The Express.
London, England, 1848-07-17 00:00:00

:::...---------------
withink, to hops for the complete union of all the
members of the race. To combine Dansie and War-
law with Jassy and Belgrade in one empire is prepos-
I terms. Nor does it seem to be for any interest or
' Zitiothat Bohemia should be detached from its
incor-
old
connexion with Germany. to be
poted in a new Sclavonia empire. The re-
geraneration of Poland, and its recovery of Posen and
Gallicia, is a fair object of hope. But the establish-
ment of a south Sclavonic empire, independent alike
of Russia and of Austria, is not realisable, or perhaps
silesimble in this age. There exists, however, a great
wares of strength, and a great guarantee for being
well treated in the immense extension of tt e Sclavonic
family. For there must prevail a certain degree of
sympathy between all, and the empire which
roles them most successfully end liberally will
I surely bo looked to as the patron and the regenerator
of the race. Whilst some are under Hungarian, some
under Austrian rule, others arc under Prussian, or
pure Russian, and others still, though under suze-
rainty, left to their own local management. Which-
ever system is found to be the fairest and best cannot
but gain great force, whilst that which remains a
rule of mere tyranny and oppression will excite
feelings impossible to smother, and a race incapable of
being ruled.
However despotic tho government of Russia, it
must be astute enon4h to feel this. Bayonets were
all very well as the exclusive means of government,
when the military empires of Austria and Prussia
constituted the sole neighbours of Russia. Now aliberal
government and a freo press must prevail more or
less along the frontiers of the latter, and the Czar
himself must have recourse to other modes of govern-
ment and measures of policy than monster reviews,
übiquitous police, the knout, and Siberia. The war
commenced, the most effective war, is one of insti-
tutions, of example, and of civilian rivalry. The
setting on foot, and in motion, of armies, can but retard
and obstruct those far more important and effective
-,.quests.

TUE Examiner levels an accusation against us of
being an anti-Times journal. Why so limit the re-
proach? We are equally an anti-Murniny Chronicle,
an anti-Examiner journal. We are a paper of pyo-
gress, that would strike out new paths, excite new cm-
pulses, and muster new friends to an onward movement.
The Times and all the other papers, daily and weekly,
are either for preserving the status qua, or for beating
time to the old goose-step, which has not advanced an
inch during the last sixteen years.
The Times we look upon as the most able and most
formidable champion of the state of things which exist,
of aristocratic predominance in parliament and govern-
ment, of the prodigality and disorder which follow'
from the fact, of the financial paralysis which benumbs
the country, and which so frustrates every effort towards'
a true policy of any kind, domestic or colonial, that
without reform we really can perceive no future for
the country save absolute ruin. The Times is for
bolstering up with sandbags and defending with
fresh entrenchments the aristocratic and absolutist
principle at home or abroad. From this principle
flow with perfect consistency and unity all its
efforts, all its arguments. We combat them all with
equal zeal, but without rancour; and the Times
combats us with no less point in not naming the new
and the sole dissident from it in the press.
The Examiner, however, with a total disregard of
both fairness and facts, accuses our opinions as ori-
ginating solely in mere antagonism to the Times.
Our advocacy of reform, it hints, is a mere counter-
move to Times hostility. Why, we brought forward
the necessity of a new reform to be advocated by the
middle classes as a substitute for the more dangerous
effects of chartism, days and weeks b. fore the Times
even hinted at the subject. We foreran, or at least
echoed simultaneously both the efforts of Mr. liumE
and the freetraders. Were they, too, it the opinion
of the Extiminer,actuated solely by antagonism to the

