The Sun.
London, England, 1852-02-21 00:00:00

,a)
185°4

i found in the camp of the Volsci, and what 130 Members
could not do, backed up by a good cause, and standing
in defence of a great principle, Lord Palmerston
achieves
ve
13.13: two small and comparatively unimportant
words.the bette real, or is it feigned ? Is it
ac
a concerted warfare between two chiefe, both of whom
know extremely well what they are about, though the
abused public looks on it all with good faith, and be-
lieves their swords are sharpened and their blows in
earnest? Is there between the dismissal of Lord Pal-
merston, his eulogistic defence, and his present vic-
tory, any rational bond of connexion; or is all this
• to pave the way for a decent fall of the Whigs; is it
to save theta the confusion of a surrender to any one
of their own body? If so, the acting has been ad-
mirable, and the play has been well played out to the
last. The blushes of the Premier, and the virgin mo
desty of his inexperienced colleagues have been spared.
However, the play is done, and the curtain has fallen.
The Ministry cannot, like the great Emperor, exclaim
Vos relete et plaudite! It cannot lease the stage it has
so long, so tediously, and co prof-ides:Ay occupied, with
thunders of applause; not like a well graced actor, hut
as 'a tedious prater, whom, if wo (la not hiss, it
because to he rill of such an iticturbranee is a
sufficient satisrection for our spleen ; and because
our interest is far more than all eoneentrated
him that shall enter next. Who that next ehall be it
will not require much sagecity to descry. If we een
read tim wishes of the country—if we can interpret the
unnaistukeable evidence of its intentions in the election
of East Kent, where Sir Brook Bridges hes been re-
turned by an overwhelming alejurity—those wishes are
not hard to read. The watch- words of that electioe
were Protestantism and Protection. Upon these
grounds .Only Sir Edward Daring was defeated,
notwithstanding his enormous advantages in the
outeet of the contest; and these are now the watch-
words of the nation. We recognise in that contest Oil
a smaller scale what soon willbo enacted on a much
larger one, and in which no party in the State but
ono can take the lead. Naturally, all those who feel with
the majority in that election will turn to Lord Derby
as their leader, as the only statesman on whom they
y
can rely to carry out those principles which they feel
to be so vitally and intimately connected with the
prosperity of the nation. Doubtless, before these re-
marks shall have reached our readers, that Noble Lord
will have been informed of the result; before, in fact,
the ink on this paper is diy. He will be prepared to
act that part, and to carry out those councils to which
the Sovereign and the nation shall have called him.
Unprepared, he cannot be, for, though sudden, this
event is not unexpected; and those councils will he
carry out with that generous and chivalrous devotion
to a great purpose for which ho is distinguished. The
wishes of the nation go with him; the good wishes
of all who are sick of empty promises and vain words
—of all who desire a temperate guiding and concilia-
tory hand to draw us out of the mass of social evils
by which we are beset—of all, in short, who long for
the peace, the prosperity, and the happiness of this
great country.

