The Sun.
London, England, 1830-10-18 00:00:00

all injudicious legislation; but they would be dealt
with, and may still, we trust, be dealt with, .1.1-re-
medies drawn from the common stork of political
prudence, temper, and justice. . They need pot
overwhelm the state, or decompose, us did the
penal lawi, the Irish nation, and separate its ele-
ments, as if they bad never been combined.
The religious war being happily ended, it is
nevertheless extremely possible that other sources
of confusion may have been opened; and even
by those vigorous hands, and through an un-
successful application of that same upright spirit,
to which Ireland is indebted for her release from
the Popery code. One cruel aggravation of every
disturbance to which Ireland has been exposed
during the last half century, was the, extreme po-
verty of the people upon whom the arts of excite-
ment operated, and their enormous numbers. That
the country at large was overstocked with inhabi-
tants, we by no means affirm. The island would
have supported twice the number, had capital ex-
isted or been employed to call forth productive
labour; but the want of commercial and manufac.
Luring industry left no means of livelihood for the
growing population, except what was afforded by
the cultivation of the soil ; so that land became the
most marketable commodity, if not the only one;
and by degrees the greater portion of the estates
throughout the kingdom were cut up into miserable
patches, such as the spade of a single peasant might
search, for a scanty crop of half-manured potatoes.
The 40s. freehold law made this multiplication
of paupers an instrument in the hands of every
'squire for extending his political influence ; so
that the political spirit of the country was de-
based, and its surface over-run, by a destitute
and pitiable, but useless and dangerous, popula-
tion. Under these circumstances, and with a
view to their amendment, the Legislature, it
short time ago, passed a Bill to prevent the
subletting of lands, a Bill which the Irish land-
lords would never have endured, so long as
the 40s. freehold law subsisted. We, with many
others, were favourable to the enactment of that
measure, trusting that it might effect a future good,
and not sufficiently adverting to the risk that the
benefit might be arrived at through great and intoler,
able suffering. The conduct of a large proportion
of Irish landlords was such as to warrant shut appre-
hension. Without regard to the wretched creatures
whom their own ambitions and sordid policy had
for many years been entrapping into a ruinous occu-
pancy of their estates, they took all occasions since
the passing of the law to expel abruptly the small
tenants wholesale on every lapse of term that oc-
curred, and, failing that contingency, on every arrear
of rent. The consequence has been the banishment
and destruction of thousands of miserable families,
ousted from their cabins with scarcely a garment to
cover them, or the means of satisfying the keenest
pangs of hunger. There are, unfortunately, no poor
laws in Ireland, so that this ruthless system of the
landlords was carried on with impunity' to them-
selves. One letter from Dublin of Saturday
last, described the sudden OcCUptilion of a coin-
mon in the county of Meath, by upwards of five
hundred families. The poor creatures were as
suddenly expelled. A contemporary asks whence
this mass of starving colonists could have pro-
ceeded, appearing by the question to throw a doubt
upon the probability of the narrative. We reply,
that there is no part of the three southern provinces
of Ireland, where a famishing multitude might not
be speedily collected, and the scene of the Lloyd-
common wretchedness be got up within eight-and-
forty hours: The country swarms with ejected pau-
pers : the law, founded, as we think, on principles
easily defensible in the abstract, has, we are afraid,
Undergone an unmerciful operation, and will require
Net early revision from the assembled Parliament, or
dreadful things may be anticipated from a people so
despairing of benefit but from eloinge. The project
of a repeal of the Union, unripe, as it was justly
deemed, and unpromising last year, puts on a dif-
ferent aspect since the precedent of Belgium has
been set up. With the predominant feeling of cer-
tain classes of men in Ireland, whose personal, inte.
rest is their only country, and with the poisonous
energy of Mr. O'Connell to act upon it, it seems
ns if the " repeal of the Union" ought not to be
looked at by his Majesty's Government as one of the
every-day babbles of fiction, no sooner blown than
lourste—nees.

Both the King and the now Ministry in France
have shown considerable tact and discretion in the
forbearance, amounting almost to nonchalance, with
which they have received the messengers, the rips
plitudings, and the greetings, with which they have
been saluted from this and other countries. Nothing
is so tempting to national or individual vanity as
flattery ; nothing so likely to compromiso their own
neutrality, or that of foreign Governments towards
them, as that they slionid be induced so nitwit as to
reply to the warm eutogiums of their addressers
with any thing like correiponding warmth. This
forbearance on the part of the new French authori-
ties is the more laudable, as they cannot but be
that, in much that has been said and done
by their admirers hi other countries, " more is meant
than meets the ear." Having been ourselves among
the earliest to admire and avow our admiration of
the heroic exertions of the French people, we cans
rot be supposed to blame those who honestly par-
take of the same sentiments. Mit, among the
crowd who have rushed forward to hall the daystar
of liberty in France, there are, doubtless, some, and
those amongst the loudest in their devotions at its
shrine, who would gladly make revolutionary irtove-
menta in one country the signal and pretext for
similar steps in their own; and we need not say
that nothing, would tend more to discourage the
spirit of itenonterference in other countries than that
Otir new Government there should, either directly
mw' indirectly, encourage such a dispositioo elsewhere.
This was the fatal error which the National Con-.
vention, iii the first revolution, fell into, anti ryas
ramie the pretext of the long train of evils with
tshich Europe was afterwards afflicted. The Drench
revolutionists of that day held Out an avowed en-
couragement to the discontented in every country to
rally round their standard, and look to them for
encouragement. This was any thing but the noes
iniederenee now so wisely recommended, and
hitheito acted upon, towards Franca and :Belgium ;
end. naturally led the way to results which never
can he too much deplored. It is not alwaye that
nations, ~ more than individttals lento W;Stiotri
from experienee, On Nit Occasion, however, it ep~
pears to he the ease, and we applaud it !Alike for its
value and its rarity..--41fornin9 Irerokt,

The reformation in the administration of ustice,
which was promised in tho Speech from the 'l' hrone
at the cotrimencement of tbc lust Session of
meta, has yet to be carried into eNect. It is true
sonic alterations ill the practice of the law were
made during that Session, ,but wu fear they callow,
be called improvements. Those alterations con,
silted in the abolition of the NVelsh system of jisdi.
cature.—a system which afforded more cheap and
expeditious Justice to the people than the one that is
substituted for it; a system, moreover, in which
the inhabitants `of the prineipality expre,sed their
confidence; and, though tiny admitted some reforms
were necessary, they deprecated abolition. A few
of the aristocratic families of Wales supported the
tiwesure, but it was curried o..lKaitist the sense of the
grcat Wily Of thepenple. peOple, We need not wonder sit
Shill, when iso find that the same Bill by which this
abolition has been effected 'vent to inercase the pa.
trottsge of the Ministers of the C.7rown, by the up.
Intinttnent or three newlndges,with a salary of 5,0004
Si year each, in the Courts sa Westminster. At the
same time that this addition in Imola to tile exPenseg
of the jtolitiot establistiment .or this country,
totions that we hose fur Stidgeo tit it i 7 n°-
(,'nitttof
14chequer, who!ext,,e;it a t the frrintis of tler 4,4 ' g
rind Summer Assnies, have very
dicey in the Court Est of 'elle( *`
pier, It is true toe
Welsh Judgeships have been abolished, hut the ex,
pence of their appointments Wit* MU SO great 1)I;
soma thousands as that of the three judges who are
totart eppointed in their place. TIMIS flOith(T