The Press.
London, England, 1857-02-28 00:00:00

"CHINA" DEBATES.

PERSONS who have been in the habit of
supposing that the art of oratory was
fast becoming obsolete, must have been
considerably "awakened" by the scene
which took place in the House of Lords
on Tuesday last. In moving the resolutions
condemnatory of our late proceedings in
China, the Earl of DERBY made his audience
feel that eloquence was still a living motive
power, and not merely a dream of past ages.
There are occasions (now for various reasons
becoming less and less frequent) when the
peril of sonic great principle, or the discus-
sion of some of the fundamental doctrines of
political morality, demands that appeal to the
higher laws of our nature in which the excel-
lence of true oratory, as opposed to morn
acute advocacy, ha.. been held to consist.
Such an occasion was afforded on Tuesday
last, and when we say of Lord DERBY that he
proved himself fully equal to that occasion,
we have uttered the highest praise we know
how to confer.

The chief of his Lordship's arguments are
already before the public. The worthless
character of the register under which the Ai row
claimed to be a British vessel, which was but
so much waste paper ; the fact that the loreha
was no longer under the protection of that
register, even had it not been worthless; and
that, further, she was not of that class of
vessels entitled to its protection, had both
the register itself been good, and its autho-
rity still in force ;—are now clearly aster
tained truths, and we shall not delay our
readers by the discussion of them. But it was

THE PRESS.

by his noble and forcible language on the broad
question of international law and Christian
duty that the Noble Lord reaped the truest
laurels—language, we venture to predict, that
will do more in recovering or maintaining our
prestige among weaker nations than all the
cannon in our arsenals.

There is really such an abundance of argu-
ments, every one fatal to the pretensions of
this miserable vessel, that it is difficult to
choose the most pertinent. Perhaps, hm‘ever,
the maxim laid down by Lord LYsonuasr con-
tains within the shortest compass the most
irrefrogable testimony against her. " Allow
" me," said the Noble Lord, "to lay down a
" principle which no one will successfully con-
" test

" to the subjects of a foreign country, by any
" of your laws, as against the country of which
"he is a subject." That is to say, what should
we think of an American vessel coming up the
Thames, granting to British subjects the right
to hoist the American flag, and then proclaim-
ing that they were withdrawnr from British
jurisdiction ? Yet this is exactly what we have
required the Chinese to submit to.
To those who urge that, if every other point
were abandoned, e should have been justified
in bombarding Canton for the dishonour which
was done to our flag, there is obviously a double
answer In the first place, if every other point
be abandoned, the flag flying ou the lorcha
could not lawfully be looked upon as ours.
But we deny, in the second place, that any dis-
honour was done to it. We challenge proof
that the flag was hauled down. The Imperial
Commissioner states over and over again, in
the most decided language. that all vessels
coming to anchor in the harbour of Canton
lower their colours ; and, as he pithily observes,
colours that were not flying could not have
been hauled down. What ground Lord CRAN-
WORTH could have for saying that this denial
on the part of YEli was an " after thought," we
cannot discover, except in the fatal familiarity
with after-thoughts for which the Learned Lord
is famous. Nor should we have expected that
Lord WENSLEYDALE would have been quite so
reaz!y in adopting the ideas of a Lord Chan
cellor who had got him into one mess already,
and on Tuesday night led him into another.
He, however, repeated the invention on Thurs-
day, though totally unable to give a reason
for it.

Another most amusing feature in the ad-
journed debate was the conduct of the Duke
of ARGYLL. Really this young man's friends
should give him better advice. To see him
contradicting Lord LYNDHURST on a point of
law, and correcting the Bishop of OXFORD OH
a question of argument, reminds us irresisti-
bly of the ambitious and ill-fated frog.
The stress laid by various speakers on the
material aspect of this question was not in
the least exaggerated. The value of our
Chinese trade was increasing yearly, and that
it should have been so is in itself a tolerably
strong argument that our exclusion from the
town of Canton could not have been a very
ruinous restriction. We talk of reducing
the duty upon tea Why, if this wretched
quarrel is suffered to proceed there is not a
poor old woman in the country whose corn-
tbrts will not at once be materially diminished.
Charity begins at home, and so dues mag-
nanimity. Let us consider the physical in-
terests of our poor in England, before we are
so very touchy upon a point of honour in
China.

While we are now writing, the debate is in
progress in the House of Commons. What its
exact issue may be in the shape of a division,
we cannot tell. But we are quite sure that
the debate in both Houses will learo a lasting
stain on the memory of a Government which
is not thereby persuaded to acknowledge its
error, put an end to unprovoked bloodshed,
and confess that the interests of party are,
atter all, subservient to those of humanity.