The Press.
London, England, 1857-02-07 00:00:00

TIIE FALKLAND ISLANDS.

IN another portion of our columns will be
found a letter from Mr. RENNIE, late Governor
of the Falkland Islands, commenting upon our
recommendation of these islands as the site

THE PRESS.

of a penal colony. Mr. RENNIE is, of course,
a gentleman who is well entitled to a hearing
upon this subject, and whom, we own, we
would much rather have for us than against
us. And, as it is the absolute necessity for
transportation, rather than the overwhelming
advantages of any particular locality as a con-
vict settlement, that we have so constantly
insisted on, we should feel no difficulty about
the surrender of the Falkland Islands, were
we once convinced of its justice.
But Mr. RENNIE will excuse us for saying
that we scarcely catch the point of his argu-
ment. Suppose we grant that his letter dis-
sipates to some extent the notion that the
Falkland Islands could ever become the seat
of a lucrative trade. What then? He does
not disprove their fitness for a penal colony.
Allowing its full weight to Capt. SuLivAN's
evidence before the Committee of the House
of Lords, that grazing farms alone, and not
agricultural, could be carried on in these
islands, what are we to think, in the face of
other countries in which the predominance of
grazing land was never found a hindrance to
their efficacy as a penal settlement? We do
not want the convicts to grow rich ; we only
want them not to starve. And we have found
nothing in Governor RENNIE'S letter to make
us consider the latter alternative probable.
There arc, however, other authorities, and
more recent ones, which run directly counter
to Mr. RENNIE'S assertion that nothing but
grazing farms could exist there. These we
have already indicated on a previous occasion,
and shall not, therefore, at present discuss the
probability of the Falklands becoming a corn-
growing country. We would only remind our
readers that it is by no means a settled point
that corn cannot be grown there, and that in
the meantime, with a good supply of beef and
vegetables, the convict's lot would not prove
such a very hard one.
A good supply of these two articles, we still
believe, would be procurable. And here we
must notice a little inconsistency in Governor
ItEstnE's letter. After quoting Captain Sum-
VAN'S evidence to the effect that grazing
farms would be the principal attraction to set-
tlers, he goes on to say that the wild cattle of
the islands could never be collected in herds,
because the pasturage is too poor to maintain
them beyond the proportion of one to twenty-
five acres. What, then, becomes of Captain
SULIVAN'S grazing farms ? But we suspect
that the Captain is in this case nearer the
truth than the Governor. Other accounts tell
us that the natural grass of these islands,
though permitted to run to waste at present,
is capable under cultivation of furnishing a
copious and nutritive supply of fodder. We
can only recommend that the question be
thoroughly investigated. We have, we need
scarcely repeat, no interest in the matter. We
dread nothing so much as that the question
should fall into the hands of interested parties ;
and that the disposal of our felons, than which
no graver question can agitate a civilised com-
munity, should ultimately settle down into a
job.

SECRET MURDERS IN IRELAND.
THE closing article in the January number of
the Dublin Review is a remarkable literary pro-
duction. It deals with the question of perverts
to the Church of Rome, and of " Irish cha-
racter." On the latter subject, under the
artful veil of affected impartiality, its state-
ments are not highly flattering to our Irish
fellow-subjects,—a matter which need not be a
cause of surprise, when the obvious paternity
of the article is observed. The Lutinised
diction, the quotations from the Vulgate, the
prolonged air of pomposity weakening the
effect of innate astuteness and acquired
casuistry, all register the authorship. One
sentence in it, we venture to foretel, will often
be recalled to its writer's recollection. "From

