The Sun.
London, England, 1855-05-07 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

SIR, —As accounts of the fire in my dockyard have
been published which may give exaggerated impressions
of a calamity in itself sufficiently serious both to the
country and to myself, I beg you will do me the favour
to give such prominence as you think fit to the
following exact statements of fact, which may, I hope,
serve to moderate the anxiety of friends on my account
and of owners of steamships building by me, who in dis-
tant countries may hear of this calamity without know-
ing its limits :

1. No ship was burnt on that occasion, except the
steam battery ; but that was hopelessly destroyed.
2. Two ships on each side of the battery were injured,
but one only slightly, so that the injuries of one will pro-
bably be remedied in a week, and the other in a fortnight.
3. All the other ships in the building yard escaped
without the slightest injury, including the great ship of
the Eastern Steam Navigation Company.
4. The whole of the buildings and machinery of the
establishment escaped without injury, and continue un-
interruptedly at work.

- -
'5. The battery and the other ships now in the yard
are covered by the insurances I am in the habit of making
for the benefit of those who intrust me with the construc-
tion of ships for them, to the extent of 110,000/. It is,
however, true that the loss by the battery is not entirely
covered by insurance, as the ships building in the yard at
the time of the fire exceeded the amount above stated.
But a large proportion of the value is insured.
6. Besides this insurance, the works themselves, and
the machinery they contain, are insured to the extent of
100,000/.
7. Owners of ships now on the stocks at Millwall
should not therefore be alarmed for the safety of their
property by the exaggerated statements they may have
heard ; and my own friends will, I hope, allow me, in
thanking them for their reaey sympathy, to assure them
that, excepting the vexation which I naturally feel in
losing all the thought and labour it has cost the execu-
tive of my establishment and myself to do our work well,
and my distress in disappointing the just expectations of
our Government that I would execute successfully one
of the works destined for the defence of the country, I
shall not be a sufferer to any considerable extent.

I must add that, but for the successful exertions of
the Fire Brigade, of the authorities of Deptford Dock-
yard, and of the foremen and workmen of Millwall ;
and, further, for two providential circumstances—the
steady direction of the wind towards the water, and the
spontaneous launching of the battery while in flames,
the conflagration could not have failed to have become
much more serious.—l am, sir, your obedient servant,
J. SCOTT RUSSELL.
Millwall, London, May 5.

'UNIVERSITY COLLEGE HOSPITAL—The friends of this
institution will be gratified by the information that the
munificent offer of the treasurer to give 3001. if other
contributors raised 3701., had the effect proposed. By
the day fixed (May 1) the subscriptions, in addition to
the 1,3301. collected at the late dinner, amounted to
4801. ; and the Baron de Goldemid has gladly paid his
promised 3001., thus raising the collection to 2,1101.
We do not suppose that the benevolence of the public
towards this useful establishment for the current year is
yet exhausted. It will
i be surely borne in mind that be-
sides the remnant of its debt of 5,000/., new liabilities
are of necessity being daily incurred for purposes of
charity the leash open to exceptlon, the relief of the Ock
poor.

It is impossible therefore for France, or for this
country as the ally of France, deeply interested in the
stability of her government and in her welfare, to lose
sight of the precarious tenure of all that depends upon
the existence of an individual, and we can only hope that
all reasonable measures will be taken to prevent the re-
currence of a crime which might be followed by the
most disastrous consequences to the world.

(From the Daily News of this day.)

