The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-21 00:00:00

wig-Holstein Question, as latterly developed into a
Dano-German war, must come speedily and bodily
under the consideration of the Legislature.

It appears to be fated that in the absence of those
great party conflicts which often distinguish the
opening weeks of the Parliamentary Session, the
House of Commons shall this year have a plentifu'
supply of excitement in the discussion of personal
questions. Thursday evenang was especially fruit-
ful in the material for suah encounters, the greater
part of the sitting being indeed occupied by them.
The stormy debate upon the connection of the hon.
member for Halifax with the Greco conspiracy threw
into the shade the passage at arms between the
Chancellor of the Exchequer and Mr. SHERIDAN in
the e.arlier part of the evening, yet there was no lack
of explanation, of indignation, and shall we say it ?
of temper, in that same war of words. Into the
details of the matter in dispute we are not disposed
to enter. Mr. GLADSTONE thought fit to reiterate
the charges which he had made on the previous oc-
casion against a certain assurance office with which
he coupled the name of the hon. member for Dud-
ley. Mr. SHERIDAN indignantly denied the alle-
gations of Mr. GLADSTONE, and complained loudly
of the affront put upon him. The chief point
which will strike an impartial reader is the damage
which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has done to
a good cause by his indiscretion and want of cour-
tesy. Whatever may have been his motive for
citing persons and companies by name—a proceed-
ing which was certain to provoke a tempest of op-
position to his measure—his excuse, that it was
more manly to impugn a society which
was represented in the House, can hardly be ac-
cepted. The matter was one in no ways connected
with Parliamentary life, it was entirely distinct
from the political arena, and unless Mr. GLAD-
STONE wanted to do that which he now professes
himself to be anxious to avoid, and raise an issue
not upon the merits of his Bill, but upon the
demerits of the friendly societies, individually he
would certainly have done better to avoid mention-
ing names and citing particular cases. The right
hoc. gentleman's word is surely enough to sub
stantiate any assertions he might have made in theit
general features, and in many of the worst instances
which he mentioned he followed the more prudent
course. Discretion in this case, as in most others,
would have proved to be the better part of
valour, and we regret that Mr. GLADSTON E.
should have followed such a course, chiefly lei
the ill effect it has produced in the House, by nar-
rowing a question of the broadest general inheres!
into angry personal dispute. It slitters very little
to the public whether tae British Provident regis
tered its accounts in the three years before or after
1853, or whether its receipts and expenditure were
duly proportioned ; but it matters a great deal to a
very large body of the industrious poor that they
should have a safe investment for their savings.
From the tone of Mr. GLADSTONE'S attack and ad r.
SHERIDAN'S reply, a looker-ca might naturally
have supposed that all existing friendly societies
were to be seriously damaged by the introduction
of this measure. The latter gentleman, indeed,
seemed to think it an unanswerable retort on the
Chancellor of the Exchequer that friends and
relatives of his own were connected with as-
surance societies. But Mr. GLADSTONE brings
i'crward no measure for the suppression of such
societies or the curtailment of their business. He
merely proposes to enter the field as a fair com-
petitor, with several drawbacks and the one great
advantage of undeniable security. Is this such a
very formidable opposition' If the societies gene-
rally are half as sound es they profess to be they
have little reason to fear Government rivalry ; but
a somewhat forcible argument on behalf of this
measure is the eagerness with which the small
depositors have availed themselves of the newly
established Post-office savings banks. The amount
of insurance affected, will, it must be remembered,
be restricted to £lOO, and therefore all the large
assurance offices must at once be put out of the cel-
culalion. There are a number of excellent and well
managed associations for assisting the workingman
in his efforts to provide for his family. But it is
idle to pretend that in spite of these existing insti-
tutions, with whose operations no one proposes to
interfere, hundreds of the poorer classes are con-
stantly being swindled out of their money by abso
tate and intentional fraud, or forfeiting it through,
the ignorance or extravagance of managers who
know nothing of the art of management. Very
recently several melancholy cases have come before
the notice of our police magistrates, owing to a
systematic fraud carried on by two or three men who
pretended to represent a regular company, which in
reality had never existed. It is difficult for
working men and women, who have little tint
or opportunity to prosecute such inquiries, to ascer
tam the solvency of an office if actually existing
and they are ready dupes of showily dressed and lour,
voiced impostors, who find it only too easy to profess
a respectability which does not belong to them.
It must be a matter of deep regret to every honest
man to see the hardearned savings of the labouring
classes fall into such hands, and it is to guard
against such catastrophes rather than to damage
established offices that Mr. GLADSTONE'S measure
was intended. Hon. members will do well to dis-
connect the two ideas in their minds, since they
cannot doubt that cases of imposture, fraud, and
mismanagement are common at the expense of the
industrious poor ; still if people prefer to run the
risk for the sake of lower premiums or larger
bonuses, nobody intends to interfere with them. It
is to be hoped that in the farther discussion of this
matter all personal questions and references to par-
ticular societies will be avoided, and the question
entered upon in that candid, enlightened, and tem-
perate spirit which alone befits the consideration on
a measure affecting the vital interests of a iterge
portion of the population. Let the bill be es- mined
on its merits, and if it be found to offer !eat advar„
:ages to the working classes let it hare a fair trial,
with any modifications of its e lausr,d that may seem
necessary. Lord STANLEY,
'with his usual good
sense, interposed at the atei
ght of a somewhat
angry discussion, and Frainted out the desirability
of choosing between 'cwo courses—that of adjourn-
ing the debate wath a view to exhaust the argu-
mentser of at once sending the bill
upstairs) rtoa adne ej consideration deration of a select committee.
The forteaser of these courses was ultimately agreed
to, ',eaeich, under the circumstances, was the most
(I.esirable, as it gives time for the anger and excite-
' meat raised by the introduction of extraneous mate
ters to die away, leaving room for a calm and
1 unprejudiced discussion.

Now that the Easter Vacation has commenced,
and Parliament has again suspended business for e
brief period, it naturally occurs to the mind to in •
quire what has been dons during the period which
the session has already lasted. It sometimes
happens that when events of unusual moment take
place, and there is especial demand for the conside-
ration of Parliament that their particulars may be
duly entered into, that somehow or other the most
vexatious delays are continually interposed to re-
tard the course of business, and never eLding, still
beginning obstacles spring up, which eeem to
forbid the long-expected debate, or the anxiously