The Express.
London, England, 1865-04-27 00:00:00

at least will their English sympatftiaern believe in excels/. But amends, do look so far beforehand.
Southern " chivalry." For though, some among !be immediate *tit at thlllehturdst I. the trihrePh
us have by growth of prejudist oar
.to think °I 11. "It "sPialle sad elteeden. the
prime of sr assassin was political, be Mum hare'
slavery not sin, there is no Englishman yet whom struck his blow is the Lateran of the extreme abolitionist ;
secret amansination does not horrify. And the if he win • Beath... the act ww sot political
kindly nature, the earnest desire to do right, which eination, but a personal revenge." At the ume time the
even his opponent' confessed in ABNANAN LINCOLN, Standard doss not mess to say that it is impossible that
gone, turn to him all sym. Sow Southern kind may bare mingled in the plot. " Soo'
will, now that he ishusband or father, whose nearint and dearest have summed
pathies and make all among us call with one voice the last indignity at the heads of Lincoln's soldiery ; some
for vengeance on his detestable murderer. near relative of three who were butchered is Palmyra with
But a harder task than vengeance lies yet on the annetlee sad approval of the commander-incitief of all
the North, which they must enter cm before the first the Federal armies ; some dear friends of the pliant Cap-
tious, of mourning havepeased. Theyhave a govern-' tan Beek, so lately sundered by the immediate order of
merit to carry on, a war so finish, a Commonwealth the Prendast—may have bees maddesed by brooding
to reconstruct. It were vain to conceal how the over these wrongs into this criminal act of personal Tee-
difficulty of each part of their task is enhanced by Pace'"
the loss of their chosen and tried head. Nor,
unhappily, have they made provision for an event
so wholly unforeseen. The VICII-PIIERIDIINT, who,
in virtue of the Constitution, hula:early taken the
oaths as President for nearly the term of four
years still remaining to be run, is not the man
whom they would have selected had they thought
of such an event as his sitting in the President's
chair. Already, too, there has been removed from
his side the SECRETANY of Srsre, who has during
Mr. Lurecur's tenure of office shared most fully
his confidence and his designs. It is a great and
terrible crisis. But we have confidence that the
people will meet it worthily, and if they do, that
they will surmount all their troubles. Chief
among our reasons for this belief is the reflection
• that Mr. LINCOLN was himself rather a represen-
tative than a leader. His personal influence had
not formed his party ; he was only selected in its
exigencies to do its behests. Admirably as he has
• done them we must not think that he was the only

THE BUDGET TO-NIEIT.

It is stated to-day upon good authority that Mr.
Gladstone will dispose of the surplus of more than
3,500,0001., which he has to announce to-night, by
further reducing the duties on tea ; by lowering
the income-tax by 2d. in the pound (the lowest
point to which it has ever yet fallen), and by re-
ducing the insurance duty. These are understood
to be the principal features of the financial state-
ment.

one who could have substantially done the same.
And though foroasw Jonersori was not selected to
represent the party, but only aa a secondaryoompro-
mime between sections, this is an occasion which
it may be hoped will extinguish sections, and unite
all in • common effort. Round him will still stand
the old leaders--firmerort, CRAB; and GRANT.
The responsibilities thus thrust upon him will, it
may be expected, force him to guide his acts by
their counsels, and by the public opinion of the
people which has made him what he is, and which
they guide. But in the firm heart of the people,
tried and purified, as it has been, for four years,
in the furnace of affliction, lies, under Gon, our
hope for the future. Eminently • law-abiding
people, they will follow, first of all, and u far as
possible, the path their Constitution points out.
But if • chance more powerful than their will, if
the perversity of this man or of that, ren-
ders the effort dangerous, they will know how to
save the Constitution by sacrifice. Meantime, their
great common sorrow, their great common danger,
will obliterate division, and nerve them to energy.
As when a beloved captain falls in fight, his men
proms forward with more impetuous and irresistible
force to secure the post to which he led them ; the
fallof the Captain of the People will fill them with
the sterner resolve to be victors in the combat in
which he was their leader, and to gain the object
for which his life was given.

THE LONDON PRESS AND THE MURDER
OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN.

