The Express.
London, England, 1851-03-10 00:00:00

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TO CORRESPONDENTS. •
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RION WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
DAT—llaraatig. M. Na. Aftrilipla.N. Oa.
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LONDON, SATURDAY, MARCH 10.

THUS are in all free CO=tri es two parties—the ;
Me leaning to the side of authority, aristocracy, and
government ; the other drawing its strength and ;
principles from the popular side,and favouring the in-
Harney and the rights of the majority of the people.
One should think that when the necessities of the
age demanded a development of the popular power,
then the liberals would acquire political influence and
direct legislation towards the fulfilment of men's ,
yaw- sand thought,. And that when repression was
necessary, or any great measure required for miti-
gating the onward impulse, or curtailing the liberties
of the people, then the conservative party would
take the helm.
Houever this may be the case in the main, it has
still huppenril singularly enough for many years past
that it is the whigs or Ida rat party who have under-
taken to introduce and carry measures for repression
and resistance.; whilst it is the facies who have stood
wadfatherc to laws of religious emancipation, or
economical reform. Of all the great measures of
our time, the amendment of the poor law was cer-
tainly the most governmental and the most unpopu-
lar; vet it was the whigs, and not the tories, who
undertook it. On the other hand the tories put the
finishing stoke to the emancipation of the catholics,
and the abolition of the aristocratic Porn monopoly.
We could explain very satisfactorily how this is.
The rea-aan is, that parliament can never be led into
a wise and good act ; it must be tricked into it, and
parties half bullied and half betrayed. To perform
this task it is absolutely requisite for the
.party most
dime t neat). opposed in principle to what is to be done,
to undertake to do it ; for this facilitates the trick.
Such may be a very degrading exposition of the f.'s-
timvdr of constitutional government ; but it is the
true one. And, in south, we are not surprised that
absolutist statesmen who sky but the crooked model-
prey, and do not like the results, should insist that
the emstitutional system is the most egregious of
humbugs.
We have indulged in these remarks in order to
shoes that this plan of a liberal party doing illiberal
work, which has so often succeeded, hats in the pre-
went crisis failed. The Roman catholies, or the chief
whom they acknowledge, have undeniably broken
the kind of part or truce that was established
by the Emancipation Act. They lucre made an
aggression on pinhead:int feeling, and even on the
royal dignity and rights. 'lit repress them was just'.
and was loudly milked fur. That tusk, we own, na-
turally belonged to the harks. FM" our own part,
seeing that such repression was just and inevitable,
we preferred that it should be done bv the whir.
saving that it would be temperate and short-lived.
But the whir have been unable to perform a task,
for • hieh their peofisseions and their position at the
Lead of a liberal party prevent them. We will not
indeed take it upon us ut the present moment to decide,
whether the whigs have, as vet, actually and defini-
tively failed in that task. But ibis we know, and of this
we arc certain, that if the whir do fail in what is a
plaits governmental duty, power most inevitably,
and of a consequence, pass into the hands of the
tunes.

,
')lie people of England are very quiet. They utter 4-4g-et' ""'".i.r -- year .
a trifling addition, but it is
not it single expression fur the moment on the strug- i '' us 1119. appear. . .
ntolerable, seeing that in this item a considerable re-
gle in which parliament is engaged. But the people
duefion ought to have been effected. One of the most
are not on that amount indifferent. And if they
inexcusable sources of additional expenditure in the
find that owing to the division of tlw liberal party,
naval department is the division of the Admiralty-
the sineen: lihemlisin of some. the squeamishness
office between Whitehall and Somerset-house; ; which
of others, Wel, above all, to the
.yoke of tallier
moreover occasions much confusion and loss of time.