In all our more recent popular agitations, the acces-
sion of the merchant princes of London has been bailed
as an assurance of success ; but in general they have
allowed themselves -to be waited for. In the Reform
Bill struggle the men of Birmingham complained of the
difficulty of moving the citizens of London ; in the Anti-
Corn-law struggle a similar complaint was made by the
men of Manchester. It is not that our sagacious citi-
zens are less liberal in their principles, or more timid in
asserting them ; but the enormous magnitude and com-
plexity of their mercantile operations absorb them so en-
are apt to rest satisfied with expressing
any political movement, and to leave it to
the labouring oar. This habitual
approbationotwitral lereliyrnsetshstaotatn htdoaefky teardiness imparts tenfold weight to the
demonstration of Saturday. The necessity must
City
indeed be urgent which spurs such men to initiate
an agitation. Whoever was present in the London Ta-
vern on Saturday could not fail to be struck, not only
with the class of men who crowded the spacious hall,
but with their apparent ages. To those who viewed the
meeting looking down from the gallery few of the men
who composed it appeared to have numbered less than
five and forty years. The opinions and sentiments ex-
pressed by the speakers and embodied in the resolutions
must therefore be regarded as those of men-Who have
outlived the excitability of youth, and whose engage-
ments are such as effectually to preclude their taking
part in any movement the objects of which they do
not feel to be of life-and-death interest, and certain
of attainment. Government, Parliament, and the Na-
tion may rest assured that having laid their hands to
the plough nothing on earth can oblige these men to
turn back until their ends are accomplished. Where
all spoke well and to the purpose, it might seem in-
vidious to single out any one for approving comment,
and yet we believe we only echo the sentiments of every
person present when we say, that the opening address
of Mr. Morley, the chairman—so full of weighty matter,
so temperately firm, so devoid of all •mere oratorical
trick—left upon his audience the impression that he bad
caught a reflection of the spirit of those intellectual giants
who took the lead in the great struggle of the 16th cen-
tury—all whose actions were inspired by a profound re-
ligious conviction, and regulated by a surpassing practi-
cal judgment. Nor must an incident of the day, Which
has a meaning beyond what at first appears, .be passed
over unnoted. So numerous were the applicants for
admission that the surplus who could not obtain entrance
sufficed to form another crowded and most respectable
meeting in the Guildhall, the use of which wa,s promptly Cy
and liberally granted by the Lord Mayor
f(i
the purpose, at the first application. Our memory res
lr
nothing similar to this in the history of popular emove-
ments, unless perhaps at the banquet in Machester which originated the Anti-corn-law League, On that
occasion the night was far spent before half the speakers
had been heard ; but the enthusiasm of the company
was unabated, and the worthy chairman proposedthat
the proceedings should be adjourned till next evening.
The proposal was eagerly caught at—not the less eagerly
that there was something piquant and amusing inthe
idea of an adjourned banquet. The experiment was
triumphantly successful, for the interest of the second
night's proceedings fully equalled that of the first.VV*
accept the somewhat analogous incident of Saturday's
We
which cLroenwdneee meeting d the
tieffoerftssaotfertdbeey Lhaesao•gniveienarticulate
awaits
the
tha
double meeting as an omen that success, equal to t
labours of the Administrative Reform Abssociatio
voice to thoughts and feelings, which at this moment fill
the minds of men in every quarter of the land. A re-
sponse of loud and encouraging adhesion will forthwith
be heard from all the provinces. Indeed the mere an-
nouncement that such a meeting was to be held had al:
ready elicited premonitory symptoms. We were enabled

