The Press.
London, England, 1858-10-30 00:00:00

In his speech at Warminster, Mr. SIDNEY HERBERT travelled
over much of the same ground that we have recently visited
in company with so many noble and scientific orators. He
commended works of fiction to the labouring man, spoke like
Lord WODEHOUSE of the influence of newspapers, and agreed with
Mr. BRIGHT in thinking that newspaper articles should no longer
be anonymous. This latter is a question upon which we ourselves
entertain no very decided theory. But we think this, that the public is
not yet ripe for the change. Something would be gained by it, no doubt,
in a literary point of view, for it would operate as a check upon careless
composition. But we see no reason to suppose that it would act as any
check upon misrepresentation. The publicity of the Bar does not have they
effect ; and what the barrister is to his client, that is the
individual journalist to those in whose interest his journal is
conducted. Recognizing, therefore, in the journalist a species of
advocate, it is foolish to expect from him the serene impartiality
of the judge. In fact, if people generally did so, his profession would be
at an end. No artificial means, therefore, of restraining him within bounds
of which his work is in the nature of things incapable, can result in aught
but disappointment. We must also recollect that, after all, the " misrepre-
sentations" that may happen to be expressed in a leading article are
seldom the work of the individual writer. He writes according to his
instructions. If the end in view be in accordance with his own principles,
that is enough. He can no more investigate the evidence for himself than
a barrister can do the work of an attorney. Under these circumstances we
think that, in England at least, the benefit accruing to the public from the
proposed alteration would not compensate for the inconvenience inflicted
on the writer. The journalist is not here what he is in France. When
public opinion shall have made him so, it will be time enough to discuss
this question.

The only other public address of the week is Lord JOHN RUSSELL.,:,
at Ardwick, reported in the daily papers of last Monday. His Lordship
spoke sensibly on the subject of ragged-schools, the value of which is, we
believe, being more fully recognized every day. With ragged-schools,
reformatories, and a penal reformatory, which we believe it is contem-
plated to establish at Parkhurst, our machinery ought to be nearly com-
plete. On one point to which his Lordship made allusion we believe he
was misinformed. The paper-bag manufacture is prosecuted, we believe,
in London schools as well as country ones. It certainly is so in one,
namely, Mr. DRIVER'S, in Belvidere-crescent.

From Weedon to Woolwich is a step that our facetious friends who
form the Commission of Inquiry into the Army Clothing System have
probably taken with pleasure. It enlarges the sphere of their operation,
supplies them with more vaned materials to whet their wit upon, and
enables them to court popular applause from a more conspicuous platform.
It is, no doubt, in spite of Mr. SELFE S protestations, a highly delightful
thing to be a Commissioner for the first time. To crack one's little jokes
about routine and red tape with a certainty that they will not be lost, to ex-
tend one's mimic shield over oppressed virtue, and couch one's bristling bul-
rush against titled corruption, is a delicious, though apparently a somewhat
intoxicating pleasure. Mr. SELFE and his colleagues have got a certain
plain duty before them, but for the life of them they can't stick to it. First
the Militia must come under their patronage, and a fine opportunity of
tickling the British citizen in his most sensitive part must not be thrown
away. The Militia receive the cast-off clothes of the Line ! Horrible ! say
the Commissioners. They would have us to know, forsooth, that the

Militia are highly respectable. The Militia represent a great and
important class. And more of the same twaddle. Now, no one conversant
with the columns of THE PRESS can doubt our sympathy with the
Militia, whose steady champion we have been for the last three years. But
we really think the War-office, however fast bound in tapen fetter is
competent to settle this question. And as no complaints have been heard
from the Militia themselves, we think SELFE and Co. might just as well
have kept its remarks to itself. The same holds good of Mr. TURNER'S
pompous offer of protection to gentlemen who complained of their salaries—
" I will make the King do you grace : I will leer upon him as he comes
by." And we only hope Messrs. GRANT and MORRIS may find they fare
better than Justice Shallow did. The Clothing Colonel, of course,
formed a subject for satire that these eminent wits could not be expected
to leave untouched. And possibly if they had succeeded in making
a single good joke among them during the whole time they have been
sitting we might have pardoned the irrelevancy of it. But they have not.
They wish to prove themselves jaunty men of wit and
nature and position alike point to a very different estimate of themselves.
and their duties. ‘. This merriment of parsons," said old JOHNSON, "Is
mighty offensive." Would he had been a listener in the IVeedon and
'Woolwich Committee rooms ! pleasure, when

The late foul attempt at assassination in the North of Ireland is a
matter of more serious import than may at first sight appear. The murder
of a gentleman in cold blood before the eyes of his wife and daughter is so
horrible in itself, that our readers may, perhaps, he at a loss to under-
stand our meaning. Unhappily it is too easily. explained. We have reason
for believing that the reappearance of a crime, for some years hoped
to be extinct, may but too probably be only the beginning of a series.
We are assured on most reliable evidence that the revival of the
secret societies under the management of the
mined upon by the rulers of the Romish Church, and in the West is
already in course of organization. The priests having found out that the
defiant and disloyal tone adopted in Cardinal Wismot's progress is a
complete failure, have resolved upon active measures. Anything is better
Priests is already deter-
than contempt. If au omission to drink the Queen's health provokes