The Press.
London, England, 1858-11-13 00:00:00

THE PRESS, NOVEMBER 13, 1858.

only cause of it whiih they are qualified to comprehend—viz., intoxica-
. .IChe second point we would impress upon all chivalrously-inclined
Alemen is this—to take very good care that, if they interfere at all,
, shall be Witnesses on the spot able and willing to come forward and
borate the true version of the story. In the absence of such testi-
ly the magistrate has no option, and the prisoner cannot blame him
the result which a little forethought on his own part might have pre-
ited. We trust our hint may be attended to. If the public were more
careful of themselves, the police would be more careful of them, and men's
Away and character no longer lie at the mercy of a class of men who,
-lever their natural virtues, cannot be expected to rise superior to
Iptations to which even gentlemen of honour and position too frequently
succumb.

We hesitate to pronounce an opinion upon the conduct of the paro-
authorities of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields until the facts are more
before us. But certainly the statement laid before the Bishop of
LONDON by Mr. STurrros on Wednesday last seems to promise one of
those revelations which have brought the names of guardians, church-
-ardens, et hoc genus omne, into sadly bad odour with the public. The
leged facts admit of being very briefly stated. Some years ago, when the
turchyard at Charing-cross was closed, some of the bodies therein buried
removed to a cemetery at Camden Town. which was henceforth to
:e as the burying-ground for the parish. The march of improvement,
towever, has followed even the dead to their last resting-place. The
metery is now so surrounded with houses that it has to be dis-
-1; and the authorities of the parish are anxious again to move on the
corpses interred there as the Red Indian is moved on by the advance of
*yilization, and to let the soil of the cemetery for building purposes.
yen now the act of desecration has commenced, and the exhumation of
bodies has been proceeded with under circumstances of great indecency
impiety. The result of the application to the Bishop is that the latter
undertaken to request the pre?er people to abstain from further pro-
ceedings till the whole case has been heard before Dr. TRAVERS Twiss,
Judge of the Consistory Court. We don't wish to prejudge this case
the least, but we can only say that if half Mr. SmErros's allegations
out to be true the offenders in the case are deserving of severe punish-
tt for their evasion of the requirements of the law, to say nothing of
mode in which their late proceedings have been carried on.

It was Sir CUARLES TREVELYAN, if we mistake not, who first suggested

adoption of the Roman characters to express the various sounds de-
signated by the native alphabets at present in use throughout India. The
proposition is so unprecedented, and even romantic, that the imagination
once enlisted in its favour, while the judgment, though more slowly,
Itimately arrives at the same conclusion. Since the invention of letters
has not entered into the heart of man to devise any machinery in refe-

ice to human speech so entirely original in itself, or pregnant with such
great results. Of the three branches into which the human race was ori-
,:aally divided, the Western branch made to itself a set of characters re-
markable for their simplicity and severe adaptation to the end in view.
Eastern, indolent and imaginative, chose a flowing picturesque charac-
, of exceeding beauty, but difficult of formation, and not easy of recog-
ation. Careless or forgetful of the real purpose of these symbols, they
exercised their ingenuity in converting them into objects of art rather than
f general utility. Learning, therefore, became a possible attainment for
very small section of the community, who had leisure to prosecute
.adies impeded by artificial obstructions. The great mass of the people
remained illiterate, and consequently ignorant, and in that state became
, easy prey to the cupidity and ambition of the lettered class.
The natural result is the want of a popular literature
after the lapse of so many centuries of comparative refinement.
i‘ hatever literature there is, is of a barren, lifeless, speculative character,
occasionally diverging into flowing platitudes. It is now proposed to g
itahty to this ancient tongue, and to bestow upon one hundred and fi
awns of human beings the advantages enjoyed by their brethren in the
1% est. Truly, a grand and noble conception, and one that, judiciously
carried out, will assuredly have the effect of imparting a genuine and
aolesome civilization to the teeming population of our Indian empire.
And this effect will be produced far more rapidly than the British
public may be disposed to imagine. At first, the introduction of the
Doman characters will probably be viewed with some suspicion, but this
Will gradually wear off, when no evil consequences are found to ensue,
and the temptations of office and employment will soon overcome all
ether considerations. An acquaintance with the European alphabet will
also greatly facilitate the acquirement of European languages and litera-
ire, and thus lead to the diffusion of sound useful knowledge throughout
- classes in the empire. The reply which the article in the Times has
elicited from Mr. JAluurr, though interesting in a philological point of
view, does not seem to contain any valid reasons for abandoning the
proposed change. It shows that the native alphabet is simpler than was
ipposed, but it does not show that the substitution of the Roman one
could not be a great improvement.

