The Express.
London, England, 1846-12-21 00:00:00

TO CORR :SPONDENTS,

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MGR WATER LONDON-BRIDGE.

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LONDON, MONDAY, DEC. 21.

IT is difficult to recall this go-a-head age to a
serious retrospect of the laolitical personages and ideas
which preceded it. Our r -aam progress has left histm y
very far behind. And did not one or two names in
our obituary almost forcibly compel a
that
to the
last century, one might almost forget that there had
been a political past. Where are the PITT clubs?
Where the celebration :f Fox's anniversary ? The
"Man of the People" and "the Pilot who weathered
the storm " have gone arn-in-arm to Ilades, clean out
of our every-day recolleclions.
There was one GRENVILLF: left, who held on with
the family tenacity for life and power; and his disap-
paarance reminds one of the age to which he
',clanged. Nor are the (iRENVILLIIS, the bye-
gone ones, bad samples of that age, and of the mode
in which fortunes ant eminence were achieved,
and a family raised to the highest pitch of power.
With that quantum of birth and fortune still necessary,
and then still more ir), fur any superstructure of poli-
tical greatness to be built upon, the GRENVILLES made
such chosen seed to trerminata an hundred-fold. The
absorption of heiress after heiress filled the coffer'', the
acquirement of parliamentary influence and official
place augmented the importance, of the family.
When its chief might mt aspire to first place himself,
he was sure to become closely allied to him that did ;
and though the highest throne of office could seldom
be filled by a OREN VIL! E, there were always three or
four of the name upon the steps. With never any of
them of first-rate talent, all of them had improved the
average quantity which all possessed, by the utmost
c iltivation, assiduity, by skillfulness of conduct and
gravity f demeanor. The most frantic and
foolish of political measures, the American
Stamp Act, may be traced to GEORGE. GRENVILLE.
Yet he contrived to shirt the odium to other shoulders,

and, from JuNtirs to BURKE, cvery orator and writer,
who had a tribute of applause worth bestowing, did

bestow it at his shrine.

This statesman becreathed political eminence, and
his care political ii traction and capacity to his
sons, the late Lord ( RENVILLE, and the Honourable
THOMAS GRENVILLE, just deceased at the age of 91.
Lord GRENVILLE, notwithstanding the higher
honours bestowed ap ni his uncle, continued the poli-
tical head of the fam ; and ho gaidcel it in a juste-
milieu course, veering to the right or left, just as the
vane of, not popular, but public opinion, varied and
pointed.
At first all liberel with Fox, ho soon became half
liberal and anti-libe al with BURKE, continuing with
PITT, until misfortui,e and infatuation seemed to mark
that statesman's car-er. Warned by such example,
Lord GRENVILLE withdrew, and threw once more the
mantle of the Liberal patriot round his shoulders, pro-
claiming with pre,.hetic eloquence those truths and
principles especialli relative to Catholic Emancipation
and toe Corn-laws, destined to triumph a quarter of a
century later. This noble decline shed more lustre
on the GRENVILLE name than all its records of office
and of title, or then the apparently more buccessful
tacking of an aristocratic family policy.
It is idle to rail at the present day against aristo-
cratic influence, that influence being now just so much
as, and no more that, the English democracy pleases to
leave to it. Nor it .his influence likely to be less lust-
ing, because founds .1 upon voluntaryhomage. There is,
however, one part of aristocratic influence not merely
on the wane, but i lean perished. This is the influence
of such potent i'amilies as flourished in the last
century, and whic't forms, indeed, the peculiar feature
of English politics in that century. Parties no longer
hold together by the tics of blood, nor can ministries
be formed to f10..t, like rafts, tied together by such
frail ligaments el the branches of the trunks them-
selves.
Office and connexion will not alone achieve great-
ness in our day. And yet political eminence has not
been found more attainable by the politician who
springs from the crowd, than it was in the days of
the RI:REES and GRENVILLES. We still see the
gentry and the aristocracy fill as great a proportion
of influential wits, no longer indeed from the privi-
leges of birth, but from the monopoly of political
education, of family traditions and oral know-
ledge which is scarcely attainable, except in very rare
instances, by cue new man, or in one generation.
Independent of the arcane of politics, immense and
important in all countries, and especially in England.
the mere study of politics has grown into a field and a
study so minim:lse, that few can divide themselves be-
tween the tasks of amassing a fair private fortune and
attaining a high public character, so that those wha in-
herit the one have just as great advantage over the
poorer competitor, as birth in the last generation gave
over the low-born.
If we glance at the private histories and public
fortunes of men who from the middle ranks of life
have arrived at political eminence, we cannot boast
that the Reform Bill has afforded more Eseilities for
popular talent. Look at the very first of the popular
political geniuses of the age, Mr. COBDEN. The probabi-
lity is, that his genie prunesautier would have rendered
him as eminent in the last age as in this. Ills labours
in attaining that eminence would in the last century
'have been far less ' • and his self-sacrifices far less pre-
cious and c:atly. In this time ItICiIARD COBDEN has
sacrificed health and fortune to the greatest of popular
causes. And a public subscription, which will do little
more than pay the debts which he generously in-
curred in that cause, lingers and awaits, like NELsoN's
column, at hilst the votaries of his greatness grudge
and withhold tho shillings necessary to complete the
miserable and unworthy monument.
But in expatiating upon COBDEN, we have lost sight
of the GRENVILLES. 1n this too we may lay a fair
claim to fulfil the great newspaper function of repre-
senting the feeling of the public.

