The Sun.
London, England, 1839-11-14 00:00:00

EVENING ED IT lON .

on which a Chancellor of the Exchequer may con-
fidently rely, after the reduction of a tax, then it
follows that the wisest thing a Government can do
is to reduce all taxes to the lowest definable
point. Why should the principle, in which Mr. Row-
land Hill trusts, be allowed scope only in the Post-
office department? If it be wise to reduce the general
rate of postage to one-eighth of its former amount, it
would be wise also to reduce the charges in the depart-
ments of excise, customs, stamps, assessed taxes, &c., 1
to one-eighth of their present amount—and trust to
" increased consumption" for a remedy. Were the at-
tempt made, however, it requires no ghost to tell how ,
the necessities of the public service would be provided
for. We fear that a new tax, or an addition to the un-
funded
debt is destined to prove the pendant to this
cheap postage scheme. It is, probable, however, that
' our " liberal" rulers will make the most of their clap-
trap postage scheme.; and leave to their Conservative
successors, the task of providing for the deficiency in
the revenue, caused by the cheap-letter system !
(From the Tina's.)
The state of the Navy recurs to our attention every
hour ; and had we no other memoranda on that vital
subject, the letters which pour in upon the Editor of
this journal by each succeeding post, would, if laid upon
the table of the Admiralty, banish sleep for ever from
the eyelids of Lord Minto—we had almost said, alarm
his conscience. In Tuesday's Times we published a
short extract of a letter from South America, describing
the helpless condition of our commanding officer on that
important station, where each of the maritime rivals
of England, viz., France and the United States, had
an armament double the strength of ours—where
events were constantly arising of a nature to place
the interests of this country in direct opposition to
those of her European and Transatlantic neighbours,
and where it must be remembered that a defeat or
failure from inadequate force could not be remedied
by any succour from home under the lapse of many
months. It was especially affirmed in that communica-
tion, on the accuracy of which we rely with implicit
confidence, that there was a want of small vessels fitted
for the subordinate services of the station, so absolute
as to impose upon the officer commanding, the neces-
sity of employing merchant ships, generally speaking
far less trustworthy, because less responsible to offi-
cial authority, than men-of-war, in the urgent duty of
carrying both treasure and intelliger.ce between the dis-
tant points of the station, being an expedient not so
hazardous or injurious as that of waiting for reinforce-
ments to his feeble squadron, the arrival of which might
be adjourned sine die. What was asserted by our cor-
respondent in reference to the conduct of the naval ser-
vice of Great Britain on the coast of South America,
is but a sample of the performances of Lord Minto
everywhere. In all quarters the British navy is
starved. On the shores of China there has not been
either at the commencement of the late awful break-up
of our commerce with that empire, or during its progress.
or on its fatal consummation, so much as a single Bri-
tish man-of-war to protect the subjects of her Majesty
from insult, or to avenge their injuries, or to support
1 the negotiations of Captain Elliot. There too, as in
the western hemisphere, merchant ships were called
upon to provide, feebly and incompletely, for objects,
which ought to have been attained with promptitude
and rigour by an armament under the Royal flag of
England. We do not mean by this observation to pro-
nounce upon the justice or injustice of the Chinese
Government in suppressing a 'trade between its own
subjects and foreigners which both parties knew to be
unlawful, to assert that grievous wrong may have been
committed in the mode of executing a measure the
principle of which might have been upright, and
that the Queen's subjects, otherwise so much at the
mercy of Chinese despotism, ought to have had the
means of defence and protection from their natural
guardian, their country's once formidable fleet. In
treating of naval matters some days ago, we alleged
with heartfelt satisfaction, on the authority of
a correspondent there, that the British squadron up the
Mediterranean, under Sir Robert Stopford, was in a
most efficieat state, so far as regarded the internal
order and discipline of the ships. We repeat this
description, and with no less pleasure than formerly.
But what use was made of it by the hireling writers of
Downing-street and Whitehall ? Why, they had the
impudence to charge it upon us as an inconsistency
that we praised the gallant officer in command of one
particular squadron, for the discipline which he esta-
blished among his crews, although we had oftentimes
inveighed against Lord Minto and the Government fur
their maladministration of the affairs of the navy, as a
whole. Now, where is the shadow of inconsistency ?
Dock-yards may be impoverished—the force in com-
mission may be altogether unequal to the public
emergencies—jobbing may abound—seamen may be
discouraged—and the work on board, as compared
with that required from foreign sailors, or from
British-born sailors in the service of the United
States, may be unduly severe and harassing ;
but is there anything unreasonable in the repre-
sentation that such evils as these exist, accompanied
by a simultaneous admission that the duties of a
given squadron are, from circumstances peculiar to
itself, carried on in a seamanlike and effective manner ?