123

" all forms of nationality, preserve us from
" Irish gentility !" A more offensive sentence
has rarely been penned by a public writer, and
it adds to the characteristic rashness of its
ecclesiastical penman, that the organ in which
he ventilates his anti-Irish sneer should be
(falsely) called " The Dublin Review." We ate
not blind admirers of our Irish fellow-subjects.
We have sometimes been pained by their
faults, but their virtues and genius often make
amends for their defects. " Irish gentility" is
the same as seen in Protestants and Catholics,
in the drawing-room, in the hunting-field,—
ay, or in the battle-field. The remark, coming
from so peculiarly placed a personage, might
well have been spared.
It would have been better if the learned
writer had studied the Irish character more
circumspectively. We should much like to
know his opinion on the highly important
question—" Why secret and undetected mur-
" dens have so much increased in Ireland of
" late years?" We may yet state some pro-
blems on this point, of which, for juridical
purposes, it would be very desirable that a
proper solution could be obtained. A harm-
less Italian boy was murdered a few years
since close to Dublin under circumstances of
extraordinary mystery. His body was found
close to the gate of the noble park then pos-
sessed by the Marquis of ELvland now owned
by Lord Justice BLACKBURNE. Detectives failed
to discover the perpetrators of the murder.
Lord NORBURY was shot in the noonday in his
owns demesne. He was not a harsh landlord,
nor was he personally obnoxious. Again the
detectives failed. Lord NORBURY was a Pro-
testant and Tory ; while, on the other hand,
Mr. JAMES SCULLY was a Roman Catholic and
a Liberal. The latter gentleman was noticed
that he shoul I be murdered. He took pre-
cautions. Towards the dusk of a winter after •
noon, one of his own domestics cajoled him,
with diabolical artifice, out of his house.
" The wild fowl, sir, are now down in the pond,
" and you can have a shot at them, sir."
Mr. SCULLY went to the end of his lawn, and
just as he was approaching within range of
the wilds fowl, he fell a corpse, shot at. by two
men in ambush. He was a gentleman of
fortune, the son of DENIS SCULLY, author of
the " Statement of the Penal Laws," which
was a text-book of Catholic grievances. Again,
in that case, the detectives failed. So, also,
in the recent case of Mr. CALLAHAN, a Dublin
attorney (and a Roman Catholic), who went to
take possession of his land. He was killed
in broad daylight on the Queen's highway.
Mrs. KELLY was treated in a similar way,
butchered in broad daylight on a summer
evening, within sight of several men and
women. In both those instances the detec-
tives failed.

And now that the detectives have again
failed in Mr. LtrrLE's terrible case, it seems
desirable that the increase of secret murder
in Ireland should be discussed with more
attention. The subject is a most important
one, and several grave issues are raised. Why,
in the first place, should there be an increase
of secret murders, when the detective force
was never so numerous or so highly organised ?
The justice of the law is oftener now•a-days
frustrated in Ireland than in former times. Is it
that the Executive is weaker, or that criminals
are more numerous ? Or is there connivance
at criminality amongst a class which ought to
be the foremost to give up the criminal? Aro
there other '• harbourers " of murderers be-
sides persons of their own rank?

These are questions which open up a variety
of views, both social and religious. We have
not space to discuss them at present, but on a
future occasion they shall receive the attention
due to them. What we here desire to fix
notice upon, is the fact that "secret'' murders
have fearfully increased in Ireland ; that the
detectives often egregiously fail, and that there
must be some peculiar influences, of a most
remarkable kind, which aid a murderer in
Ireland.

In the meanwhile, it is impossible for
Government to avoid giving some account of
what has been done in the ease of Mr. lArruz.
The subject is well deserving of Parliamentary
explanation.

104 ...111,

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if

124

Hy Lords and Gentlemen,

Arlract6ings zn Varliamcnt.

OPENING OF THE SESSION.
PARLIAMENT was opened on Tuesday last by Royal
Commission.

The Lords Commissioners entered the charn-
her at two p.m., and took their seats upon the
Woolsack. They were,—the Lord Chancellor, the
Eari of Harrowby, the Duke of Argyll, Earl Spencer,
and Lord Stanley of Alderley. The Commons haying
been summoned, and their presence announced, the
LORD CHANCELLOR, after the formal reading of the
Royal Commission authorising the opening of Par-
liament, proceeded to read

HER MAJESTY'S SPEECH.

We are commanded to assure you that her Mnjesty has
great satisfaction in recurring again to the advice and
assistance of her Parliament.

