The Express.
London, England, 1846-12-31 00:00:00

7-Itt '-/- ;Frog.

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TO CORRESPONDENTS.
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MGM WATER AT LONDON-BRIDGE.
Tin DAL —MCCOLOM 40 min. peg 0 ; Afternoon, 7 min. past 1

LONDON, THURSDAY, DEC. 31.
PRESIDENT POLK'S rapid experience in statesman-
ship is fully evinced in his present Message, so
widely contrasted with the sweeping, the arrogant,
and belligerent documents which, in the first flush of
power, he gave to the world. His cue is now to
plead, not to menace ; to sophisticate, not bluster.
Instead of the slasher of the south-west, he appears
in the character of the lawyer of the north-east ; keen,
plausible, insinuating ; making out the best possible
case, with little regard for truth, but in no
very offensive tone. The difference is owing, no
doubt, to the circumstance that, in his first
message Mr. Pout was speaking at Europe, and
appealing in the same moment to war passions at
home, and to the mob which cherished them. He
has now little to say to Europe or to England, which
has allowed him, in a military and territorial sense,
to have his own way. The war rabble have had
enough of volunteering. Mr. Pout, therefore, has
got a purely Yankee audience to address, and not
a vulgar one either. lie suits, in consequence, his tone
and his logic to those on whom the carrying out of his
measures depends, and he has doffed the robe of a con-
queror for the purpose.
The President, however, still addresses poor
Mexico, much as the wolf addressed the lamb, with
strange hypocrisy. The ancestors of the lamb, he de-
clares, always behaved scurvily to wolves, maltreated,
robbed them, and refused satisfaction. The Spanish
mode of raising revenue, adopted by the governments
Which succeeded each other m Mexico, proved neces-
sarily onerous to American traders, adventurers, and
pedlars. All kept an account of their losses, and
such demands amounted to three millions of dollars.
It is characteristic enough, that Gen. J.icKsos was
the first President who determined to enforce these
claims, and the conqueror of Florida was doubtless a
claimant too formidable for Mexico to meet by a
plump denial. It higgled and hesitated, and craved
delays, but JACKSON and VAN BUREN pressed and
threatened, and a sum was at length extorted from
Mexico, which President POLK magnanimously passes
altogether sub silentio.
Now, the nature and justice of these American
claims, as well as the coercion put upon the Mexi-
cans, appear clearly enough from demands, quite
analogous, made by the French. The French govern-
ment claimed, we believe, 600,000 dole. as indemnities
for damage and losses suffered by French citizens.
They bombarded St. Juan d'Ulloa, landed at Vera
Cruz, and their bully ing, with the persuasions of other
powers, induced Mexico to consent to pay the indem-
nity claimed. The sum was brought to Paris, a com-
mission appointed to distribute it, and the result
was, that there did not appear claimants for more than
one-half. The French treasury pocketed the rest : but
LOUIS PHILIPPE has been heard to admit that it was
a most nefarious transaction; and that if ho had been
fully aware, he would never have allowed a French
gun to be fired against Mexico in such a cause. So
much for indemnities for losses, extorted by cannon,
and computed by the cennoneers.
The next count in Mr. PoLic's accusation refers to
Texas. He asserts that it made part of Louisiana, and
Was comprised in the territory sold by NAPOLEON !
We shall not waste time upon this question, it being
clear to all who have studied it, that the valley of
the Mississippi was the extent of the French claim.
And it is perfectly well known that the Americans in
the heat of 1819, under no pressure, but merely from
a sense of justice, admitted the Sabine to be the true
boundary between the two empires, " renouncing for
ever all their rights, claims, and pretensions to the
territories lying west and south of the above line."
Such are the words of that treaty, containing a
most formal renunciation of those rights which Mr.
POLK puts forward.
The next argument goes upon a very different sup-
position, and founds the American right upon the
independence acquired by Texas, as merely a federal
portion of the Mexican empire. Yet, what fuller
proof can exist of Texas extending only to the Nueces,
than the fact of the establishment, iu 1824, of the
republic of the Rio Grande, comprising the states of
Trunau Cohahuila, and Durango. This republic
extund toas, the Nueces, and the Texans accepted the
frontier, and aided their brethren of the Rio Grande,
in defending it. After the battle of San Jacinto, the
Texans claimed to the Rio del Norte ; but who can
doubt that such a frontier was, at least, an uncertain
and disputed one
Whatzver was the opinion of the American Execu•

