The Express.
London, England, 1848-12-20 00:00:00

"ions hitherto imbue, first,to pare down small Warns,
and make a great show of combo my, and then set to to
multiply places under the pretext of publics exigency.
While the Mint Commisalaners are probably prying
into the soormities of hutbdreds to see how a ten per
cent. may be saved, the thousands spent on junkiest
men they dare not tenth. In 'training at a gnat
public economists very often swallow a camel, as may
be instanced in the great " well jobs " going on in the
Mint, d and superintended by an officer who
if all economy, and by non-attendance to his
duties leaves the job to have its swing. We hope
next session of parliament some member will call for
a return otall the expenses incurred in sinking this
well, and other tributary jobs ensuing from it. We
hear they are so considered in the Mint, and if so,
they must be bad enough.
After what we have said here, and in previous
articles, our readers will be satisfied that a reform of
the Mint is required, and if the commissioners fail in
their duty to the public, we cannot, in our humbler
capacity, be accused of failing in ours. Their pub-
lished evidence and report will prove how fu they
have acted up to the grave and important duties im-
posed upon them by the crown.

We can see no reason whatever for the illiberal
triumph displayed on acoount of the result of the
West Riding election. If the tory candidata carried
the day, he did so from his having become a convert
to much that is liberal in principle. If the reform
candidate failed, he certainly owed a portion of his
failure to the facilities of misrepresenting one who
had lent some portion of his time and countenance to
intolerants.
Mr. DENISON congratulated the men of Yorkshire
on having changed, and on being civil to him in 1848,
whilst they hooted him in 1841. Mr. DENISON
should have confessed that the change was in him,
not in Yorkshiremen. He was a protectionist in
1841 ; be accepts free trade and the repeal of the corn
law in 1848. That the conquest of free trade is final,
we need no better proof than the ground which Mr.
Detirsox took up, and the allies whose neutrality
enabled him to conquer.
But, indeed, neither one candidate nor the other
seemed to know where his strength lay. Both took
it for granted that religious motives predominate
above all others, whether liberal or economical,
in the West Riding. Mr. DElvisox declares now that
his chief merit and recommendation to the electors
has been his desire to keep church and state
closely wedded together. Sir CULLING EARDLEY
evidently reckoned upon his anti-catholicism being
his most popular and powerful device. Yet what
said the men of the West Riding ? They
shrugged their shoulders at the religions zealotry of
both. The cry, in which both candidates joined, of
the church in danger from the Pope, remained on-
echoed. In the same way, the twin exaggeration
that religion would be extirpated by secular or state
education, was equally scouted. The electors of the
West Riding evidently disclaim the character of an
ecclesiastical council. And it is one of the most re-
markable signs of progress in the English mind, this
evident tendency to judge even religious questions
with lay calmness and sense.
If, however, to judge by the barometer of the
Yorkshire election, free trade seems irrevocably a
fail accomplc and religions cries are considered out of
place on or before the hustings, we cannot congrstu-
tuLate ourselves on the sentiments evinced by the
men of the West Riding for either retrenchment
or reform. The demand for them they have
certainly in some degree ignored. And if
the farmers are still to be saddled with the
malt tax, the townsmen with the wiedow tax,and with
an income tax on their precarious earning, equal to
what the landlord pays on his sempiternal rent, the
farmers and dealers of Yorkshire may thank their
votes for the neutral and the do-nothing Deimos.
The West Riding, through one it its members, will
dance the goose step next session and thereafter,
stirring not one peg in advance, notwithstanding a
world of preaching, shouldering, " right about face,"
and " as you were.
Already, indeed, we see the bad effects of this
cunuchism in other quarters. Sir ROBERT PEEL'S
son counts on the DENISON principle of expe-
diency and ambiguity in the election of Leominster.l
And Sir EDWARD BULWER LYTTON Deems quite
afraid, notwithstanding his desires, to take any
broader or more liberal ground. Sir EDWARD Butwaa
Lerrost represents himself as a country gentleman,
equally proud of his descent and his liberalism, and
claiming the sweet voices of the Leominster., evi-
dently more on the spirit of the pest than the pro-
mimes of the future. Sir EDWARD points to his very
liberal votes, and he might have quoted very
able and liberal speeches of his. But be
haggles and doubts
About the repeal of the
Corn Laws. He is ararmed by organic changes.
He is for the ballot, indeed, and retrenchment.
But he is only for so much radicalism as will not soil
his gentility. We are not surprised that the electire
of Leominster are puzzled, that they show small en-
thusiasm for either candidate, and that they should
look on with such blank and undecided faces, that Sir
EDWARD BULWER LYTTON declared, " if they did not
make up their minds he would take ap his hat and
go." Let Sir EDWARD BULWER LYTTON rather
make up his own mind, and stay ; let him
speak the language he did fifteen years ago, and he
will soon raise yeas and nays. We are for Sir
EDWARD BULWER LTTrotr, one of the first of English
geniuses, if he will prove as frank a politician as he
is a poet. Bat if he will not, it is not fair to have
Leominster tickled by a semi-liberal and a semi-con-
servative. If Sir E. BULWER LYTTON retire, Mr.
JOHN PHILLIMORE should be called forward again. He
at least can speak out.

