The Sun.
London, England, 1864-04-23 00:00:00

THE DUTY ON RAGS.

Ir. reply to Mr BLACK'
Mr. M. GIBSON said that he underitood the Italian
Government had not abolished the duty on raga exported.

PENAL SER.VITUDE BILL.
In answer to Mr. HUNT,
Sir G. GREY said he would consent to postpone the
further progres of the bill from Monday next to Tbutsday.
THE LATE ALLEGED OUTRAGE ON A BIZITISH

•
BJE(.3 •r IN NORTH AMERIC,'A.
LAYARD Bald the Government had received ihfor-

mation respecting the matter which corresponded with the
accounts which appeared in the newspapers, and had com-
municated with the Government of the United Sty tea.
CAPTAIN MELVILLE WHITE.
In reply to Colonel FRENCH,
Mr. LAYARD said that despatches had t een received
from her Majesty's Charge de Affaires at Hamburgh, to
the effect that the award had been made, but that it was
unfavourable to Captain White.
CHINA.
Mr. LIDDELL moved that, in the opinion of this house,
further interference on the part of this country in the civil
war in China is impolitic and unnecessary. The hon.
gentleman condemned the course adopted by this country
in regard to China by our interference in the military ope-
rations in that country, the object of which, he contended,
was to introduce British supremacy there, It was not his
intention to ask the house to pass a censure upon the Go-
vernment, although he considered their policy erroneous in
very many respects—but he wished them simply to join
him in the attempt to dissuade Ministers from continuing
in the course which was unprecedented in the past, and
which he hoped would find no favour in the future.
Mr. LAYARD, after complimenting his hon. friend on
the ability displayed in his speech, explained the course
which the Government intended to pursue in reference to
the resolution that had been submitted to the house. As
he (M.r. Layard) was precluded from moving the previous
question, he should move that the Speaker do leave the
chair. If the resolution were carried, and sent to China,
together with the debates upon it, disastrous consequences
would ensue. The hon. gentleman proceeded to sketch the
history of our commercial intercourse with China from its
commencement until the signing of the celebrated treaty of
Tien-Tsin, or Pekin, which was the most important instru-
ment entered into by England with any Eastern nation.
It had caused a great change in the state of cur relations
with China, and had put an end to the chronic state of
war which had previously existed. Our great difficulty
lay in restraining our consuls and other officials, who,
having been brought up in the old school, were in the habit
when a grievance arose, of insisting upon immediate redress
without referring the matter to headquarters. But it now
appeared, from the papers which had been laid upon the
table, that Sir F. Bruce had succeeded in almost every case
in keeping the consuls under due restraint. In all the sea-
ports which ware thrown open to our commerce by the
treaty of Tientsin, the English had the benefit of ex-ter-
ritorial jurisdiction. They lived in separate quarters from
the Chinese, and were exempted from the law of China. As
to the Taepings, they were marauders and plunderers con-
nected together, as everybody now admitted except the hon.
member for Aberdeen (Col. Sykes). Well, these Taepings
came at last to the neighbourhood of Shanghai, and repre-
sentations were addressed to her Majesty's Government by
the Chamber of Commerce of Shanghai to send troops
there—and he would ask the house, if notwithstanding
those representations, and notwithstanding the statements
of their diplomatic agents in China, her Majesty's Govern-
ment had declined to send the troops, would they not have
been deserving of the strongest censure ? If assistance had
not been given the Taepings would have entered Shanghai,
and the result would have been an immense loss of life and
property. There were three courses open to her Majesty's
Government—to leave Shanghai :to be defended by the
Chinese, to defend it with English troops, or to allow Eng-
lish officers on half-pay to aid the Chinese Government in
disciplining their soldiers and sailors. Of these three courses
her Majesty's Government thought the last the most con-
venient one to adopt. The hon. member had referred to the
30-miles' recline, and said that it had been exceeded ; but
he was prepared,to show the house that the 30-miles' radius
was a military question, which had been resolved upon
after due consideration at the recommendation of !Admiral
Hope, Brigadier Savory, and other naval and military
authorities in China, and that positive orders were given
that
,it should not be exceeded by troops in the service