We are commanded by her Majesty to inform you that
difficulties, which arose in regard to some of the provisions
of the Treaty of Paris, delayed the complete execution of
the stipulations of that treaty. Those difficulties have
been overcome in a satisfa3tory manner, and the intentions
of the treaty have been fully maintained.
An insurrectionary movement which took place in Sep-
tember last in the Swiss canton of Neufchatel, for the
purpose of re-establishing in that canton the authority of
the King of Prussia as Prince of Neufchatel, led to serious
differences between his Prussian Majesty and the Swiss
Confederation, threatening at one time to disturb the
general peace of Europe.

But her Majesty commands us to inform you that, in
concert with her august ally the Emperor of the French,
she is endeavouring to bring about an amicable settlement
of the matters in dispute, and her Majesty entertains a
confident expectation that an honourable and satisfactory
arrangement will be concluded.

In consequence of certain discussions which took place
during the Conferences at Paris, and which are recorded
in the protocols that were laid before you, her Majesty and
the Emperor of the French caused communications to be
made to the Government of the King of the Two Sicilies,
for the purpose of inducing him to adopt a course of policy
calculated to avert dangers which might disturb that peace
which had been so recently restored to Europe.
Her Majesty commands us to inform you that the
manner in which those friendly communications were
received by his Sicilian Majesty was such as to lead her
Majesty and the Emperor of the French to discontinue
their diplomatic relations with his Sicilian Majesty, and
they have accordingly withdrawn their missions from the
Court of Naples.

Her Majesty has directed that papers relating to this
subject shall be laid before you.

Her Majesty commands us to inform you that she has
been engaged in negotiations with the Government of the
United States, and also with the Government of Honduras,
which she trusts will be successful in removing all cause
of misunderstanding with respect to Central America.
Her Majesty has concluded a treaty of friendship and
commerce with Siam, which will be laid before you.
Her Majesty commands us to express to you her regret
that the conduct of the Persian Government has led to
hostilities between her Majesty and the Shalt of Persia.
The Persian Government, in defiance of repeated warnings
and in violation of its engagements, has besieged and cap-
tured the important city of Herat.
We are commanded by her Majesty to inform you that
a British naval and military force despatched from Bombay
has taken possession of the Island of Karrak, and of the
town of Bushire, with a view to induce the Shah to accede
to the just demands of her Majesty's Government. Her
Majesty has seen with satisfaction that the naval and mili-
tary forces employed on this occasion have displayed their
accustomed gallantry and spirit.

Her Majesty commands us to inform you that acts of
violence, insults to the British flag, and infraction of
treaty rights, committed by the local Chinese authorities
at Canton, and a pertinacious refusal of redress, have
rendered it necessary for her Majesty's officers in China
to have recourse to measures of force to obtain satisfac•
tion.

Those measures had, up to the date of the last
accounts, been taken with great forbearance, but with
signal success as regards the conflicts to which they
had led.

We are commautlel to inform you that her 3lnjesty
trusts that the Government of Pekin will see the propriety
of affording the satisfaction demanded) and of faithfully
fulfilling its treaty engagements.

• A full report of the noble earls speech will be fount is the
Supplement.

SATURDAY,

approval of the principal Governments of Europe.
With regard to the Persian war, it was very far from
being the groundless quarrel which the public
seemed quite to believe. The capture of Herat, a
city of much importance, and surrounded by a ter-
ritory of unexampled fertility, was one which could
not be regarded with indifference when such a con-
quest was in direct violation of previous agreements
with this country, and threatened at once the neutra-
lity and independence of Atighanistan, both of which
were necessary to the security of our Indian empire.
The noble earl then entered into some detail of the
chief incidents which led to a declaration of war, and
in the course of which he read a despatch addressed
to the Persian Government, dated July 11, com-
plaining of the advance upon Herat in violation of
the agreement, and to which on September 25th an
unsatisfactory reply was received. On that day the
order for the expedition to the Gulf was despatched
to Bombay, and on the 10th October Lord Clarendon
replied to the Persian note, threatening hostilities if
redress for the grievances complained of were not
granted. On the Ist of November war against
Persia was proclaimed. The conduct of Russia in
the present dispute had been" frank and friendly "

I believe the Russian Government and the whole of the
Russian people are under the belief that their destiny is to
go forward, to conquer, and to hold new territory ; but I
believe, as the noble lord has said, that there is no disposi.
tion whatever upon the part of the Russian Government to
go to war with us on this question. Our communications
with the Russian Government have been frank and friendly.
I believe we will not go to war, and that it is the interest of
both that a neutral and independent country should form
a division between the two territories.

