The Sun.
London, England, 1863-04-20 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

SATURDAY REVIEW.—The unanimity with which
the Poles appear to have rejected the amnesty offered
them by the Czar shows that there is much more
strength in the adherents of the insurrection than
1 could have been expected. The revolution keeps
gaining ground, and the successes of the insurgents
are as yet unchequered by any signal disaster. The
defeat of Langiewiez does not appear to have exer-
cised any material effect, and if he was not neces-
sary as a leader, the troops that shared his ruin
were too few to affect the issue of the struggle. The
Pope, too, is said to have openly espoused the cause
of Poland, and the peasantry have begun to show
their responsive zeal by burning the churches of the
Eastern communion. The Poles will not own they
are beaten, and think it worth while to fight on and
risk life and property, in hopes of getting a very
different result from that which the amnesty holds
out to them. Impartial and distant critics must
applaud their perseverance and admire their cou-
rage ; but they cannot view any insurrection hope-
fully which does not tend towards a definite and at-
tainable object. The Poles will not take peace and
present security, and the chance that the Czar may
give them as much political liberty as is good for
them. They say the amnesty does nothing more
than put them in the position which they occupied
before the revolution began. They want much more
than this—they want a separate national existence.
It is this, they conceive, that the Western Powers de-
mand for them, and less than this would do them no
good. They are now fighting, therefore, to be a dis-
tinct and a free people. Perhaps they would hardly in
terms claim more than that the kingdom of Poland
should be restored, and that all that was promised
to that kingdom by the first Alexander should be
granted to it by the second. But the restoration of
the kingdom of Poland, as contemplated by the
treaty of Vienna, is a sheer impossibility. The old
Polish provinces, which were excluded from the
kingdom, have east in their lot with the revolution
when in adversity, and cannot be separated from the
revolution if successful. They must go with the
kingdom, and if they go with it they will swell
the loss of the population subject to the pure des-
potism of the Czar up to a total of 12 millions.
Russia will fight very hard before she agrees to
this. But the existence of a kingdom forming part
of the Russian Empire, and yet with different rights,
different institutions, and different privileges from
those possessed by the other inhabitants of the em-
pire, is an arrangement impossible on the face of it.
The old kingdom of Poland had an army, and was
promised a Budget of its own. It was to be governed
by Russia, but to be apart from Russia. This could not
last. Countless difficulties of management must
necessarily arise, even if the Court of St. Petersburg
were sincerely anxious all should go smoothly.
SPECTATOR.— With no new man in the Commons
the Government of Great Britain becomes that of
Lord Palmerston, Earl Russell, and Mr. Gladstone
—a working arrangement, no doubt, but not one
which can endure, or which can be held to repre-
sent the multiform interests, opinions, and wants of
the millions of governed. Sir George Grey is of no
use, even when he can be induced to think, instead
of acting as funnel for Sir Joshsa Jebb. Sir Chas.
Wood, able as his friends believe him to be, is a
source of weakness as long as he remains in his
present office; and Mr. Milner Gibson restricts
himself to particular subjects, as if statesmanship
were a toil, or as if he accepted Lord Palmerston's
impertinent application of the proverb ne sutor ultra
crepidam to the whole class of manufacturing poli-
cians. There remains Mr. Cardwell, and Mr. Card-
well apparently loses himself in dreams of the
happy days when silence was not his role, when
Peelites were a party, and among them he was not
last in rank. The Cabinet needs a third organ in
the Lower House, and where is it to be obtained ?
The " old hands" are either in power, or used up,
or discredited, and the eye seeks in vain for a young
man of the highest political class. The Whigs are
paying the penalty of their contempt for new blood.
In their own narrow circle they have not an untried
man of obvious mark, not one of the calibre, for
example, of Mr. Hardy on the Conservative side.
There is no rising Russell, or Grey, or Cavendish,
or Fitzwilliam, or Say mour, or Grosvenor, who
would be accepted as a Minister without a start of
surprise, and for years they have not made a suc-
cessful importation, unless indeed the member for
Calne can be considered a source of strength. He is
a strong man in his way, but not precisely of the
grain out of which Cabinet Ministers are carved.
Mr. Chichester Fortescue, Mr. Baring, Lord C.
Paget, Mr. Fitzroy, Mr. B. Osborne, the list of the
second-rate men is wearisome at once in its length
and its total want of interest. The independent
Liberals might furnish recruits, but a second im-
portation from that side might alienate the Conser-
vative reserve guard. Mr. Bright is out of the
question, Mr. Cobden would not take office under a
Palmerston Ministry, Mr. Forster is the determined
friend of the North, and Mr. Stansfeld entertains
avowed Mazzirian sympathies. The list is soon
exhausted, and the speculator is driven back once
more to the old, old circle. There is no strength to
be had while the Whig leader is really supported
by a Conservative party, and the Government must
continue to depend, as it has done for 12 months, on
the personal popularity of its chief. There are peers
in plenty, and men of official habits, "experienced"
privy councillors, and speakers of considerable force
in debate; but statesmen are either not forthcom-
coming, or belong to the class of minds which
Conservatives cannot endure.

