The Sun.
London, England, 1864-05-03 00:00:00

LONDON, TUESDAY, MAY 3, 1864.

This afternoon, according to announcement, the
Conference reassembled in Downing-street. Does
alvyone, however, believe that the slightest possible
:good can come of it ? Anyone that is out of Bed-
lam. It is eel !ainly hard. to think so—particularly
after the point blank refusal of the preliminary
proposition of the armistice. And still more is it
difficult to conceive the possibility of any really
good and practical result coming from what is re-
garded by the belligerents themselves with such
supreme
anci
ineffable indifference. The sittings of
the Conference, in point of fact,
exercise no influence
whatever either upon the
course
of events at the
the councils of Europe
actual seat of war, or upon
as these latter are evidenced thro,gh the policies of
th© respective oontinental Governments. So far
as any influence could come of it, indeed, the pleni.
potentiaries again collected together
to diECUtiS the
Schleswig-Holstein d'ffioulty over a table in one of
the rfficial apartments of the First Lord of
the Treasury in Downing-street, = •
gilt just as
well have been discussing a good dinner and
(after the cloth was removed) the rival merits
of SIIAK,q'LRE and the musical glass=-s. It la the
hobby of our Foreign SecretP.ry, however : and—nois
that that hobby has orci been mounted—it must
b• 2 ridden on, as patiently as may be, at the same
dull, hopeless jog-trot, even to the end. Besides--
tlfer all—it is serving its purpose. It is whiling
away the difficult time of the session. It is post.
polling the otherwise inevitable discussion of the
foreign policy of Har MAJESTY'S Government,
particularly in this matter of Denmark a
discussion of a very alarming character, in-
deed, for her MAJESTY'S Government. The delay
of the blue-book was the first dodge of the
kind, hit upon; and that, we all know, during the
that weeks of the cession, succeeded to admiration.
It was very irritating no doubt—hut it succeeded.
Aud its success as au exCuzi.e for putting off the evil
day (of discussion) both in the Lords And is the

Commons, but more particularly of course in the
Commons, was such that the Cabinet contrived very
cleverly, we repeat, to tide over the whole of the first
few weeks of this session, up to the time of the
Easter Holidays, under cover simply and solely
of those delayed despatches. After the holidays—
upon Parliament reassembling again—the new
dodge of the Conference was resorted to, And
that, in its, turn, is proving equally and, therefore,
of course it may be said, eminently successful. The
opposition are hushed into silence—because of the
Conference. Just as they were previously hushed
-into silence—because of the delayed despatches.
The argument in each case is equally cogent.
6; wait," said Lord PALMERSTON, again and
vet again, in the earlier part of the session,
while the Lords and the Commons were waiting in
eager but long-tantalized expectancy—" Wait,"
said the Veteran Premier, " until you have the
despatches laid upon the table. We are getting
them ready as rapidly as possible. You will have
them in good time ; be sure of thet. All we ask
of you, therefore, is that you will only wait for
them until we are able to put them in your
hands, and then—when you have read them—you
can pronounce an opinion upon them, and upon
our diplomatic proceedings generally." Well,
Parliament heard this and waited. All dis-
cambia in regard to Denmark was postponed. The
Opposition—naturally enough, fretting under its
almost compulsory silence—growled an objection
from time to time, but waited. Bit by bit the de-
spatches were doled out. They were not published
simultaneously as a Blue-book. They appeared
without any blue cover at all, almost sheet by sheet,
almost page by page. And, by the time the last
instalment was making its tardy appearance,
Easter had come upon us, and with Easter the
prospect of this inestimable Conferetice. Then, of
course, there was that new and still more powerful
reason for a postponement yet longer of this
perilous discussion about the Deno-German policy,
or rather, no-policy of her MAJESTY'S Government.
And so the time speeds on—vastly to the satisfac-
tion, no doubt, of a bungling Minister of the
Crown, like our Marplot Foreign Secretary. But—to
anybody else's ? Well, really we should hardly
suppose so. We should scarcely deem it possible,
for example, that it can be in any way to
the satisfaction of the country at large that
half the session of 1864 should have been
dawdled through already, without anyone being,
as yet, one iota the wiser as to what are the
probabilities, even, of a satisfactory settlement of
difficulties ! Difficulties long urgent, at last immi-
nent, and latterly, and, for that matter, still becoming
every day, every hour, more and more sanguinarily
complicated. Systematic delays like these on the
part of a Ministry, are nothing less than insulting
to the House of Commons. The only excuse now
remaining for their continuance is, as we all know,
the sitting of the Conference. And yet, while the
fact is so, we all know equally well, that the proba-
bilities are that nothing good, that is to say in other
words, nothing practical in the way of clearing up
of existing difficulties can reasonably be expected to
come out of this Conference.