It is because we feel that the object proposed by the
meeting on Saturday is entitled to respectful considera-
tion, that we have ventured to point out what we believe
to be the right course for its attainment, and have thought
it our duty to warn those who have not perhaps looked
at the matter carefully of the folly and danger of a mis-
taken course. We may add, moreover, that a reform
such as that contemplated by the meeting must depend
for success upon the pressure of public opinion, legiti-
mately evoked, and rationally directed. A knot of
gentlemen in the City may imagine themselves the
apostles of reform, and believe that they could mate-
rially assist legislation ; but they may be as much
astray, as to their own fitness for the office they
aspire to, as in the effect produced on the public by
their harangues. When these gentlemen talk of the
people, and of themselves asr their leaders, they may
possibly reckon without their host, and put themselves
forward in a position for which they have no warrant,
and in which they will not find the popular support they
reckon upon so confidently. The people are not so
easily led as these orators imagine. The British public
does not move except the object to be secured is tangible,
and the teaching of its recognised leaders earnest and
intelligible. These are the indispensable elements of
any serious agitation. With them, anything may be
be accomplished ; without them, nothing. We have
only to add, these elements are not to be found in the
proceedings at the London Tavern. Nevertheless, a
great cause is at stake, involving no less than the honour
and safety of England. It is impossible that the present
miserab!e and destructive system of government can be
tolerated. We must have the right men inthe right places,
by which phrase we mean to say, we must have honest
and vigorous will in the counsels of the Sovereign. We
must have a Ministry equal to the emergency, and superior
to the contemptible acts to which these in p ewer resort
for the sordid Purpose of retaining office, of abusing the
confiden4 of the Crown and of the nation, and of insult-
ing the authority of Parliament. This is what the people
want, and moreover what they are determined to have
at whatever cost—but this end is not to be secured by
the expression of clap-trap sentiments at any meetings,
and by thrusting forward into indecent prominence Mr.
Layard, or any other pretender, in the name of the people
of England. The hour commonly produces the man ;
that man or those men, whoever they may be, if they
are to serve the country, must have its entire confidence.
Those on whom the nation rely have been tried and found
wanting. The country now turns to the ranks of that
party that has never failed to furnish able and resolute
men in the time of trial. Should the Conservatives for-
get their duty now, they need never hope to regain a
lust position ; and, we say it with deep humility, the
names of those members of the Legislature, who for
the sake of party or other considerations would forget
their duty to their countryat this crisis, and look upon her
visible decline with folded arms, will descend to posterity
in obloquy and shame, a mark for the contempt and de-
rision of future generations.

(From the Morning Chronicleof this clay.
The first great step in the new political campaign was
taken on Saturday, with a success that equalled public
expectation. The new movement in favour of Administra-
tive Reform was both initiated and inaugurated with all
the honours of a grand popular demonstration. The effect
produced far exceeded the means employed, which
argues how entirely the public mind was prepared. A
few gentlemen, individually of weight, worth, and wealth,
but none of those who are usually prominent in political
movements in the city, issued, with their signatures at-
tached, a plain statement of National Grievances, and
invited all who sympathised with them in their desire
for a remedy to attend on a given day at a given
time and place, in order that they might express
their wishes. hat was the consequence ? So pro-
found and so universal was the sentiment of dissatisfaocf-
tion, that, long before the appointed hour, the doors
the great room of the London Tavern were closed against
the still increasing numbers who demanded admittance
into the already crowded space—that the proceedings
were
commenced earlier than had been annaunced in the
advertisement—and that of the overflowings of that
crowd another vast assemblage was contemporaneously
formed in the Guildhall, granted by the Lord Mayor for
such purpose.
The meeting of Saturday was the expression of a want
and of a determination. Good Government is the want,

Another remarkable feature of this movement is the
total absence of all political feeling in a party sense.
Those who are acquainted with City of London politics
will at once see how diverse are the political creeds of
the chief speakers. As Mr. Travers well remarked, "the
promoters of the meeting could not be charged with
wishing to use it for the purpose of subverting the Go-
vernment—for the movement is too important and too
general to condescend to attack any particular indivi-
dual, or any particular Government. It might rather
bear to be described as a movement in aid of all those
earnest and well-meaning men among the governing
classes, who desire to shake off that incubus called " the
system." To wha',ever consequences it may lead, those
who have initiated it are not wild theorists, but the ex-
ponents of a feeling deep and universal, the growth of
long observation by the most just and practical people
on the face of the earth. It is important to dwell upon
these features of the demonstration of Saturday, for they
constitute its significance and grandeur.
It will be objected by the habitual opponents of all
change that the promoters of this movement have not
suggested any specific plan of their own which shall
supersede the system now condemned.. To this the re-
ply is obvious. The primary object in all undertakings
of the kind is to simplify and concentrate. Before
coming to the details of the scheme which may hereafter
be accepted as a remedy, let us know whether the pub-
lic are unanimous in desiring to immolate the existing
system, and substitute for it a better. A basis must be
laid, and this the meeting of Saturday has done. But
this is not all. The resolution moved by Mr. Lindsay,
in a speech of great argumentative eloquence, clearly
points to a general remedy. There must be "no more
monopoly of Government by a section of the community,'
whilst "enlarged and practical ability must be introduced
into the service of the State." Never mind the obstacles.
They must be overcome, for the cause is a holy one,
nothing less than the rescue of Western Europe from
the outstretched grasp of a barbarian conqueror. It is
very well for Lord Palmerston to protest that he is not
a free man—that he is obliged to work with the tools at
his band—that with a House of Commons as now con-
stituted he can make no better selections than those with
which he has astonished and disgusted the nation. The
people are prepared to tell another story. They say, " What we require is just and necessary—the safety of ,
the State demands it. It is for you to devise the means
of effecting it if you can. If not, we will I"
It was in this spirit that the resolutions and the
speeches at the two meetings—at the London Tavern
and the Guildhall—were conceived. It is in this spirit
that the Committee of the Administrative Reform Asso-
ciation will act in carrying out the objects for which they
are constituted. Like the wealthy burghers of the
middle ages, they are leaving their industrial pursuits, to
take the helm at a period of danger and disaster. To
those pursuits the majority of them will return, when
their work is done. They have been slow in coming
forward, because their present attitude is a result, not a
cause, of public opinion. Of this let them rest assured
—that in proportion to the moderation and firmness of
their proceedings will be their success, and that in all
reasonable demands for change, while they will not be
left without the countenance of the Sovereign, they will
meet with the cordial and universal support of an unani-
mous people.