LONDON REVIEW.--On the whole the Budget is
most satisfactory, in showing the stability of the
revenue under very trying circumstances, and in
the promise which the small reduction in the esti-
mates gives us of a return to the principles of
economy. The reduction is not wholly trustworthy,
since it is obtained not by diminishing our naval
and military forces, but by a temporary abstinence
from the purchase of stores. Yet it will probably
be difficult for any Ministers to recur to the swollen
votes of the past three years, and they will be
driven to more permanent modes of economy. The
stability of our revenue, however, affords unmixed
satisfaction : in spite of the suspension of labour in
Lancashire, and the destruction of half our trade
with North America, the actual revenue of the past
year has been £70,603,000, against an estimated
revenue of £70,050,000; and the increase appears
to be due to the development of the normal portion
of the national income. During the past four years
the revenue, exclusive of the accidental and remitted
portions, has shown an annual increase of about
£875,000. The actual expenditure of the last year
has been £69,302,000, against an estimate of
£70,108,000; whilst the total estimates for the cur-
rent year amount to £67,749,000. Even this sum
shows an increase of expenditure (besides the charge
for the National Debt) of more than five millions
over the year 1858-9. The additions which Mr.
Gladstone proposes to our sources of revenue are,
in general, unimportant, though some of them will
probably be hotly contested. Chicory has a bad
name, and there has long been a tendency to
equalise the duties on it and on coffee. The wis-
dom of such a course perhaps admits of a doubt ;
and there is certainly one important difference be-
tween the two articles—that chicory is an
article of home as well as of foreign manu-
facture, and the collection of duty upon it requires
additional machinery. It is impossible to dispute
the propriety of requiring clubs to take out a spirit
license, and no one but a publican will object to the
alteration of the beer licenses. The legislation
which Mr. Gladstone proposes with respect to rail-
ways and charitable endowments admits of more
discussion. Much of the existing legislation about
railway companies is anomalous, because it is
founded on the assumption that they enjoy a prac-
tical monopoly, and that the public require protec-
tion against their powers. If Mr. Gladstone carries
out his proposal to levy a uniform duty on all pas-
senger trains, there will remain the existing obliga-
tion on railway companies to run one cheap train
every day, and perhaps the companies may not
unreasonably complain of the injustice of imposing
the tax and preserving the obligation. As for the
charitable endowments, it is evident that Mr. Glad-
stone has not weighed all the difficulties of the
question.

EXAMINER —While every person who pays
income tax will in future be chargeable at the rate of
7d. in the pound, as originally proposed by Sir It
Peel in 1842, instead of 9d. in the pound as in recent
years, a new system of graduated exemption is pro-
posed, applicable to incomes of from £lOO to £2OO
a year. After battling long against the theory of
graduation in general and in detail, Mr. Gladstone
has at length yielded the principle ; and he now
offers to make a beginning in that part of the scale
of incomes where, as he says, there is the greatest
pinch and pressure. Every man who earns two
pounds a week is to be entitled to deduct £6O from
his chargeable income, and to return himself as
liable only to a payment upon £4O. The man who
earns three pounds a week is to be charged by the
tax-gatherer only upon £9O; and the man who
earns four pounds a week in like manner to be
charged upon £l4O, and no more. The reason for
assuming this uniform basis of £6O exemption we
have yet to learn ; and why the system of exemp-
tion is to pull up with a jerk at £2OO a-year, we do
not undertake to explain. We shall doubtless hear
a good deal upon the subject when it comes to be
specifically taken into consideration ; and for the
present, therefore, we may defer its discussion.
Meanwhile we rejoice unfeignedly at the abandon-
ment of the superstitious adherence to a uniform

