The Sun.
London, England, 1830-10-05 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF, THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

It would be seen in our paper of yesterday, that
the Deputies of France were zealously occupied on
Saturday 'with a petition from some absurd person,
urging them to claim the bones of Napoleon, and to
.transport them from St. Helena to France. The
Chamber came to no decision on so weighty a
proposition, but so interesting was the topic con-
sidered, that the debate is to be renewed on Thurs-
day. It would certainly puzzle people of some in-
genuity to find out why the free-minded Frenchmen
atm present day, living under a liberal charter and
a citizen King, should desire again to see among
them either the lifeless remains or the living pre-
sence of their former tyrant. In repealing lately the
law which banished from France certain classes of
French citizens, it was not thought advisable to
abandon one of its previsions, which excludes the
family of Napoleon from the French soil. Is the
Chamber seriously to continue an unjust sentence
of exile, against whole families and generations
because they happen to bear the name of Buonuparte,
and to make a parade of reversing a sentence of banish-
ment against his ashes? So much for their consistency !
But, leaving out of view his transcendent victories
and everlasting military renown, which have cost
France enough already, without the additional ex-
pense of a funereal mission to St. Helena and a gor-
geous monument in Paris, what claims. has he on the
grateful remembrance of France or of Europe?
What reason can be given for invading his repose
under the willow of his choice; and parading his re-
mains before the eyes of a nation which suffered so
much from his ambition ? He was twice banished
from France in @lf life-time ; be was twice deserted
by those who pretended to be his friends; and hav-
ing exposed his country to the horrors of two mighty
invasions, was obliged to quit it amid the execra-
tions of those whom the armies of the invader re-
mained to oppress for his sake. What merit did he
acquire in exile to balance so heavy an account of
calamity, and to allow a surplus to pay for his
posthumous transportation to Europe ? The French
now justly boast that they enjoy a charter,—
that they cherish a constitution which gives them
free deliberative assemblies,—that they have re-
nounced the dazzling splendour of military glory for
the more substantial blessings of civil tranquillity,—
and that they prize a free press as the source of
'their civilization and the guarantee of their rights.—
Is it because Napoleon bestowed or respected these
ennobling blessings, that such posthumous honours
are to be conferred on him by an enlightened and a
free people? What was the charter which he gave
to France but the laws of the conscription, or the
acts additionel, intended, by an army so raised, to
preserve hereditary. despotism in his family ? What
were his Chamber of Representatives and Senate
but halls where the tribune was silent, or resounded
only with the slavish echoes of flattery or falsehood?
And when did he show his love of free conversation
and a regard for a free press? Was it in banishing
Madame de Stael for her bons mole, or ordering
Palm, the German bookseller, to be shot for an
alleged libel ? We only remember one similar
instance of folly said to have been recently perpe-
trated in the transport of buried remains from one
hemisphere to another, and that was in the case of
Mr. Thomas Payne, whose bones Cobbett alleges
that be brought to Europe, and persists in keeping
from their mother earth. If the French Chamber
really intend to do any thing in this dirty work, we
would recommend them to our old bone-grubber, who
must be already inured to the resurrection trade, who
will find Napoleon's hair more profitable for rings than
that of the American infidel, and who, in fact, will lied
any honest occupation more profitable than collecting
poor labourers to hear seditious lectures, and filching
from their pockets their odd copper, on pretext of
sending it to the wounded patriots of Paris. If
the French Legislature entertain projects like these,
we must conclude that the revolution is not yet
ended;' that it is about to extend to the tomb, as
well as to the scenes of living existence; and that
every political culprit, who was either exiled for his
offences or executed for his crimes, is to be restored
to his country, or commemorated in an expiatory
funeral cerernotty.—Tintes.

