The Sun.
London, England, 1839-06-29 00:00:00

EVEN ING EDITION.

LONDON :
SATURDAY, JUNE 29, 1839.

The Usury Laws Suspension Bill was passed in the
House of Lords last night, with the amendments pro-
posed by the Marquis of LANSDOWNE, which will very
much extend its operation.
The only business transacted besides receiving peti-

tions was to hear Counsel against the Jamaica Bill, the
second reading of which will be proposed on Monday.
Some conversation took place about the busi-
ness of the House in the Commons, when Lord JOHN
RUSSELL explained that he should proceed with the
Bill for the Government of Canada, but that the Bill
for uniting the two Provinces should he sent out to
Canada, and not be proceeded with till the opinions of
the Canadians on the subject were known. The Bank-
rupts' Estate (Scotland) Bill was read a third time and
passed.
Sir ROBERT PEEL'S Bill for trying Controverted
Elections went through a Committee, and is to be re-com-
mitted on Wednesday.
The Irish Municipal Bill was also committed after
some objections on the part of the Tories, and the
clauses to the 20th were agreed to. The Committee is
to sit again on Thursday.
The Bill for improving the Navigation of the Shannon
was read a second time without opposition. The
House of Commons likes to vote money, so it agreed
to the Bill. Ireland is the most favoured part of the
empire so far as voting money for it goes. All the
Members expressed regret that the rail-road project
was given up.
On the third reading of the Sugar Duties Bill being
moved, Mr. EWART moved the amendment of which
he had given notice to allow of all sugar, the produce of
free labour, to come in at the the same rate of duty
as that from our own colonies. After a short debate,
in which Mr. CLAY ably seconded Mr. EWART'S judi-
cious remarks, and in which the CHANCELLOR of the Ex-
CHEQUER and Mr. THOMSON defended the Bill as it
stood, giving us hopes that the question must, ere long,
be coosidered on a comprehensive plan, lr. EWART

withdrew his motion.
Such a measure, by reducing the price of sugar, ‘ooulld
be a present relief to the bulk of the people ; it 18v.ud
be a little step towards the end of an odious monopoly-_
it would give a blow to other monopolies—and, there-
fore, we presume it was not taken. We have ever
preferred practical reforms, which come into immediate
operation in the shape of present relief, to speculative and
organic reforms, that may hereafter elevate the national
character and improve the condition of the people ;
but if the Parliament is careless of all such
reforms, or obstinate in denying
.them, the people
will and must be driven into effecting great changes.
The Constitution is a very admirable thing, inas-
much as it promotes the public happiness ; but if its
only fruits are scoundrel monopolies and vexatious
imposts, producing great public misery, it may b,
apprehended that this or the next generation will
come to regard the Constitution itself with as much
abhorrence as their ancestors held it in veneration. The
art of making a free people submit to laws they no
longer respect, has not yet been discovered ; and we,
therefore, earnestly advise our Statesmen to take such
matters into their serious consideration, and begin as

soon as possilile to abolish the numerous unjust laws
which now press the most numerous classes to the earth.
The Custody of Infants' Bill was read a third time.
The Admiralty Courts' Bill was read a second time.
Some other measures were forwarded a stage, and the
House adjourned at One o'Clock till Monday.

The Tory Lords, according to the Morning Post,
had a meeting yesterday at Apsley House, and re-
solved, tuna voce, to support a motion for striking
the first clauses out of the Jamaica Bill. The other
Morning organ of the Tories—which was not, how-
ever, favoured with this information—the Times,
conjures the Conservatives to make an attack on
the Minute in Council concerning the Household,
and on the Minute of Council establishing a Board
to watch over the expenditure of a part of the
money voted for education. One is to be clone in
the Lords, and the other in the Commons. The
Tories are determined, therefore, to have another
faction fight before the end of the Session ; the
contests between rival septs, which did disgrace
Ireland, but which have been happily put an end
to by the Whigs, being now transferred to Parlia-
ment. If this be so, the Tories will make the
Session go out in a blaze. They remind us of
those ancient weapons of war called stink-pots,
which whizzed and fizzed and frightened people for
some time, and then burst, doing all the mischief
possible, and diffusing around a most insufferably
fetid odour. So it will be with the wrangling poli-
ticians, whom the public will properly call Stink-
pot Tories.