It is not, indeed, very wonderful that whatever merit
may be frankly and rishteously ascribed to Sir R.
Stopford or his officers, the desperadoes of the Admi-
ralty should wrench, so far as in them lies, from its
proper owners, and divert to the profit of Lord Minto.
I'hey may just as well rob our brave flag-officers of
their honours as of the rewards which those honours
have so richly earned ; nor need it cost them more to
steal for Lord Minto the reputation which belongs to
Sir R. Stopford, than to plunder the fleet at large of
Greenwich Hospital, and bestow it on Lord Minto's crea-
ture.
There are, nevertheless,facts relating to the same
squadron, commanded by Sir Robert Stopford, which in
no manner constitute any reproach to that veteran
officer ; but, on the contrary, a serious grievance, of
which he has just to complain—viz., that in a fleet
amounting to fifteen sail of the line, and, we understand,
expecting a further accession of at least one SO-gun
ship, the rulps and precedents of the service have been
so far departed from, and its interests so neglected, that
only one flag officer, and he a full Admiral—an Admi-
ral moreover of the red (the senior flag of all), and an
officer well stricken in years—has been appointed to
discharge all the complicated and extensive duties of so
numerous a squadron, with no Rear-Admiral to relieve
or to support him, and what is still more indefensible, no
" Captain of the Fleet." It is needless to ask the opinion of
any seaman as to the usefulness and importance of this lat-
ter officer. It would be difficult to find at the present mo-
ment among the captains in commission, who are mostly
hangers-on of the Minto clique, and many of the: better
acquainted with election than with maritime manoeuvres,
it might, we say, puzzle a plain man to discover more
than half a dozen, perhaps, who know anything of the
necessary evolutions relating to the " order of battle,"
or of the formation of movements incidental to a fleet at
sea. But the drill and instructions of officers in such
branches of naval service are peculiarly the proeince of
" captain of the fleet," who always ranks with a Rear-
Admiral. We put it, therefore, to any dispassionate
man whether the presence and activity of such an officsr
were ever more essential than at this hour ; when the
greater portion of our captains have to learn almost
every thing of the higher tactics, and when, at twenty-
four hours' notice, the Mediterranean fleet might any
day of the week be brought into collision with an
enemy. Besides all this, the aged Commander-
in-Chief must be physically incapable of discharg-
ing double nay, treble duties, his own. ncluded
namely, those of a Rear-Admiral, second in
command (of which no fleet of equal force with this
ought ever to be left destitute), and those of " Captain
of the Fleet." But Sir Robert Stopford has not the aid
of either ; and to say nothing of the consequent injury
to the service, it is utterly barbarous to exact from any
person of his age such an accumulation of duties. Thus
sacrificing both the brave old Admiral, and the effi-
ciency of his fleet, for a miserable saving of a few hun-
dred pounds a-year, being the difference between one
Rear-Admiral's half-pay and full pay, and the further
difference between the full pay of the Captain of the
Fleet and Isis retired allowance. Thus we find tla!
" fructification" system of the Treasury, or in other
words the starvation of the public revenue, to he the
real. canker at the root of all our national establlsh-
ments. There is not a guinea to the good in the
hands of our Finance Minister. How, then, can it
be otherwise than that some halfpenny saving here
and there should be held paramount to the highest
and most comprehensive views of power, security,
prosperity and honour? Sir Edward Codrington, when
commanding an " experimental" squadron, or more pro-
perly called a pleasure-boat squadron, and, if we recol-
lect right, of inferior numerical force to that under Sir
Robert Stopford, which has been assembled for active
subserviency to the measures of Russia, had a Rear-
Admiral for his second in command. But " Ned' was
a 1 Vhig Radical, which good old Sir Robert is not, nor
ever has been. But turning away once more from the
superfluous fleet in the Mediterranean, let us—pailful
though be the spectacle—let us examine somewhat
nearer home.
humbug
force
thhraevee
dwiesmfaonrttlehde defence of
England (the o
has been pretty well exposed) ? But what home
os sr
tarda rdoi
tni
ohhaavl e h we
necessity
s? s i t
y? What
Whatwestern u
issqe ua dr
s in ro nt
the
a C t
ihi
ai ng
h.
nel ? While the armed navy of Russia covers the entire
Baltic, what, we repeat, has England to depend upon
in any quarter of the North Sea ? W!!y, not a frigate,
nor a sloop of war, nor a look-out cutter—no
' not one, from Orkney to the Land's End ! How can
this latter enormous risk, incurred by her Majesty's
virtuous Ministers, be accounted for ? Thus, without
a shilling in their pockets (alwas s save and except their
' salaries), without one shilling in the public Exchequer,
for any purpose, however vital to the interests of the
State, they durst not dream of fitting out a squadron of
British men-of-war, to keep in check one moiety of the
fleet prepared by Russia in the Baltic—all such chi-
meras of impracticable patriotism were abandoned. Be-
ing abandoned, they were ridiculed, and treated with a
peremptory " pooh ! pooh r Well, then, but it was
. necessary to make sornesaort of compromise ; and let the
form of the bargain have been what it might, we care
not, the substance speaks for itself. It is this—Russia

