The Express.
London, England, 1848-04-15 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, SATURDAY EVENING, APRIL 15, 1848.

at its close their lordships would not have the painful
alternative cast upon them, as at present, of passing
measures without due consideration, or of rejecting
them for want of time properly to consider them. As
regarded measures so postponed also, he thought it
would be desirable that their lordships should
have the power of referring them to some
competent legal adviser, in order to ascer-
tain the bearing that one class might have on
another, and who, at the commencement of every
session, should patent to their lordships a legal re-
port on each bill so postponed. The Marquis of
LANSDOWNE and Lord BLIOUWIAII concurred in
thanking the noble lord for the introduction of the

bill.
In the house of COMMONS, which met at twelve
o'clock specially for the purpose, the recommittal of
the Crown and Government Security Bill was
carried, and alternately all the clauses were agreed
to. The house resumed, and the report was ordered
to be received on Monday.

THE first step has been taken towards the realisa-
tion of a wish, expressed by us some time sie,-o, that the
earnest and practical liberals in parliament would
introduce as much of organisation aid preconcert
into their conduct as was compatible wi:h in-
dependence of judgment. A meeting of liberal
members has resolved that a more cordial understand-
ing and co operation are urgently required among
those members of parliament who are favourable to
extension of the suffrage, revision of taxation, reduc-
tion of expenditure, and the general advance of
reform principles. Further, soave simple arrange-
ments have been made for promoting the desired
co-operation.
The actual circumstances of the country are such as
at once render some such step imperatively necessary,
and afford good grounds to augur well of
its success.
The conduct of the new House of Commons, during
the brief period which has elapsed since the opening I
of its first session, has sufficed to deprive it of the
confidence o! the great mass of the industrious and
less wealthy electoral class, and of the thinking por-
tion of liberals, even among the higher ranks. An
overwhelming majority of that ie.sembly is evidently
composed of men who may differ in the degrees of
liberality with which they are accustomed to express
themselves, but who are as one iu their incapacity to
appreciate the force of the elements fermenting in
society, and likely, if unappeased by reforms, to find
vent in serious disaffection and disturbance. They are
listless and languid in what relates to measures for in-
creasing the efficiency of the various departments of
administration ; they cannot be made to feel the in-
tense eagerness with which the taxpaying classes
yearn for a more rational application, a more econo-
mical disbursement, a more satisfactory account-ren-
dering of the national revenue. They alternately;
either sneer superciliously, or tremble like craven's at
the prospect of popular discontent. The industri-
ous of the middle classes—the immense majority
of those who have been enrolling themselves as
special constables to keep the peace in Lon-
don, Manchester, Glasgow, and elsewhere—have
lost much faith in the present House of Commons;
and in any house that is likely to be elected by tho
present electoralbody, distributed in the existing consti-
tuencies, and according to the present forms of election.
We need not tell our readers that sixteen years' ex-
perience of the House of Commons, as constituted
under the Reform Bill of 1832, had at a much earlier
period brought not only chartists but the entire body
of the working classes to a similar conclusion. With
the exception of the more numerous section of the
aristocracy, their political associates and dependents,
the people—taking that word in its most compre-
hensive sense—are dissatisfied both with government
and the legislature, and distrustful of them. A deep
and spreading spirit of disaffection is abroad, which
must be fraught with anarchical tendencies, unless,
by means of recognised leaders among the constituted
authorities, it can be brought to confine its forces to
legitimate channels.
The present moment is propitious to an effort to
bring this strong spirit of discontent back into legiti-
mate channels. The class which had been admitted
by the Reform Act to a greater participation in poli-
tical power was necessarily less quick to perceive the
defects of that measure, than the class which it ex-
cluded. Hence it came that coldness and jealousy
between the enfranchised and unenfranchieed classes
soon grew up under the working of that measure.
This alienation was increased by the nature of the
discussions which first arose in the reformed parliament.