"Unjust as we believe it to be," observes the
Times, "the Confederate C 116211 will Dot escape the die-
honour teat upon it by the wanton murders of Mr. Lisoole
and the Secretory. The admiration won by the long end
pliant defence of Richmond will be lessened ; the memory
of Lee's lofty bearing and Jackson's deep religious feeling
will be obscured by the atrocities committed in the name
and oe babel( of the South. Arson in New York, theft,
under the pretence of war in Vermont, and assassination in
the capital dim the lustre of a four years' renitence to
superior foam and of many a well-fought field in Virginia."
The Times proceeds to point out the perfect
hominy and the temperate demeanour towards
opponents and neutrals which distinguished Mr. Lincoln.
and the quality of the "conservative progress" which °ha-
redefined his administration. "He felt his way gradually
to his ereclusions, and those who will compare the different
stages of his career one with another will find that his
mind was growing throughout the come of it." With
regard to the new President, the Times trusts that
it "his own SOUS of decency" does not suggest the
voluntary resignation of his office by Mr. Johnson,
mach a pressure of public opinion will be brought
to beer upon him that he may be led to adopt it.
" ins instant assumption of the Presidency was probably
deemed neoeseary, and, eider such exciting circumstances,
little can be gathered from the few words uttered by Mr.
Johnsen when the oath of office was administered to him.
Such as they are, they point to a resolution to execute the
duties of the post, but the influences by which the incom-
ing President is surrounded cannot be favourable to his re-
jection of offioe. General Grant and General Sherman are
both in or near Washington, the one the commandsr.in-
altin and captor of Richmond, the other the man who first
demonstrated the hollowness of the Confederate resouraw.
Neither they nor Mr. Stanton, the Secretary of War, can
wish to see the work on which they have been engaged so
long, and on which so much life and treasure has been spent,
wasted because it has fallen to a hand which is incompetent
to carry it through. The task which lice before the Pre-
sident and his cabinet is the most considerable that has
engaged the attention of statesmen for several generations-
It was doubtful whether Mr. Lineoln could have accom-
plished it ; it is morally certain that Mr. Johnson cannot.
The fate of a nation hangs in the balance, and we wait with
anxiety to see which way it will turn."
The Poet moot discover the motives which would actuate
a Southerner to this particular crime. " Mr. Lincoln could
not be held individually accountable for the cruel war which
has made so many regions of the Confederacy desolate, and
none who took the trouble of considering the matter would
fail to perceive that that war would, in all probability, have
squally run its coarse it another individual of the same politi.
on opinions had been elected President four years ago, or if
Mr. Lincoln had died at any period subsequent to his
sommion to office. The assassination of Butler in New
Orleans would have been perfectly intelligible ; but that of
Mr. Lincoln in Washington, at the very moment when the
war bad to all appearances come to an end, is apparently
motiveless. The circumstance, however, that an attempt,
and probably a suoceesful one, was made to murder Mr.
Seward at the same time, shows that the double crime was
the result of a carefully organised scheme." We may ob.
'WM that the Poet alludes to the new President as "the
armies rowdy whom, in a moment of inadverteece, the
American anion Gloated to a sinecure office."
The Herald says :—" Now that he is dead the good
qualities of the unfortunate Lincoln seem to come into the
feraground. We remember his honesty and his manliness,
we &jellabas to has consistency, we give him all praise for
the spirit of send Union which he has shown, for his retinal
be be borne along by the sanguinary counsels of hie Merida
we make some allowance for his frequent and untimely
levity, we almost excuse his obstinacy in the prosecution of
like war. Such, we are persuaded, will be the sentiments
of every right-minded Englishman ; end they will be
aimed in by the vast majority of the Confederate people."
To describe the new President, the Herald ransacks the
dictionary of slang,-calling hicn,—" this incapable and
igeorant person; this blustering and bloodthirsty ruffian,
who has expressed a wish to hang the Southern leaders ' as
high as Hamm ; this low devotee of the brandy bottle, who
has Boated like the scum of the cauldron to the surface of
the revolution ; this man who, even when sober, cannot
speak or write a sentence in decent English, who is as
incapable of the feelings as he is of the masers of a gentle-
man," &c. ; and the Herald adds :—" It was just possible
that the South might have yielded to Lincoln ; it is out of
the question that it should submit to inch • fellow as
Jobosoo."

The Standard also indulges in abase of Mr. Johnson :
" The drunken tailor of Tennessee, the one man more brutal
than Butler, more savage then Brownlow—the 0111115114
most vulgar, most ignorant of Amernan politicians; sad
my; "the ultimate result may possibly be advantageous
to the South, by reuniting her people in a desperate reels.
ten" and giving the North over to manly sad sill