of her Majesty. This radius of 30 miles only applied to
the two treaty ports of Shanghai and Ningpo, and it
would entirely depend upon military considerations whether
or not it would be applied to other treaty ports. It was
true that in one instance Gen. Brown deemed it necessary
to exceed the 30 miles' radius, but nevertheless the order
was adhered to that the limit should not be exceeded.
After taking the advice of Sir F. Bruce, orders in council
were issued enabling English officers to enter the service
of the Chinese Government. With regard to the massacre
at Soochow, it was impossible to avoid condemning the
barbarity committed by the Futai, but later accounts which
appeared in the China Mail showed that it had been very
much exaggerated. After reviewing all the circumstances
of the case, he was inclined to take a favourable view of
the course pursued by Major Gordon, an officer of whose
ability and discretion he entertained a very high opinion.
Placed in a position of great difficulty, and deceived by the
Futai, he had to consider what course was best to take, and
it seemed to him that if he had quitted his post the troops
would have gone over to the Taepings, and a dreadful mas-
sacre would have ensued. In consequence of the repeal of
the order in council Major Gordon was no longer in the
service of the Chinese Government. Tho hon. gentleman
then referred to the breaking up of the flotilla in conse-
quence of the Chinese Government having refused to ac-
cept the services of Captain Osborn and Mr Lay ; and after
defending the character of Captain Osborn from the taunts
of Mr Goldwin Smith and other writers, he said that the
stores and ammunition supplied by this country were paid
for with the exception of a balance of übout £3,000, for
which there was sufficient security. With regard to Mr.
Lay, it seemed that he exceeded his authority, but he was
' a man of large views, and had large ideas as regarded
China. (Laughter.) Mr Lay's idea was that he might
introduce civilisation into Chins, end reform the Chinese
revenue ; and, looking at what ho had effected in three or
four years in the revenue department of China, he (Mr.
Layard) maintained that it was impossible to resist the
conviction that he was a man of great power. The policy
o; her Majesty's Government in China was to avoid all in-
terference in the civil war as long as it did not approach the
treaty ports—nor to meddle with the interior of the
country. The object of accomplishing that 30 miles radius
was to defend the treaty ports, and not to take part in the
civil war. And had their policy in China been successful ?
The enormous increase in the British and foreign trade
with China—an increase even exceeding that detailed by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer with reference to our imports
and exports at home—was the best proof that it had. Had
the Taepings been permitted to enter the treaty ports, and
had all that vast trade been cut off, how great would have
been the responsibility of the Government I There was
not a respectable merchant who would not be horrified at
the notion of our policy being reversed. That policy had
likewise been approved by the representatives of America,
France, and Russia, and they had expressed their opinion
that the employment of the fleet under Captain Sherard
Osborn bad proved most useful. No Government could
take upon itself to overturn the marvellous results which
had been brought shout in China, and therefore he would
move that the Speaker do now leave the chair,
Mr. W. E. FORSTER said that the question really
befor the house was whether the Government were to be
sanctioned in continuing their interference for the purpose
of putting down the Taeping rebellion, and that question
the Under Secretary had not attempted to ens wer. He com-
plained of their policy that it had not only not been right
with regard to China, but not fair towards the house ; and
condemned our recent operations against the Taepings as
a species of buccaneering. Captain Sherard Osborne, how-
ever, had acted nobly in returning home. He had resisted
all temptations, and thus saved ministers from consequences
such as they would have rued for years to come. With re-
gard to protecting the treaty ports and our treaty rights,
he should like to knew whether the capture of Soochow.
which was accomplished chi, fly through the assistance of
British officers, was necessary. In looking back upon the
history of the past, it was impossible to deny that we had a
good deal to do in creating the anarchy now prevailing in
China. The end of this policy would, he feared, be to throw
another Chinese war on our hands and oblige us to effect
the conquest of the country.

