The Sun.
London, England, 1852-09-23 00:00:00

sally and signifieeotly revealed capacity as an
administrator by the vigorous manner in, which he
brought the British North American F),heries
Question—in spite cf the hluedering of Lord
ABERDEEN and the blustering of Mr. WEBSTER—tO
a prompt and bti3.ac t o ry settlement. Several of he
subordinate members of the DERBY Cabinet have like-
wise evinced abilities sufficient to have justified the
PREMIER in baying risked their elevation to the ranks
of Government. It has thus happened that notwith-
standing his Young England " antecedents," not-
withstanding verse-writing and white waistcoats,
Lord JOHN Matermas has contrived to acquit himself
creditably in his capacity as Chief Commissioner of
Woods and Forests. So also with the Earl of EGLIN.
TOIIN as Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland—the memorable
tournament, as they say in the law courts, to the
contrary nevertheless notwithstanding. Additional
evidence of a similar character might possibly be ad-
duced from the proceedings of our newly-appointed
administrators in the other departments of the Go-
vernment, but the foregoing we take to be more than
sufficient in anticipation of the speedy assembling of
the Imperial Legislature. It demonstrates clearly
enough that Ministers have not been idle
any more than they have proved themselves
either ignorant or incapable throughout the
whole of their reiterated delays and tedious procras-
tination. It is thus, we conceive, that the difficulty of
their position has been somewhat appreciably dimi-
nished. While however such, to our thinking, has
been indisputably the crse, we feel satisfied, at the
same time, that as the peril of their situation in re-
gard to the past has been diminished, so its respon-
sibility in reference to the future has been propor-
tionately increased. Upon the leader of the Cabinet
devolves at this moment the necessity of unfolding
with promptitude and perspicacity the precise nature
and direction of the policy upon which he proposes to
carry on the affairs of her MAJESTY'S Government.
At this juncture, moreover, he finds himself unex-
pectedly called upon to distribute with a wise and de-
liberate impartiality a surprising number of honours,
places, and emoluments—consequent, of course, many
of them, upon the demise of the great Duke of WEL-
LINGTON. It is the last-mentioned event which
imparts the novel and peculiar interest, to which
we have already incidentally alluded, to the approach
ing assemblage of both Houses in the Legislative
palace at Westminster. The tributes which will ne-
cessarily and naturally be offered to the memory of
his Grace both in the Lords and in the Commons will
impart value to the debates of a session such as might
otherwise have been almost entirely restricted to the
dull routine labours of organizing and martialling
the ranks of a newly elected Parliament. Mean-
while the Earl of DERBY, in discharge of the acces-
sion of duties before specified, will have to award the
two Garters now lying at his disposal, and to dis-
tribute a variety of other honours and authorities. If
we are to credit the announcement put forward by
our Ministerial Contemporaries that Lord Viscount
HARDINGE has been selected to fulfil the responsible
duties of the Commander-in-Chiefship, no better ap-
pointment could have been made on the score cf
services and experience, and this first step of the
PREMIER'S will ba universally commended. But
there is still much to be done, and everything
assures us, indeed, that it is under no ordinery cir-
cumstances that the nation is now awaiting the
arrival of the memorable November which is to wit-
ness, so soon after the death of the Duke of WEL-
LINGTON, the assembling of the new Parliament.