THE dinner given by Mr. HUDSON, at York
on the commencement of his mayoralty was, as became
the occasion, a railway dinner. The London guests,
as stat a by Lord GEORGE BENTINCK, after having
break( wted in London by daylight, were whirled to
York by daylight " for a less sum of money than
years ago it would have cost to pay the post boys and
the ti xnpike tolls on the road." And after dinner the
festii 2 part) of the Mayor of York had their healths
drunk by au equally festive party of the Mayor of
Newnistle, receiving an intimation of the honor done
them by the electric telegraph, and returned the com-
pliment, despatching a message to that effect by ano-
thei ministering " streak of lightning."
It was natural that an entertainment given by Mr.
HUDSON, and at which, owing to the presence of
gentlemen of all shades of politics, political questions
were kept in the background, these marvels of modern
inventiveness should supply their place. The promi-
nent and influential part taken by that gentleman in

the development of our railway finance was enough
to give a railway tone to the proceedings. And on
this occasion he was supported by GFA3ROE STEPIIEN-
SON, whose genius gave our first passenger railway
its first lecorcotivi 8, and by his son, whose inventive
and persevering energy has done so much to per-
fect the system of railway construction and locomo-
tion. . _ .

The effect of this triumph of railways was different
upon different minds. Combined with the late more
than railway rapidity of political changes, it appears
to have altogether dislocated the ideas of Mr. It. P.
MILK E. "Ho had given up politics," he said, "or
rather politics had given up him. During the last
twelve months kis political senses had all been knocked
out of him. When asked what he thought of things,
his answer was, he could not tell--ho would leave
them to guess for themselves—he might as well prog-
nosticate the seasons as speculate upon politics, inca-
pacitated as he felt himself."
The constitution of Lord GEORGE BENTINCK, on
the contrary, toughened it may be by athletic exer-
cises, stowd better the dizzying influence of the rapid
transit from London, and the yet more vertiginous
effect of the confidential whispers between York and
Newcastle. Nay, if we may take so great a liberty
with one who Fmbraced the opportunity to pro-
claim himself " leader of the House of Com-
mons," the vibration seems to have stimulated
unwonted powers of thought in his brain.
At least, we cannot recall any occasion, upon
which his lordship uttared consecutively so many sen-
tences of unquestionable good sense. lie dwelt with
emphasis on the fact that the citizens of York, " where
they once paid 16s. 6d. per ton for their coals, now
pay Gs. 6d. ;" that the farmer has his " corn carried
to market fir him at 4s. to ss. per quarter less than
before ;" that " profit is the aliment, the vu-y breath
of enterprise and commerce ;" and that " deny to
commerce her just profit, and few years will elapse
befiire the enterprise of England will subside, and
instead of being at the head, we shall be at the tail of
all the nations of the world."
Spoke like a leaguer, my lord. Yon have pointed
out reductions in the expenditure of the rural districts
fur fuel, and diminished cost in bringing agricultural
produce to market, that may, of themselves, enable
our farmers to face any competition ; and you have
proclaimed the great truth, that the might of England
will be paralysed, unless we leave our merchants free
to make just profits.