Mr. FE ItRAND denounced the policy of successive Whig
Governments with regard to China as unjust, cruel, and
dishonourable, and declared that, however cruel RusEda
might have been in Poland, or Austria and Prussia at this
moment in Denmark, the conduct of England as a nation,
acting under the direction of Lord Palmerston, had been
ten times worse.

Tne hon, member was continuing his speech, when the
house was counted out at a quarter past 8 o'clock.

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SHAKSPERE,

(From the Times.)

Englishmen do not keep the 23d of April—St.
George's-day—as Irishmen keep St. Patrick's, and
Scotchmen keep St. Andrew's. The great champion
who slew the dragon is not much cared for, bat a
large portion of the human race commemorates to-
day the birth of a Warwickshire boy 300 years ago.
Since he first drew breath ten generations of men
has come and gone, and the world has seen vast
changes—dynasties melting away, nations dropping
out of account, great conquerors crossing the earth,
and mighty empires rising out of the dust—new
literatures, new arts, new sciences. Since the world
began there are not to be named three centuries
which have made such a complete revolution in the
affairs of men or in the aspects of nature, and
which, reckoning not by time, but by events, are so
full of moment or so long in the account. Yet, in
all the ages, we cannot point to any man who, for a
mere human achievement, has been remembered
one century after his birth as the child born at
Stratford-on-Avon is now remembered after the
lapse of the three longest centuries in the history of
mankind. It is the son of a homely alderman whose
birth we celebrate—the son of a grazier, who was
bred among the cows and the calves; bat his in-
tellectual work has raised him to a throne recog-
nised from continent to continent and lasting from
age to age.
Shakspere gives voice to every Wave of feeling—
to every mood of the mind. He knowe all the pulses
of sorrow as well as all the springs of laughter. He
studied hate as well as love, and low appetite as
lofty ambition. Men and women, lords and com-
mons, fays and hags, he knows them all. Lands-
man and seaman, tailor and apothecary, are alike
to him. His revelation of the workings of the
heart is a ceaseless marvel. Wben the murder of
Duncan is discovered, Lady Macbeth expresses
her astonishment—" What, in our houses ?" She
is not like an innocent woman astonished at
the murder, bat that it should have been
perpetrated under her roof. Is there anything that
can be compared for knowledge of human nature,
and consummate skill in managing it, with the
great speech of Antony over the dead body of Caeiar?
Similar examples might be quoted without number,
and will crowd on the recol:eetion of every intelli-
gent reader. But Shakspere's perfect knowledge cf
the human heart would appear cruel were it not
tempered with perfect sympathy. If no man has
exhibited so clearly as he the frailties of our nature
and our self deceptions in fancying ourselves better
than we are, it is a rare thing for him to make any
one positively hateful. There is no malice in the
ridicule with which he covers a fault; there is infi-
nite pity in the fate which overtakes the offender.
See Shylock, and note how we pity him as he goes
out of sight a ruined man—reft of his vengeance, of
his ducats, of his child, half raft of his religion.
The tender memory of his Leah, which makes the
loss of the turquoise she gave him when he was a
bachelor one of his sharpest tortures, imparts a
touch of softness to his character; and the revenge
for which he thirsted is palliated by the strong
provocation of a Jew who has feelings like other
men, but is treated as if he had none. Or, again,
take Lady Macbeth, and remember how she herself
could not imbrue her hands in Duncan's blood.
" Had he not resembled my father as he slept, 1
had done't." She, too, has the tender part in her
nature, and with all her cruel ambition has the family
affections strongly developed. Not only has she
warm place in her heart for the memory of her
father, " she has given suck, and knows how tender
'tis to love the babe that milks her ;" all her fierce
ambition is inspired by devotion to her huaband,
and at last the mind of this strong woman gives way
in the contemplation of her guilt, her higher nature
gets the mastery, and she dies in an agony of re

worse. Or, yet again, take Lig°, than whom in the
whole range of Shakspere's characters there is not
a more hateful villain. Sbakspere never, like
other dramatists, paints gratuitous villainy, and in
always suggesting a strong motive he mixes mercy
with reprobation. Ingo, it must be observed, is
labouring under the impression that the Moor had
been too intimate with his wife Emilia,

-- the thought whereof
Doth like a poisonous mineral gnaw my inwards,
And nothing can or shall content my soul,
Till 1 have evened with him, wife for wile.