(From the Morning Post of this day.)
The great meeting has been held. The new association
has been formed. The money has been subscribed ; that
is to say, twenty-five gentlemen have put down their
names for 1001. each, so the chairman, Mr. Samuel
Morley, informed his crowded audience ; the committee
have been named ; and the Administrative Reform Asso-
ciation is fairly afoot. For our own part we have already
expressed our wish that, if these gentlemen have disco-
vered points that are wrong in our administrative sys-
tem, they should first show what they are, and, secondly,
should explain what will set them right. That if we have
the wrong men in place, they will bring forward the right
ones. That if all our system be wrong, they will have the
kindness to show where it is wrong, and how it is to be
set right. Our system of administration is undoubtedly
a great public question. It is open, in common with
all other such questions, to public discussion of all sorts
—it may be talked of—written about—printed on—
solemnly speechified on—the sleeping people of England
may be roused by the eloquence of Mr. Bennoch and Mr.
Lindsay—they may be electrified by the novel images of
the constitutional tree with bright foliage and rotten
branches— of the precipice on which they stand with the
price of corn steadily advancing—of our old ship, which
we want men of nerve and capacity to guide through
the breakers that surround us. All possible points of
this kind are the property of the public—are fair subjects
for discussion ; the mismanagement of the aristrocracy,
if it exist, is to be pointed out ; its evil consequences, if
there be evil consequences, are to be remedied ; if our
present Ministry be in fault, let it disappear before the
adverse breath of the offended public ; if all our
clerks in all our offices be mischievous or useless
let us have a clean sweep—let us by all means ge
the right men in the right places. This is, after all,
a matter on which we are unanimously agreed. 1
is
int
that we are all striving for, only it happens to be a point
ho
uld agree, and
the very principle of our Constitution—it is the Po
on which it is impossible that all men
i a
cts
of a
majority of
on which we therefore take the ver..d
majority of the
been able to get it, the opinion of
It form Association is, it
the House of Commons, representing,
public. The Administrative
e
by a conviction that we have not got
appears, distressed
tingsfar as we have
this verdict, and is forthwith to set about the means of
getting it, and
of administration, and the un-
business-likeand irresponsible
system t of every department of the of ridding the country of an " inefficient
management
" A system and a management which they hold
great disasters on the country. It is
well that, in this case, they should first prove their state-
ments ; and, secondly, show the remedy for existing
have
evils, They should prove that the wrong men are in
office, and should show that they have the right ones.
Now, after being at the pains to read through th speeches of Mr. Samuel Morley, of Mr. Travers, of e
avers of Mr.
Lindsay, of Mr. Powles, and of Mr. Oliveira, we confess
ourselves at a loss to ascertain what is the
aim, or object of the association—what • precise end,
or how it means it to done. We it intends to do,
can see that Mr. Lind-
say considers himself to have been
is neglected and M-
used ; but we canncit see that
missing all the clerks in the Ad
that a reason for dis-
missing
Mr. Bennoch thinks • Admiralty. We can see
military affairs to pronounce that himself a sufficient judge of
our officers did not do
their duty at Inkerinan, but we should be very sorry to
Bee Ur. 13040 011 Wall •
_ _ Qua place, r3u4 dillKitiDg oar_