has been bought off in the north of Europe, yid the price
paid by Euglind is a surrender at discretion to all the
propositions and demands of Russia in what concerns
the East and South. A few weeks will bring this an-
ticipation to a test, by which we should be too happy
to find it proved fallacious ; but that we shall be ieve
when we see it, and not a moment sooner.

SECOND EDITION.

THE FUNDS.-(CLOSING PRICES.)

BRITISH FUNDS
rank Stock 175% In,lia ,z nck
3 per Cent. Red
3 per Cent Cols. B9 y 9 Ditto Bonds ..„.«.„.......••
4
903 i , „nu, (Ad Annuitie< --
3N, per Cent. Red 974i; f Ditto New Annuities
New 354 per Cent 9S'X Ex. Bills, 1,(:001 ~' 1 dis:
New 5 per Cent. Ditto 50,, 1 die.
Long Annuities to expire , Ditto 500! 1 dis.
Jan. 186,1
Oct. 1859
Jan 18 i 0
13% Consols for Act
FOREIGN FUNDS

Austrian, 5 per cent !Portuguese Ponds, sper cent.
Pic,lgian, 5 per cent 104--!'% Ditto, New Ditto
Brazilian Bonds 7I X, !Prussian, S per cent —
Buenos Ayres, 6 per cent — I rtu,Sial4 Bond,, 5 per cent.... - .
Chilian, 6 per cent — Ditto, Metallic
Colombian, 6 per cent — !Spanish, 5 per cent. 271,4
Ditto, 1824.
Danish, 3 per cent... ........ .... !French, 5 per cent.....—..111f. tOc.
Greek Bonds, 1825, Spec ct. !ExitellaIIW,
Ditto, (I per cent., 1825......... '29%
Dotch, 214 per cent.... ...... ... 5114
Mexican, 5 per cent... .......... 2314 !French, 3 per cent —l'. —c.
Pernvian,lB2s,6 per cent.... i Ditto, 5 per cent. . siA
SHARES.
Great Western Railway rig
London and Brighton Railway l6
1.0.101 l ailtll3ll-11111Igharn It iiiwa)
London ,ifid Croydon Railway (Trunsl
Manchester and Birmingham Railway
Ditto ditto Extension ,i,
,--
North Midland riailAaV .... ................ . IoN,

