The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-12 00:00:00

THERMOMETER.

---------•----
. 38
Highest since Noon yesterday ...... ..
33
Lowest during the night
35
This day at N00n.....

Barometer-29.85.
Wind—North-E,; light, with dull rainy weather.

JANUARY 12.
Highest since Noon yesterday 37
Lowest during the night.
This day at Noon
Barometer-30.14.
Wind—S.-W. ; light, fine but cold.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
THIS DAY.—Morning, 6h. 25m.—Afternoon, 6h. 47m
To-monnow.-Morning, 712. 9m.—Afternoon, 7h. 30m

Zbt

~~`S~O

LONDON, MONDAY, JANUARY 12, 18€3,

"Water," quoth that old Sea Porkypine and
genuine Yarmouth Bloater, Mr. PEGGOTTY, in the
penultimate chapter of David Copperfield," ' water
('specially when 'tis salt) comes nat'ral to me ; and
friends is dear, and I am here.—Which is verse,'
said Mr. PEGGOTTY, surprised to find it out,
though I hadn't such intentions." A whimsical
correspondent of our esteemed contemporary the
Examiner has just now " found it out" for us.
Meaning by it precisely such another undesigned
breaking forth in thyme : what some among the
rhymsters of the last generation were wont to desig-
nate by the euphonious and sesquipidalian title of
" unpremeditated verse." Our own lapsus
in this wise, running the words into jingling har-
mony with each other, upon New Year's day, of
all good days in the year—in celebration, as it
happened, of the unusually propitious financial
situation for the current twelvemonth. Reading
our own words as they come echoed back to us in
the columns of the Examiner of Saturday, by
the facetious voice of its observant correspondent
x," we can only exclaim, surprisedly, in the
language of Mr. PEGGOTTY, " Which is verse—
though I hadn't such. intentions ! " Descending,
however, again to humble prose, as to a medium in
every way more befitting the theme descanted
upon, as well as more suitable to the unambitious
manner of a Journalist, we cannot but still rejoice
in unrhythmicll accents over the unusually fair
prospect immediately opening up just now before
the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
After a year of gloom, and even of disaster, there
is
a reasonable probability of the right hon. gentle-
maneg himself much more agreeably prepared
to open his Budget before the House of Commons
than circumstances have permitted him to be during
several past sessions. A twelvemonth of royal and
loyal mourning, of political stagnation, of mercantile
calamity and social privation throughout the north-
west provinces of England, of fierce conflict among
the divided States of the North American republic,
of continued expenditure upon an enormous scale
in all our warlike departments ! A twelvemonth
thus painfully characterised from first to last has
nevertheless closed—with a balance-sheet left in the
hands of Mr. GLADSTONE, showing something like
a round surplus of two millions, upon a comparison
of the national incomings and the national out-
goings. The uppermost thought with everyone on
realizing which especially gratifying fact—a fact
especially gratifying, as we have intimated, from
the
circumstance of its coming to us at the end
of so
fimatnythuelt
and of such protracted privations—
the words of the with everyone will be in
Novelist ordinarily sitting
opposite Mr. GLADSTONE
once upon a time sent this v' the
Novelist who
very
Corfu in a moment of difaotat GLADaTONE to
asn I°.rat I gf
foremost-
eemOn t-
missioner Extraordinary—the'
thought with us all 'fill be, rat
do with it ?" Witte this surplus " 100
" What was he
agreeably befeke the nation, to the extent
ogf
some
where about 1'2,000,000? A surplus tolerably
sure of being still further enhanced by certain
as yet undetermined modifications in the extent, as
well As in the distribution, of the National Ex-
peiediture. For, without in any way diminishing
cur military or maritime forces as they are at
present constituted—a diminution, this, which no
true patriot amongst us can be in any way
desirous of witnessing—it is still perfectly within
reason that there should be divers abatements in
thoss gigantic dishureernents that we all wot of
but lc
° Well' disbursments that have drained
the Exchequer, of late, so lavishly and copiously
hut that need d
n it now no longer, at any
ral drain
e, upon ',he
"'" gigantic soak. Enheneing
that surplus that
may bo fcuud in hand,
when the right hon, gentleman the Chancellor
of the Exchequer, shall have
unfolded his titian •
ciel scheme for 1803-'O4, enlaan
cmg the realized
£2,000,000 by(say)anotherl:2,ooo,ooo realzz •
able by
some rational determination at last to economize—
" What will ho do with it ?" He, the Chancellor
of the Exchequer, with it, this doubly-welcome our-

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