The Express.
London, England, 1866-06-21 00:00:00

OUR CONTEMPORARIES.

(THIS DAY.)

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THE SINISTERIAL CRISIS.—RESIGNATION OS DISSOLUTION
Taunting the government with the confusion
which its policy has brought upon it, and taxing Mr
Gladstone with insincerity in having assumed that the
lower end of the electoral toile is the true people
of England, the Times proceeds to condemn the
advice of s dissolution with which rumour credits
the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Earl Russell. The
Times supposes that the constituencies without exception
remain of the same mind on the subject. Ministers cannot
possibly count on even half-a-dosen members returned
for the bill, the whole bill, sad nothing but the bill,
while it is very pomade the smaller boroughs would
return men pledged more stoutly against all reform what.
ever. What quarrel have Lord Russell and Mr. Gladstone
swab the House of Commons, and what plea have they for
inflicting upon it a flue of two millions by a general elec-
tion I The house was quite ready to follow them and
serve them moat faithfully. This loyalty they met with
a design to destroy it altogether, substituting a now house
elected by anew coestituency. If anybody had cause to
complain it was the house, rot the leaders.
The Daily News supposes that the country may look
forward to a purely tory, or to a mixed tory and Adullam-
its administration, or, in any case, to a very earnest and
resolute attempt to form one. It is a tribute
to the national sense of the value of the re-
tiring government that its slayers now charge it
with gratuitous suicide. They are in Macbeth's
plight, afraid to think on what they have done.
The hostility to Lord Russell began before the session com-
menced, and various tactics were employed, particularly
by the feasts, to drive Lord Russell from the premier-
ship, and to prevent Mr. Gladstone Ram succeeding to it.
The obstruction offered by this group of schemers to the
progress of the Reform Bill has been part of a much
larger design. It is natural that he who secretly abhors
the end should cavil at the method of obtaining it, and
when it is found that those whose hostility to the bill has
been unwavering are angry at the occasion taken by
ministers for withdrawing at once themselves and their
measure, a strong presumption is raised that the go-
vernment has acted with prudence, u well as
with honour, in the course it has adopted.
It was time that the curtain should fall upon a very sorry
faros. We now wait the ministry of reaction. They will
have the fair play which is due from the honour of oppo-
nents, even to men who have themselves played foal.
But they must expect the suspicion which they have
elaborately earned ; and not the " co-operation " which is
shameleeely demanded in their behalf.
The Post repeats its often-expressed opinion that the
people are profoundly indifferent to any reform whatever,
and that reform is the mere stock•in-trade of decayed
and bent rapt potiticians
The Herald thinks that all candid and thoughtful
liberals will recognise the desirability at this juncture of
the assumption of office by the conservatives. Sent back to
opposition, the liberal party will be re-formed ; it will
have definite and intelligible principles. It will of course
lose valuable members, and that loss may have the effect
of keeping it some years out of offioe, but then, whenever
it returns to power it will return in a condition to hold
power with more honour and with little chance of losing
it again by its own dissensions.
The Telegraph continues to pronounce for a'dissolution•
No insignificant sign to guide the government to a right
determination, stands forth in the fact that conservatives,
Adallamites, and half-hearted reformers alike deprecate
an immediate appeal to the country. Governments, how-
ever, should, as a general male, adopt the course of action
which is least palatable to their enemies. To have a tory
cabinet in power during the recess, while the most terrible
and pregnant events may occur abroad, would be a public
calamity, and the Telegraph is well persuaded that her
Majesty, perceiving the gravity of the crisis, will seriously
consider the only course that can preserve us against a
war with continental powers, and secure for us progress at
home.

The Star urges that from every great town the voice of
a public meeting ought to call at once for an appeal to the
constituencies. It is not necessary that a dissolution
should take place at once and to the postponement of all
public business. The government might go on for a few
weeks, get through so much of administrative work as is
absolutely necessary, and still have the election over in good
time to give legislators their autumnal holiday. It may
be that the course of affairs abroad would in any case re-
quire a winter session : let advantage be taken at all
events of the present crisis to forward the work of reform.
The government will certainly act unwisely—as unwisely
as the promoters of a self-denying ordinance usually do—
if they allow the dissolution which must coma before long
to be taken under the auspices of their enemies.

EXPRESS, THURSDAY

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inscaurigious TOPICS.
The Times depicts the strange confusion in which the
colonial bishoprics are involved, and pities the good church
people, who find that they have established no Anglicanism
at all, butlers simply emoted an independent bishop free
from all restraints and restrictions whatsoever, and at
liberty to strike oat soy new, un-Anglioan—it might be
Homiah or latitudinarian—couree he chose. In the mean-
time, before any further legislation is begun, let the state
of affairs be distinctly understood, on good legal authority.
The decision on Bishop Colenso's application for his salary
will throw some light upon the general owe, and the refer-
MOO of the subject to a mama eoinmittee, as proposed
by the Archbishop of York, is desirable.
Commenting upon the report of the Jamaica commis-
goo, the Daily New points oat that it is now clear that
the original riot, whether extemporised or not, was cer.
teinly local. There was excitement elsewhere and disoon-
tent, but no traces of conspiracy have been discovered.
The supposition that Mr. Gordon was connected with any
conspiracy is so repugnant to the evidence, that the
oommierioners repel it in a mod decided manner. They
say :—" On the assumption that, if there was in fact a
wide-greed conspiracy, Mr. G. W. Gordon must have
been a party to it, the conclusion at which we have
arrived in his case is decisive as to the non-existence
of Inch a conspiracy." Sir Henry Storks informs
Mr. Cardwell that that people are generally tranquil, of a
contented disposition, and full of confidence in the govern-
ment instituted by the Queen. The worst sign recently
reported from the island is an attempt by two mounted
white ruffians so ride down the governor—an occurrence
which has compelled Sir Henry Storks to appear as a pro-
secutor in a police-court.
The Star represents the tendency of the report to be to
conceal the parties who were mainly responsible for the
acts which the commissioners themselves could not but
condemn. But the Star does not believe the Eng-
lish people are prepared to allow law to beoome
a dead letter in Engliali colonies, merely becalms
military men or governors may be the culprits. If the
government do not institute a prosecution of the late go.
vernor to vindicate the majesty of the law, they will fail
most lamentably in the discharge of the highest obliga-
tions which rest upon the advisors of the crown.