The Express.
London, England, 1849-07-09 00:00:00

et aristocratic leadership, the protect i mists will sooner
er later fall back °IWO more emir: the yoke of the Lie-
cotri s and iitiente.

IT is certainly a gratifying sight to behold that
laidittry imperator, who, when we hat turned oar I
regards towards Sp in, was confiscating its Mord"
impending its 000stitutioo, exiling its liberals, trine-
porting its journalist*, shooting and imprisoning
every object of sospicion—it is gratifying to behold
this Peninsular CAESAR relating of his rigours, We-
trusting the safety and duration of a purely
despotic pole, and recurring mice mote Os
losucel to • • sms to publini ty. Gm
oy one we have seen the ben;stied liberals re-
turn. Tim Cortes has been »spited, nor have its
speeches been coofined to tt-e besi"e.d courtiers se
epauletted ministers. Cornice has recovered his
voice, and ()LOMA his influeuee. TLe friends of
EAPARTERO, limited of being scooted, are favoured.
The pram itself is allowed to breathe. A fall amnesty
km bees granted, and the objects of it have been
enabled to return to their country. In doing all this,
Heaven has but folios el the advice which Sir
HENRY Butwelt gave him, and for giving which he
quarrelled with and outraged our envoy. By
his change of policy NAIVAIIE dove make some kind
of apology to the British government for his pas-
sionate conduct, although, we admit, not as yet a
complete and satisfactory ore.
Much of the wisdom and liberalism of this changed
conduct on the pert of the military government of
Spain, is no doubt owing to the influence assumed
over NARVAEZ and over the councils of 0,6 QUEEN
rthe NLaTOR of our day, King LitoeoLo.
ut the sagacity of NARVAY.Z himself has
enabled him to descry the new danger which menaces
Spain, from the universal reaction going on through-
out Europe, should that reaction prove successful. It
is impossible, indeed, to cast our regards eastward.
without entertaining the fear that 11450 may prove
another I'4ll Russia, again, after a sleep of thirty-
five year', comes forth active, conquering and dicta-
torial. Austria in in her hinds. Prussia, which
would fain resist, had sLe German natiouslity behind
her, cannot succeed in rallying this nationality and
rendering it sufficiently docile and intelligent for the
purpose. Italy sinks under Austrian or French
cannon, whilst France herself, under a prince of the
dynasty of NAPOLEON, seems more ready to renew
the treaty of Tilsit than that of Campo Formic,.
In all this there is grave mittcr of consideration
for Spain. Neither Russia nor Austria have recog-
nised the present dycasty, nor the constitutional
regime connected with it. NARVAPZ, however de-
spotic, bases still his honour and his dignities on the
constitutional regime. Reaction menaces him, es
well as every man born of the new order of things.
France and its republic might be formidable barriers
to prevent the powers of the East and their influence
passing into Spain. But France and its republic seem
to be in the bands of children too week to know tl'eir
own minds, too unsteady t be sure of their own aims.
Seeing the chafer s, the inconsistencies, the weakness
of public men in France during the last eighteen
months, who could depend upon any public man or
party in that country ? NARVAEZ feels this; and he
has wisely taken the resolve of reconciling, as far as
possible, all Spanish liberals and parties, so as to pre-
sent a national front to danger, wherever it may
come from. In this there is sound policy and
true patriotism, from whatever party it proceeds ;
even though it advances under a military flag.
The moat pleasing result to Englishmen, however,
in the changed politics of Spain is to contemplate the
Spanish Cortes engaged for the last month in the
calm and intelligent discueslon of the financial and
final affairs of the country. The national mind has
been turned to this subject; the mo-t eminent men
have devoted their time and researches to it, some,
like OLOZAGA, turning even momentary exile to Iles
account; and the result is • fortnight's debate
in the Spanish Cortes on the question of free trade,
which, for its intelligence, and talent, and advance-
ment of ideas, rivers the debates of Englard or of
America, and leaves thole of Paris or of the Zollverein
fsr behind. The great protectionist orator, Senor
MADOz, is a kind of Lord GEORGE BENTINCE in his
way—ardent, obdurate, diffuse—throwing out clouds
of figures and objection., the doll mass of which he
seeks to animate by passion ann by an almost Maho-
media devotion to the principles of preeection. In vain
do the Spanish free traders most able men, too, with
