Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-07-12 00:00:00

THE NORTHERN TIMES, TUhSDAY, DULY 12, 1859

an interview between the two Emperors was to take
place at Villafranca. The llfoniteur also publishe
the order of the day contained in the message from
Turin of yesterday. • .
The Liverpool Town Council. met yesterday, and a
full report of the proceedings will be found in another
part of our paper. It will be observed,that the dis-
cussions on several points were of great importance.
to the inhabitants of the borough, not the least of.
which was the extraordinary fact elicited by Mr. J.
R. Jeffery that the Corporation had lent the St:
James's Cemetery- a- Joint-Stock Company—the
sum of £7,000, which, with interest, now amounted
to about £lO,OOO. In explanation, Mr. Stewart
stated that, previous to the reformed Corporation's
existence, £7,000 was advanced by the Corporation
towards the construction of that cemetery, under the
act of Parliament. The money was advanced upon
something like an engagement that the Corporation
and other parties who advanced it should be paid
five per cent. interest. In 1841, finding that the
interest had not been paid, it was proposed to add
the amount of interest, which had accumulated so
far, to the capital, and to make the interest payable
upon the increased sum. The amount, however, had
never been paid. He believed there was no means
of recovering any amount, but by selling what
might be called some shares, but which he believed
would not realise much at present. The Town-clerk
did not know whether any bonds or shares had ever
been delivered to the Council. Mr. Alderman Holme
always looked upon the amount as a bad debt, in
fact, as the Council's subscription to the cemetery-
Ultimately the subject was referred to the Finance
Committee to report upon.

THE EMPIRE IS PEACE " AGAIN!

THE question which suggested itself, with con-
siderable solicitude, to the minds of most political
writers and thinkers, weeks before the vaunted

" Liberator of Italy " arrived upon what may soon be
the scene either of fresh crimes against humanity, or
of the inauguration of a novel course of honour and
public faith, now presses upon Europe with increased
cogency and uneasiness. "What will he do: with
it 9" While many of us were expecting yet another
bloody and eventful scene, which should close the
first act of the play, a midnight telegram, with the
suddenness of a celestial messenger, seems to hurry
us into the denouement of the fifth. With the first
pause for breathing, so dearly purchased by the
bloody day of Solferino, reposing—if it could be
called reposing—on the banks of the conquered
Mincio, alternately elated by the semblances of
victory and depressed with the mournful reminis-
cences which generally belong to the vanquished,
the wearied Gaul shows himself a not un-
willing listener to the whispers of Peace. Another
fresh victory, and NAPOLEON would have been
ruined. The summary process of the sword had
begun to realise difficulties uglier and more tedious
than the first onset had promised. Notwitstanding
the provisional success of his impetuosity, it had
'done nothing but bring him to the very threshold of
the lion's lair ; and whereas it might fail in cutting
the knot, or could only succeed at the most tremen-
dous sacrifices, another solution might be found
without involving the loss of a warlike reputation,
brief indeed, but easily flattered into glory.
In proportion as this contains any truth, and
according to the measure in which Louis NAPOLEON
has appreciated the lesson of the past campaign,
will be the moderation of the terms proposed to the
Emperor of Austria ; and, correspondingly, the

disappointment of the anticipations formed at its
commencement. We cannot avoid the use of strong
language in the midst of the sycophancy of one part
of the Press, and the coward hypocrisy of another,
which dissembles its real sentiments, lest the
adoption of a manly tone should provoke to
invasion a sensitive and inflated.. parvenu ; and,
therefore,' we set down as mere drivelling
the proposition that the French Emperor is in a
position to dictate the terms of a conqueror. What !
—with the army of his Ally, at the very outset of
the war, enfeebled almost to annihilation; with his own
choice regiments cut to pieces, and France rummaged
from one end to the other to recruit their wasted

strength ? When the last, no doubt glorious; effort
of his arms—announced to the womanly enthusiasm
of his Imperial Consort as an alcuostdecisive blow at
the power of Austria—numbered: by thousands, both
in officers and privates, his preponderance of loss
over that of an- enemy inferior in force, and whose
ultimate retreat was mainly owing to the lamentable
divisions of Generals, and to circumstances whose
recurrence could not only not be calculated. upon, but
was evidently improbable in the next phase of
the contest When to gain so little had already
cost him so much, and when all previous advantages
were within an ace of being lost, and when we
recollect how Germans had often fought even against
the First NAPOLEON, what might we have expected,
now that the real -struggle was looining close at
hand, demanding still 'mightier efforts-from the one,
and involving for the other new conditions of
strength and reliance? Was NAPOLEON, too, not
surrounded by difficulties foreign to the battle-field,
and distractions perplexing to a mind occupied with
the novelty of warlike pursuits, and on the keen scent
of a new glory ? Were no political complications
lik-e a cloud in the horizon giving token of rising
to the zenith, in concentrated blackness, for the
moment of explosion ? And have we not heard
some whispers of plots, and adventurous assassins,
who have not lost the memory of the unavenged
ORSINI. We have long survived the age, indeed'
when bulls from the Vatican excited apprehension
in foreign States, or the " major-excommunication"
was capable of raising uneasiness in the minds of
rulers ; but if the strength.of NAPOLEON'S position
in France at all rests on the semblance of universal
suffrage, or the will of the nation ; and if one of
the main defences of his despotism is to propitiate
and delude the great mass of the people, then
the disaffection of the Papal Court must, by tending
to alienate the- hood dispositions of the French
clergy, react upon the popular voice, which is
moulded, by their skill and management. To
infringe upon the temporal power of the Pope, and
thereby disgust the clergy, would be to sign the
death-warrant of the empire. The fulsome lauda-
tions of the French Bishops are not for nothing.
Were the present enterprise to issue in a crusade
against the Pontificial Government, what would
become of the audacious, proposition uttered by an
episcopal mouth, that GOD, with the " concurrence "
of the Frenoh nation, was about to achieve the,
happiness of mankind? The priestly Owl:mu

that the -elevation of -Louis NAPOLEON was a
benefit due to the Church from the " gratitude "
of the Almighty--words we are afraid to
transcribe—was a splendide mendax of impiety
which deserves or looks for- a ; .large recom-
pense of reward. The " Patrimony ohSt. PETER,".
then, is sacred even to Louis NAPOLEON, to wholn
nothing is sacred that stands in the way of his
necessities or his desires. Within this circle his
hands drOp powerless—he dares not, if he would,
break the charm ; andlthe " Liberator" las solemnly
declared his intention to increaffe, if necessary, the
armed" force with which, for ten years, he has
propped up the most hopeless tyranny in Italy. The
national metropolis of the captive nation is at all
events to be denied it, and at the very acme of their
aspirations the cry of " nationalities " is to be stifled;

as Austria smothered the cries of Lombardy, as
FERDINAND crushed, in his dungeons, the rising
intelligence of Naples. The pretentious and
lawless ' scheme, which, if it' dick Inot avail to elate
the fond credulity of a people struggling to be free,
was nnnounced to Europe in grave and sympathising
languages, which based its defence on the complete-

ness ofthe boon it proferred them, sinks into a com-
promise. The further progress of the campaign, it is
evident, whether one of uninterrupted success, or of
insurmountable difficulties, would have involved the
matter beyond compromise. The complete annihila-
tion of. Austria would have set the whole Peninsula
in a blaze, and would have justified and infallibly
superinduced the ultimate reforms,
th&brief episode of 1843, have b

only the vain