We remember once, when arguing with a banker
in whose office we wished to leave a petition for sig-
nature on behalf of the penny-postage, being met
with the self-contradictory objections, first, that the
vast increase of letters would break down the me'l
coaches (for railways then had hardly dawned upon
us), and next, that the revenue could not her.' the
loss. Soon perceiving that such a vast increase of
letters, and loss to the revenue too, would not hang
together, and awa-e that with such profits it could
easily afford to pay for a little more accommodation, he
admitted the petition, but obtained not a single signa-
ture thereto. We afterwards found that there was
an unmentioned argument behind, he feared its in-
terfering with what he could charge his customers
for remittances ! Our agricultural friends frequently
were much in the same position. We used to hear
them argue, first, that foreigners would take nothing
but gold for our corn, and that there would be a
most ruinous drain of bullion ; end when told that
they must in the course of trade receive our goods in
return, they would turn round and tell us, well, but
with free trade they will deluge the English markets
with foreign goods, and ruin the home producer.
But JOHN BULL, in the person of the Norfolk farmer,
hal, like the banker, an inner counting-house reason—
he did not like low prices for wheat. It is, howeva,
remarkable, as if every form and shape of Protec-
tionist argument, after refutation by reasoning, was
to be utterly routed by experience, that the late re-
turns of the Board of Trade exhibit the precise
converse of the two above-mentioned assertions. Our
exports have largely increased, our imports dimi-
nished, and gold flows in of course to pay for our
JOHN BULL (in Essex at least) would not
always understand, that no one could eat gold, and
that it signified little who had it, provided those who
had parted with it got money's worth for their
money ; nor would he understand that with provi-
sions at a reasonable p-,.:ce we feared no foreigner ;
but be can understand, we hop, the irrefutable
argument of facts rnd figures ; and from these it ap-
pears that we have t 3 much rather then too little
gold, that foreigners have taken increasing quantities
of our produce, and yet have sent less of theirs. We
do not, of course, mean to imply that such a state of
things can continue. Oar consumption of foreign pro-
duce has, in fact of late, exceeded the importation,
and trade will no doubt soon approximate again to its
normal condit'on, that of barter. Still it is instructive
to notice how a sound principle like that of free trade
will in its workings falsify by tuns every supposable
objection which can be brought against it. For the
month terminating on the sth of September the increase
of exports, as compared with the corresponding month
last year, is 170,965/. ; and though, owing to the re-
duced price of cotton goc Is (for the quantities each
year nearly correspond), the value of exports for the
seven months terminating the sth of September is
somewhat less (373,4961.) than that for the corre-
sponding months of 1851, yet, compared with the
same period in 1350, the increase of exports is not
less than 2,330,488/.1 It is worth the agriculturist's
notice, too, that grain itself is one of the articles of
which the foreigners have sent us much less in return
for our increased exports during the last seven months;
5,414,398 quarters in 1851, against 3,239,492 in 1852.
It is obvious that 89 our consumption of foreign ar-
ticles has exceeded the importations, the latter must
soon login to increase, and we shall have abundance
of either manufactures or the magic gold itself to send
them in return.

THE NEW COMMANDER• 1N• CHlEF.—Lieutenant-
General Lord Hardinge has been appointed the new Com-
mander-in-Chief. The next Gazette will officially announce
the Noble Lord's promotion es " General," after which his
Lordship wig succeed to the command of the army.

T 1,1 t
-Coloneltn gat 413 .a
s
Viscount Hardinge has left Great Stanhope-street
for Seuth Penghurst, Kent. where the noble Master-General
of the Ordnance, and family, intend to remain until shortly
arrra
before the meeting of Parliament.
DuT:ee:warquis of Exeter (Lord Chamberlain) has
Lieuten
arrived in Grosvenor-square from Burleigh House.
Lo d • His
visit to town is said to be connected with the
gements for the contemplated public funeral of the late
o Friday lea:
Anssistant-
entered3i lu n Mundy
thearrived
d ut
ic s
oin f
his
i kmeene
Distrie. Quartermaster General of the inkenny

We understand that the Marquig of Waterfor3
paged through Glasgow on Tuesday,
en route fcr Eglinton
Castle.

_ The Earl and Countess of
t, r n
SE
d gely re-
- Clanwilliam and family
intend to remain at Deal Castle, of
month, ich the Noble Earl is
then
e
governor, until the end of the ensuing
turn to Belgrave-square.
Lord and Lady Hatherton hai arrived b
at
park, Staffordshire, from visiting the Duke and Duchess of
Sutherland, at Dunrobin Castle, N.B.
Lord end Lady Edward Fitzalan Howard have
arrived in Grosvenor-Street, from the Duke of ._NO __,_
tiolk's seat
in Derbyshire, Glossop Hall.
REPORTED DEATH BY DROWMIIG OF ALBERT
SMITH AND HIS BELTHEIL—Lettei3 were received in town
yesterday announcing the death of Albert Smith and his
brother by drowning in the Rhone, whilst on their way to
Chamouni.—Herald. A few days r -ro a pocket-book, con-
taining a passport in the name of Mr. Albert Snlith, 12,
Percy-street, Bedford-square, London, and dated the Bth
September, 1852, several family letter:, and seven Bank of
E‘England notes of 101, each, was found on the banks of the
_
Etone, about seven miles from Chalon. This book, which
was probably lost by the owner on board one of the steamers,
Is now in the possession 11
Plain du piiii.
,—Galignani.