BABZANALLANA at their head, prove beyo- d thepossibi
lity of a doubt that Spain has net the capital wherewith
to build the factories, and produce the supply, which
is needed in many branches of the most necessary
and every-day manufacture. In vain does Senor MoN
demoorrato that in his proposed admission of
twist and of cotton stuffs at a duty of
from thirty-five to fi'ty per cent. ad valorem,
there are none of the kinds which Catalonia produces ;
—those which it does produce being still left under the
strict law of prohibition. It matters not. Even
these first inklings of free trade are deprecated by
the ardent Catalonian as the ruin of the capitalist,
the bereavement of hundreds of families of bread, and
the degradation of the peninsula. If you want to see
the wealth and power that protection can pro-
duce, exclaims Senor MADOZ, look to England.
If prohibition be the only path to prosperity and
wealth, rejoins BARZANALLANA, look to Speen. Spain
surely has been prohibitive enough at home and in
her colonies. For the result, eireumapive.
If English debates have furnished arguments and
convictions to the free traders of the Cortes,
they have no less supplied its protectionists with
obstinacy and with tactics. Even those pro-
hibitions, for which there was some show
of excuse in England, are as manfully recommended
in Spain, without even a rag of excuse for them.
Thekose of the amendments is in favour of a Spanish
corn law, some worthy hidalgo being alarmed at an
Max of wheat from Odessa or Tamisoff, which, once
shipped, instead of sailing to a British port, may be
induced, it is supposed, to seek a market at Valencia
or Cadiz.
Then a worthy shipbuilder of Santander dickies
for a Spanish navystion law, whilst again the hidalgo
is at variance with him on the score of Spasish
timber, to which he would preserve the monopoly of I
ribbing and planking Spanish ships. High timber
duties in a country denuded of forests is a'
crotchet too absurd not to be insisted upon,
tooth and nail, by the protectionists. The first
portion of the tariff indeed, which limited to 14 per I
cent. the duties on raw material, including timber,l
sod to 30 per cent. those on iron and coal, gives
rim to a host of amendments and hostile debates.
The new tariff, however, is not altogether one of
free trade. It contains a notable augmentation of the
Spool& sow duties, supported by the Minister of
Finance with arguments not so orthodox as these
which he employs upon silks and cottons. Boast
MON once endeavoured boldly to make up the iblic
ciences in the Spanish revenue by direct taxation.
Having reached what he considered a limit to
that, in the disorganised state of industry
and the depression of agriculture, owing to
dyil war and stagnant trade, he recurs to
levy upon sugar the same duty which it paid in 1841.
The minister oomplairui that the consumption of sugar
does not increase in Spain, and that an Englishman
consumes 221ba. in the year, when a Spaniard uses I
only five. Whilst sugar, however, supplies the re-
venue of the Spanish colonies by the export duty paid
on it in the colony, and then the revenue of the mother
country, by the import duty it pays on arrival, the
minister cannot wonder if sugar repays such ill treat-
ment by disappearing from consumption.
Bat whatever fiscal mistakes Spanish statesmen
may yet persist in, immense good must result from
the present agitation of such questions, and from Spain
thus entering on the path ofngland in economical
discussion,
discussion, instead of following her neighbours in the
paths of ambition, revolution, or intrigue.

BRUTAL ATTACK UPON AN At/MONISM—At the
county serious. Mancheater, on Thursday last, John
Hutchinsoa, a adder, residing at Henley, was brought up
on a charge of maliciously wounding Mr. Ganef:Mosul*4b,
aucti ,of this town. It appeared that on Monday leak
about noon, Mr. Greenbalgh went to the primmer's house
with a warrant of digress from the landlady, and after speak-
ing with him in the lane the prisoner meet Into hie house,
and, seising a poker, ease vat and struck him six or sawn
aavege blows about the he.td and sane, fatiguing deep
wounds. He was conveyed to the police station. where be
was attended by Mr. Sharp, Surgeon, and elegy attention
psid to him. Though able to attend the bout he was net
considered oat of danger. A polies's= wr ea eye witness
to the affair, but the taart was so sump and outrageous that
he dazed not interfere with him natl' he had procured
another officer to audit. The printer's conduct was very
unseemly in court, and, after a reproof from the bench, be
was conszaiTtnd for trial at the ant essies&—Mencherisr
Miestirwr.