A sensible pamphlet has been submitted to us,
published, indeed, so long. ago as the year 1813, by
a Lieutenant in the Navy, an experienced and pains-
taking man, with apparently a strong desire to pro-
mote the weltitre of his profession. The title of the
work is, An Essay on Naval Discipline, showing
part of its evil cll'ects on the minds of the Offi-
cers—on the minds of The Men—and on the Com-
munity ; with an amended system, by which Press-
ing may be immediately abolished. Tide is a com-
prehensive index to the contents of the worthy
Lieutenant's pamphlet t but we think that he•
has really touched upon every topic which
the has advertised.' The general scope of the
author's book is a complaint of the harshness and
cruelty practised systematically by superiors towards
inferiors in the navy, and, allowing fur the soreness
of a men who had himself suffered what he con-
ceived to be oppression from a commanding officer,
there are many propositions and remarks interspersed
through his essay which seem to be. worthy of at-
tention. At the head of all a sailor's grievances,
impressment stands first and most conspicuous; nor
have we ever seen a human being bold enough to
justify that heart-rending outrage against the rights
and comforts of existence, upon any plea but
one,—viz. its necessity,--implying that the Go-
vernment was no mote a free agent than the
unfortunate man upon whom its political dis-
tress re-acted in a manner so revolting. It
certainly does appear an the face of it • a little
strange, that in a nation 'so proverbially brave, enter-
prising, and maritime, as the British, it should be
requisite to force die seafaring class of it to defend
their country, and on their own accustomed ale-
merit, But, to come at once to the point, we
have never yet conversed with any one who could
prove to us that it was possible- o remedy this evil
by a simple abolition of impressment. They say,
" Take none but volunteers, actuated by love of '
country—by a noble ambition, and so forth,—men
who will do their duty from love of it, not from fear
of punishment." This is all very good. If setoocn
are not to be bunted and impressed, why then
they must be invited into the navy. But how if
they will not accept the invitation? Must the fleets
of be left without bandit to eavigate them 0
There are three obstaties to the entrance of volin=
tees! into the navy, so long Oa England gliarll have a
commercial marine requiring sailors from the same
market its his Majesty's vessels. In the first place,
the wages paid to the crews of men of war have
hardly ever in war time equalled those of the mer-
chant service; one obstacle, therefore, is inadeqweie
psy. Seeondy, the -crews of men of war have
hitherto been evaipelled to serve for the whole period
of humeri life,--a dreadful prospect this for tiny man
who feels, as we all must, the appetite for poirgOaal
liberty, The excessive and indefinite restraint of
the navy, therefore, is a second obetecle to the, oli7
taming of volunteers in eufficient numbers to tiVi.
gate and fight our ships. .Thirdly, a rooted mid
irreconcileable hatred to the discipline exercised
over the seamen after they have entered, is an
obstacle the force Of which, we acknowledge, lut,,
been much impaired since the pamphlet was originally
published, thOugh of its existence and previdetiee to
certain degree it is impossible to entertain a doubt.
ha true remedies for the wrong of impressment,
therefore, ere pointed out by the nature of the evilil
which hese tendered necessary a practice so foreign
to all the institutions and ad the characteriities of
this free country. Th. seamen .on board 'men of
war ought to he assured oterputl wages, or nearly
equal, to those which are. paid by the steerage of
rlVata merchants, They ought. to be assured of an
opportunity of returning to dose families •
sonalde time after leaving home awl tt bin rea-
sieves during the whole of life, or' only made
condition of decrepitude which reriders-mre 71 in
a
of bodily lehour. The lititich seaman," like
ilier
British subjects, ought to besiecured ngeirrirt ca.
tpricions and unprovoked severity, frorri the Captel;i
am) his aulialtern hathaws,-$lll4l either recompensed

or punished on principles which bespeak.an acknow-
ledgment of every man's right to justice: • We may
from time to time revert to the various questions
treated of in the pamphlet under consideration, not
pursuing them consecutively, or with much regard to
system, but feeling that, one and all, they well de-
serve to be placed before an intelligent public,•;--
Tim%

The reports of atrocities committed on English
residents in Brussla are, we regret to say, more than
confirmed. In the Belgium Journals these atroci-
ties are attributed to the Dutch ; the Dutch again
throw them on the people of Brussels. The fol-
lowing► letter from the same English source with
one which lately appeared in the chronicle on the
same subject, attributes the outrages exclusively to
the Dutch :

TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE.