Live, and of Congress, with respect to the exact posi-
tion of Texas, certain it is that the American forces,
under General TAYLOR, did at first respect
the territory claimed by the
inns;Mexica that he did not
advance from Corpus Christi but obedience to com-
mands given in consequence of the Mexican govern-
ment refusing to admit an American envoy, Mr.
SLIDELL, to negotiate questions which the Mexicans
would not moot. The American advance from Corpus
Christi to the Rio del Norte must have been either the
peaceable taking possession of a territory considered
their own, or it was a hostile advance into
a disputed territory. Mr. POLK represents it
as both one and the other a manifest
absurdity. The advance of General TAYLOR pro-
duced war; the advance was avowedly made in
revenge, because the Mexicans would not admit Mr.
SLIDELL and his propositions. The war was there-
fore evidently provoked by the Washington govern-
ment,
the Mexicans being evidently prepared to
remain passive, had they not been bearded and
attacked. This is the weak point of President
Pout's plairloyer, and will give rise, no doubt, to the
principal portion of the ensuing debate.
-

Mr: POLK's assertion, that the refusal of

Mexicans to receive Mr. SLIDELL was a just
cause of his marching onward and provoking
war, reminds one of the very different conduct
of general JACKSON. Under his Presidency the
Mexican government refused to treat with an
American envoy, Mr. Ponismr, nay, insisted on his
recall.; and General JACKSON, though not admitting

the justice of their complaint, still aceeded to it, re-
called POINHETT, and contented himself with de.
ploring the irritation of the Mexicans, bat never
thought of resenting or avenging it.
The arguments by which the President follows up
his denun,iations are completely destructive of all the
rights of independent nations and of the rules of
their intercourse. His accusations of PAREDEB,
praises of HERRERA, and hopes of SANTA ANNA,
represent the President of the United States in the
singular light of making war, not upon Mexico, but
upon particular parties and statesmen in Mexico ;
very mean, personal, and unwarrantable way of pre-
senting and regarding so great a question.
We utter this judgment more in a spirit of criti-
cism than of antagonism. For certainly the mode in
which President Poui takes up and treats the, to us,
more interesting question of international trade,
disarms every feeling of rivalry or hostility. Were
such principles as those of President Pout's, Message
prevalent, it would be little matter over what shores
or ports the flag of the Union floated.
We could scarcely have expected to find the prin-
ciples so very recently triumphant with us, so
speedily and so fully re-echoed from the chair of the
Washington executive. It is a proud triumph for
those who won, and for those who carried, free trade.
The language of the American President on this
point has all the calmness of strong and irresimina-
stible
conviction. There is no party, no personal recri
tion in it, and it constitutes such an appeal to
the public of the United States, as appears
perfectly irresistible, as it is irrefragable. But the
commercial policy of which President POLK has
hoisted the flag, in amity with, and in response to,
our own, is a subject not to be disposed of in a few

paragraphs.
The financial statements of the Message are more
cheerful than rumour led to suppose. The Presi-
dent represents the war estimates as consider-
ably short of the amounts with which Mr. WEB-
STER alarmed his New England audiences. At the
same time the President insists on having the credit,
withheld last session, of two millions of dollars,
evidently to satisfy the Mexican army. This shows
the conviction of the American government still to be,
that the aid of SANTA ANNA may be reckoned upon
to bring about a treaty of peace.

THE humanising influences of art upon the popu-
lace are beginning to be admitted in theory, but little
is done to bring them into practical operation. The
presence of the fustian-coated artisan or lounging
Guardsman in the National Gallery, sometimes serves
as a text for a dilettante or a humanitarian, but your
average Englishman no more dreams of any good to
be derived by such persons from pictures or statues,
than he can detect sermons in a Lord Mayor's show,
or discover an educational influence in the parade of
RICHARDSON'S booth. The Houses of Parliament are
in much the same predicament. A few of their num-
ber really believe that art has an aim beyond the
filling up of an idle moment with a transient and
picktooth pleasure. Concessions are made, from time
to time, with a sort of contemptuous tolerance to these
enthusiasts by their more practical companions.
Schools of design are founded and helped with grants

