The Press.
London, England, 1857-11-21 00:00:00

THE PRESS, NOVEMBER 21, 1857.

beforehand, in his last circular to the European I
Courts ; and since tben the Commissioners of Austria
and Turkey at Bucharest have declared the Divans
rebellious and revolutionary for thus fulfilling the
behests of the Congress of Paris and the firman of
the Sultan. The poor Moldo-Wallachians are at
their wits' ends. It is rumoured that the Anglo-
Austrian alliance is bringing forth its fruits, and that
the wishes of the Principalities will be quietly
burked at Vienna and London. Here we can
hardly credit such an act on the part of Lord
Pahnerston, the champion of independence and
the supporter of constitutional principles.
Certain it is that Austria blusters more than
ever, Russia throws cold• water on anything un-
orthodox, while the English representative joins
in the demand of his colleagues, that the Divans,
having said their say, should now apply themselves
to the reform of their internal administration, and
supply the Commissioners with the materials and
report which they were sent hero to collect and
frame. The Divans in vain protest that they cannot
define the form or extent of their administration and
its powers, until assured of the regime under which
they are to be administered, as each and every
department must necessarily be adapted to suit the
circumstance of a union of the provinces under one
head—varying greatly in the case of a foreign prince
from that of an indigenous one, but differing totally
where the regime of the Hospodars or the abuses of
the present are to be continued. The Commissioners
pooh-pooh the idea, and leave the Divans to their
choice—either to frame laws for any eventuality and
without any basis, or to run the risk of being declared
contumacious and rebellious. If the Divans remain
firm, and request a solution to their wishes as to
their future form of government before proceeding
further, you will find the foregoing anathema
launched against them—foremost in the field per-
fidious Albion. If the Divans succumb, the popula-
tions will find their wishes shelved. A sort of
hubble-bubble piece of replatrage cooked up, com-
prising all the old abuses with a few novelties—a
sort of administration that is neither fish, flesh, fowl,
nor yet good red-herring, but a strong incentive to
revolution, and a stepping-stone to dear and well-
beloved Austria, which holds a finger ready to pull
the chestnuts out of the fire.

The Divans have already incurred the displeasure
of the High European Commission—as it loves to be
styled—by not forwarding to them copies of all their
proceedino. These powers are indebted to the
reports of their friends or of the papers for what passes
in the Assemblies—nit one of their dragomans being
able to st,!nograph or make an abridged report of
the sittings of the Divans.
Meantime, the Commission has formed itself into
sections to get up Justice, Finance, Education, dcz. ;
and I do believe that this chapter of their protocols
will not fall much short of some of the others in
eliciting the mirth of the searching spirits of the
House of Commons, when the herculean labours of
our Commission are laid upon the table.

Va!eat res lathers, si me
Palma negate macrum, donate reducit opimum.
The acts of the other Commissions connected with
the Danube will also have to be strictly scrutinised
by those who do not wish to see us made the tools
and laughing-stocks of continental powers. Austria,
after having succeeded in packing the River Com-
mission, has also managed to pass resolutions
affecting the navigation of the Danube that render
the freedom of passage perfectly illusory. Vessels
are to be boarded and searched ad libitum, their
cargoes entered for a given port, and a strict prohi-
bition against shipping any from and to intermediate
ports on the Danube. In short, the so-called coast-
ing trade of the stream and the passenger traffic is
to be confined to riverain States, or, in other words,
to remain a monopoly of the Danubian Austrian
Steam Navigation Company. This is but one speci-
men of Austrian free-navigation ideas, and probably
does not belong to " the impediments, of whatever
nature they may be," that the River Commission
was ordered to remove in Art. xvii. Prot. 16 of the
Congress of Paris. The Porte is said to have already
attached his signature to this act of the River Com-
mission, which Austria is no doubt anxious to have
signed, sealed, and delivered at any price. Surely
this undue haste is not in accordance with the spirit
if it be with the letter of the Treaty of Paris. Your
columns may yet induce our rulers to pause ere they
commit themselves by a participation in such a
discreditable transaction.