Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-01-12 00:00:00

they are making about the Galway line of steam.
The Lord Lieu-

communication with America

tenant of Ireland has been waited upon again by
some of the parties inter sted in the steamers, and
because, like a prudent man, he will not encourage

their hopes of Government assistance, they are

actually raising the cry of "Justice to Ireland !"
That is to say, ju,stice, it is pretended, is denied to

the Irish,, because, forsooth, the Viceroy will not

the British Govern-

ment, to this private enterprise of the establishment

of a steam navigation company to run their
from a port in the West of Ireland to
Newfoundland and New York. "It is quite
natural," we are told, " that every Irishman should
feel most warmly and acutely anything like a
check to the hopes which Ireland may reasonably
entertain, that this great undertaking will receive
the assistance from the Government which it un-
doubtedly merits, and must eventually command."

steamer

We dare say that " every Irishman " does not care
so much about it. We question if, not " every

Irishman," but one Irishman in twenty, takes any

interest in it whatever. The Galway people very
naturally feel interested in it, because it is calcu-

lated to advance the importance and prosperity of
their town. But to affect that it is a thing of
national concern is preposterous. As well might

it be insisted upon us an affair of national interest,
that Liverpool should be preferred to, say South-

ampton or Bristol, as the transatlantic steam-
packet station. Liverpool has doubtless advantages

over those ports, for such a purpose ; but to con-

tend that, on thii account, or on any account,
" every Englishman should " feel most warmly
and acutely ' anything like a check to the

hopes

which,

we will not continue the

and say that the hopes of the

parties interested are those which " England

may reasonably entertain," regarding the under=
taking of a Liverpool transatlantic steam naviga-
tion company ; for it Were enough to expose the
absurdity of what we are animadverting upon,
of seriously maintaining the idea of making the
question of " the assistance from the Government
which it undoubtedly merits "—that is, any parti-
cular transatlantic company at the port of
Liverpool, as we are supposing, " undoubtedly
merits "—appear an English question, and not
merely a Liverpool one. England, of course, is
generally interested in the, maintenance of an
expeditious steam communication with the Ame-
rican Continent ; and if Liverpool is better
adapted for being the English port for such a
communication, it will secure a preference, as a
matter of course, and without its being necessary
to calculate upon any " hopes which England
may entertain " respecting it at all. And this is
precisely the fact of the matter. Private enter-
prise at Liverpool has accomplished everything
that is requisite, without troubling the " hopes
which England may reasonably entertain " to
interest themselves in anywise about it, publicly
west I or

nationally. Liverpool has, after the trial of
now a good many years, proved its adaptation for
the object in view, and therefore, as was from the
first foreseen, it not only "must eventually com-
mand," but it has commanded, and is commanding,
and will continue to command, not " the assist-
ance from Government which it undoubtedly
merits," but the support of the public—the
encouragement of all who are interested in the
maintenance of a prompt, regular, and reliable line
of steam communication with the Western Conti-
nent. Southampton shares ' with it in the only
" assistance from Government " which it receives—
that, namely, of their employing the steamers for
the transmission of the American mails ; a service
which the facilities of the port of Liverpool enable
them to perform in a manner which Galway will
never, with all its boasted superiority in point of
distance, be able to surpass.
We are well aware that, as the touters for the.
Galway line are proclaiming, the " British Cabinet
is fully aware of the importance of the subject and
the interests at stake." But we have only their
Dwn word for it as yet that, as they pretend,

" Irish steam-ship, fines have become a commercial
necessity, not only to Ireland, but to the Imperiaj
Ezdievey-,0 Where are the evidences of any