Tim conquest of the Punjaub is still a future event.
The steamer front Calcutta has brought tidings no
more decisive than those conveyed by its immediate
predecessor from the Western Presidency ; and, in
truth, all that we have learnt by the despatches of
yesterday is contained in the brief sentence—that the
ten days, from the 20th to the 30th October, witnessed
no row exploit of moment, either by General WEITBII
or his enemy. The interesting circumstance in the
news of the last mail was the adroit departure of
SHIRE SINGH from Moultan, and his reported
junction with his father, Count:it SINCH, at
some point to the north-west of Lahore. The
exact position of these wive chieftains does not
appear to be even yet very aoctimtely ascertained. It
is certain that at least one of them is not far from the
capital, for a pontoon bridge established by Major
*NAIR across the Rave., at a trifling distance
from Lahore, has been twice subjected to night at-
tacks from advanced picquets of the Sikh army.
The task of keeping these troublesome neighbours in
check has been entrusted to Brigadiers GODBY and
Cuarrow, and it is possible—probabilities in this slow
campaign are another thing—that we may learn by
the next arrival of some pitched fight or severe skir-
mish between the troops commanded by these two
officers and the levies under the Sikh leader.
In Peshawar, it is gratifying to learn that Major
LAWRENCE is still able to maintain himself, but how
he continues to do so must be elucidated by explana-
tions more connected and explicit than those which
transpire through the present casual intercourse with
that extreme corner of the country.
In the districts between the frontier and the capital
there is more room for the leisurely exercise of Bri-
tish vigilance, and General WHEELER has been keep-
ing the people of that pert of the country very
effectually in mind of his presence by attacking, over-
powering, and reducing to an untenable condition
two forts of some magnitude in the neighbourhood of
the Beam.

We must again repeat that as to the ultimate Moue'
of the campaign there cannot be two serious opinions.
The force we poesess, even on the Bengal sides of
perfectly overpowering steungth—a force greater by
four and five times than the armies to which we
are indebted for the series of conquests which have
given us an empire wider and better consolidated
than that which at any period acknowledged the sove-
reignty of the Mogul Emperors. Reckoning only upon
those troops which are either actually in cantonments
o the westward of Delhi, or which are under orders
to proceed in that direction, there is a body of up-
Irak ds of 40,000 men of all arms ; and, deducting
from this aggregate strength, the troops already be-
fore Moaltan and employed in other parts of the Pun-
jaub, there will still remain a reserve of at least
26,000 Lnen boasting a perfect discipline, and
in the highest state of efficiency for field
service, uptm whom the commander-in-chief can
depend for the prosecution of any line of operations
he may think proper to propose. In the presence of