rate of charge ea essential to the maintenance of tii&
system of direct taxation., The great principle is at
last and irrevocably conceded that cap,hility to en-
dure fiscal burthens is not measurable by one un-
merciful rule of simple per eentage, and henceforth
we may hope that the duty of adapting the scaleof
direct taxation to the circumstances of persons
having next to ,nothing in common will be further
acknowledged by the Legislature, until the blind,
clumsy, and semi-barbarous method of dealing with
the matter as a mere random sum in the Rule of
Three shall be totally abandoned. Mr. Gladstone
having to make a choice between tea and sugar
duties, and between dealing with one of them or
Loth in a less effective way, has exercised a sound
judgment in striking 14 per cent. off the cost of tea
rather than eight per cent. off that of sugar, or seek-
ing to evoke compliments for comprehensiveness by
peddling with the two. The reduction of duty on
this great staple of our Indian commerce, and chief
item of household comfort and cheer to Is. in the
pound, will be received universally as a real and
tangible boon. The abated duty is only to be taken
until August, 1864, by which time, if peace shall
happily be preserved, Mr. Gladstone hints that
we may possibly be in a condition further
to reconsider the question in connection with the
duties on sugar, regarding which certain negotia-
tions, chiefly on matters of subordinate detail, are
now pending with other European States. But even
though the remission should not be carried further,
the community have good reason to be content.

SOCIAL SCIENCE REVIEW.—We cannot pass
without notice the death of the eminent scholar,
politician, and social reformer, Sir George Corne-
wall Lewis. Of all the leading men of England,
there is not one whom England could so ill have
spared. Not brilliant in debate, not quick, or rather
not hasty in perception, Sir George's real power
was unseen on the surface of his work, but when he
was met quietly and his well matured plans and
convictions were discovered, the depth of his reason-
ing was easily detected, and the secret of that ster-
ling influence which he exercised was exposed. Sir
George filled different offices in the State, but it was
as Secretary of State for the Home Department
that he played his best part. In this office his hu-
manity, his courtesy, his industry, his knowledge
were each and all turned to the performance of his
duties. As a scholar he was remarkable for his
profound learning, and in his private life he was be-
loved by all who knew him, but by none so well as
those who knew him best.

ATHENAIIM.--Sir George Cornewall Lewis,whosc
sudden death at the age of fifty-seven has taken the
world of politics and society by surprise, was some-
thing more than a statesman among scholars and a
scholar among statesmen. As author, editor, privy
councillor, and cabinet minister he was alike no-
ticeable. He was not, indeed, a first-class writer,
for he lacked in a remarkable degree the delightful
humour, the brightness and flow of fancy, the ori-
ginality, speciality, and sympathy which invest
the few high priests of literature with power to
charm. But he was an able man, of very large at-
tainments, logical, sound, sedate, uncompromis-
ing, capable of doing good service to truth, and also
capable of waiting for the literary rewards which, in
cases like his, are slow to come. There would be no
use in saying that the late editor of the _Edinburgh.
Review was a popular author. His writings won
the respect, even where they failed to conquer the
conviction, of scholars and authors ; but they were
at best, too dry and abstruse, too solid and consecu-
tive, to please the subscribers of a library, and the
reading public, who heard him spoken of as one of
the literary men of the Cabinet, knew him chiefly
by name. Mr. Mudie was not troubled by many
demands for The Astronomy of the Ancients' or
the ' Enquiry into the Credibility of Early Roman
History.' Yet, on the other hand, it may be safely
foretold that these two books will be consulted by
men of learning and ability when the trumpery of
the day, which jostled them into corners out of
sight, will be utterly unknown. All the works of
their author had the dry quality which is invaluable
in wine, but intolerable in books. That on ' The
Origin of the Romance Languages' might have been
made as interesting and as flimsy as a romance; but
Sir George chose to make it as uninviting and as
durable as a dictionary. Even in his political works,
those on ' Local Disturbances and the Irish Church
Question,' On the Use and Abuse of Political
Terms," On the Influence of Authority in Matters
of Opinion,' On the Government of Dependencies,'
and 'on Methods of Observstion and Reasoning in
Politics,' there is the same solidity, not to say
heaviness, of treatment. The very titles of his
volumes show how close an attention he had given
to politics as a science. Sir George had the genius
which succeeds in public office better than in Albe-
marle-street or Paternoster-row. He could do
any amount of work, sit up any number of hours,
write any quantity of despatches. Everything
that industry could accomplish he achieved; fame
as a scholar, reputation as an administrator, stand-
ing as a statesman. These were victories to win,
and they were all honestly won by the untiring
exercise of faculties common to us all. In that fact
lies the lesson of an honourable and successful life.