The Clothing Commissioners arc still proceeding with their labours.
Saturday last Mr. TURNER signalized himself by some inquisitorial
observations addressed to Quartermaster TAYIAM on the subject of his
seeping racehorses ; though what right the Commissioners have to pry
to any
one's private life is more than we can tell. The statement made
that day,
to the effect that our men borrowed great-coats from the

1109

French in the Crimea, was subsequently rebutted by Mr. GORDON, who said
he knew the French got much more from us than we did from them. On
Monday some statements were put forward by Mr. HOWELL and Mr. SIM,
Government broker, in relation to the purchase of timber, tending to
exculpate the War-office at the expense of the firm of Messrs. Rola and
BROCKLEBANK, who, it was said, had written to offer a cargo of timber to
the Government, which had not yet arrived in this country. This excuse,
however, for the neglect of the department in not inspecting what proved
to be first-rate wood, and was sold elsewhere at ss. a load more than the
Government was asked to pay, was completely upset by the evidence of
Mr. ROLT on Wednesday, who proved that the timber was actually lying
in the docks at the time. So that another pompous dictum of the Coin-
missioners about the honour of commercial men has totally missed its
aim. We have yet to hear Mr. Sim's explanation of his extraordinary
assertion last Monday. But if this is a sample of the practices by which
those interested in the system of brokerage are endeavouring to bolster it
up, we predict that this pretty bantling of Lord PANMURE will not have a
very long lease of existence. During Wednesday's investigation nothing
very objectionable was discovered, although we have to notice a curious
discrepancy between the opinion of Mr. SELFE and Mr. (formerly Cap-
tain) GORDON, military storekeeper in the Arsenal, on the subject of
quartermasters' allowances. Mr. DOLAN, an army clothier, had stated
that it was a general custom in the trade to allow a certain per-centage to
quartermasters, though whether for their trouble in taking care of the
goods which were not issued to the troops, or as a commission upon those
that were, did not very clearly come out. Mr. GonDoN's remark upon
this practice was couched in terms of military decision :—" If it came under
" the notice of the commanding officer, he did not see what he could do
" but place the quartermaster under arrest." The Chairman, on the
other hand, did not see anything very bad in it. About the practice itself
we say nothing, but what we do see something very bad in is this—that any
practice should exist in the army, either by the connivance or the igno-
rance of commanding officers, which, if brought into the light of day,
would involve such results as Mr. GORDON speaks of. These regular irre-
gularities, and the official blindness which permits them, are some of the
worst legacies transmitted to us by a bygone regime. Their demoralizing
effect is undeniable ; and we trust they only require to be discovered to
be at once removed. The inquiry is for the present adjourned till next
Wednesday.

We are sorry to see there is some probability of the Turks being sent
to the wall in the matter of the district of Grahovo. No one even
pretends to deny that Grahovo is Turkish territory. It was seized by the
Montegrins in the late war under aggravated circumstances of treachery
and cowardice ; and unless certain underhand designs exist for establishing
a European station somewhere upon that coast, we are totally at a loss to
comprehend what object any Western rower can have had in urging such
a point. Simply to weaken Turkey can hardly be the aim of a Conference
assembled for the express purpose of strengthening her. We have reason
to believe that the turn which affairs are taking is highly distasteful to the
representative of the Sultan in this country ; and, candidly, we think he
has cause for discontent, not with England, but with those who have
professed to co-operate with England while in reality serving their own
purposes.

The speech delivered last Monday to his Lambeth constituents by Mr.
WILLIAMS is valuable as affording an insight into the actual ways of
thinking peculiar to the class which he belongs to. His ideas of political
economy, in the broad sense of that term, evidently extend no further
than the management of a retail shop. He has voted for every-
thing under the sun that has a tendency to make things
cheap. He would cheapen Parliament by repealing the Septennial Act
and freedom from arrest ; cheapen religion by abolishing Church-rates ;
cheapen Ireland by abolishing the Lord-Lieutenancy ; cheapen honesty by
introducing the ballot; and cheapen, finally, the army and navy, by
reducing the estimates to such a point that the services would become con-
temptible. Yet there was one thing—and very well worth noting it is—
which the Hon. Member for Lambeth was not inclined to cheapen, and
that was the exercise of his franchise by the voter. Quite aware that he
himself has nothing to expect from votes brought up from any distance,
he was able to afford a great show of purity at a very little cost. As for
poor voters who have to travel many miles to exercise their right, this
friend of the people and guardian of the poor man's interests was sternly
opposed to relieving them. This is CANNING'S friend of humanity over
again to the life. " I give thee sixpence ! I'll see thee damn'd first." Mr.
WILLIAMS'S address, indeed, throughout reads more like a parody than a
serious speech. But if, indeed, there is any numerous body of people
in this country who arc such lovers of the cheap and nasty
as Mr. WILLIAMS, we would ask them, do they really carry the
system out even in their own private affairs ? Do they get their clothes
from Mons ? Do they never indulge in amusements ? Do they teach
their sons nothing but arithmetic ? Do they buy no books but account-
books? Do they subscribe to no societies for objects which they rarely
see realized, for something they call principle ? In one word, do they
never expend one single penny upon aught not immediately productive ?
Do they believe that good " means simply good to be eaten " ? And
that beauty, and truth, and faith, are ridiculous phantasms ? We know
very well that they do not, and that if they ever had done, England would
not have been where she now is. Yet this is actually the view of
government which poor Mr. WILLIAMS boasts of entertaining !