We are happy to see, by a communication from
a Correspondent that the spirited electors of Brid-
prt are prepared to call Mr. SWYNFEN JERVIS
to account for his vote on the 24th instant. A
successor has already been selected as the Li-
beral electors do not like to be misrepresented by
those whom they truLt.

The debates on Mr. WA nu's motion, and on
the Earl of R [PON'S motion, have brought under
the notice of the public two instances of great pro-
fligacy on the part of former Ministers. In the
case to which the Earl of RIPON had, we must say,
the effrontery to call the attention of the country,
three functionaries were removed, not because they
had behaved improperly, but because they had
little or nothing to do, and ought never to have

been appointed. The first of these functionaries was
the Chief Justice of the island of Malta, the se-
cond the Attorney-General, and the third the
Collector of Land Revenue. The two latter were
appointed by Lord RIPON himself, the very last
was a relation of his own, and the first was appointed
by the Tories to reward him for his services to
their party as a writer in the newspapers. The now
Sir JOHN STODART, was the notorious Dr. SLOP
of the Times, for some years a writer in that jour-
nal, and afterwards the editor of the New Times,
and who was continually spoken of by the Times
in no respectful terms, as having pirated its title
after he had been dismissed from its service. This
man was appointed by the Tories Chief Justice of
Malta with a salary of 1,5001. a-year.
Our readers cannot require us to inform them,
for the Duke of WELLINGTON lately stated the
fact as an all-sufficient reason for not allowing a
free press in Malta,.,that the island was a mere garri-
son. There are a few shopkeepers, merchants, and ar-
tizans in Malta, of English birth, but the bulk of the
English inhabitants are connected with the garrison
or the dock-yard, and are under military discipline.
The Maltese know little or nothing of the English
language or laws, and have laws and customs of
their own. A Chief Justice in such a place can-
not be wanted, and it was accordingly stated that
since his removal the business of the Courts had
been more effectually done than formerly. If one
had been necessary, a gentleman familiar only with
our civil or ecclesiastical law, must hare been an im-
proper appointment. But when the person ap-
pointed was not practically conversant with that,
having neglected his profession to write Tory po-
litics, his presence at Malta was about as useless
as the skates and warming-pans which our specu-
lating merchants sent to Buenos Ayres when South
America was first opened to English trade. The
merchants, however, suffered for their folly, but the
people of England paid for the folly of their Govern-
ment, in the shape of a salary to the Chief Justice
of 1,5001. a-year.
The Attorney-General, in such a garrison, was
of course as little wanted as the Chief Justice,
and his salary was so much taken from the pockets
of the people. The Collector of the Land Revenue,
it was proved, had a salary of 7501. a-year, and
was incompetent to perform his duties. They were
done by a deputy. The Commissioners who were
sent out some time ago to examine into the condition
of the island, found that all these three offices were
useless; they recommended the abolition of them, and
they wereabolished accordingly. Of this act of justice
to the people, because it affected a relation of his
own, Lord RIPON complained, the night before
last, in the House of Lords. Now this Nobleman
is by no means one of the worst of the Tories, but
we beg the people will remark that they were so
accustomed to provide for their poor relations out
of the public purse, creating offices for them when-
ever they were wanted, that Lord RIPON looks upon
it as an insult and injury to himself and his friends to
have these sinecures abolished. If such are the habits
of the Tories, and such are the discoveries made in
one small "garrison," the reader may infer what they
did in the numerous great and opulent colonies
which Great Britain possesses in all parts of the
world. He may be quite sure that the system
adopted at Malta was followed out at the Cape of
Good Hope, in Ceylon, in the Mauritius, in the
Canadas, and in all the rich and extensive colonies of
the West Indies. In fact, it is well known that all
these colonies, the same as the Navy, the Army, and
the Church, were jobbed under the Tory Ad-

ministrations—and much we fear that the system
is now not greatly improved—to provide for the
sons, dependents, retainers, and vassals of the
aristocracy.