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC :JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS or THIS DAY.
(From the Globe.)
The appointment as a Magistrate of Frost, the leader
of the Newport Chartists, is seized upon as a legitimate
cause of accusation, or rather of vituperation against
Ministers. " Who appointed John Frost a ma-
gistrate r is repeated by every Tory Journal; and
responded to by ever Tory panisan. This inquiry
might be answered by a similar reflection upon
communities for the improper conduct of indivi-
duals who, when they had no reason to suspeCt their
principles or practices, Lad been placed by them in
offices of honour or of trust. The same mode of
inquiry m.ght be adopted with equal reason, and for
the same sinister design, with reference to any depart-
ment of the public service, in which any one of its
officers had committed some gross and flagrant crime.
Every one will at once see that imputations of nezlcct
or connivance on the part of Government, under
such circumstances, arc unreasonable and unjust,
.and can only flow from the virulence of party. It so
happens, however, that in the ease of John Frost
the vindication of the Government is complete. The
Town Council of Newport recommended Mr. Frost
as a fit person to be placed in the commission of the
peace for the borough. Complaints of impropriety
of conduct in some parts of his previous history
being mada against Mr. Frost, Lord John Russell
refused to adopt the recommendation of the Town
Council until the circumstances referred to were
properly investigated, and their truth or falsehood
ascertained. That the inquiry might be property con-
ducted, and its result such as would acthorise Lord J.
Russell to act with confidence upon it, the investigation
was entrusted to the Lord Lieutenant of the county who
recommended his Lordship to comply with the recommen-
dation of the Town Council, by placing Mr. Frost in the
commission for the Borough. When Mr. Frost was
subsequently disanssed for his connection witi; the
Chartists, and his improper mode of addressing Lard
John Russell vin the correspondence his Lordshi
held with him on the subject, a petition nume-
rously signed was forwarded to Lord John Russell,
strongly urging his restoration. To this application
his Lordship very properly refused to listen. %Vhat
more Lord John Russell could have done in the affair
which has furnished the Tory press with matter of ac-
cusation, those who urge the imputation of neglect or
connivance will possibly condescend to state. At all
events their not doing so will manifest that faction,
rather than truth and honesty, has supplied the motive
of attack.