Times ?
But after all we are by no means so diametrically
opposed to the Thin,. That journal has frequently,
though fitfully, admitted the expediency of reform.
It joins the -Examiner in admitting the necessity of
an extension of the franchise ; but it goes further than
the Examiner, and admits, with the Erpresa, that
there does exist great injustice in the present distri-
bution of electoral districts. This is a point which to
our remembrance the Eraminer has nut touched upon
at all, and which it therefore has decidedly " flung
overboard."
But why is the question of electoral districts so im-
portant to bring forward? And why did Mr. Ilusik
insist on coupling it with the ballot and the extension
of the suffrage ? First, from its intrinsic worth, for
without it the other two would be comparatively
inoperative; secondly, from the present system being a
more gross injustice to the intelligent and middle
class than even the denial of the ballot, or the
limitation of the franchise ; and thirdly, because
it enlisted new and great interests in the question of
reform, all the great mercantile towns, all the recently
developed and industrial counties, all the districts
is which popular election would prevail over aristo-
cratic and landlord patronage. It is the question
of electoral districts which makes the new movement
a middle-class one. No man, no capitalist engaged
in industrial occupations, can upon a moment's re-
flexion put up with a gross slur and disad-
vantage cast upon I him by allowing the
three landlords of Buckinghamshire to have as
mangy• votes in the House of Commons as South Lan-
cashire. And consequently the introduction of the
equalisation of electoral districts into the fa'ciculus
of reform measures, does no less than secure to the
reform movement that immense mass of partisanship
which carried corn-law repeal.
In the face of such motives and aims as these, the
Examiner in the press, and some members in parlia-
ment, affect to deprecate the introduction of such a
question as inimical to reform, which was likely to
fare better, if confined to the ballot and the extension
of the franchise. The persons who cast such a re-
proach as this upon Mr. Hust F. must do so from either
ignorance or from their being lukewarm reformers.
What is the advantage of having some dozen votes
more, or some dozen votes less, minority in the House
of Commons? is it in .he house of Commons or in
the country that the battle of reform is to be fought,
to be lost, or to be wou? Clearly it is
not in the House of Commons, which, un-
less the pressure of public opinion from without be
brought to bear, will never pass one clause of reform
more than another. The idea of carrying on the
movement fur re'orm by a resuscitation of the old
humdrum, annual motion for the ballot, upon
which no orator could utter one new idea, is about as
hopeless and preposterous as the hope that you can
carry or advance any one question in :he House of
Commons without the aid of what is called agitation.
It would therefore have been the highest degree of
folly in Mr. HOME to have brought in a measure of
reform which was not simultaneously addressed to
the country and to parliament. It would have been
equal folly to have produced nothing more than the
old common-place motions, which had already ac-
quired within and without the doors of parliament
all the support that they could command, a support
found utterly inadequate to keep the subject of them
before either the country or the house. Go ask Mr.
GaoTE how he fared with the ballot, and whether he
would recommend Mr. COBDEN to set sail in so small
and so feeble sailing an embarkation.
In addition to such considerations as these, comes
also the equally important one of the necessity of
launching a lifeboat in thu political storm, of
throwing out something to which the liberal but
unfrenzied mind would cling at a moment when
every revolutionary element has been let loose.
We all know the prevalence of chartism. None admit
it more fully than the tories, or truckled to it more
basely. Lord JOHN RUSSELL himself admitted that
the lower class movement was more mighty than the
middle class one, and in more than one argument he
leaned to Mr. FEARGUs O'CONNOR against Mr.
HOME. However a Whig orator or a falsely
liberal organ may indulge in such dangerous
petty treason as this, it is not the less the duty
of honest and thorough liberals to persist in their own
efforts, made against the united opposition of
the three aristocratic parties, and, we are sorry
to add, against the more covert hostility of some
who call themselves radicals, to carry oat such a
measure of reform as will rally all the liberal middle
class behind it, in order to the carrying it for the con-
tentment and improvement of the lower classes, and
their admission within the pile of the constitution.

FRANCE.

1848.

TUE brief debate of Thursday night ou Mr. MOP-
FATT'4 Qualification of Members Bill recalled the
accusation of a foreigner against the English, that
they maintain two codes of propriety and morality—
ono for the trading and the other for the gentleman