The other case of the disposal of the lands of
our colonies to favour and enrich the aristocracy,
brought forward by Mr. WARD, is still more mis-
chievous and profligate. If the Government had
not taken on itself the extraordinary duty of distri-
buting millions of acres, and had merely protected
those who fenced in and tilled the wastes, there
might have been nothing to say against it ; but,
undertaking to distribute the land, it was bound to
do so on some known and just plan. Mr. LABOU-
CHERE, the Under Secretary for the Colonies, ad-
mitted that Mr. `'WARD'S accusations were true,
that irretrievable mischief had arisen from jobbing
in Crown lands in the colonies. Lord Ho wicx,
too, admitted that great abuses had existed, but he
attempted to excuse them by saying that they " did
not so much arise from corrupt motives as from
honest and real mistakes as to the policy to be
pursued." On all hands the jobbing was admitted,
and that it had inflicted gross injustice on individuals
and gross injuries on the colonies. Such conclu-
sions are adopted by all inquirers into the
conduct of Tory Governments whenever they
closely examine it. The abuses at Malta,
and the abuses in appropriating land in the
colonies, are types of the abuses perpetrated by
the Tories in every department of the public ser-
vice. Lord Howlek excused them from igno-
rance ; but it is singular enough that their ignorance
always kept the advantage of their own class in
view. Never, by any mistake, did they confer any
advantage on the great bulk of the people, or pro-
mote their interest. L►variably the intention was
to benefit the dependents of the aristocracy. We
can easily comprehend this, and we are afraid that
honest intentions may even now he impelling ig-

norant statesmen in the same or a similar course.
The public interest never constitutes a strong mo-
tive ; while private interest for ever domineers over
man ; he is biassed by that without suspecting it ;
and we have no reason to suppose that
ignorance will not in future, under the influence
of this powerful and ever-present monitor, commit
as great mistakes as in past times. We would not
have Lord Howterc and Mr. LABOUCHERE
flatter themselves, therefore, that sonic enlightened
statesme❑ will not hereafter make the same
apology for them which Lord Howtcx made for
the Tories It was not their dishonesty, but
their ignorance, under the influence of their
selfishness, which had led them into mistakes most
prejudicial to the national prosperity."

There are no reforms more obnoxious to the
priesthood than those which have been made in the
laws affecting the celebration of marriage and the
registration of marriages, births, and deaths. The
undue and pernicious influence which the clerical
body had usurped and exercised to an incredible
extent over the minds of the unthinking and easily
deluded multitude, received, by the reforms above

mentioned, a shock more severe than any it has
ever experienced. The Church, in fact, ceased to
be the civil officer of the State. It was com-
pelled to abdicate its most influence-begetting
functions—to renounce its arrogant claim to
the exclusive right of celebrating marriage and
of registering baptisms, and—which was not
the least grievous of its afflictions—to renounce
also the fees therefrom accruing. The loss
of power was agravated and embittered by the
loss of pelf, and hence the inveterate hostility
which the parsons have evinced to the Marriage
and Registration Acts ever since they became the
law of the land.

That sage, pious, solemn, pompous, empty-

headed personage, Mr. H. GOULBURN, delivered
himself, on Thursday night, of a considerable quail-

tityof bilious animadversion on these Acts. We need
not tell our readersthat GOULBURNiS apoor creature,
incapable of taking either an enlarged or 'a straight-
forward view of any subject. He affects, on all
occasions, a most profound reverence for Mother
Church, winks ac all her obliquities, cannot see her
backslidings, and regards every one who is not of

her communion as little better than a heathen or an
infidel. In the debate which arose on the motion
for opening the Universities to the Dissenters,
some years ago, he expressed his horror of the con-
tamination to which the youth of the Established
Church would be exposed by such a measure, and
threatened—this great man actually threatened—to
remove his son from Cambridge (to the utter ruin
of that University, of course) if it should be
carried.

From a mind of such calibre as this what is to he
expected ? Its approbation of any measure must
not merely cause all thinking persons to suspect the
character of the measure, but ought to satisfy them
that it must of necessity be factious, narrow, and
sectarian. O❑ the other hand, when Mr. HENRY
GouLBuRN gives way to his vituperative tenden-
cies, it is a no less sure and certain proof that the
object against which he directs his splenetic effu-
sions is worthy of all acceptation. He tells us that
he prophesied when the Marriage Bill was passed,
that it would facilitate clandestine and illegal mar-
riages, and that his prophecy has been fulfilled
to a certain extent.