" Bruxelles, Oct. 1, 1830.

Slll,—ln my last communication I undertook to send
yo'u a detailed and an authentic account of the numerous
atrocities committed on English residents hers by the
Dutch troops in their recent attack of this city. In this
letter you will find that promise fulfilled. Now that the
Belgians have nobly delivered their country from the
tyranny of the Dutch, we rest assured that the letters of
the English will no longer be opened and stopped, as they
have hitherto been, to afford information to a feeble and
suspicious Government.
" The Belgian Papers will have informed you that an
army, composed of nearly 80,000 men, the ' elite' of the
Dutch troops, with an extensive train of artillery, most
completely appointed, quitted Holland only a few days
since, for the conquest of the Belgic territory; that this
army appeared suddenly nn the boulevards of Brussels;
and without the usual form of summoning a besieged
town, at once employed every horrid implement of war
against this open' 'and almost defenceless city, many of
whose inhabitants were asleep at the commencement of
the assault; that during four days of continued bombard-
ment with heavy artillery, mortars, Congrevo rockets, and
other projectiles, the Dutch officers set an example to
their men of all that has ever been related in history, or
can be conceived by the imagination, as most barbarous
and atrocious—pillage, assassinations, incendiarism, viola-
tion—an example of crimes of which no horde of savages
has ever been known to be guilty, even against its deadliest
foes—crimes, not only sanctioned, but positively justi-
fied' (to an Englishman) by the Prince Frederick, whose
first campaign has opened with the massacre of his father's
subjects !! ! There has been an insanity in these bloody
excesses of the Dutch,

" Providence, however, has,willed that citizens, hastily
assembled—irregularly armed—without military chiefs—
without any combined plan of operation—deprived of
almost all means of defence by the treachery of several of
the upper classes of the Bourgeois—confounded by alarm-
ing reports, industriously circulated by traitors, who had
been bought by the King with Belgic gold—that these
citizens, thus unprepared and defenceless, should, after four
days of heroic resistance, have driven their cruel enemies
into an ignominous flight, diminished in numbers, dis-
graced in reputation, and thoroughly demoralized, too fortu-
nate if they ever reach the turpid waters of Holland in
their retreat. They carried back to his Majesty of Hol-
land the bloody fruits of fifteen years' misrule over this
noble people. They will be the heralds of his just de-
thronement, as they have been the sanguinary instruments
of his vindictive obstinacy.
" Thus, however, has it pleased Almighty God, by
whom the people rule,' to prosper the righteous cause, and
to avenge the injuries so lung, so loudly, and so vainly
complained of by an enlightened and generous nation !
While the Monarch of Holland shall be recorded on the
page of history, as the barbarous butcher of the Belgians,
it will be said, in after ages, that the br.ive Belgic race
displayed not less of mercy and generosity towards their
wounded enemies and prisoners, than they bad evinced re-
solution and heroism in driving the invaders from their soil.
" EXCESSES COMMITTED BY THE DUTCH TROOPS IN THE
HOUSES OF THE ENGLISH AT BRUSSELS.

" The Lord Blantyre mortally wounded, whilst sur-
rounded by his wife and family.
" The wife of the Maitre (Motel of the English Em-
bassy most brutally treated on the boulevards, and her
children during some hours menaced with death before
her eyes.
" Numerous Englishmen dragged out of their houses,
and compelled, at the point of the bayonet, to surrender
their money and other valuables.
" Numerous houses belonging to the English fired upon,
broken into, furniture destroyed, pillaged and burnt.
" The daughter of an English Field Officer cruelly mal-
treated, his own life threatened, his plate carried off, his
cellars emptied of their contents, and all his money stolen.
" An English servant, living in the h',►ubourg of Scheer-
breek, crucified at the door, burnt by a slow fire, and his
body pierced with balls and bayonets.
" The house of an English gentleman, in the Rue
Royale, completely sacked, and plundered of plate and
money, and other valuables to on enormous extent—himself
dragged out into the street to be shot, and only saved by a
mi racle.