liehom weighing upon the Irish port:woof our repre-
It is keeping op two establishments instead of one,
ambition, the work of HENRY VIII., of ELF/A-
each of them having its staff of waters, nws-
ann. of Enwano, of the Commonwealth, of
the mvolutima a 16,04, and of the Ilatmverian wngerm' h°llmeitecPers' di'l'n'meuls' howeekeepera'
servants, &c. &t. As a KIIIIIrIe of the small pent-
anoression, is to he undone; in other words, if the
lotions (the aggregate of which swells to a large
people: of England Irate mason to fear that the
amount). tolerated in this dertment, the following
ref venation is to be repealed—oh then we should • .
uttems are instructive :—" Clothing for Admiralty
Yet 'WI politician& and eqwtiully liberal pub-
" Gratuities instead of cloth-
tieinns. too look forward to no common change. For rarg`Tar„, n 4 "'" '—'"
Are they clothed, or are they not?
a general election under such circumstances would, 'llg' '"'"' .4."
In the item of wager to women and marmot, them
We fear, move little short in its effects of a revolu-
is an increase of 91,65:11.; in the item of victuals
lion-- and a revolution, we am sorry to sue, not in
liberal intereats, and having for its result the very them is a decrease of 29,0271. For the decrease free
trade and not the Admiralty is to be thanked. The
contr.:iv of liberal programs
regret to ham to say it, but we do only use the Admiralty seem disposed to make of the
Deeply du we
say it with a full and painful conviction. that pro- reduced annual coot of the seamen they employ is to
trostantism in these countries is in danger. When we increase their numbers, and that in a much larger
woe the boldness of papal emissaries, and when proportion than the saving. This scandalous policy
through the lukcwarmnewo of parliament we are is adopted too in defiance of the demonstration
condemned to witness their triumph—when we ace the affonled by the evidence before the committee on the
strongest ministry overthrown, the oldest aystem of navy estimates, that an improved distribution of the
state policy torn asunder—when we we the power of war-ships afloat, good a more judicious selection in the
Roman catholic votes to deprive thew kingdoms of any claws of vessels employed, would give more efficient
administration. und when no the teeth of the tempest protection to our mercantile marine at much
whielt they base excited and the wreck they have le'ss cost' It may be idle to expect the
made-. no more could he done than to put together a Prc'enl government to adopt the views to
raft
.and stick up an old jury nowt to tick: over the which new convert,' are daily being made in the
moos .we cannot be blind to the fact, that there general public as to the amount of naval force re-1
is indeed a Cardinal, and a Cardinal well called of quired by the real wants of the merchant service ;1
. Westminster. nonompot us. When we see the great but surely when it has been shown that a force 1
dignitaries of the church, its universities, its choke eiluallY efficient with that at pi esent on foot may,
clergy. its woolthiest flowks. its most ingenious by proper arrangements, be maintained at less ex-
logicians, all labouring to build up and so apart een'e: we are entitled to demand that this shall be '
the better portion of the petite-scant established thine-
church, as a kind of sweurmil to Route— In the connexion with the subject of provisions for
when the lea • g of the ari„nnvin.y is evidently
2 the flee ay het
tabli s remarkm
hedents , that o
ff the
e sum of
in favour of a proteatantiam wporated by a mere 3,6511. chat, it
nineto rged r "b 03,427/.
mother-of peados:men-work from Ihnow_when. mare. is required for victualling establishments. It would
over. we MCC this large section of Womanising clergy, be well tar consider whether this branch of the naval
nubility. mid statesmen all lending a hand to the service might not be better performed both with
Pore and Cardinal Wtsiattx to take footing and regard to economy and regularity by the coronation-
Ithillllll' dignity in this country---then we commit hut fiat. The commissariat, although but little under-
repeat. that protestantism is fit danger. stood, is one of the most useful practical branches
We hail hoped tluet the preownt religious effervescence of the military service we possess, and the,
would have been taken advantage: of to erect bulwarks degree of efficiency to which it has be:en
agai lost the influx of t hat religion a hie h. hay ing once got lwought, reflects much credit on the heads
hold of the ignorant poor and thepowerful rich, keer of the department. It carries on the: whole banking !I
that hold by the spiritual despotism which is its duties of the army, ordnance, and naval stores. The
essence. But government evidently is pandered for financial administration of the convict establishments
is entrusted to it. Na), more, it has actually the
the delimee of prottsaantiam or of reliotious 'liberty.