Now what the Right Hon. Gentleman may
mean by these words we do not pretend to know ;
but it is a fact that he only brought forward three
cases of this kind to verify his prediction. One of

these, from the way in which he described it, we
take to be the case in which a man had, contrary
to all precedent, married his grandmother—who, by
the by, was not of his blood ; the second case was
that of a man's marrying his late wife'sniece; and the
third delinquent had married his wife's sister.
Now, it is hardly to be wondered at that
cases of this latter kind should occur in so nume-
rous a population as that of England and Wales,
the more especially as it was a thing of general
occurrence, and not only not forbidden by law till
a few years ago, but sanctioned by dispensation
from the Bishop of the Diocese as the representa-

tive of his Holiness the POPE. The real matter of
surprise is that with Mr. GOULEURN'S active spirit
of research into the abuses of the Act, be should
not have been more successful. We venture to say
that bad he bestowed half the pains in scrutinizing the
merits of the marriages celebrated by publication of-
banns, his labours would have been far more amply
rewarded. Of all possible methods for getting
married clandestinely, the Church method is,
out of sight, the best. A man and woman
have only to remove to a locality where
they are not known, and a fortnight's residence
qualifies them for appearing at the altar, and de
manding to be united in holy matrimony. In all
populous places, particularly in the metropolitan
districts, where not a fiftieth part of the population
either do or can attend the parish church, and
where a still smaller proportion of the inhabitants
are personally known to the clergyman, what pos-
sible check is there on improper marriages? The
reading out of the names of perhaps a hundred
couple of candidates for the honours of matrimony,
with no more specific designation than that of " ba-
chelor" and " spinster" subjoined, is nothing better
than a farce—a mere mockery. Such " publication"
as this is the best of all modes of concealment—it

is a complete cloak to the designs of the parties
who resort to it. How easy would it have been

for Mr. GOULBURN, had it suited his purpose, to
have instanced multitudes of cases from the records
of the police offices, illustrative of the facility with
which a man may supply himself with half a dozen,
or indeed any number of simultaneous wives, merely
by adopting the Church plan of marriage by cele-
brationof banns

The trial of the prisoners of the 12th and 11th
of May commenced before the Court of Peers on
Thursday. This is the only subject of any import-
ance in the Paris journals of that day, the whole of
which we have received, with the exception of some
comments of no interest on the aspect of affairs in
the East. We subjoin a report of the proceedings
before the Court up to the departure of the mails
for London:—

TRIAL OF THE INSURGENTS OF THE 12TH

AND 13TH OF MA Y. -
COURT OP PEERS. -THURSDAY, JUNE 27.

This important trial commenced this day, and excites
great interest, from the many lives which arc at stAk", and
from the expectation that the ramifications of the extensive
Republican conspiracy which has been in progress in
France since it was discovered that the barricade" Monar-
chy was not the " Best of Republics" will be completely
developer'.
The following are the names of the prisoners:—
Armand Barbes,man of property, aged 29 ; Martin
Bernard; Pierre Nougues, printer, 23; Jacques Bonnet,
engraver. 28; Louis Bondi', umbrella maker, 19 ; Hyp_
polite Guilbert, currier, 37 ; Joseph Delsade, toymaker,
32; Jean Mialon, stonei,ason, 56 ; Redolphe Austen,
b.,ot-maker, 23 ; Jean Lemicre, toymaker, 23 ; Joseph
Walch, carpenter, 27 ; Lucien Philippet, ropemakcr, 40
Jean Le Barzic, stoker, 23; Fiorent Dugast, cabinet-
maker, 34; Jules Longuet, traveller, 23; Pierre Martin,
ropetnaker, 19; Eugene Marczcal, mechanic, 33; Louis
Gregoire, mattress-maker, 40; and Ame Pierce, stocking-
maker, 18.
All the preparations being completed by about two
o'clock the President, Baron Pasquier, entered the Cham-
ber in his robes of office. Ile was shortly afterwards fol-
lowed by all the Peers.
M. Frank Carte, the Procureur-General, then en-
tered the Chamber, attended by his two assistants. They
were attired in their scarlet robes of office, trimmed with
ermine, and were seated opposite the scat erected for the
prisoners.
The prisoners were then introduced, each attended by a
gendarme in uniform. A general buzz was heard around
the Court at the ent,ance of Armand Bathes. This indi-
vidual is one of the ringleaders of the rioters, and has ob-
tained an unenviable notoriety by the violence of his revo-
lutionary principles, his education, and superior intellectual
powers. It was he who led the insurgents to the attack at
j the Palais de Justice, where he shot with his own hand the
I unfortunate Lieut. D7ouineau.

Pasquier, the President, afterwards proceeded to
call over the prisoners by name..
Armand Barbes, on being asked his name, professi)n,