(From the Courier.)
The arrival out of Sir Charles Metcalfe and his con-
sequent inauguration as Governor-General of the im-
portant island of Jamaica, of which intelligence was
received yesterday by the Delight packet, may, we
hope, be hailed as the commencement of a new, more
pacific, and more prosperous era in the history of that
suffering colony. It is time, if the preservation of a
British interest in that colony be worth the care of those
who at present rule over us, that the system upon which
it's administration has been conducted for several years
past should be radically changed ; that the House of As-
sembly, if it's existence be, as we presume, a constitu-
tional right, should no longer be regarded and treated
as a mere court for the registration of the decrees of
the Colonial Office ; and that the body of island pro-
prietary should cease to be persecuted by official under-
lings and non-recognised authorities as a proscribed
race. The party dominant and all-powerful under
the late Governor, have not been slow with
insidious attempts and flattering appeals to entrap
the new Governor in their toils, but we ob-
' serve with satisfaction, that without any unneces-
sarily offensive repulse he has beeri cautious to avoid
compromise to any opinion or any course of action. It
may therefore be assumed that he is carefully measuring
his ground, so that his steps may be sure, and his future
position resolute and dignified; that he will no more
permit the ascendancy of one and the undue humi-
liation of another party, but deal out equal justice
to all. And, above all, we trust that he will suffer
the interposition of no unacknowledged and ex-
traneous influence from this side of the water
betwixt himself and the subjects delegated to his Go-
vernment by the Sovereign whose high commission he
bears. He brings to the task, happily, that experience
in the art of governing of which his immediate predeces-
sors have unfortunately been so defieent.
(From the Standard.)
It is stated by the Ministerial Journals that'a special
commission for the trial of the Monmouthshire rebels,
will be issued forthwith. About 12 persons already
stand committed on a charge of High Treason, as
participators in what Lord Normanby mildly cha-
ractcrises as " the outrage." We hope that the public
attention will be steadily fixed upon the proceedings
under this Commission, as otherwise there is little
reason to hope that the ends of justice and truth will
be satisfied. We trust that we shall riot be suspected
of any wish for sanguinary sacrifices, but we are
convinced that the safety of the country, and
the well-being of the humbler classes, demand a strict
and searching investigation of the origin and progress
of the late insurrection. 'We shall not be sorry if
the utmost latitude of mercy is extended to the rebels,
idler conviction, but we must insist upon it that
inerey shall not be shown to rebellion by the
concealment of its springs and instruments, as will be
the case if every prisoner committed foe treason shall
not be brought before a jury, and confronted with all
the evidence that can lee fairly adduced against him.
The country has a right to demand the most com-
plete account of a transaction that has caused the
destruction of so many of our felloW• subjects. We
think it necessary to give this early warning, because
we have heard whispers of a proposition to Frost and
others to banish themselves, as the price of pardon,
and because we know that all such compromises
as that suggested in this proposition are of the
worst consequence. Even, if Frost be guilty, we do
not want to have him hanged ; on the contrary, we
sincerely hope that no more 'blood will be shed io this
disgraceful rebellion ; but if Frost be guilty, a full ex-
posure of his guilt, and of the guilt of his accomplices,
and of the means employed by them to seduce the un-
happy thousands led into crime by their arts and exam-
ple, is absolutely necessary to protect the giddy populace
from similar seduction hereafter.

MA SQUERA DE.—There was a masquerade
under the direction of Mr. Obbard, last night, in the
English Opera-house. The gentleman whose name has
just been mentioned appears to be the onlyciondtpvaidnuyallaisnt
the metropolis at present who takes la bal masque
under his special guidance. He takes for his motto
tor ,
ilc
crrthoughs t
could wish, there
the
m
nll‘'slll tenr‘or': observable breach sy asansdr "m•e' isrre;ashe n
of decorum, which too fre-
quently in former times operated against the popularity
of this species of amusement. The characters last
night were numerous, though of the usual cast. Seve-
ral bands of music played during the evening ; and
boxes were filled by respectable-looking parties, who
viewed the masquerade without mixing in the Inoilty
group.

MAYOR OF BOLTON.—At a meeting of the
Town Council of Bolton, on Saturday last, Robert
Heywood, Esq., was proposed as Mayor, and elected
with only one dissentient .voice. When this election
was communicated to Mr. Heywood, he addressed a
letter to the town-clerk, expressing his surprise and re-
gret that the choice of the Council should have fallen
upon him, as he had previously stated hie determination
not to accept the office, on account of an intended ab-
sence from England during the ensuing year, nod other
causes which he enumerated. This letter was read at
ati adjourned meeting of the Council, held on I..londay
evening ; when, after some discussion, a deputation was
appointed to wait on Mr. Heywood, and endetivour to
prevail upon him to accept the office. The deputation,
accordingly, had an interview with Mr. Heywoyl,
after some solicitation, consented to reconsider the
matter, and to give a final answer to the Council on
Thursday.----Illan
Let it be remembered,chester Guardian..
tl
forc ounce, thernr,HthEatNoEnwan id)°atesfTArGthe sth of December next a
letter, containing one or two enclosures even, if not
weighing
frnouary be sent from
Jersey to themore Spence. Bravo
Whigs!
Buitcai DumyltlES.--At the annual elec-
tion t hhaen t a but:. an
Isles,
of Councillors on Tuesday the Tories were worsted.