LAW TIMES.—Mr. Commissioner Fonblanque has
resigned his office as Commissioner in Bankruptcy,
and retired into private life, carrying with him the
respect and esteem of all connected with the court
over which he has presided for so many years. No
successor will be appointed, the Act having pro-
vided for a diminution in the number of commis-
sioners. It is, however, very doubtful whether the
vast increase of work caused by the new law will
not impose upon the judges who are to remain more
labour than it will be possible for them to perform,
even with the aid of the registrars, who now act
judicially.
THE READER.—On Thursday next, the 23d of
April, there will be the usual celebration, p'iblic
and private, in different parts of England, of the
accepted anniversary of Shakespere's birthday. The
Garrick Club is to hold its usual dinner on the day;
we hear also of other Shakespearian club dinners in
London in the same week—at one of which Mr.
Thackeray is to preside; and there are many Eng-
lish fami'ies that never let the 23d of April pass as
an ordinary day. This year, too, there will be the
special interest of looking forward to the 23d of
April next year—which, as Shakespeare was born
in 1654, will he the trecentary of his birthday.
Already it is being considered, in various quarters,
whether there should not be preparations for some
national Shakespearian demonstration on that occa-
sion, the centre of which should be Stratford-on-
Avon. There are recollections of the old jubilees,
when the Johnsons, the Garricks, and the Boswells
took the trouble of going down to Warwickshire;
and it is asked whether in these railway-days
people will be less alert ? But, though the centre of
the demonstration must be Stratford-on, Avon, there
may be simultaneous celebrations in all towns.
There is the precedent of the Burns Centenary of
1859 to supply hints.

BRIGHTER PROSPECTS FOR THE Ass.—We are
glad to see that an effort is being made to raise the
ass from its present degraded condition into its proper posi-
tion ..among the domestic animals. Most European na-
tions, and especially Great Britain, have sadly failed in
their duty towards this poor patient drudge. Not content
with giving it only the scantiest and coarsest fare, its
owners often overload and abuse it in the most inhuman
fashion, without once imagining that they are guilty of a
brutal act—though similar treatment of a horse would be
considered the grossest cruelty. As the Jew was wont to
be in Christendom a mark for jeer and scoff, and for
every kind of indignity, so is the ass still among the
beasts useful to man. Long years of neglect and savage
usage has broken its spirits and deadened its intelligence ;
but there can be no doubt that, under a more merciful
rule, and a careful supervision as to breeding and feeding,
its value to man would be very much enhanced. In its
native East, the ass is quite a different looking animal
from those miserable creatures which we see maltreated
by ragamuffins on our streets, to whose tender mercies,
indeed, the asses in this country are now almost entirely
given over, being too much despised to be used by a better
class of the community. It is melancholy to think that
the animal ridden by kings, and princes, and prophets,
which naturalists say possesses, originally, even a greater
degree of intelligence than the horse, and which would
seem to have been brought under man's dominion earlier
than its larger rival, should with us have degenerated into
a mere whipping-post for costermongers. In Arabia,
Syria, and Persia, where the ass is well cared for, it is a
fleet, spirited, and for its size, a powerful animal, displaying
none of that obstinacy which is regarded as the distinguish-
ing feature of the race in this country but which is really
simply the result of continual hardship and abuse. Far-
mers have paid far too little attention to the ass. There
are many jobs about the farm which one or a couple
of donkeys could perform to the saving of a horse; and as
an ass could be bought for a tenth or a twentieth of
the price of a good horse, and fed at a fourth of the
expense—on the coarse herbage, indeed, which all other
animals on the farm are too nice to taste—the balance in
favour of keeping two, instead of an extra horse, would be
something considerable. It is with pleasure, therefore,
we notice that Mr. Gurney has offered no less than three
prizes at the forthcoming show of the East Surrey Agri-
cultural Association for this hitherto so contumeliously
treated beast ; and we trust that it will not be long before
similar inducements are offered at other agricultural
exhibitions. There can be no doubt that such premiums
will stimulate competition and healthy emulation among
breeders ; and will undoubtedly effect the improvement in
the ass which has been secured in the case of the horse,
the shorthorn, and the sheep. It is not to be expected
that the ass will ever became so strong and fleet of foot as it
is in Central Asia, our climate will scarcely admit of this;
but a few years under the auspices of the principal agricul-
tural societies would infallibly bring out merits which most
of its owners dream not of.—Scottish Farmer.