" Two families, entirely composed of English females,
and together in one house near the Pare, robbed of every-
thing, after having been threatened during many hours with
instant death ; compelled to taste the liquors demanded, as
a proof of their not having been poisoned.
" The daughter of an Englishman violated before her
father's eyes, and then shot. This roan will complain to
our Government at home.

" A hoarding-school for young ladies broken into, and
seventeen violated—the report of the surgeon attending
them-01 these not known how many are really English !
" But, Sir, here 1 must stop—the heart sickens at the
relation of such horrors, and I am lost in tears and indig-
nation. Throughout the whole of the recent proceedings
here, the Dutch have evidently, and' no doubt by autho•
rity,' selected the English residents at Brussels, as the
esiecial, but not, alas ! the exclusive' objects of their
furious atrocities. The Belgians have their tale too of
horrors to record. As far as the English are concerned, I
do hope that these details will have a direct and positive
influence on our Government in their view of the Belgic
question, as in their dealings with the Ex-King' of the
:Pays Bas—and that the people of England will never
allow our Ministers to enact a Crusade for the worst of
causes, ' Royal tyranny,' over a nation, whose will it is
to be free, and to have a national existence.'

This is certainly an appalling list of outrages ;
but we ate at a loss to understand how it can be
ascertained they are Dutch, except in the sense
that the Government instigating the attack is
Dutch; for we presume the regiments Ni ere us
much Belgian as Dutch in composition. The army
has always been in Holland, a still more degrading
occupation than in England, and it is possible
that the compeisition of sonic of the regiments is not
over and above good. However this' inay be, the
fact is but too certain that humanity has been sadly
outraged on this Occasion. One melancholy case
has been communicated to us on the best authority.
An English Officer, whom we forbear to name, had
lire daughters violated ; three of them are binee
dead, anal it is not expected that the remaining two
will survive. Some of the English, we know, at-
tribute their sufferings to the populace of Brussels,
Father then to the Belgian or Dutch troops. One
reason assigned fur the outrages not being Dutch is,
that the Dutch were themselves ism such constant
fear of the people of Brussels, from the hatred
borne them, that they thirst not straggle. Another
reason assigned is, that our countrymen and the
people of Brussels have very long borne no good-
will to each other. We have heard that one great
rause of the misunderstanding was the foolish aris-
tocratical pretensions which, we are sorry to say,
inake Englishmen the object of very general dislike
in every cotory, Every one at all acquainted with
society in England is aware that exclusiveness is the
great object aimed at; that every town, and even
village, is divided and-subdivided according to the
supposed wealth eh(' style of living of the inhabi-
tants. This morgue was carried so tar, we learn, in
Brussels, that it was understood, if any English
family visited in a Belgian family, they were ex-
cluded from English society. 'When people take so
much pains to make thetwelves disagreeable, it is
impossible they should not sometimes succeed.
This i 3 no excuse . for the barbarous and most in-
human treatment which our countrymen have ex-
perienced; and we pity most sincerely the sufferings
of the unfortunate parents. But we cannot, et the
same time, help regretting that the natives of this
country, when their poverty or the state of their
health, or the wish for a more rational education
than they can obtain at home, drives them to seek
hospitality 'Aimed, should be so ill-advised as to en-
deavour t 9 make themselves disagreeable to those

whose guests they► are. We ought to eonfina our
national absurdities to our own island.—Morning
Chronicle.

