The Express.
London, England, 1867-03-09 00:00:00

THE WEEKLY PRESS.

Reviewing the position of parties the Saturday
Renew sees a proof in Mr. Gladstone's unwillingness
to commence an active opposition, that ho is not
yet able to rely on the unanimous support of his
own ostensible followers. If, however, circumstances
relieve him from the risk of mutiny or secession,
his toleration of Mr. Disraeli's vagaries will soon be ex-
hausted. The failure of the reform bill on which the go-
vernment may finally determine would render a change
of ministry inevitable. If the bill iIaSSCII, it must neces-
sarily be followed by a dissolution within the year, and it
is at present impossible to calculate on the opinions or
character of the future House of Commons. The disor-
ganisation which prevails can only be corrected by a re-
construction of party alliances. Between the conserva-
tives who are about to support Mr. Disraeli, and the mo-
derate liberals or whigs, there is no longer any intelligible
difference of opinion ; and after every considerable change
in the constitution, the party of resistance receives many
new adherents, who are alarmed at the possible
consequences of the concessions to which they have been
persuaded to assent. Within nine years from the passing
of the Reform Bill, Sir Hobert Peel commanded an over-
whelming majority in the House of Commons ; nor would
his power have been broken during his lifetime if his fol-
lowers bad been wise enough to concur iu his adoption of
• free trade policy. The conservative party, in the form in
which it has long been led by Lord Derby and Mr,
Disraeli, will perhaps have been irretrievably shattered by
the secession of Lord Cranborne and his colleagues.
The Saturday Rainy compares the warfare which is
probably meditated by the Fenian leaders to the last
Polish conflict. This Irish insurrection, however, in its
attack on the land has more sweeping objects th►n any
rebellion known to history, and it is impossible to effect
a compromise with the armed promoters of so sweeping an
innovation. Their leaders may be well assured that there
is at least one question on which all classes of Englishmen
are unanimous. It is not intended that Ireland should,
under pretext of independence, become the possession of
• foreign enemy. To prevent such a misfortune the pro-
perty of England would submit to a tax of half its value,
and the people, in spite of habits and prejudices, would
unanimously applaud a conscription. The criminals who
await punishment deserve neither sympathy nor indul-
gence, although all indiscriminate severity ought to be
strongly deprecated. The utmost rigour of the law will,
with universal approbation, be exerted against the Ame-
rican adventurers who have undertaken the guidance of
the rebellion.

Of the ministerial changes the Apytalor says:—Lord
Curnarvon is to be succeeded at the Colonial-office by the
Duke of Buckingham. He, again, is to be succeeded as
President of the Council by the Duke. of Marlborough
(who on ecclesiastical questions has attained a certain no.
toriety for speaking like a goose). Sir John Pakington is
to go from the Admiralty, concerning which be has some
knowledge and indulges many fanaticisms, to the War-
office, of which he is entirely ignorant. Mr. Cony—who is
said to know more of the Admiralty than any one else, the
Duke of Somerset not excepted—succeeds Sir John Peking.
ton ; Sir Stafford Nortlicote succeeds Lord Cranbome at
the India-office ; and the Duke of Richmond succeeds Sir
Stafford Northcote at the Board of Trade. Thus there
are only two really first-class working ministers left in the
cabinet, Mr. Disraeli, whose ability is often the worst in-'
ability, and Lord Stanley. Lord Derby is too lazy, or too
indifferent, to hold the reins nominally placed in his
hands. It is the worst government of modern times, and
is entrusted with the most important work.
The Fenians offering as their sole material reason for
insurrection their hostility to the existing tenure and the
dominant church, the Sped. tor says if we could once
cure this—once convince the Irish peasant that his
tenure would be menaced cod not strengthened by the
disturbance of public order, the strength of Dish di*.
affection would be silently drawn away and an Irish
American preaching sedition would be regarded by the
masses as he now is by landowners—an enemy to their
property. It is of course impossible even to think of the
measures which would secure this result while Irishmen
are in open insurrection ; but it is in such measures alone
that the hope of conciliating Irishmen now lies. Acres
rather than ideas make Irishmen conservative, and now
in Ireland, as a hundred years ago in Bengal, the secret
of order will be found in a perpetual settlement, or, u
Englishmen put it, the conversion, by compensation to the
owner, of every tenure into copyhold, the substitution, in
fact, of a quit-rent for rental.

The Examiner, criticising the course taken by the minis-
terial seceders, allows a kind of invincible ignorance to
General Peel, but attributes to Lords Carnarvon and
Cranborne wilful and deliberate blindness. They shut
their eyes and ears for seven months, lest seeing
they should see and understand, and bearing they
should hear and be converted to the faith which the
rest of their colleagues believe—availing themselves of
the opportunity to earn reputation an administrators by
practically deferring all disputes about reform as far as
possible. As to the future, household suffrage, the
Examiner says, will be on Monday week the order of the
day. Neither duality nor plurality of votes will be
agreed to by parliament. The true conservative limitation
is not to be found in the pecuniary figure at which the
rent or the rating is put, but in continuous residence.
Treating of foreign affairs, called " Dark Clouds over
Europe," the Examiner expresses the belief that if the
wisdom of statesmen and governments be unequal to the
occasion, that general disturbance of Europe which has
long been foretold will be speedily upon us. The discus-
sion which took place last night in the House of Lords at
once exhibits the absence of anything like a settled and
definite policy, even amongst gentlemen holding the same
general views on politics, with respect to the Eastern
ques• ion, and the imminent danger that appears to be now
brooding over that portion of Europe.
The impriol &rim thinks it is pleasant to see the
journalists who have been loudest in condemnation of
martial law in Jamaica, insisting on the necessity of con-
dign punishment and the utmost severity in Ireland. In
whatever action the executive may take, it will receive
the support of public opinion. No tenderness must inter-
fere with the course of justice.

With regard to the misspelt petition to parlia-
ment from a meeting held at the Lambeth Baths, which
was noticed by us on Wednesday, Earl Shaftesbury writes
to say :—"I should be sorry to have it believed that I
signed a document without knowing its contents. The
fact is that the petition was read aloud on the platform
and then handed to me for signature. I thus knew what
was in it, but I had not observed the shape of the winds
in which it was expressed."