charge of the tietnalling and provisitming of both tier-
It cannot reform the univemities. it tonna combat
vices and, where them are no nasal agents, it takes
lime% ism. it eannot put down the leg:mine authority
lip all the: freight required fur the public senior.
of Met ifl.N and of CULLEN. It cannot found or
develop any system of national Munition. It um: naval agent has the charge of provisions. slops,
stores for the nary Rent from England; he has
eon do nothing. in fact, but deliver up the , and
al.o charm and management of the transport service:
pepulation of England, as well m it'. Sovereign,
ts obliged to obtain all his supplies of rash
to he insulted. and converted, and cheated on their I bur In'
death beds by agent", mendavienni and rapacious, as'' from the Commissariat. The: pursers of ships. in
the: trials in our courts of 14W daily disclose I . like manner, obtain their cash from the commissariat.
Deeply do we regret to see so 'few of the liberal and where there is no commissariat officer thee draw
party stand out lwavely in resistance to doctrines and, direct on the Accountant-General of the 'Nam
t„ „.I„ a, inimical to fr,"l,„„ and to rotnii, 'Naval :Miters afloat also draw for their pay on the
th,c.ply d„ we regret to ~,e. the tow champions Accountant-General. So. in fact, the naval agent is
who did at first stand forth. ationdon the cause. , a out of useless being, or commiamriat shadow :he is
thi Satunlay morning the tiomeme rims. after , kept up merely for the exercise of patronage. Yet
liming for months hallooed on the ministry to ; there IS a naval agent and a commissariat officer at
repristh. now turns round to scout booth them and Iten of our foreign stations.
their bill, and to tell them to abandon all idea Of : With reference to the manning of the uavv—the
resisting aggression. It demand.. the impunity of , pre dost—it deserves to be noticed that under the
Coates. the triumph of WM:MAN. and the dip.. , he:"ad of the " Active List " we find 140 flag-officers
titian of Lord Jonm Resseat., for having dared, I whose aggregate salaries amount to 71,604/. per
with the support of this very Mk A. to wok to re. , annum. Yet it is a matter of notoriety that the
press their audacity. Suell'a twist round of the 1 Admiralty have given the command of the expeci-
weathereock journiil. although it is no indication of mental squadron to a captain. Why this anomaly?
any than*: in popular me pular sentint, is but too true an :Is it because our flag officers are useless? Are they
index of pirliantentam faintheartedness. Glad .no longer "fit to go to sea" like " the rum old
enough. no doubt, would ministers he to get rid commodore" of the song? If so, let them be trans-
of in -object which renders not me re :y offices. but even
rat. immure. And to overturn tile re
hill the ' and 1,1 us have men who can be employed. But in
way of this reform political interests and other
would prolsably let: as many votes to-marrow as there the
were a fortnight ago for its introduction. I selfish motives, nowhere better understood than at
We cannot, however, maw to give warning. that the' Admiralty, interpose almost insurmountable
in the very proportion in which parliament may do obstacles.
little. the people will be inclined to do much. Eng- ' In selecting these examples of upon how strong
laud did not make a union with Ireland in order to grounds a stand may be made against the navy estie
mates for the year, we' have been influenced by the
sink at her fect.nor did she grant the Roman cathulies
emancipatiom in order that through that emancipa. • comidemtion that the debate on them be,oins to-
tion, they might introduce the Poet: and his mtvnts nig'ot : and that the votes fur wag, ~, Ileum's. ~d the
amongst as, to prow:raw our edueat:on. menace oar Ackdraity•office come first in order. The groweit
of unwarrantable extravagance fail under
, instances
religious liberties, and insult our Qt rt N.
. t.li. h,.id, of establishments at home and abroad, new