The persons who have been principally instru-
mental in creating the popular delusion relative to
the office of Coroner are not pleased with our re-
marks on the subject, nor did we expect that they
Would. Mr. Wakley says that we ought to have
stated our opinion at the time of the electiotts but
that, instead of doing so, we let the mischief be
done, and spoke of it afterwards. We do not know
that any mischief happened through our silence, in-
asmuch as from the beginning to the end of the pop
the medical man was in a minority, and it was evi-
dent from the first day that he could not succeed,--
But, had it been otherwise, it would not have caused
us to act differently from what we did, as, when
party spirit ran so high, calm reason had little chance
of being listened to, and any thing we could have
said, to show the absurdity of electing a medical
man to an office strictly legal, might be supposed to
be uttered in a feeling of partizanship, and to serve
the purpose of the then present election. In the
success of neither of the candidates personally did
we feel the least interest. We know nothing of the
professional acquirements of Mr. Baker, who may
make a very good or a very inefficient Coroner for
what we can tell; he is, we understand, a pluralist
in legal offices; and, if so, though we support ,the
principle of choosing a legal man, yet he is not
exactly the sort of candidate whom we would hay.e
recomaiended. We do not approve of pluralists in
civil offices any more than in the Church; but,
thougk a legal man, who has to attend to several
offices cannot be supposed to execute the office of
Coroner very well, we are clearly of opinion that a
medical man, unacquainted with law, could not ext-
cute it at all. We have given our reasons for this
opinion, and Mr. Wakley, instead of answering
them, has chosen to attack a statement winch we
did not make, and which, if we did, would have
been at variance with the whole tenour of our argu-
ment. He says—" The writer in the Morning
Herald compared the Coroner to a Judge." We
did no such thing. So far from it, we distinctly
stated that the Coroner's " inquisition" was only in
the nature of a bill of indictment, to put a person
upon trial without the intervention of a Grand Jury
—and, consequently, the whole of the proceedings
which led to that inquisition were only initiative and
inquisitorial. This distinction between the judicial and
inquisitorial office we had previously drawn, in alluding
to the case of Mr. St. John Long, when some of our
contemporaries treated the verdict of the Jury as the
result of a judicial proceeding, and commented upon
it accordingly. We stated then that they had no
more right to make that verdict or inquisition a sub-
ject of comment before the trial than they had to
discusa the contents of an untried bill of indict-
ment. Having now stated what we did not say
respecting the office of Coroner, it may be neces-
sary for ua briefly to repeat the arguments we really
did use, 113 some pains have been taken to misrepre-
sent them. We stated that it was necessary to have
a legal man for a Coroner, because, although a Co-
roner is not a Judge, he is, even in the capacity of
inquisitor, just as a Magistrate would be, who con-
ducts the initiative process of the law, bound to re•
ceive no evidence but whet is admissible according
to the established rules of evidence—and, there-
fore, he must know those rules of evidence well to
know what testimony to admit and what to ex- I
elude ; and there is no part of the law of England
more nice and complicated in its nature than the
law of evidence, or that forms a more important
branch of legal education. We said that a medical
matt, summing up evidence to the Jury, would find
himself as much astray as a legal man giving a lee-
ture.on morbid anatomy. We said that the "
which is the Coroner's record of the pro-
ceedings and the " finding" of the Jury, requires to
be drawn up with ell the technical accuracy of a bill
of indictment—and if it should be drawn up in an
informal or unlawyerlike manner, it would be in-
evitably quashed, on being produced in Court, and
all the proceedings on the Coroner's inquest would
go for nothing. And we presume a medical man,
if lie be good for any thing in his own profession,
ought to know more about writing a prescription
than drawing a bill of indictment, or accurately pro-
pounding to a Jury the refined legal distinctions
which exist between some cases of murder and some
cases of manslaughter. We also said that, " if the
argument for having a medical Coroner be valid, the
twelve Judges, the Recorder of London, and all
the Recorders and Criminal Judges throughout the
kingdom, ought to be either surgeone or physicians."
We used this as an argument a fortiori; for, if it be
necessary that the Coroner, who conducts but the
initiative process of the law, should be a medical
man, to prevent mistakes in criminal jurisprudence,
how much more necessary is it that those who
finally try the cases should be medical men, as the
mistakes of the Coroner may be repaired, but those
of the Judges are irreparable ? It is the duty of
Coroners and Judges to be acquainted with medical
jurisprudence—but, to apply that knowledge rightly,
they must be lawyers, and not medical men.-
11101ning Herald.
Whatever may have been the original character
of the Belgian insurrection—however inexcusable
may have been the first acts of the populace at
Brussels---or whatever may be the fate of those who
have fought to achieve the independence of their
country, we think there is no one conversant with
the intelligence received since our last publication,
who will not now admit, first, that the insurrection is
national, and not a merely popular, movement;
secondly, that the Belgians have now great cause of
irritation ; and, thirdly, that however patriotic may
be the disposition of the King, his counsellors
have wholly failed on the present occasion in mani-
festing the judgment which ought to predominate in
the councils of such a Sovereign. We deem it ne-
cessary to state these matters pointedly, because
much misconception, and consequent miarepresen-
tutioe, is elliroad on the subject---because it is still
studiously attempted to be inculcated to the people
of England that the Belgian insurrection is only a
popular ferment, which ought to be put down, not
by the strong arm of the law, but by the stronger
arms of fire and sword—rind further, because it is
still asserted, in an evening print on which we have
already animadverted, that die insurrection is no
more to be justified now than in the first instance.
Against such misconceptions and misrepresentations
we here enter our protest. The first movement in the
Belgian Revolution NUS undoubtedly a mere popular
commotion, as first movements in such mighty affairs
generally are, and the acts of the people, as is also
not unusual in such cases, directed against persons
and things which they ought to have preserved and
protected ; and such acts we are its Gtr from think-
ing of justifying us even the King of the Nether-
lands himself; but every thing, good or evil, must
haveaelt'it t
e railti, abte l
shouldg:rpeople' vge at once
tnd
r: its iti t w
dirgnourbt:iignorant, and express i too much to
m-
patient,
s
desire for u redress of grievances, in the same quiet,
harmless, and ceremonious mode as an assembly of
Senators and Legislators. Be this, however, as it
may, a population of armed citizens put down by
force the violating of property, anti having removed
from Brussels the armed masses of soldiery whose
presence irritated the populace, Set themselves to
work iii earnest, but with respect and loyalty to
procure the redress of those grievances, the continued
existence of which, coupled with the national anti-
pathy, or rather hatred, felt by every Belgian to-
wards the Dutch, had given rise to the first effer- ,
veseence. Deputations were appointed and sent to
the King, with petitions and lists of grievances, to
which lie replied, first, by assembling an extraor-
sbld.
ditiary Session of the States-General, where the
Belgian people could not expect to be beard,
sing
their Deputies, both person and
utidly, thought,y were
certain to be under constraint; and, secondly,
sending against the authors of the Petitions bands of
soldiery, whom, after four days' fighting, the Bel-
g i ians succeeded n again driving from Brussels
Here was the grand fault committed by the advisers
of time King; and they are now reaping the cookie.
„owes, They insisted OR treating that as a local

