The Sun.
London, England, 1852-12-23 00:00:00

PIRIT OF TILE
4LS.

THE NEW ML
PUB.

VISTRY.-S

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
TIMES.—We may as well state at once, for the
relief of those legislators who wish to spend the re-
mainder of this week otherwise than in dancing at-
tendance on Parliament, that, according to Lord
Aberdeen's first and very reasonable intention, nc-
thing will be announced this evening. Of course,
we must regret, on Lord Derby's account, that his
fervid curiosity and irritable temperament will be
deprived—the one of its satisfaction, the other of
a new stimulus ; but after his lordship himself took
a whole year to form his Mtn Cabinet, out of one
political section, he cannot complain if his succes-
sor has not finally arranged every particular be-
fore the expiration of one week. The House of
Lords will be adjourned this evening to next Mon-
day, when there is no doubt the country will pos-
sess a Government with a fair promise of support
and durability. We say the country, for notwith-
standing the special anxiety with which a crisis is
watched by expectants of every degree, the nation
is far more interested even than would-be Minis-
ters and ambitious subordinates. It certainly is
for the interest of the country that it should have
not only a good Government, but one which can
command a Parliamentary majority of its own,
and which is therefore a source of security, in-
stead of being, like our two last Governments,
itself an uncertainty, a weakness, and a trouble.
Something like terra firma we trust to arrive
at before long, though how that is to be done
in the present state of parties, without a
good deal of mutual forbearance and gene-
rous co-operation, no one ventures to say.
Notwithstanding the wear and tear of heart and
sense by our late political controversies, there is
happily enough patriotism left for the formation of
a comprehensive Government. There are not many
men who would rather fish in troubled waters for
the great prize of power than help to reconcile fac-
tions. The proper policy of the country is scarcely
any longer a matter of dispute. In all the declama-
tion that we read in and out of Parliament, we
don't see so much as an attempt to make out that
the grand principles of our Government depend on
the selection of this or that set of men. The only
question is who will best carry out the principles
already adopted by Parliament and the nation at
large. Attacks by anticipation are at least under-
stood. When writers are so candid as to inform us
that they intend to abuse Lord Aberdeen, his col-
leagues, his Cabinet, and his policy, whatever they
are, to give no quarter to anything or anybody that
crosses the threshold of Argyll-house, and to think
worst of those measures that look the best, they
necessarily disarm themselves of what strength
they might accidentally possess. For our part, we
are always disposed to give a new Government
fair play, especially when its very formation is an
act of patriotic risk or self-denial. That is not
the course adopted by Lord Derby and his sup-
porters. Though they claim to be the largest party
in the State, they are not strong enough, as they
confess themselves, to wait. They must crush
the new Government in its very cradle, or it will,
they seem to think certain, speedily be too much
for them. They cannot afford to be candid or
patient. The stakes are planted, the faggots piled,
and the sentence pronounced, before there is any-
body to burn. We may judge how rapid will be
the process of justice when the men and the mea-
sures are in court. Next week we shall know the
men. Then will come storm the first on the de-
voted heads of the unfortunate statesmen from the
phials of disappointed protection. In February we
shall know the measures. Then will come storm
the second. How kind to be told all this before-
hand ! What an immense improvement it would
be on the existing state of things if all people pro-
claimed their purposes and character on their very
forehead so promptly and so plainly as our late Pro-
tectionist contemporaries ! When the fatal out-
break of ungovernable passion, unlimited personali-
ties, and scandalous insinuation is at last poured
upon us, it will be a great comfort to reflect that we
had fair warning, and that as it was threatened be-
fore the men or the measures were so much as set-
tled, no choice of men or measures could have averted
the infliction. But before these gentlemen de-
nounced so very positively the men and the measures,
whatever they may happen to be, of the new Admi-
nistration, they might as well have agreed among
themselves what ground to take as to the known
facts of the case. What is the particularcrime or folly
of which the statesmen in consultation at Argyll-
house are guilty ? Is it that they are too well pre-
pared, or that they are not prepared enough ? In
one speech or one column we are assured of a long,
a deep, a well-organised conspiracy to wrest the
Government from the Conservative party ; in a
sister speech, or an adjacent column, we are as-
sured that all its surprise, confusion, disagreement,
and everything that usually argues want of pre-
meditation in the statesmen charged with this sin-
gular conspiracy. Both these charges cannot be
true. Will the assailants be so good as to elect
which charge they mean to insist upon ? Is it a
conspiracy, or is it a misadventure ? Were the
parties agreed before the opening of Parliament,
the terms arranged, the spoil divided, or, to take
the other alternative, are there no parties as yet,
no terms of co-operation, no agreement as to the
spoil ? Just now the last seems the favourite topic ;
and when it becomes known that the Cabinet is not
yet entirely filled up the run will be stronger in
that direction—namely, that the three anti-Protec-
tionist sections of the Legislature have been taken
by surprise. There is actually some truth in the
charge. But as contradictions cannot be equally
true, it is not so true that there has been a league
of long standing to overthrow the Ministry and
divide the places among the confederates. The
fatal division of last Thursday night happened to
be about as little premeditated or concerted as fatal
divisions have generally been of late years. An
unusual variety of motives contributed to the re-
result. Besides merely political considerations,
every one of the five measures constituting the
Budget furnished its quota of dissentients, and if
the debate on them, as it went on, turned more
and more on the question of confidence, that was
owing rather to the Ministerial orders that it should
be so than to any mischievous combination of par-
ties.