of public money.
In this, to be sure, the economy of the house is
lulled with the tradesmanlike sop that such schools
will make us independent of foreign taste and artistic
culture. We have seen money granted in prizes for
cartoons Cid specimens of fresco painting. We have
a National Gallery, with its annual grant, and its
porn-curante trustees. We have a British Museum,
enriched chiefly by private taste and muni-
ficence with some of the noblest marbles of
the highest Athenian schools. Your PEELS,
and MORPETHS, and MoNTEAOLES, and even your
HUMES, in a spirit altogether at war with penny
wisdom, get up from time to time to defend the
grants for these and similar objects against the
estimates-economy-man for the time being, and the
majority generally back their representations. The
bulk of our public men do not, speaking truly and
soberly, care one straw about any such business.
Whatever be the amount of public coarseness
and indifference in matters of art, it is more
than accounted for by the apathy and ignorance on
the subject, amongst the governing class in England.
This is true, in despite of unrivalled private galleries,
collected by English taste and resources, and not-
withstanding the existence among us of a small but
highly. cultivated body of connoisseurs, not to be out-
done in knowledge by any unprofessional class in
Europe. If anything were required, besides our
public monuments, to prove the absence of general
artistic cultivation or concern about matters of art, in
this country, it is supplied by the mal-administration
of our museums and galleries. No country, in which
art was cared for by the represented or their repre-
sentatives would sanction the present management of
the National Gallery, which falls short of its duties or
violates them, in every particular of its action. It destroys
good pictures by cleaning : elevates bad ones into the
best places in its wretched rooms : accepts, as gifts,
works altogether unfit for a national collection: re-
fuses the best pictures when offered to it ct fair prices,
and buys the worst at extravagant sums.
The defects of administration in the British Museum
are less apparent. There the collection, as compared
with the National Gallery, is permanent. Additions
are made from time to time (as lately of the Lycian
marbles), but the transactions as to purchase, or re-
jection of works offered, are little before the public.
But the absurdities of the Library-arrangements for
the new catalogue have been admirably exposed by
Sir HARRIS NICOLAS, and there can be little doubt
that in its other departments the Museum exhibits the
same ignorant and blundering procedure as the National
Gallery. Thus the Etruscan collection, which had
an archreological and artistic value—when the sarco-
phagi with their deposits were shown in Pall-mall,
in rooms painted and arranged to imitate the vaults at
Volci or N olaterra—has lost most of its significance
since its purchase by the Museum, now that the sar-
cophagi have been placed in one room, the urns in
another, the bronze ornaments and utensils in a third,
while the copies of the wall paintings have disap-
peared altogether.
This present Christmas has shown a singular piece
of carelessness or stupidity in the authorities of both
great national collections. Boxing-day, the national
holiday, fell this year on a Saturday. Thousands of
holiday-keeping artisans, with their wives and fami-
lies, flocked, as, to their credit they have ever done
since the privilege was allowed them, to the National
Gallery and the British Museum. At the former they
were met by closed gates, and could not obtain even
the boon of an answer. At the latter, querists were
informed that the Museum was always closed on
Saturdays. So is the National Gallery as a general
rule. But, surely, on this particular Saturday, an
exception should have been made. Here were some
twenty or thirty thousand people shut out from a ra-
tional, humanising, to some an ennobling, pleasure,
from the carelessness or blockheadedness of the
officials, with whom Saturday is Saturday, be it
never so much boxing-day. If the exclusion was in-
tentional, it was ill-judged and unjustifiable ; if acci-
dental, it was stupid and unkind. The attendants at
these places have their regular holidays, and no great
amount of work while on duty ; but the poor artisans
with their families have, many of them, but this one
week-day in the year to enjoy themselves. Who
knows how many sorry hearts were made by
Saturday's disappointment, or how many poor
men's holidays had a shade thrown over them by the
unexpected refusal of the bluff gentleman in livery
at the gate of the Museum ? These things may seem
trifles, but they indicate a want of thoughtful-
ness and sympathy, which it is peculiarly
irritating to see at a time of general rejoicing.
. It is probable, that if a single person in authority
had thought of coupling boxing-day and the poor
man's two gratis exhibitions in London, this absurd ex-
clusion could scarcely have taken place. It could hardly
have occurred had the visits of thousands to these
places, on our rare holidays, ever suggested the thought
that here was a means of instruction at command,
which should be kept always in the reach of the poor,
and of which they should in every possible way be
encouraged to avail themselves. Who can say how
many an extra shilling was spent in the gin-shop and
\ public-house, to make up for the balked enjoyment of
- the pictures and statues, and natural history of the
national collections?
the

IN the dark ages, when a conjuror wished to im-
pose on a credulous multitude, his first step was
" to cast a figure." In our days casting figures is the
cabalistic process by which statisticians impose on
themselves. Mr. Euw.tan BtINES believes that he
will demonstrate the inutility of State interfe-