(From the Morning Advertiser of this day.)
If Lord Palmerston had desired to use his utmost in-
genuity and influence in order to break up the aristo-
cratic monopoly of place, and throw open its honours
and emoluments to men of merit, we doubt whether he
could have acted more judiciously than he has done for
the production of that result. The country—which,
notwithstanding its grounds of just complaint, would
have been satisfied to leave their redress to the House of
Commons, had his lordship, on becoming Premier, fol-
lowed the course which events had marked out for him
—no sooner saw that he was resolved to adhere to the
principles of his predecessors, than it began to calculate
what means of redress it possessed, independent of a
Minister who had proved false to his antecedents, and
of a House of Commons which hardly numbered fifty
honest representatives. Even then it was possible for
his lordship, by a great act of repentance, to dis-
perse the gathering storm. Had that been his object,
he would have aided it by showing that he was im-
pressed with the calamities we had suffered, by treating
the popular members of the house with some show, at
least, of respect, when they questioned him on matters
of vital interest, and by abstaining from any of those
scandalous jobs, by which the youth of the aristocracy
are forced into positions for which they are utterly un-
qualified, to the exclusion of men who are highly quali-
fied. But he had lived so long under the "family" in-
fluence—he had seen the talisman of birth so uniformly
triumphant over the vulgar title of merit, that it would
appear as if he believed that he and his order were en-
titled to be our rulers by the claim of divine right.
Therefore he scorned to conciliate public opinion. He
even went out of his way to show with what contempt
he regarded it. To speak in the Parliamentary language,
which we receive from his own lips, he "falsely and
calumniously " charged upon the middle classes the dis-
asters we have suffered, and gave to the scions of the
aristocracy, with equal falsehood, the whole credit of the
Alma and of Inkerman. When questions were asked
touching the progress of affairs in the Crimea, he treated
them as if they had referred to a mere bagatelle, and
thought it no disparagement to his own dignity, and no
insult to the good feeling of the country, to make a jest
of an expedition to which lives were daily being sacri-
ficed, and which had already cost the sacrifice of thou-
sands upon thousands of our fellow-countrymen. The
obedient House of Commons laughed with the dispenser
of the public patronage. Only once his lordship warmed
into indignation, and when, in that fit of enthusiasm, ha
predicted the downfall of England with the downfall of
its aristocracy, the house burst into tremendous cheering.
From all this what have the people learned, but that, it
they would rise
,from their prostrate condition, it must
be by their own energies. If they will not befriend
themselves, they must look elsewhere for a friend in vain.
To this truth they are, at last, we rejoice to see,
thoroughly aroused. The great meeting at the London
Tavern, on Saturday, the distinguished characters of
the men convening it, their position in the mercantile
world, their wealth, their business capacity, and the
fact that they belong to different political parties, cor-
dially uniting as to the vital necessity of Administrative
Reform, will be felt throughout the country. The
friends of Government, the participators in the spoil,
for which national interests have been sacrificed, con-
sole themselves, in the face of this great demonstration,
by saying, "It will be a flash in the pan." What says
Mr. Samuel Morley I " This is not to be a thing of to-
day only." Why should it ? " I should like," continues
Mr. Morley, " to take you through the list of the Com-
missioners of Excise, of the Customs, of everything. I
will prove to you that in nineteen out of twenty cases,
they are the sons, cousins, and brothers of members of
Parliament, or of some persons who have interest enough
to demand an appointment. I would ask whether it
would not be grateful, for instance, to see Rowland.
Hill made Postmaster-General ? I would ask you why
it should be a fact, that never, in the memory of any
man, has any other than a peer occupied this position,