HERALD.—AII sorts of rumours are of course
afloat as to the arrangements in progress for the
formation of the new Cabinet. Many of the minor
appointments are said to be settled, and we think it
probable that this evening Lord Aberdeen will be
able to state in his place in the House of Lords
that matters are progressing, although not finally
arranged. Amongst the on Bits, we may mention,
that it is strongly rumoured Lord John Russell is
to be pitchforked into the House of Lords, and is to
be Lord President of the Council ; that the leader-
ship of the House of Commons lies between Sir
James Graham and Mr. Gladstone ; and that the
first-named of these two gentlemen is to be First
Lord of the Admiralty. That Sir J. Graham
may be desirous of securing this appointment
we think extremely likely, but when we take into
consideration how he acted when occupying the
same position in a former Administration, we
cannot nna,gine a more injudicious appointment,
especially at the present time, when it is a matter
of essential consequence to the country, that this,
the most important arm of the public service,
should be rendered efficient, as we do not hesi-
tate to say it is not at present, but which
Lord Derby had determined upon effecting without
any delay. A more injudicious appointment, we
say, than that of Sir J. Graham to be First Lord
of the Admiralty, we cannot conceive, or one more
likely to disappoint the great mass of the English
people ; and should the report of his appointment
turn out to be correct, we shall take an early op-
portunity of proving what we now assert. We
have reason to believe that this place was offered to
Lord Palmerston, and in our opinion his lordship
is eminently qualified for the post, and his appoint-
ment would, we are convinced, have given great
satisfaction to all naval men, but we are informed
that his lordship has flatly refused to have anything
to do with the embryo Cabinet ; and we are not, we
confess, surprised at this determination, for we can-
not understandhow a nobleman of Lord Palmerston's
high character and gentlemanly feeling could for
one moment sit in the same Cabinet with Lord John
Russell, from whom he has received so flagrant an
insult. Another rumour, and one which some of
our Liberal contemporaries seem to give credit to,
is that Lord St. Leonard's has been strongly pressed
to retain his office of Lord Chancellor. No doubt
Lord Aberdeen would be glad enough to avail him-
self of the noble lord's splendid talent and high
character, but then the difficulty remains—the
Lord St. Leonard's has a character to maintain,
and his lordship has too much penetration, to say
nothing of his feelings as a high-minded nobleman,
not to know that he has nothing to gain in public
estimation by lending himself to assist a cabal
which has overturned one of the best Governments
ch
the country has seen for many a year, and hi
can only obtain power by swallowing all its former
opinions. It is an affront to Lord St. Leonard's to
suppose him capable of such conduct for the mere
sake of remaining in his present position, and, but
that we are compelled to allude to the matter, as
some of our contemporaries have already done, we
should be ashamed of seeming to countenance such
a report, even whilst we are contradicting it.

PRECAUTIONS AGAINST THE YELLOW FEVER.—The
Lords of the Admiralty have issued instructions to the Ad-
miralty agents on the West India station not to permit in-
valids and distressed seamen from places where the yellow
fever is raging to be received on board the homeward-
bound,
mail-packets.