A large proportion of the unenfranchised were natu-
rally the least disposed to sec any virtue in
the stern principle which, however wholesome,
was somewhat too complacently trumpetted
by the promoters of the new poor law. The
advocates of short-time bills were naturally annoyed
by the little attention which their petitions at
first attracted in the House of Commons, in the for-
mation of which their class had no voice ; for some
time elapsed before the conservatives took up these
measures as a means of damaging the middle-class
liberals. Thus stood matters, when nearly about the
same time the anti-corn-law league and the chartists
commenced their respective agitations. The unen-
franchised were irritated that the free-trade agitation,
the importance of which they appreciated very inade-
quately, should engross the attention of the middle
classes, to the exclusion of franchise extension, which
they deemed of so much more consequence.
The middle classes were angry with the
chartists for broaching a question which, by dividing
public attention with theirs, was likely to diminish
their following. Out of all the causes enumerated
there grew up of late years a lamentable spirit
of alienation and embitterment between the middle-
class
and the lower-class reformers. The events of
the last few weeks have predisposed both parties to
seek reconciliation.
On the one hand the practical reformers of the
middle class have been taught by the proceedings of
the new parliament that the popular element is not
yet strong enough in the electoral body. On the
other hand, the gross mismanagement of the chartist
leaders has sickened even their immediate followers
among the unenfranchiaed, and prepared the general
body to think more favourably of co-operation with the
middle-class reformers. Even in the convention the
more reasonable members have taken grace, since the
brawlers have made such fools of themselves, to talk
of inviting the assistance of the middle classes. And
out of that coterie there are not above a few hundred
workmen in the country who do not see that nothing
can be done under the guidance of men who, without
examination, submitted to the scrutiny of the House
of Commons the signatures to their petition 1
evi-
dently far more in number than could possibly be
real. In short, one common feeling at this moment
pervades all of every class who are convinced of the
necessity of further reforms, that to obtain these
reforms unity of purpose and harmony of action are
needed, and that this can only be obtained under the
guidance of leaders who, from their character and
position, are likely to be generally acceptable.
As journalists—that is as historians of passing
events and independent commentators upon them—it
is not for us to be partisans. We are not going to
give in our adhesion to the new party which is being
formed in parliament, great as our confidence is iu
some of its members, opportune as we consider its
organisation, and judicious as we think its pro-
gramme of principles. We have no hesitation in ad-
mitting that we have a friendly feeling to it—that we
heartily wish it may deserve and obtain success—
but, like young knights in the olden time, it must
earn its spurs by its own exertions. If it really
prove itself competent to promote the great cause it
has espoused, none will be more ready to do justice
to its merits—to encourage its arduous struggles—
than we : but it is deeds, not words, that must win
our confidence and support.
Both in and out of parliament the new party, if
sincere, intelligent, and resolute, have much in their
power. Even the present House of Commons we do
not altogether give up in despair : activity and per-
severance may extract some good even from its
inert mass. At present, the liberal conserva-
tives and conservative whip are neutralised
by the uncertainty as to who are to be
the holders of office. Those in office are averse to
laborious and decided measures ; those who think
they have a chance of office, are averse to " commit
themselves." Hence the members unfettered by party
ties are unable to muster more than scanty minori-
ties. Let a ministerial crisis, however, take place—
and it cannot be far distant—and the ejected from,
and disappointed of, office will form a shifting balance
of the house by means of which a well-informed,
alert, and resolute minority may extort many con-
cessions to the popular cause, even from a
stronger administration than we are likely to
have for many years. And to reformers

out of doors such a minority would be
—what a standard is to warriors in an arduous and
changeful fight—eorn, thing round which to rally,
whenever they are broken and dispersed. They would
have it in their power to raise discussions upon all
sins of omission and all sins of commission of men
in office. They would have it in their power to sub-
mit practical and practicable measures to parliament,
and to compel the parliamentary leaders either to
avow their reasons for rejecting them, or to damage
themselves still more by arbitrary unexplained re-
jections. They would have it in their power to pro-
claim sound liberal and generous principles on all
occasions. Not a word that fell from their mouths
would be lost; the press would circulate it to all parts
of tho empire with almost telegraphic speed. Their
motions and speeches, with the comments and discus-
sions raised upon them through the press and at pub-
lic meetings, would ripen public opinion, and prepare
the popular will for unanimous movements. The
action and re-action of the reformers in parliament
and the reformers out of doors would accelerate the
maturing of practicable and efficient measures of
reform, constitutional, administrative, and legislative.