disease, which . wiL in trfith.:tortatitutional—thdy:
would persist in seeing only a popular ferment, or
causeless tumult, in What was a national rising; and
the consequence has been, not only the loss of pro-
perty and lives to a great extent, -and without any
ground for the shedding of blood, but the Widen-
ing of the breach which previously existed be-
tween the Belgians and the Dutch, and we fear
the ultimate separation of Belgium and Holland.
The King ought, to have conciliated his Belgian
subjects by redressing their grievances, and not to
have irritated them by a useless display of force.
He ought to have cast a veil of oblivion over the
first acts of the insurrectionists, and continued as
decirous of removing every just cause of complaint,
as they were strenuous in insisting upon it ; and
had he done so, every reflecting person must agree
that the revolutionary movement would have been
speedily at an end, and Belgium as free from dis-
turbance and bloodshed as England now is. But
could it be expected, that a people who conceived
that-they had been treated more as a conquered na-
tion, than as loyal subjects—who, during fifteen years,
imagined that they had enjoyed only a semblance of
freedom—who were joined by foreign force to Hol-
land, and not by their, own will—would lay down the
arms which they had taken up, without endeavouring
to obtain by force, what was refused to their prayers?
The calculation olt 'they would do so was ridiculous
under any circumstances, but more especially under
the peculiar circumstances of a people who had to
complain, first, that the Ministers of the Crown were
not responsible—secondly, that the Judges of the
Courts were removable at pleasure—thirdly, that the
press, and the whole expression of public opinion,
was at the mercy of Courts thus constituted, and of
Judges in whom no faith could be reposed, because,
from their tenure of office they must, in ninety-nine
cases out of a hundred, be under the influence of
the Court. Thus, as is well stated in the last
Number of the Westminster Review, (the ablest
Number by the bye, which we have ever seen of
this very able work) " the three great practical secu-
rities of constitutional liberty were wanting in the
Netherlands—the responsibility of Ministers—the
independence of the Judges—and the freedom of
the Press." Nor is this all. The Belgians, by
their union with Holland, not only became liable to
the payment of a debt, with the contracting of which
they had nothing to do, but considered themselves
aggrieved by a forcible union with a people whom
they universally disliked.
" The loi ondOntentale, or constitution," as is truly
stated in the Westminster Review, " was never accepted
by the Belgians they refused it, and it was imposed upon
them t it is doubly hard, therefore, that its promises, such
as the securities we have here mentioned, which, or
at least two of them, are there directly stipulated for, have
not been kept. We have said that the Belgians, in point
of fact, refused the loi Jbndamentale, which they are
now at least content to live under with some amelioration..
The States-General of Holland accepted it unanimously
the Assembly of Notables in Belgium rejected it. The
circumstances were these :

