The Express.
London, England, 1847-09-07 00:00:00

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MAWS.
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OS. Egypt, Aare. lee* liens yep Ike., will be awls up on the
amain dabs ember.
The Mee Mr Opal LW," Madeira, Cadiz, and Gibraltar
trill he me& urea der 17th September.
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aide op emir menelles etas fah Sep:.--mbil•
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Dieland will le orb ego es Ilieeming of the Jots September.
The amps for Mal MMIMM,Ihs year Plate, Monte Video, Pernam.
Asa, hall". liefekee, est Diseoe Ayres, will be made tip oa We
alissiee of dm Ns Weber.

TO COZIESTONDTTITS.
Aghbrelyymeses Istseaml nu in... 4 L.A. ...Wit yaw, nut by
as UN Moe by Tyre •Yelyek Yu bir*blb..lo.

HIGH WATER AT LONDO7I.3IIDOZ.
Twas DAT .iterllleg. 36 W. pea ifteromm. 12 W. Nat 11.
UW. past I; ifoream. 36 RYA post I.

LONDON. TUESDAY, SEPT. 7.
IT is pleasant to turn for a moment from contem-
plating the display of Austrian insolence and brutality
to Italy and allow the mind to dwell on the more ra-
tional and useful efforts of which Belgium is about to
become the scene. As has been more than onoe noticed
in this journal, a congress of the political economists of
Europe will meet in Brussels on the 16th of the pre-
, sent month, and on the 20th a congress of the friends
and advocates of the amelioration of prison discipline
and the general improvement of penal law.

The Penitentiary Association meet for the second
time. The order of their discussions is in a great
measure pm-determined by what took place at their
last year's meeting in Frankfort-on-the-Maine. That
assembly almost unanimously approved the principle
of separate confinement both before and after teal.
Vaiaryear the association, samming tantspostion
be set at rest, proposes to proceed to the discussion of
practical means for carrying the separate system into
effect :—the organisation of employment, inspection,
&c.; the architecture of prisons, principally with a
view to the arrangement of the buildings; the means
of preserving the health of prisoners ; the best mode of
dealing with liberated prisoners; preventive police;
and the reforms necessary in penal legislation, in
order to promote penitentiary reform. Here certainly
is work enough for one year's meeting ; and we do
not therefore object to the temporary assumption that
last year's vote has settled the preliminary question
as to what system of imprisonment is moat efficacious.
This conventional understanding will prevent the
introduction of much irrelevant matter and keep
speakers to the point. But of course it remains free
to the congress to open up that question in future years.
The vote of the Penitentiary association has not the
effect of law ; and even if it had, final legislation on so
vital a principle would be premature in the present
vague and unsettled notions on all matters connected
with penal law which pervade society.