class. There was some troth in the observation. We deeds, and documents relative to his ------•••
must all admit that in this country there has been a BraziL property in
leniency shown to the delinquencies of the rich, The negotiation for the purchase by the Q
which the less fortunate portion of the community of the Lyons railroad, which two day,":""Dett
have never enjoyed. Debt has been viewed as a very advanced that we believed we might safely wQ81„„_81
trivial matter so long as the person incur- it was concluded, is for the moment entirrly"-,t7
ring it had not a ledger wherein it was M. Goudchaux, after having lowered hie often
4,7,
registered ; and dissipation in Burgundy and a bet- 7f. 60c. of renter in the Five per Cents. for
6fr—r."
ting-book has been looked at as a very venial sin by went of 250 f. already made, has alniostfis,ert
men who: condemned with appropriate emphasis the Oared that the purchase cannot be made— '',.
on any
excesses of the poor in beer and gin. Indeed, we are terms.
not quite sure whether a slight dash of immorality The Minister of Finance suffered a check to.
has not been considered rather to improve one of the the assembly, which
refused hie demand that de
,i.
1:
upper classes than otherwise—just as the corruption for the tax on mortgages for the pretent year .1...,.***
of a Stilton produces the delicate mouldiness that gra- be passed as a measure of urgency,
tifies the gourmand. There has been a kind of tradi- The national guard of Lyons has been whor, a...
tionary feeling in favour of a scamp among our mid- armed, and the prefect in a proclamation oe''
die classes, and they have carried into public matters subject says, "It is a return to the law raw .-,7
something of the sentiment of sympathy with Mirka of agitation, which it would not allow to be eze-rt:
Surface and his proceedings. 'Phis kind of feeling as it should be."
has a motive, too, much less romantic than any sort
of hero-worship, as these habits of the rich render
them alnore facile and lucrative prey to the credit- i
giving habits of tradesmen. A revolution, however, i
is taking place in their mutual qualities and habits.
The welt-bred are ceasing to be so inexhaustibly sup-
plied with resources; and the industrious are begin-
ning to feel that usurious prices beget a dangerous
and reckless class of customers, to whom it is much
, he•ter to prefer the economic and ready-paying public.
I The object is to transfer this quiet revolution from
(life to legislation, and to deprive debt-incurring
qualities of that respect in parliament which they
have lost in shop and street. We trust at
another general, election the disgraceful scenes which
took place at Wallingford will not only not be
tolerated, but not be legal. if a committee of the
house can unseat for bribery, it can surely unseat for
a delinquency so much more easily proved. It is time
that hose hfiosend
g pl
or or
yp ear n gdphimerpeuinsitthy eliaQsut.cesnte'splhleennt
and that the new house of parliament should cease to
be a sanctuary for insolvents. We have had gentlemen
meddling with the nation's debts who ought to have
begun with their own; impeachments of ministers
from friends of Mr. SLOMAN ; and declamations
against tyranny from individuals who were at the time
condemning a poor tradesman to the slow and linger-
ing torture of payment " deferred." It is time that
the House of Commons should consult its
1 dignity by repealing a law which exposes it
to the imputatiou—doubly discreditable in a commer-
cial country—of protecting reckless and unprincipled
persons, to the iejury of the honest, the industrious,
and the poor.
Mr. MOFFAT'S bill provides that, in the event of a
judgment being obtained against auy member, the
creditor may petition the house, and that such peti-
tion shall be referred to a committee to investigate
the debt and decide whether the member ought
to be disqualified. This is ono of those de-
cisively stringent measures that accomplish an
object, and accomplish it at once. The dread of
the shame of such a committee being held on a man's
tailor's bill would operate as effectually as the more
familiar fear of the bailiff, and save parliament from
the presence of persons who aspire to benefit Europe.
but forget what they owe in a pecuniary sense to their
neighbour. There seemed an anxiety on the part of
members to shrink from giving a decision on the
principle of the measure. Sir GEORGE GREY affirmed
that there were " formidable objections" to the bill.
These must indeed be " formidable" since the hon.
baronet seemed to have been afraid to bring them
down in his head for the information of the house.
His dictum, however, was sufficient without argu-
ment, and the bill was withdrawn, to be renewed next
session with probably more success.
Indeed, as reform progresses, such regulations as
these will follow as a matter of course. At present
they should follow even more logically, for where a
want of actuai property bars a seat, surely the posses-
sion of negative property, a large amount of unsatisfied
debt ought to have douto!e effect. The old law, how-
ever, respected the even nominal capacity to spend,
and substance in a progenitor was lookel to more than
su',stance in se. It is time, however, that such old
laws, having one foot in the grave, should take the
other after it.