which requires a knowledge of business, something like
a sympathy with commercial industry, general qualifica-
tions which, I am bound to say, are not found in the
cases of one out of ten peers." This is not the language
of a man who has made up his mind for a mere demon-
stration. Hear, again, what Mr. Lindsay has to say
on this point. "It is said, at the West-end, that this
meeting will be a mere flash in the pan. I will tell them
—and it will go forth to them—that it will be no mere
flash in the pan ; that such men as our excellent chair-
man and Mr. Travers and other men now around me—
i men of business—will not leave their desks merely to
have a flash in the pan. We enter into this undertaking
like men of business, and we will not rest until we shall
have effected the reforms which we deem to be necessary.
At this meetinc, a committee will be formed, and that
committee will meet instanter. It will be composed of
men of business ; the resolutions they may pass here
will be sent to every borough in the kingdom returning
members to Parliament. We have all, throughout the
country, correspondents who are men of substance, and
who have something to lose ; we will ask them, if they
approve of our resolutions, to pass similar resolutions in
their own districts to form themselves into committees, and
to act, if they please, as sub-committees. We will then
have agents in every borough in the kingdom, and t
when
we shall see any such abominable job, as the recent
and
pointment of the Hon. Mr. Howard to the Wood
Forests, the City Committee will endeavour have a
Ciand
motion brought forward on the subject in the
he house,
matter
to
will send copies of the resolutions upon
country,
Ludwig
themey e r y
to petit
on
against sub-committee
tbeapp.n appointment,
no on
and
We cannot do more at this moment
its
to their members to protest against itt.;an
object shall
to the determination of the meeting
. that
instantly resented
be carried out.
proceedings, was
not to thwart the ,
put dawn. Here we have
by a burst of indignatiroali a
ai
which the associatio* pro.
briefly allude
ie_nterruption, tending to delay, but
part of the tn,odssAnP
immediate v
"Before I conclude this address,"
to bear
poses. The pressurei° of ohs tchoen shtiot:setent co;
is
a refernd
this,
h t bog ehlo bntwei roughs
npoint
it that it sho.ul
an
nI
sat e flippancy
goa
nun
It
t ots
to
said the Chaim
tfheealtingsit
ewXhpircel2B SI beforeamazementni/3 forgot
in:Minister
rtloafonenfedol
Etiaionnedegx.i
of the Prune.
of
Eng is
lanldfuypeounstehleisctsutwieencttyshcooululdmbnes min et
abnyy
utt,rly atrocious . thatb.the deep and earneysta
Perpetual
newspaper
joke. If
speeches he has delivered since he became the
Prime Minister of England, under circumstances which
have broken the hearts of thousand l which have carried
villa ,e of thes—and—you will find
desolation into every
that out of these 20 columns, nineteen at least have led.
to roars of laughter. It is perfectl true. But wh
such cold-blooded indifference to the afflictions whichil• follow thick upon the nation must ever rest the greatest
blot, amongst man
onethsisnoctasiencmonosrideeasrabale, Onn
on his lordship's character, minor
in
than a statesman, what are we to say of the House of
Commons which has encouraged the heartless flippancy
of the antiquated beau ? Against that corrupt house the
attack must be directed, if it is to be successful. T
plan of the association is admirable, so far ;and
be-
lieve, as we earnestly hope, that in all its
of the
it will equally deserve the enthusiastic supportththe great
people. It seems, indeed, strange
thatmade in the last
advances which popular power
tr h constituencieshr
assertion
oo s shouldfe of
theirw a
several
enn
vbe
evi
:earl
her details
as
e
quarter of a century, theP
have been banded together f
ugalissehas returned its repre-
sentative influencing the conduct of their representatives, and
°nye any voice in the L
animatingright
The
hoen emaonmo tehnetratto b
borough
eve sentative it has ceased o
tore. The M.P. no sooner finds
Withthe exception of a
himself in the house
than he looks out for himself.
English representatives, and the Irish mem-
bersfeavw honestpa ctwith Messrs. Lucas and Duffy, this is un-
phe fact. And who is to be blamed for it I Who
hiwhoy
t
but the people themselves, who have permitted it,