Rarely, if ever, has a nobler field been opened to
legitimate ambition than this country now presents.
Rarely, if ever, has the temper of a nation and the
laziness of its rulers rendered it more urgent that
men of courage and foresight should step forward
and undertake the task of preventing revolution by
' timely reform.

TUE Times has taken five days to make the
discovery which we made on Monday evening
last—viz., that the chartist petition, and the
chartist meeting, and the panic consequent on
them, were nothing but pieces of one and the
same huge hoax. We must own that we, too,
with all the world, fell into the snare, that, see-
ing the alarm of the government, and the fearful
echo of that alarm in the Times we thought that
there must be danger to the public tranquillity,
to the sovereign, and constitution of these realms.
We saw, indeed, no potent cause for such fears, but
relied on the omniscience of government that there
must have been something more serious brewing than i
Mr. CI: FFA Y'd speeches and Mr. BRUNT ERRE
O'BRIEN'S denunciations. On Monday morning,
therefore, our small powers of persuasion were at the
service of the government, and well pleased were we
to find masses of the population mustering and
marshalling to do battle in defence of what. all held
sacred.
On Monday evening our sentiments were very dif-
ferent. We, too, had taken some pains, rot only to
count the number of those who formed the preliminary
processions, but to form a judgment respecting the
general state of feeling in the population who
thronged the streets. And our conviction was, that
not only we ourselves, but that the great mass of the
loyal population had been duped into a day's loss
of time, a day's waste of zeal, and into an open con-
fession of panic, for which there was neither cause
sor pretext.
It is, indeed, the Opinion of many, of many too
whom we respect. that the culling forth of this
great manifestation of loyalty, this mustering
of the armed citizens, had its advantages, which
far repaid the loss of a day, or even the confesaion
that the cause was not of sufficient importance to war-
rant the display. Wo cannot, however, but think
these advantages counterbalanced by the fact of go-
vernment and society having been thrown into a
causeless panic, and by showing the turbulent classes
the power which they possessed of creating alarm,
suspending business, and turning society topsy-turvy.
In Manchester the summoning of the citizens had more
unpleasant results, since those who figured as special
constables on Monday, found it neccesary to call a
public meeting immediately afterwards, and to pass
resolutions to the effect that the citizens and the
middle classes, in actinsr as constables+, neither in-
tended to set up their cause apart from that of the
working classes, nor meant by their so doing to indi-
cate any desire to put down the people's charter, or
even to oppose it. And, altogether, the result of
Monday's artificial panic throughout the country
appeared to he to give increased importance and
attention to the charter, whatever ridicule it may
have flung upon the physical supporters of that
banner.
We are perfectly well aware that the course which
we have followed on this and on several similar occa-
sions is not the popular one. Our aim and tendency
have always been:to resist panic and to check exagge-
ration, and to struggle, as far as lies in our power, to
recall, even in the midetofexcitement, the sentiments
of common sense and the conclusions of calm judg-
ment.
The Times, we admit, is wiser in its generation.
Let no matter what idea be started, likely to in-
fluence and be agreeable to the purchasing classes,
the Times instantly gets astride of it, lashes it, spurs
it, and rides it to death. Let the smallest speck of a
cloud appear in the horizon, containing in it the germ
of a storm, the Times instantly divines it, takes pos-
session of it, and seta all its machinery to work
to blow a gale, to get up a panic. and
to be the Neptune of the tempest. Let
there be but a symptom of scarcity, and
the Times will soon work it into a famine. Let there
be but a too copious shower, and some black spot in
the potato, and the limes will soon persuade borne
BULL to put himself on rations and send to the four
quarters of the world for corn to glut the markets,
and cause those oscillations in price which make the
fortune of the speculator and the ruin of the mer-
chant.