It is not so easy to foresee the exact course which
will be taken by the debates of the economists—the
topics which will most engross their attention.
Among the subjects announced fer discussion in the
programme of the meeting we find, " The particular
interests or special reasons which each country may
invoke for or against free trade." The country in
which the congress are to assemble and the countries
immediately adjoining afford apt matter for such an
investigation. A treaty of commerce has lately been
concluded between Holland and Belgium. which the
Dutch and Belgian ministers had tough work to
render palatable to the last sessions of their respective
legislatures, by each protesting sturdily that the other
country derived the leant advantage, from it. The "par-
ticular interests and special reasons which, in thiscase,
have rendered difficult the triumph of common sense
and common justice, are all bound up in the compli-
cated artificial system by which the colonial posses-
sions of Holland in the East, the overgrown sugar-
refining trade of Holland, and the national debt of
Holland, have been erected into a fantastic structure
of national policy. A clear statistical exposition of
the actual condition of this branch of Dutch politico-
indastrial activity by intelligent natives, with com-
ments on it by economists whose views have been
developed beyond the sphere of its influence, would
possess a high degree of practical importance.
Again, thy convention of the ftats rirerans of
the Rhine at Mayence is at this moment
in session, or has just terminated its sittings.
This suggests another topic in which Belgium,
Holland, and the German States immediately
adjoining them, are deeply interested, and respecting
which the economists of those countries which, as
nearest to Brussels, are likely to send the greatest
number of members to the congress, are most likely
to be able to elucidate satisfactorily—the free naviga-
tion of the Rhine. 'Widening a little the circle within
which we have hitherto confined our thoughts, we
come on one frontier of Belgium and Holland to
England with its navigation law ; on another
frontier of Belgium to France with its prohibi-
tive system in respect of the importation of
cattle and agricultural produce ; and on another
frontier of Holland to the Zollverein with its
tariff. Each of the countries we have named has
hitherto been endeavouring to realise its own peculiar
theory of political economy ; each has, by the legis-
lation introduced to promote its pet theory, thrown
impediments in the way of equitable national com-
mercial relations ; the meeting of economists from
all these nations, if it lead to a free and full inter-
change of their peculiar opinions, must contribute
mate, iallv to expand and obliterate one-sided notions.
The idea of those periodical conventions of men
devoted to the study of the administrative sciences
has been taken from the annual meetings of
naturalists. If possible, political economy, cri-
minal jurisprudence, and other practical sciences,
I are adapted to receive even more benefit from such
assemblies than mere abstract science, or sciences
of observation and experiment. The ideas and logic
of botanists, mathematicians, or chemists, are under
all conditions of society the same. But the views of
the political economist and of the student of syste-
maw jurisprudence, or administrative constitutions,
are necessarily biassed by the political and social
forma of the communities amid which their thinking
faculties have been developed. It is only by the colli-
sion of the thinkers of many and various nations that
the cultivators of these departments of knowledge
can escape mistaking particular phenomena for
general principles. And, at this time, when
the necessities of society are compelling every
government in the civilised world to set about re-
modelling its laws and institutions, it is most desirable
that every opportunity should be embraced by those
who take upon them to instruct or act for the masses
to attain to views of catholic and absolute truth.
It is on this account that we observe with sincere
pleasure the free-traders of Manchester appointing
OW of their number to represent them at the ap-
proaching economical congress, and a number of our
Middlesex magistrates accepting the invitation of the
prison discipline congress. We infer from these
movements that English publicists are becoming
alive to the importance of cultivating liberal and
extended views of legislation.

THE conduct of the Irish proprietors is a subject of
vital interest to all who are connected with the sister
country. For our own part, we have never joined in
the indiscriminate censure which some of our contem-
poraries have lavishly poured out upon the landlords.
The readers of the Daily News will admit that we
are not addicted to habits of invective against any
clam of society; and if, in recent comments on
the conduct of some Irish landlords, who forced
themselves into notice, we indulged in a severe strain,
we can only say in our self-defence, that the occasion
called for it. Lord SHANNON, in a letter to an Irish
journal, has taken exception to some of our statements.
But when we charged Irish proprietors with apathy,
we did not allude to such men as Lord SHANNON, who
is a credit to his order. Both branches of the house of
BOYLE have always been distinguished for their libe-
rality and high personal character. In :private vir-
tues, if not in public talents, they sustain the name
inherited from the justly famous BOYLES of other
times. Unlike most other great families in the Anglo-
Irish racy, we learn from Dr. W. C. TAYLOR,
in his history of the " Civil Wars of Ireland," that
the BOTLES rose to fame and fortune by honour-
able services." The early history of the wide-
'theitALiandernwsml:iefsithsodteodgeirigthirfame,urehasenthecigo7ti°.elylivriEarir;t:l:anol.erc thvwftareir:;nha:Thf;Mhaulf:ideanazaraBl7ll;toete:NStrlivnah:ele.yrNMarriageetWn,thtatba:r•tetwormstereic:
by encouraging manufactures, and by erecting useful
public works, at his own expense. While he thus per-
manently benefited the country (continues the hie-