He regretted much to hear the terms in which Lord
Derby had spoken of the conduct of the English
authorities in China. The course which had been
taken there was one which had only been resorted to
when all other steps failed—when, in fact, the refusal
of the Chinese to hold communication with our offi-
cials had left the latter no other remedy. Non-access
to the authorities of Canton had been the origin of
the quarrel. The course pursued by the British
authorities had been just and necessary, and he had
no doubt but that we should ultimately obtain our
demands.

Earl GREY said he could not characterise the war
with Persia as other than unjust and impolitic.
Upon the showing of the Government, exhibited in
the proclamation of war by the Governor-General on
the Ist of November, he was prepared to prove the
war indefensible. The violation of a, agreement
existing between this country and Persia was made
the ground for a war, but he would ask their lord-
ships whether a war would always be vindicated
upon the ground that an engagement had been
broken ?

The whole discussion must turn upon the nature of
the agreement. Its substance is, that Persia engages not
to invade Herat. Now, I want to know what principle of
the law of nations authorises one independent country to
take upon itself to dictate to another what course it shall
pursue in its relations with other States? Persia might
have had a legitimate cause of quarrel with her neighbour.
I saw it stated at a public meeting the other day by a
zealous missionary who has laboured long and faithfully in
those countries that the original ground of dispute between
Persia and Herat some years ago was, that the people of
the latter place, with the connivance of their Government,
persisted in making plundering excursions into the Per-
sian territory for the purpose of carrying off its inhabitants
and selling them as slaves. If that be so, nobody can
doubt that such outrages constitute the most valid excuse
for war. I am quite ignorant of the facts of the case on
this point; but it may be that good cause for war against
Herat has been given to Persia; and I totally deny that
we have any right to dictate to independent States in what
manner they shall vindicate their rights, and punish the
invasion of them by their neighbours.
Yet such, in fact, was the right claimed by this
country in the quarrel between Persia and Herat,
without our Government even taking the trouble to
ascertain which was in the wrong. If it was the
bugbear of Russian influence which our Government
professed to dread, the late war showed to every man
of sense the groundlessness of such a plea. But
granted that a Russian invasion of India was not far
distant, the very policy we were following out was
just that to hasten such an event :
If you are afraid that Russia will wield against you the
power of Central Asia, what is the first thing you ought to
endeavour to secure? Why, you should first of all be on
good terms with Persia; you should endeavour to make
Persia so strong and powerful that it would not be likely to
WI under Russian ascendancy. Now, let any man tell me
whether the war which we have now commenced is not
calculated in every way to play the game of Russia, not of
England, and to create a state of things in Persia favour.
able to those designs which you so gratuitously impute to
the Czar. You want to be on good terms with Persia. Are
you likely to conduce to this object when you arrogantly
claim a right which you would never dream of insisting on
in the case of any European power—when you say that
Persia shall not pursue, without your permission, that
policy which she thinks fit with regard to her near neigh-
bours ? Is it likely to promote good feeling between Eng-
land and Persia when, without any proper proclamation of
war, you invade her country, slaughter her troops while


FEBRUARY 7, 1857.

defending their own homes, and take possession of peace-
able cities? I say that those proceedings of the English
Government at Ilushire will not be forgotten for many
generations, and that by what you have done you have
alienated Persia from you probably for ever.
Russia exercised an undeniable influence over Persia,
it was true; but was our present policy such as
could weaken that influence ?