It would seem as if the Government had resolved
to make their tenure of office as celebrated as pos-
sible for want of justice, consideration and courtesy,
One of the latest feats of the administration in this
contrary line of action has been their conduct with
respect to Mr. BEWICKE. Not only did they refuse
to render justice themselves, but they opposed with
might and main all attempts on the part of others
to do so. Such conduct, is most unaccountable, and
must cast a discredit, en the C ibinet that adopts it,
through the len n and breadth of the land. It is
contemptible to see those dressed in a little brief
authority thus wantonly ignoring the claims of the
oppreeaed, and leaving things to take their course
to sait their own plans and purposes, and to satisfy
...heir prejudices to the uttermost. Mr. BERKELEY
deserves great credit for the zeal which he displayed
in bringing the matter forward, and the spirit he
evinced in the struggle which he had to encounter,
opposed as he was by the Treasury benches with
might and main. There is no doubt a most glaring
defect in the law as it has been enforced against Mr.
BEWICKE, but what are Ministers but servants of
the State, appointed to rectify the abuses and sup-
ply the deficiencies of the law. When it is seen
that any particular statute is deleterious in its
workings, when any enactment presses heavily on
a particular individual, it is the bounden duty of
Government to come down to the House, and to
suggest a remedy for the grievance in the way of
altering or expunging the faulty regulation. In-
stead of this, when it i 3 a well-Known fact that a
man has been grossly injured and very grievously
wronged, the Ministers use all their efforts to lteqa
up the evil practice, and continue the course of
oppression which so militates against the welfare
and curtails the liberties of the subjects of this realm.
Can anything be more dishonest and dishonourable
than to persist in making a man suffer the same
penalty whether he is innocent or guilty. When
he has been greatly injured, and the most fearful
miseries have been inflicted upon him, the only
thing that is done is to grant a pardon. The very
notion of "pardoning" a man who has been
wrongly convicted, falsely imprisoned, and
unrighteously despoiled of, his property and
possessions is a monstrous thing, and consti-
tutes an anomaly of the worst description, and
whose results are lamentable beyond compare.
Thus a man is doomed to undergo the evils of being
a felon, when the sentence which constituted Kim
was a wrong one, and supposed to be revoked in
its nature and effects. It is not often, happlly
for the interests of society and the peace of the
community, that a case like that of Mr. BEWICKE
occurs among us, but that it should be possible for
such a thing to happen at all is a great shame and
a scandal on the taunted freedom of the country.
Allowing for the sake of argument that mistakes
and confusions had arisen to complicate the affair
and mislead the jldgment, no single earthly reason
can be adduced which can be accepted as valid that
justifies Ministers in the course they adopted of
wilful aggression and subtle devices, By such a
determined opposition to a just request they iden-
tified themselves with the men who had carried
on the persecution, they sanctioned the cruel and
vindictive course that has called forth most
unmitigated :scorn from all who have studied
its bearings or traced its workings. It is to
be very much regretted that Mr. BERKELEY'S
motion was not carried in its integrity. It
remains for the House, however, to carry on the
good work he has begun, and so remedy in some
measure the cruel evils that have arisen from the
workings of the nefarious scheme concocted against
Mr. BEWICKE. To enable the undertaking to
reach a successful
issue, it will be necessary to
exercise care, caution, and firmness. The juggles
of authorities are proverbial, many spacious delays
and important suggestions
Will intervene to check
the progress of inquiry, and to stultify the deci-
sion of the House. Therefore it behoves all who
care for the right settlement of the affair to be
on the alert. Let them be decided, or the victory
will not be theirs after all. It might be asked
with great slio,v of reason, what reason the Minis-
ters have for keeping this unfortunate 'man
out of all restitution, and pitventinghio
I