abyminia for the cultivation of (1) cotton and (2)
Christianity, for so they are usually placed. Goodness
knows how ter this British pinion for land—which
only ditten in degree whether exhibited individually
in reenact) to a few some at home, or nationally
respecting thousands of square miles abroad—may
carry us ; but at present it does not seem very likely
that the public will consent to leave Abyssinia to the
Egyptians in a hurry.
The late application at Bow-street polioesourt
for a warrant against Mr. Eyre, for the murder of
Mr. Gordon, at Masa Bay, in 1845, will be
generally regarded as an ill-advised proceeding on
the part of the Jamaica committee, considering that
the case has been virtuall7 decided in two mutts,
and that a London grand jury refused to find • true
bill against the immediate compassers of Mr.
Gordon's death, General Nelson and Lieut. Brand
The decision of Sir Thomas Henry not to grant a
warrant under such circumstances will be widely ap-
proved. Public opinion, without altogether con-
cloning the Jamaica business, owns to have decided
that no criminal prosecution can properly be founded
upon it; and as any London jury would probably be
of this opinion, it would be • mere waste of time for
the chief police magistrate to spend days in inquiring
into aOM against Mr. Eyre—a waste for which, WO
may be sure, be has no inclination after his recent
protracted labours in Fenian investigations. He
therefore leaves the would-be prosecutors—perhaps
we ought to my persecutors—Mr. Mill and Mr. P.
A. Taylor, to proceed by way of indictment if they
think proper.

It is settled beyond all cavil that the Rev. Mr.
Spoke has been the victim of temporary insanity in
hie late erratic proceeding,. The rev. gentleman's
mind bad been deeply affected for some time par
by the tragic end of his brother, the great African
traveller, and he deliberately formed the wild
design of disappearing without say adequate motive,
-bee ee• ow-10w1.4.34 be be. ow". balltautsalions. Tm
Weal obareeter is said to be =improbable, and has
certainly not been impeached. Under these circum-
stances, • new current of forint, has set in towards
him. At fired he was the object of great public
anxiety and curiosity; then of indignation; but
now sympathy for hie unfortunate affliction seems to
be the dominant feeling; and, having expressed this,
we, in CIOUILDOII with our brother journalists, let the
delicate veil of deuce drop over the whole matter.
Whatever kindly feelings may exist between the
people of Great Britian and the French nation, it is
undeniable that the liveried fatally has never been
very warmly, so to speak, received at the British
Court. There have been civility and politeness, of
come, but there has been no great cordiality. It
may be that the vt of the kind, gentle, and
amiable Empress to the Queen last summer at
Osborne did something towards promoting a more
genial feeling between the two families. Be this as
it may, it is pleasing to hoar that the Queen has
presented the Emperor with a copy of her Jocund
in the Highlands. The Emperor is said to have read
it with greet interest, and the conteut between his own
We of Omar and this homely simple book, mar have
presented itself to him as very striking. True,
the subjects are widely different, the life of the
great conqueror and law-giver demanding a much
loftier style than a narrative of rambles in Soothed;
and, moreover, the Emperor's work was evidently
written with • purpose in every has, and with the
eyes of Europe supposed to be on him; while our
Queen's effusions were originally intended to be
reed only by her family and friends. But "com-
parisons are odious," and, without pressing them
any further, the fact as it stands—the gift by royal
to imperial author—is a very pigment one. Apropos
of the former, it is painful to boos that Priam
Leopold's berth oontanes in a very delicate state;
and this perhaps may have a deadening effect on
Her Majesty's movements during the Load=
carom But it is at leer to learn that
all the danger has passed, thong considerable
weakness remains.

It is °turgidly reported in Paris that this oonnh7
is on the eve of concluding an atiaDoll, offensive and
detesuive, with France and Austria, to counter-
balance the alliance sapposed to exist between
Remy Prussia, and the United Sinks. It is not
at all likely that we shell give up our wholesome
polio, of shi-interventiou, and ally ourselves with
such political adventures se Austria and Prance. The
report may, therefore, be regarded as a canard.