Then again, if payment for this over-import of
corn creates a momentary over-export of gold, the
Times instantly sets to work on the new material
for panic. Threatened with being left without aloof
one day, the world is told the next to despair of pos-
sessing a guinea. Its cry to the individual is to
hoard ; to the Bank, to put the screw on the public ;
to government, to put the screw on the Bank. To
fetter and to frighten Jodie BULL is, in fact, the
nightly thought and the morning task of oar contem-
porary.
The want of corn panic, and the want of gold panic,
not proving sufficient sources of alarm, the railway-
phobia was got up by, way of interlude in the Times.
The principal channel for the employ of capital was all
of a sudden denour.ced, and government bidden to
act the part of M. Louis BLANC towards the compa-
nies, which were declared national enemies, and
which were to be forbidden to spend their own money.
The French communists have not gone more violently
or more radically to work.
After this one should have thought the country
might have bad some time to repose. But the Times
knew no repose, and in conjunction with some tones
it got up the cry that we were to be invaded, that
50,000 Frenchmen were to march on London, and that
fortifications, and armaments, and awful precau-
done were necessary. The public, however, thought
this a little too much, and began to laugh outright,
whereat the Times pocketed its panic, swallowed its
war-cry, and disappeared to exchange its military
uniform for its clown's dress, whea it began to
tumble and make merry with the very war and na-
tional defences cry that itself had raised.
Our contemporary's thirst for panic and excitement
was not doomed, however, to be kept long unsatisfied.
With February the new era of revolution came, and
thick in-pouring tidings from every part of Europe
naturally excited the deepest interest and the gravest
thought. One should have thought that these occur-
rences, simply narrated, were sufficiently exciting of
themselves, and that the sympathy and the turbulence
which foreign revolution was sure to excite here, in
a certain degree, would have suggested the expedi-
ency of treating such symptoms with calm and
patient dignity, wise and silent precautions on the
part of government, and on the part of the press,
without the employment of exaggeration or any
appeal to passions.
The Times, however, did not see its duties in this
light. It descried in these events merely the occasion
for exciting panic, for denouncing liberalism, for 11
arming one class of citizens against another, and
envenoming the rancour of the larger portion
of the empire against the smaller. This me-
tropolis was threatened with a rising of the I
people, which, ;to the number of 200,000, were to'
march with pike and tricolor to the sack of parlia-
ment and the royal palace. Whilst the populace was
thus to rase the stronghold of the constitution, the cheap
press, the great bugbear of the Times, was to e.sta-
blish a provisional government. Not all the ravings,
of French republicanism in the last century outdid
the conservative ravings of the Times. And what I
did this mighty revolution turn oat to be ?
Ten thousand unarmed chartists, giving. vent to
three or four pointless speeches, their leant
shaking hands with, and asking pardon of. the

police commissioner, and the monster petition, signed
by Snoulies, Paynnse, and Co., brought down to the
house in a cab. On dissection of the said document,
its five million signatures have dwindled down to
nothing, just as the physical-force chartists dwindled
down from 200,000 to 10,000 in the columns of the
Times.
And now that the people's charter, as a banner of
I revolution, of physical force, has been torn, soiled, and
vilifiid, the indefatigable limes has got a quite new
panic, a new clement of exaggeration and abuse.
