The Express.
London, England, 1862-06-21 00:00:00

MOH_ WAI72 AT LONDON DROOL

T 9119 Dig —Morning. 91 /Mormon. 91 40m.
To-MORROW—llorniug. 1011 Afternoon, 191 008

LONDON, SATURDAY, JUNE 21.

Hee Matiterv's Ministers to gratify a foreign
government have lately suppreseed a newspaper
published in London by a British subject. So at
least says Mr. Maorrina, who accordingly
blushes with shame. Before we have time to
wonder that the thing could be done without our
hearing of it through the courts of law and police,
Mr. MAGUIRE explains that the "suppres-
sion" has been effected simply by ordering
the British Postmaster at Constantinople not
to distribute copies of the journal in that capital. '
If such an order amounts to the suppression of the
British Star, it is evident that, wherever it may be
convenient to print it, that journal is a newspaper
made for circulation in Turkey, and the pretence
of suppressing a London newspaper falls to the
ground. It appears that the Turkish Government,
Partly for its own convenience and partly for ours,
allows us to deliver at Constantinople the
letters which we carry thither. This aliena-
tion to foreigners of functions properly belonging
to the local government is not without ex-
ample in the East, and as it creates a kind of
trusteeship it sometimes raises the question when
and how far the foreign power ought to act upon
its own principles, and when it ought to consider
itself bound to regard those of the government on the
spot. However this question may be decided, what
our Government did in the premises is easy to be
understood. It declined to use a privilege and
employ an organization instituted in the interests
of commerce to circulate in the Scirait's domi-
nions • paper hostile to his Government. Some
people may think it ought to have insisted on
distributing everything which was properly stamped ;
others may think that to insist on pushing
such a journal into circulation would have been
to abuse a privilege. But, in any case, the
facts are plain, and it is absurd to pretend that
our Government has suppressed the British. Star.
This paper may be sent to all parts of the world,
like any other paper, by our own mails ; but our
Government will not regard the exceptional agency
which it exercises in Turkish territory as one which
it has a right to employ for purposes hostile to the
Porte. The propriety of its resolution is a very fine
subject for debate, and we are not sorry to see it
discussed. The beet thing to do, no doubt, would
be to assist the Turks in setting up a poet office of
their own, and then to retire from the responsi-
bility of delivering some papers, while the distribu-
tion of others is declined. But in the meantime
we may remind Mr. MAGUIRE that the " freedom
" of the British press," about which he declaims,
does not consist in forcing Greek newspapers into
Turkey, or Turkish newspapers into Greece.

Ir is well known that the Mechanics' Institutes,
hailed thirty years ago as a great instrument of
social regeneration, have failed to accomplish the
object for which they were established. They
have done, indeed, and are still doing, a consider-
able amount of good ; but it is not the kind of
good they were intended to do. As the name indi-
cates, they were originally designed for working
men. The Institutions were set up to supply
mechanics with a library, reading-room, lectures,
and classes—in a word, with the main requisites
of efficient self-improvement. But the means
employed were not well adapted to secure this
important end. The scheme of the Mechanics'
Institutes was too showy and ambitious to meet
the actual wants of working men. The libraries
and reading-rooms were generally so grand, or so
much frequented by the well-to-do, as to repel me-
chanics in their working clothes. The object of the
lectures was entertainment, or display, rather than
instruction ; while even the class-rooms failed to
supply that direct and elementary instruction
which working men really want. There was,
moreover, an oppressive air of patronage and con-
descension about these Institutions. The me-
chanics themselves had no voice whatever in their
management. They were rarely even consulted
as to what they would like in the way of recrea-
tion or instruction. And it is not surprising,
therefore, that the real mechanics finding in the
bill of fare provided by their social superiors little
to meet their taste, soon ceased to frequent these
Institutions. They accordingly soon fell into the
hands of the middle classes, who had managed
them from the first, and who are now, as they ,
have been for years past, their exclusive
supporters. Meanwhile the working chum's
are worse off, so far as the means of social '
improvement and recreation are concerned,
than they were before. Their need of some
simple and effective organization of this kind is
certainly far greater than it could have been thirty
years ago. They are better educated, more intel-
ligent, have a stronger sense of self-respect, and a
more general desire for self-improvement. Yet
with a few exceptions the working men in our
large towns have no place where they can meet
together to inform themselves on subjects in
which they may take an interest, to read the news
and discuss the questions of the day, or organize
plans of recreation and social enjoyment.
A new Society, "The Working Men's Social