Si
inl f
Ar,g1,1030,11:01
The advocates in thPeAltB,
a'semblyl
chambers in the new constitution appear to be ,e• --
hopeless minority. Assuming that a single
will be adopted, the direct election of the president'.
universal suffrage will be opposed, and, as a 7,k
present, with some probability of success. tue—
systems have been proposed with referent y
the president, the one proposes his electios
universal suffrage, the other by the assembly. t'tle
advocates for two chambers adopt the fusser tql
only on the condition of a second chamber.
Leon Faucher, in the 7th bureau, in a speech nu*
by considerable ability, urged the objections cocks
election of the pre-ideut by direct and nice*
suffrage, showing the imminent danger of his Mew
ing in that case too power ul. Tne bureau vieldsi
to this reassning and by a large majority adopted
a resolution in favour of the election of the praidat
by the assembly.
M. Prudhon's project for confiscating a thirdaftbe
revenues of all proprietors was broughtbefetetV
Committee of Finance. That individual dismayed
confiscation, and maintained that the effect soy
proposition would be merely to give afreercireulmis
to capital. Being pushed by M. Thiess, howermte
explain himself more frankly as to the real tesderey
of his doctrines, M. Prudhon said, " I am neitherem.
monist nor socialist, I am opposed to the program's
impost, but I believe that property will share the fat
of Christianity, and this last is wearing out and et I
wear out, it will only have a certain duration,2o
years perhaps. I wish to shorter. its life, but Ido ue •
wish to kill it. It is on that account film IVI
to take away only a third of the revenue with*
prej dice, however, to wt at I shall propose hem*,
The bureau becoming impatient, the simple eject*
of the project, without further discussion, was abut
to be adopted, when M. Thiers interposed, and is
sisted on the expediency of allowing the proposing
a full development and public debate, in order that
ell those anti-social doctrines now spreading sba
serious mischief among the masses should be ousts
all exposed in their full absurdity. This opinionprs
railed, and the discussion was adjourned to Monday,
M. Lamartine, in the committee of foreign offs*
has delivered an important speech on the forage
policy of France, which produced a great Insane
yesterday. I will send you this afternoon a fat
translation of it.
Among the atrocious attempts at assusiteis
which I have signalised as taking place from day to
day, is mentioned an attempt on M. Lucien Miint,
member of the assembly, and son of the ex-iiing
Naples, who was fired at in the open day on Tinkly,
in the public promenade in the Clamps Elyserf. lh
was in his carriage at the time, the panel of whir
was penetrated by two balls. M. Murat was net
those marked for execution if the insurrectio: hag
succeeded.
M. Jules Fevre has postponed his motion for th
confiscation of the private property of Louis Phil*
as ailing the initiative of the government. The ea
sure was denounced with such indignation that du
was no hope of carrying it in the bureau.
M. Bethmout, it mister of Justice, has reap,
and his resignation has been accepted.
lam assured that Count Mole will be retormat
Bordeaux almost without competition, the mem
bsing created by the multiple election of NL That
The Monitersr of this morning contains a decade
the loan of 150,000,000 of francs from the Birk
France, and the treaty on which it is founded, by ski
I the minister is authorised to contract such lose mi
las security to transfer to the Bank 75,000d00 ofst4
from the sinking fund and to sell to the Bank cats
forests of the state for the remaining 75 million 71a
loan is to be advanced thus : 75 millions in 1845,4
75 millions in 1849. The amount payable inlB4Stel
paid in equal thirds in July, Aug., and Sept, griddled
1849 at the rate of twenty-five millions a month big
Ist of January. If the re-sale of the forests by tl.l,
Bank produce a loss, the Treasury is to reimbune
if a profit, the amount of profit is to be paid tans
Treasury, the Bank merely taking the sole m nos
corky for its advance. The rate of interest is fins
at 4 per cent. The loan of the seventy-five milli"
made on the security of the sinking fund to be repef
in 1850, and toe other seventy-rive millions by see
of the forests.