The big smithy-bellows of Printing-house-square,
turned away from Kennington-common, has its
mouth-piece applied to the Irish Confederation, the
I already hot spirits of which it will soon blow to in-
candescence. As to the Irish repealer', their instant
I rebellion is taken for granted, their very success re-
presented as a thing possible and probable, and the
only mode of dissuasion and defence adopted by the'
Times, is that of acquainting the landlords and the
upper classes and the loyal subjects of her Majesty in
Ireland that England wilt abandon them to their
fate, for that they are just as bad as the rest of the
accursed Irish, and may be well left to perish. Eng-
land, it is threatened, will cut off all commerce with
them, send them no more charity, bestow on them no
more care, and banish every native of Ireland, opera-
tive or engineer, men of labour, of letters, of politics,
or of wealth, from forth the realm of England, just as
ST. PATRICK banished vermin out of Ireland.
Such is the fairness, such the wisdom, such the
moderation, of the Times! Upon every question of
which it treats, it takes the maniac view. Repression
is in every word, and civil war in every line. Mutual
contempt between each race, mutual hatred between
each creed, mutual enmity and war between each
class, lurk at the bottom and evaporate from the
surface of every article. Under the pretence of de-
fending the cause of civilisation and peace, it prompts
and pushes the government and the dominant classes
of the country to turn their backs upon both, and to
recur to measures utterly destructive to them and to
liberty.
It is possible that this eternal catering to excite-
ment, this indefatigable manufacture of panics, this
outcry every morning of the country being in danger,
set forth for the mere pleasure of declaring the coun-
try saved in the evening—it is possible that this may
succeed for a time with honest JOHN BULL, that it
may act like snuff in his nostril, or like a glass of
strong liquor in his mouth, and create a feverish sen-
timent of self-satisfaction. But the more sensible part
of the public must at last awaken to the fact that no
society can bear to undergo this repeated process of
galvanisation, without at last suffering collapse, and
falling into inanity and idiotism.
Everything now depends on the temper of society,
and the opinions of the public. Of old, the late of
empires depended on the wisdom of individuals and
of councils. They now depend on sentiments far
more extended, more common, and more out of doors.
The welfare of England does not now hang so
much on the character and foresight of a ,
WALPOLE or a RUSSELL, as upon the character
and foresight of the English mind. It is it'
which rules—it which directs: And unless it can pre-
serve its national sobriety of thought, calmness of
temper, evenness of conduct, eschewing exaggeration,
panic, frenzy, with all the alternate feebleness and
fury which characterise people and periods of excite-
ment, the country will not be able to extricate itself
successfully from the innumerable and serious difficul-
ties of the present European crisis.

GERMANY.

INSURRECTION IN C.ISSEL.
HESSE CASSEL.—An insurrection has broken
out in the capital of this electorate. A letter from
Cassel of the 10th instant, published in the Cologne
Gazette of the 13th, says: At the moment I now
write a most fearful riot rages in the streets of this
city. The drums are calling the civic guards to arms,
and the alarm bells arc ringing. It seems that a por-
tion of the inhabitants had expressed their antipathy
to the ex-Finance Minister Motz, by making. a demon-
stration under his window. On the evening of the
Bth, demonstrations of the same kind took place be-
fore the houses of the former War Ministers, Messrs.
Deim-Itothfelser and Abbee, during which some
civic guards were wounded. On the 9th a number
of young people endeavoured to get up a demonstra-
tion of a different kind—namely, in favour of the
present ministers. This they did before the house of
the minister Eberhard, and they then went in all
peace and quietness to the house of the Minister of
Justice, Baumhach, but the procession was stopped
on its way, in the neighbourhood of this minister's
house, by a picquet of body guards, who fired upon the
unarmed people and wounded several. The exasperation
at this unprovoked attack is difficult to describe.
Barricades were immediately formed in all the streets
and the arsenal plundered of its couteats. An orga-
nised attack on the barracks in which the body guard)
had retired was commenced immediately after a
youth had been wounded by the discharge of a pistol
from one of the barrack windows, and when an entry
was made by force the troops had retired,
leaving only a few sick within. The barracks were
razed to the ground, and it was only owing to the
great exertions of the chief burgomaster that they
were not fired. More than 4,000 men were under
arms, and even boys of barely fourteen were to be
seen handling their carbines and pistols like men. At
three o'clock the body guard having been removed
from the town, the cause of the outbreak was re-
moved, and the storm was partially allayed ; the bar-
ricades still remained, however, and the people re-
fused to lay down their arms unless the body guard
was disbanded, and the officers who commenced the
attack sent to prison. Such was the state of affairs
by the lest accounts. The minister Eberhard was
during the whole night in the midst of the affray,
trying to appease the citizens.