" In the nine departments of Belgium 1603 notables were
convoked : 280 never attended to the summons. Of the
1323 that appeared '796 voted in the negative, and 527
in the affirmative. Of the 796 negative votes 126 were
given on grounds of religious nature, the Catholics refusing
to accept a Protestant King, and these votes were put
aside as contrary to the dynasty, and going beyond the
question. This reduced the negative votes, to 670, and
gave a majority of 143 voices for the rejection of the con-
stitution. In this difficult position, the Government re-
solved to consider the absent 280 notables as consenting
by their silence. By this extraordinary measure a pre-
tended majority of 11 voices was vamped up, and on the
24th August, 1815, the adoption of the constitution, or
loi forulamentale, was proclaimed."
Such is a hurried sketch of the questions at issue
between the King of the Netherlands and his Bel-
gian subjects. The mode in which they have been
discussed by both has been highly reprehensible and
injudicious ; but we still hope that the door is open
for reconciliation, and that the total separation of
Belgium from Holland, which is now threatened,
may still be averted, and the peace of Europe re-
main uncompromised by the numerous dangers to
which either such a step, or further hostilities, would
so greatly expose it.—Morning Advertiser.

We are glad to perceive that the majority of our
brethren unite with us in deprecating any inter-
ference in the affairs of the Continent, and that the
Government shows no inclination to take part either
with the Dutch or the Belgians. This is as it
should be. There is no casus fecderis—no treaty
which binds us to support the former order of things
against the declared wish of either of the contracting
parties that it is incompatible with their prosperity.
All the treaties entered into by the Government of
this country, which have reference to the peace of
Europe, arose, as we showed yesterday, under a
wholly different aspect of affairs than that which
now exists, and had respect, not to internal com-
motions for the redress of grievances, but to external
invasion. But no one has invaded the kingdom of
the Netherlands ; and there is therefore no ground
for, as we are confident there can be no truth in,
the reported application of the King for aid to put
down his rebellious subjects. Crusades in favour of
royalism are now, in fact, out of date ; and if they
were not, the British Minister who, with the recol-
lections of the last continental war, and the debt
which now presses so heavily upon us in conse-
quence of it, would run a risk of exciting a general
war throughout Europe, would be more fit for St.
Luke's than for an office in Downing-street. But
as we have already said, we have no apprehensions
on the subject.---Morning Adverliser.