If you, with your gigantic power, attack that weak
country, what resource has she? She must, willingly or
unwillingly, throw herself into the arms of Russia; and
thus you are accomplishing that which you believe to be
the aim of the Russian Government and people. If Persia
is compelled, either directly or indirectly, to admit Russian
ascendancy—if she is driven to employ Russian officers to
command her troops, and to avail herself of Russian skill
and discipline—she will undoubtedly very soon be in the
position of the horse in the fable, who applied to man to
assist him against his adversary. Again I say, then, that
it is for our interest to make Persia strong and powerful.
Does it conduce to that object when you lay waste her ter-
ritory, slaughter her soldiers, and;destroy the small amount
of regular force which she possesses ?
In the present case war had been declared under
remarkable circumstances, and there was no ques-
tion but that we were the real aggressors. The noble
earl then alluded to the constitutional phase of the
question :
I find that the proclamation was dated on the Ist of
November, and that the expedition sailed from Bombay
on the Ulth of the same month; and, as both those
measures were ordered from home, it is obvious that the
order to invade Persia must have 'been sent from this
country not later than the middle of September. I say,
then, that when her Majesty's Government determined
on making war with Persia and sent out those orders, it
was their bounden duty at the same time to advise the
Crown to call Parliament together and to appeal in the
usual form to Parliament for support. (" Hear, hear!"
from the Opposition.)
If Ministers sought to evade responsibility because
they had made no formal declaration of war
this was far from excusing them, and if Parliament
was to maintain its authority over the advisers of
the Crown it must not pass over this omission.
Lord Grey concluded by moving an amendment,
framed without communication with any member of
the house, to the effect that it was the duty of her
Majesty's advisers to summon Parliament together
and inform them of the state of affairs with Persia
before declaring war.
Lord GRANVILLE replied, and defended the course
which the Government had taken in the negotiations
with Persia. With respect t 9 the relative position
of Russia towards India, Lord Granville said :
Now, my lords, T, for one, am not inclined to attach
any exaggerated importance to the probability of the
Russian Government making formidable expeditions of
an aggressive character a long way from their own domi-
nions. I believe that at the present moment—and lam
more justified than most other persons in saying this—it
is not the intention of the Russian Government to take
any such steps, and that their anxious desire is that this
matter should be arranged as speedily as possible. But
this does not affect the question of future contingencies.

Ile justified by the precedents of the Affghan and
Chinese wars the declaration of war through the
Governor-General cf India, and maintained that
at the close of last session a direct intima-
tion to Parliament of the probability of a
Persian war was made by Mr. Vernon Smith.
Though her Majesty's Government were quite pre-
pared to meet Earl Grey upon any question he
might raise, he trusted that the noble earl was not
serious in pressing his amendment at the present
juncture.

Lord BROUGHAM hoped we had not been picking
quarrels for the sake of !advantages therefrom.
With respect to Europe, he condemned the notion of
it being our vocation "to plant Parliaments all over
Europe." His lordship then spoke strongly against the
further continuance of the income tax. In 1816 he,
in conjunction with Mr. Baring, made a reduction of
6,000,000/. or 8,000,0001. in the amount of the in-
come tax, upon which the Chancellor of the Exche-
pier withdrew his estimates and framed new ones,
on the principle of cutting his coat according to the
cloth. His lordship then reverted to the necessity
for a legal reform, especially in those laws relating
to secondary punishments.
The LORD CHANCELLOR agreed with what had fallen
from the noble and learned lord as to the necessity
for law reform. He had himself given notice that
evening of his intention to bring forward at an early
period three bills for the purpose of amending the
laws relating to marriage and divorce, testamentary
jurisdiction, and ecclesiastical law. In the other
house a bill would also be brought in to meet those
crimes of breach of trust such as had lately shocked
the public confidence. His lordship concluded after
briefly referring to bills for the registration, for the
transfer of land, for the simplification of the law
with regard to mortgages, and for the consolidation
of the statute law, to which the Government in-
tended directing their earliest attention, and among
others a bill which would be brought in by Sir George
Grey, haying peculiar reference to secondary punish-

THE PRESS.

Their lordships then divided upon the Address
and the amendment, when the numbers were :
For the Address, contents
Not contents
Majority for the Government

HOUSE OF COMMONS.—TuEsDAv.
NEW MEMBERS.

The following noblemen and gentlemen took the
oaths and their seats !--Mr. B. Cochrane, for Lanark-
shire, in the room of Mr. Lockhart, deceased ; Lord
Henniker, for East Suffolk, in the room of Sir E.
Gooch, deceased ; Lord Castlerosse, for Kerry, on
his appointment as Comptroller of her Majesty's
Household ; and Mr. Paget, for Nottingham, in the
room of Mr. Strutt, raised to the peerage.