PRUSSIA.—We have the Berlin journals of the'
12th. The following is the letter of our corre-
spondent :
BERLIN, APRIL 11.
Now that the political questions of the day, the electoral
law, and the mode of choosing the delegates to the forth-
coming constituent assembly at Frankfort are finally settled
in this kingdom, public attention will, for some time to
come, be almost exclusively directed to the amelioration of
the condition of the working chases, and that attention will
' not be diverted to soy great extent, even by the Schleswig
Holstein question. In fact, the operatives in general are
conducting their own affairs in a most systematic manner,
and with considerable tact, spirit, and energy. On the other
hand the communists are beginning to raise their plotting
heads and their discordant cries. They have asserted in
some of their recent meetings that work for mere wages,
must cease, because such is the work for slaves ; that those
who help to produce capital should have a share in the pro-
fita of capital, and that the mere raising of wages will lead
to no permanent good, because the price of provisions will
he equally raised. People are coming forward here with all
kinds of surgestions for the restoration of public credit,
which is still terribly shaken, and for supplying the want of
that ready cash which, as stated in the diet yesterday, nume-
rous persons are burying for safety. One plan is for each
railway to issue so-called "railway money notes," of the value
of live thalers each, to the amount of the gross receipts of the
respective lines during the year 1847. It is propueed that
such notes be taken on eh the lines of railway, and in
all the national establishments, and that they be re-
dtemed before the expiration of two years. Moreover
the Berlinisclus Zeitung of this day recommends toe abo-
lition of all laws limiting the rate of interest for sums
advanced by capitalists. The ground far such a recommenda-
tion is, that by bringing money into the market, from which
it is now totally withdrawn, a first step will be taken
towards restoring public confidence. It is added that even
if 10 per cent. interest should be required, instead of the
present legal 5 or 6 per cent., no great evil will arise, for no
one will procure money at tat interest, unless it be to avert
a greater loss, and moreover that high rate of interest will
attract foreign capital to the country. It may be stated here
that, a short time ago, the committee of the united Diet
voted by a majority of 61 to 34 the abolition of the anti-
usury laws, and that ministers have the power of carrying
that decision into effect. Another propo3ition is that 12,000
out of the 26,000 armed eitaz..ns pay each 3 pfennigen
weekly, whereby a weekly rum of 100 thalers will be raised.
It is calculated tuat this sum would not only relieve at least
.50 families every year, but put them in the way of gaining
an honest livelihood.
All the trades in Betlin are forming unions and holding
m..ztings for the purpose of adopting measures for improving
their condition. The compositors have not remained be-
hied. Their average weekly wages for 12 hours daily do not
exceed 3 thalers 20 sgr. (something under lls.). They now
require that the hours of labour shall be lowered to 10, and
the wages raised to at least 5 thalers per week. or about 155.,
with double pay for night work as well as for walk done on
Sundays and holibsys. Piece-work is to be paid for at the
rate of SI per 1,000 letters fur nonpareil, and about 3d. for
larger type.
According to the Posen Gazette ri yesterday, the " re-
organisation committee" appointed by Gen. Von Willisen
consists of flee Pole- and four Germans—viz Archbishop
Von Przyluski, General Councillor Von Tr:show Count
Nlielzynski, Councillor Kullnu, Herr Polworowski, Herr
Von Zedwitz, Dr. Libelt, Surgeon Grumvald, and Herr
Stefanski, a well-tinowa aseller. This committee will
bars merely a deliberative voice, It appears that the Poles,