(From the Chronicle.)
The Russell Cabinet—triumphant on Thursday night
by a majority of upwards of ninety, on a question of
first-classimportance, and defeated on Friday night by
a :majority of less than a dozen, on a question of no
practical moment—now talk of resigning. Long as the
country has been prepared for this inevitable catas-
trophe of an Administration which for years has been
sinking from one depth of feebleness and decrepitude to
another and a lower—which passed through ono " crisis"
just twelve months ago, and which barely survived
through a recess that deprived it of its ablest and most
popular member—the announcement will, after all, take
the nation by surprise. The resolution which Lord
John Russell intimated to the House of Commons last
night, after the division on Lord Palmerston's motion,
was so obviously uncalled for by the circumstances
of the case, that the public will find it impossible
to regard the ostensible ground of the Ministerial
decision as the real one. The Cabinet have
long been inured to Parliamentary defeat; they have
never shown any indisposition to accept modifica-
tions, even of their most important measures, at the
hands either of their friends or of their foes; and the
particular question on which they were outvoted
yesterday evening was about the last on which one
would have looked for an extreme assertion of the prin-
ciple of Ministerial autocracy. So far from the majority
declaring or implying, by last night's vote, any want of
confidence in the Government,
it actually gave them a
larger confidence than they had asked. The difference
between the Premier's proposal, " to amend the laws re-
specting the local militia," and Lord Palmerston's reso-
lution, to " amend and consolidate the laws respecting
the militia," amounted simply to an extension of the
powers and resources of the Executive. Moreover,
when Lord John Russell consented to add the word
" consolidate" to his own resolution, he virtually gave
up the whole question—it being little better than a con-
tradiction in terms to talk of " consolidating" the Acts
relating to the local militia, which are only two or three
in number, whilst those relating to the regular militia are
exceedingly numerous. Nor was the vote of the House dic-
tated by any-secret and unavowed feelings of hostility;
for it will be found, when the division lists are pub-
lished, that the not very considerable majority which
affirmed Lord Palmerston's amendment included no
small proportion of the habitual supporters and friends
of the Government. A Ministerial resignation, under
circumstances so strangely disproportioned to such a
result, carries with it its own interpretation, and irre-
sistibly- suggests a pre-formed determination to relin-
quish office at the first plausible opportunity. The
country will be at no loss to divine the true cause of that
determination, when it is remembered that on Tuesday
next the House of Commons was to have been called
upon to pronounce its judgment on the policy which has
led to the costly and disastrous Kafir war. We offer no
opinion st present on the prudence, the temper, or the
patriotism which Lord John Russell has manifested iu
this proceeding. The country will judge of the conduct
of a statesman who throws down the reins of Govern-
ment at a moment when the whole business of the year
remains to be done—when the gravest questions
of foreign and domestic
policy are pressing for
a prompt solution—and, moreover, under circumstances
which will inevitably convey to all the Powers of Eu-
rope an impression alike groundless and pernicious, as
to the real cause and the practical import of the event.
It is certainly unfortunate that, with so many opportu-
nities before him of retiring from a post which he has
long since been incapable of occupying with credit to
himself or advantage to the country, he should have
chosen an occasion which, in the eyes of every Conti-
nental Government, will apparently identify the Parlia-
ment and people of Great Britain with the foreign policy
of Lord Palmerston. But we have little inclination to
dwell on these topics. It is of infinitely more moment
that the country should prepare itself to enter on the
grave struggle which now awaits it, for the defence of
the great principles of a just and liberal commercial
policy, than that the merits or demerits of a defunct
Administration should be precisely appreciated. The
formation of a Protectionist Administration will
probably be the result of Lord John Russell's abdication
of office; so that the time has arrived for the final ter-
mination of that mischievous class controversy which,
for the last six years, has disorganized political parties,
obstructed all useful legislation, lowered the tone and
character of Parliamentary discussion, and rendered a
strong and efficient Government an impossibility. We
need not say that we look forward to the result without
fear or a misgiving. Of the issue of such a struggle it
would be folly to affect a doubt which it is impossible for
any one to feel who knows how deeply, and widely, and
solidly the principles of Free-trade are rooted in the
convictions, the interests, and the necessities of the great
mass of the community. The conflict may be a severe,
though scarcely a protracted one; but it is a necessary
stage through which the country must pass in order to
arrive at a definitive solution of that intolerable political
entanglement which has brought all Government and
legislation to a dead lock.
(From the Advertiser.)
the he
Though no one will feel surprised, and few will regret,
to learn that the Whig Ministry are among
t slightest
things
that were, few persons, wo suppose, h
idea of the circumstances under which tande downfall was
to be brought about. Little did Lord John Russell
imagine when he dismissed Lord Palmerston, that in the
brief space of two months, the "Expelled Minister"
his co
would be the means of turning himself and 11
ergues
crop and heal out of Downing-street. There is at least
poetical justice in this. No novelist could invent a
denouement more in keeping with the incidents of his
work of fiction. We say nothing just now of the merits
of the question on which the Whigs are ejected. We
are merely recording a great fact—one which illustrates
and confirms, in a remarkable manner, all that wo ever
said respecting the impolicy, as well as bad feeling, in-
v Lord olved in thee condon. uct of Lord:JohnWh Russell in dismissing
from trivial
ar " at dire
causes spring !" effects
was the exclamation of the poet, more
than a century ago. Who could have believed that the
simple and seemingly unimportant circumstance of Lord
Palmerston proposing as an amendment to the Ministe-
rial scheme, respecting the militia, that a regular should
bo substituted for a local militia shouldm result in the
vbeur but nt
eenntorwthicie days before, to b o
destruction of a Go,
declared at Perth
Fhretovme
rteleseigDn
eadi r. Fox Maule had
4, The Inevitable Government ?'w'
The Ministers(
n'AcietujusPon a broad tine's-
tion of national policy or of Parliamentary reform, bat
upon a difficulty whether
eighth of George the the forty-second or the forty-
present Third should be refurbished for
present use! There was a significant muster on the
Tory benches in the House of Commons yesterday even-
ing, and the habitues ofthe the mischief
in the wind. In
n due time Lord John Russell rose to
propose his militia plan. He desired to have what he
considered a constitutional means of defence for the coun-
try, and thought that a local militia was the best mode
of providing it. With much ingenuity he put his propo-
sition before
his hearers, but through the whole explu-
tion there shone out two great errors of policy—two
great mistakes—the one potent for evil in the eyes of the
Liberals, the other still more fraught with mischief in
the Tory view of the subject. The economists could see
the broad absurdity of making bad soldiers of useful
mechanics to be ready three months hencce to meet a
danger said to be imminent; whilst practical Members
of the Tory party saw the insufficiency of a weak local
force, when compared with such a militia as England
boasted during tbo last war. And far more than that,
Lord Derby's follceivers saw also, in the dispute before
them, a chance of up-Setting the Whigs, and getting
their With an audience to a
placeF. . large extent thus
mentally prepared to resist his arguments, the Minister
went on detailing his plans, and when he had finished
his story, upstood his ex-colleague, Lord Palmerston, to
knock down all he had striven to raise. Lord Palmerston
had no official reserves to check him, and on he went, ap-
pealing to the fears of those who dream of an teras!on,
and to the patriotism of such as desire such e glory
_aS
the French are fond of. His address might be calledae
genuine ".Rule Britannia oration," well adapted to his
audience, eminent y
audience, well sprinkled with elevernese,