PARIS, SATURDAY, 6.30 r.m.
Yesterday passed away without disturbance, not-
withstanding the grave apprehensions of ti e public
and of the government itself. The formidable extent
and efficiency of the measures taken by the executive,
and the attitude of determination assumed by the
authorities and the National Guard, may have been
the cause of the absence of any attempt to disturb the
public tranquillity.
From the great military force now collected within
the capital itself, and the cordon of camps and forts
which surrounds it outside the circle of the fortifica-
tions, it is not possible to imagine any attempt at in-
surrection with the remotest hope of success. The
theatre of the insurrection, being necessarily the fan-
bourgs, would ba included between two fires : while
the military force within would drive the insurrec-
tion towards the external boulevards, the military
furce without, closing round these limits, would drive
it back again. Open insurrection, therefore, is not
what is now feared : secret plots and conspiracies are
what is apprehended.
Within the last ten days the emigration of people
from Paris has assumed formidable dimensions. All
the employh in the passport offices are insufficient to
discharge the requisite business. At the prefecture of
police there has been daily a queue of several hun-
dred yards in length.
Attempts at assassination still continue. The night
sentinels forming the outposts of the camps and the
detached forts are frequently fired at and sometimes
killed. The night before last a soldier was thus killed
at the camp of St. Maur.
The .3tmitcur publishes the following table of the
receipts of indirect taxes fur the first six months of
the present year:—

F;;;;;. F.
Registration data, ima. „.. ........ ..... „ 90,910,000 109,101,0,0
Stamm, 15,913,000 20,501,000
Customs
Navigation
Customs' duties (imiadriew) — 912,000 1,387,000
BaRM.°,
Potable liquors 44,871,000 47,768,600
Salt duties (without Oselams Units)
Indigenous supra .. 10,331,000 11,114,000
Varian 14,384,000 19,055,000
Tobacco sales
Gunpowder
Letters and duty amending money
For passeliger, by the malles-pcatee
Ditto by mails and packets

The Madrid mails with the journals and cones*
ence of the 10th inst., have naive& The coati
reached La Granja.

Total
Showing a decrease of 61,818,000 f. Compared with
1846 there is a decrease of 67,6,52,000 f.
The committee of finance has examined the propo-
sition of M. J. Fevre, to authorise the state to seize on
the private domain of Louis Philippe, on the ground
that the donation made by that monarch, when on the
point of ascending the throne, was an act null and
void. The author of the proposition maintained that,
previously to 1789, it had always been the cueom in
France for the propetty of the reigning prince to
merge into that of the torone; he dented that the de-
cree by which Napoleon had constituted a private
domain could have any value in 1830 ; he declared
that Louis Philippe, in making over his property to
his family, had done nothing else than defraud the
state. M. Jules Fevre admitteu that a law had been
passed in 1832 rec,Tnising the donation so made ;
but he argued that such law could now be declared
of no avail, since Louis Philippe had lost his crown
by his own laults and crimes. M. Thiers, on hearing
this language, said :
I am accustomed to the language of victorious parties, and,
as far as I am personally concerned, I never allow myself to
be either astonished at what I bear, nor do I ever reply. But
there are thins which I cannot allow to be said without,
protesting against them. King Louis Philippe. no doubt,
committed faults, and grave ones, which led to his downfall
—fault. which I deplored and opposed for eight years ; but
he has never committed crimes. Ho was in his own person
often the object of crimes ; but it is false to say that any can
' be laid to his charge. I appeal on this head to every honest
man. I appeal to history. As to the confiscation of the
private property of the late royal family I shall oppose such
an act as an odious injustice. I admit the republic, and
• desire to see it firmly and peaceably established ;
but I do not wish to see it dishonoured by such acts
of iniquity as this. The principles of the old monarchy
cannot apply here.
It was by mistake that we yesterday announced the
arrest of M. de Pontecoulant, ex-peer of France. M.
de Pontecoalant, his son, has alone been called on to
• give information to M. Desnoyer, jnge d'instraction,
with respect to an interview which he had in March
last with the Prince de Joinville in England. This
• interview, quite honourable on his part, took place to
enable himi to remit to the ex-prince all the papers,