The Express.
London, England, 1858-03-23 00:00:00

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LONDON, TUESDAY. MANCH 23.

MONCITON Maass is to all the attention of
the House of Commons, to-night, to the vexations to
which British subjects are exposed by the late altera-
tion in the passport system in France, and to move for
a copy of such correspondence as may have taken place
between the two Governments relating to such alter-
ation. The more the attention of the British Par-
liament is drawn to this matter the better, for it
would be difficult to exaggerate the amount of
annoyance and inconvenience to which British
subjects are exposed in consequence of the
regulations alluded to. The French purport
system, however, is to a certain extent the affair of
the French Government, sad it that Government has
determined, in the exercise et a friendly policy and a
wise discretion, to throw every kind of impediment
in the way of that influx of British citizens into
France which has hitherto been generally supposed
to have been more beneficial to the pockets than de-
trimental to the polities of our neighbours, it is
pretty clear that we on this aide of the Channel shall
neither be the greatest sufferers, nor have the gravest
ground of complaint. As far as our pleasure tourists
are concerned, the change of system will be likely
to tell most disadvantageously on French railway.,
. _

French hotels, and French shOpkeepers. Wales and
Westmoreland, Devonshire and Derbyshire,our inland
spas and oar sea-aide bathing places, will be looking-
•p ; nor, except perhaps in the item of hotel charges,
will there be any great grievance in this compulsory
exploration of England by the English. As regards
the intercourse of business, the vexation and discom-
fort will no doubt be more severely felt, and it is
abundantly certain that no additional hindrance of
this kind was required to check the flow of trade
which is already subsiding into stagnation, or to
reduce still further the reoeipta of railways which
have not for a long time been at so low an ebb. There
is, however, one point to which it is to be
hoped Mr. Mures will not fail to do justice, and
that is the way in which Lord CLARENDON, before
leaving office, appears to have done his beet to
second the vexations regulations imposed on the
other aide of the ChanneL It is of worse competent
to "our august ally" to testify his value for the
English alliance by any measure of internal police
which he may see fit to adopt. We may protest, but
we cannot interfere. Why, however, in the name
of all that is uncomfortable, should we °erosive* aid
him in his effort to be unneighbo•rly, by inaeasing
the stringency of our own purport regulations.
What is • passport? A certificate of citizen-
ship, and • pledge of protection. Primd
facie, every Britith citizen is entitled at the
bands of the British Government to such a
document as this, on no other condition than the
payment of such trifling fee as may be reasonably
necessary to cover the cost and trouble of its prepa-
ration. Why should our Government go beyond this,
and annex the further condition that the applicant
should have a personal acquaintance with a justice
of the puce, • police magistrate, ore banker ? Is
it to be said that the right of travelling in foreign
parts under the protection of the State is only to be
granted by the British Government to such British
citizens as keep a banker, or have a justice of the
peace on their visiting list ? Is this the
ultimate form of the Chia Rom:uts theory ? Is
protection to be commensurate not with citizenship
but with respectability ? Is no man to travel abroad
who " does not keep his gig "at home? It is to be
hoped these senseless and vexatious regulations will
at once be put an end to : they are creating more
ill-will and irritation among low-caste people of
locomotive tendencies than the dilettanti of Down-
ing-street will at all like to encounter. If it is so
now, at • season when people no more dream of CLOW
ing the Channel than they would of calling Loed
(.ALA PAN DON a patriotic Minister, what will it be
when the hot months and the long days have set in
with the usual consequences, and Mr. BULL and all
his family are raging with the Tarantula of travel P
Let these things be looked to in time. Our authori-
ties may not be able to make matters pleasant across
the water, bat they may at all events avoid making
them needlessly disagreeable here.

THE resolution recently adopted, after grave deli-
beration,
by the Bank of England, by which they
decline to re-discount the bills of the Discount Houses,
deserves all the attention which it has received. It
would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of
the functions discharged by these establishments,
which, now•a-days, are not mere Commission Agents,
acting as intermediaries between the person who has
money to lend and the person who has securities to
offer. They are really bankers and dealers in money
upon a colossal scale. We speak of them in the
plural number, but, owing partly to the changes
produced by the events of last year, there are
less than half-a-dozen of these establishments,
properly so called, in the City of London;
and of these only two carry on transactions upon an
important male. In reality, the field is still further
narrowed 1 and the alteration at the Bank is vir-
tually aimed at the old established and eminent firm
of MINIM. OVERVID, Gt•inzT, and Co., who mono-
polies the great balk of the Lombard-street discount
business. So extensive is the " connexion "of this
house that, upon extraordinary occasions, its aggre-
gate transactions are said to have amounted to some-

thing like a million sterling per di.,„ ; and even in
ordinary times its business is extremely large.
Owing partly to the recollection of certain cir-
cumstances connected with the late crisis, a
suspicion has been hinted in some quarters
that the Bank Directors, in their present