When Lord dialiN Ilussett, in his letter to the
electors of London, pointed out the subjects of educa-
tion, sanitary regulation, and the penal system, as
the most important matters of future government
action, he was propounding substantially a new
theory of government. Under these three heads may
be classed all forms of state intervention which affect
the character of a people, as distinct from and lying
at the bottom of all social and political action.
Hitherto the executive has confined itself rather to
the regulation and control of the effects, than to the
shaping of the cause; to the trimming, and pruning,
and restraining of the branches and their burden,
than to the nurture and preparation of the root.
We have official assurance that in one of these three
subjects, sanatory regulation, it is the intention of
government to act at once and cirectuelly. The
materials for the work are prepared. Since 1838
the subject has been investigated more completely
and by more competent persons, than generally fall
to the lot of parliamentary inquiries. The evils are
obvious, their causes pater.t, their remedies within our
reach, at the expense of combatting, satisfying, or
setting aside certain not unimportant private interests.
In education, the government has a work to do as
urgent, but not so easy. The country has already,
with partial aid from the Legislature, exerted itself
to educate. The imperfect machinery which religious
zeal, or intelligent philanthropy, has already set in
motion, cannot be suddenly or rudely stopped. It re-
quires more caution and thought to accommodate to
the present rude apparatus the improvements of a wider
and wiser invention, than it would to construct an
entirely new engine, and set it to work promptly
by an exercise of central power, as was done in France
and Prussia. There can be little question that exist-
ing means must be incorporated in any scheme of
government educational action. There are opposing
forces to be considered and conciliated, narrow views
to be extended, animosities to be softened, fears to be
soothed away if possible, or, if that may not be, to be
firmly and quietly disregarded. It would be premature
to ask front the executive any expression of their
intentions a:: to education at present. Any intima-
tion of more than an earnest attention to the subject,
and a determination to deal with it, would do more
harm than good. It is certain that asmuch has been
done by the inspectors of the committee of council,
sufficient information of what has been done, is
doing, and should be done, is not yet in the hands of
the government.
The third head of the programme, our penal
system, is the necessary complement of the other
two. It involves, for the most abandoned and most
neglected class, the same sort of action as education
and sanitary law together will exert on the poor and
honest. The gaol, or whatever answers to it, may,
and should, be the school and home of the criminal as
well as his workshop and place of punishment. In
this department, as in all others, all our pre-
vious appliances have been directed to effects,
not causes. We have taken the crime per-
petrated, to visit it with the vengeance of
society, rather than the evil germ, to purify and turn
it to good for society's future benefit. By our
neglect of education and sanitary restraint, with a
commerce unrivalled for extent, a fertile and highly
cultivated soil, great practical energy, and enormous
political power, we have a population suffering under
the worst effects of ignorance, and towns whose squa-
lor and festering uncleanness cannot be exceeded
in the lowest community of the lowest beings who
wear human form. So with a vigilant, well-admi-
nistered, and long-standing legal system, the penal
part of which finds in society a ready agency in aid
of law, we exhibit an appalling annual list of crimes,
and a miserably small offset of reformations. Not
one in a hundred of those who start with crime
amongst us, end other than they began. The
nurture of the streets is aggravated in the prison,
and matured in the hulks, or exhibits itself
in forms of demoniacal horror in the penal settlement.
This is the mischief, for the remedy of which govern-
ment is pledged to do something. The first-fruita of
their intention are already given to the public in. the
alteration of our system of convict transportation.
This reform directs itself, however, to the •adult
offender. We may by it avert some of the more
monstrous evils of our previous arrangements, I jut we
cannot hope that it will materially dimiuish the amount
of crime, or induce ang but a partial improv ementin
the condition and habits of the criminal c sass. To
effect these larger objects we must begin 10' ser. We
must deal with the spawn of vice• ands dlany on a
principle wholly diferent from any hither to acted on.
The most effectual change in the penal system, for
society, both morally and economical.) y, will be one
which takes the culprit in his fast stage. In the
juvenile offender the penal reforme r recognises the
fairest subject for his experiment& This matter has
been brought before the public last week, by Mr.
M. D. lima., the Reevrder of Birmingham, at a
meeting of the Law Amendment Society. His
theory rests on the fact, that in the long
ran it is less expensive to reform than to pro-
secute. It is a great thing, in this country, to enlist
interest measured by money, on the side of
sense and humanity. Once convince people that
this is really so, and it becomes a duty to
spare tax-payers and rate-payers the expense
of prisons by the establishment of reforma-
tories. It is trite that as Christiana this is
a duty almost too obvious for enforcement. But
prove that it lies upon us, as men of business, and
you are likely to win a hearing and effect a change.
A plan has been tried for five years past, at Bir-
mingham, of binding young offenders to masters,
when these can be found to receive apprentices from
the dock, instead of committing them to prison. The II
number of such apprentices, up to last Michaelmas, was'
113. Of these, 40 had returned tolled courses; 29 were,
doubtful; and 41 had been entirely reformed ; " their
reform baying stood the test of time." Mr. Hr:a.,
without going into detail, declares his object to F,e the
establishment of the principle, " that a pers•-m, once
rightfully imprisoned, should not be suffere'e to go at
large again till he shall have become thoroughly
reformed." We doubt the feasibility eif this, and the
possibility of testing it; nor do stie consider the state
bound to find that morality for the condemned, which
it certainly cannot hope to secure to those who never
enter a court of justice. But the thing should be
tried. We do not at all agree with Mr. Ilitt in
thinking that refr;rm of the culprit should be even the