So the worst villain gets the benefit of a doubt in
his favour and is always j•istly treated. In Shah-
spere's view of human vice and frailty there is indeed
hardly any satira. It is only in" Tiilia and Cres-

sida" that the scornful view of life is fully presented,
and certainly nothing can be more scornful than the
view there presented of love without purity, of war
without dignity, and of society all destitute of truth.
But such a view as this is quite exceptional in Shak-

spere, unless we add to it the misanthropy of Timon,
which, after all, is not of a kind that makes the pie
tare of life hideous. We may go through play after
play and we still find this, that whereas when St ak-

sp€re rose to his height he took sad desponding
views of human life, saw the earth but as a football
of the gods, and the human race as but the dust on
its surface, he never mixed with this view an
unkind judgment of man, he never separated him-

self from his fellows, he was a partaker of their
sins and follies, sorrowed in t heir sorrow, and re-
joiced in their joy.
Shakspere's art too of expressing his idea, or of
making it felt, was beyond that of any man who ever
lived. He puts his idea before us, or suggests it
with immense ease. It was usual among the French
critics to speak of him as a splendid barbarian and
an inspired idiot ; but in ail French or any other
art there is to be found nothing like the power
which Sbakspere displays of bringing all the rays
of thought into a focus, and concentrating light

in a word, in a character, in a scene, or in a whole
play. Other writers spread out their ideas, divide
their forces, and are content to make a single
effect in one play. Sir John Vanbrugh provides
us with as good an example as we need. In one of

his plays he has Lord Foppington—one of the most
celebrated representations of a dandy. In another
comedy he has Lady Fanciful, the feminine coun-
terpart of Lord Foppington. The lord is the cen-
tral figure of the one and the lady of the other.
This is precisely as if Sbakspere had put Benedick
in one play and Beatrice in another. It is the very
opposite of his method. He would not have wasted
two plays on one idea, but would have worked both
Lord Foppington and Lady Fanciful into one drama,
where we should see the dandy of every shade and
degree. Thus in the most popular of his tragedies,
if he undertakes to show us the mock• madness, or
whet some think the half-madness of Hamlet, he
takes care to let us see it in contrast and compari-
son with the perfect madness of Ophelia, with the
irrationality of the gravediggers, and with the over-
wisdom of Polonius. So if Lear is to stand forth

another meldman, his mental aberration is put into
comparison with the assumed madness of Mad Tom

and with the mother-wit of the poor fool. Not only
does he bring varieties of the same class of charac-

ter thus into close relationship, he loves to present
the same idea in double lights. The play of "King
John" turns upon e question of primogeniture. It is
a question to be seriously determined between King
John and Prince Arthur. Shakspere begins the play
by discussing the law of primogeniture from a
comic point of view, and raising a question as to
the rights of the bastard Falconbridge. This may

not be conscious art ; if the French choose to call it

nature they are freo to do so. We know not what

to call that organic force in nature which produces
in the leaf and in the fruit of a tree the same form

which we see in flower, in stamen, and in pistil.
The morphology of plants shows us the same type
of structure pervading every member of the plant;
and in the works of great art wo may detect a like
morphology. By some inherent force, call it art,
call it nature, the parts repeat each other, and the
whole is a repetition of the parts.
Language is perhaps the most wonderful part
of Shakspere's art, and his dominion over language
is perhaps the great miracle in literature, At least
it is in this region of his. art that his power is most
understood. We have not all attempted to draw
characters and to construct plays so as to under-
star d by experience how rare is the mystery which
Shakspere has attained in this way. But we all use
words and know the -difficulty of finding forcible
and felicitous expression for our ideas. Shakspere
at all times gave to 11 thoughts not only the most