The Sun.
London, England, 1837-08-23 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 23, 1837

foisted into the representative trust. For two Sessions
have measures most essential to the national welfare
been defeated by faction and intrigue—and when an
opportunity offered to give effective expression to the
indignation naturally excited by such outrage against
the general sentiment, public opinion has been to a
great extent suppressed by practices the most disgrace-
ful that ever flung infamy on the records of a general
election. Will the Tories dare to repeat the outrage
which the people in the forbearance incidental to
the consciousness of superior power have twice
suffered to pass with impunity ? With all their
vauntings and all the grandiloquent threats of
resisting Reform, or " dying in the last ditch of
the Constitution," so copiously poured forth with
the after-dinner libations during the heat of the
debates in the last Session, we believe the Tories to
possess more of that better part of valour called discre-
tion, than to persist in such attempt when they find a
serious and determined manifestation to coerce their
compliance. The Duke of Wellington, on the eve
of the last dissolution of Parliament, expressed his
anxiety to see the disputed questions set at rest, and
avowed his willingness to assist in the establishment of
Municipal Reform in Ireland on the elective principle.
The Noble Duke is not a man to give way while there
remains a fair chance of successful resistance. We
may, therefore, consider this avowal as a pro tanto con-
cession to the claims of the " aliens.' The Tories
are, in fact, like persons in a besieged town, who,
finding surrender inevitable, make a great display of
strength in which they have themselves no confidence,
merely to exact the most favourable terms from their
conquerors; but the Reformers are in a position to
dictate their own terms, and the nation will accept of
no undue compromise. It is, therefore, the best po-
licy of Ministers—as we are assured it is their incli-
nation—to advance once more to the breach with the
just claims of an oppressed people in one hand, the po-
pular power in the others and insist upon an uncondi-
tional surrender.—Motizing Advertiser.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has availed him-
self of an opportunity afforded by some remarks of a
Dublin paper, the Evening Post, upon the late Kerry
election, to explain how much he is the friend of free-
dotn of election. The following is the letter of the
Right Hon. Gentleman to the editor of the paper •we
have mentioned :

" London, August 17.

" Sir—ln an extract of a private letter inserted in your
paper of the 15th I find the following statement What
think you of the voters on the estate of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer having, almost to a man, polled for the Tory ?'
And again :—"l'hus Spring Rice's estate has bean made
ancillary to a Tory triumph.'
. .

" In order to remove any misconception which this com-
munication might produce, it is due to myself to state that
whilst I have not felt myself precluded from informing
those who were connectettwith.me as tenants what were my
o.vn political feelings and wishes, I have, at the same time,
most strictly and scrupulously abstained from any attempt
.controul or authoritative interference to fetter their free
will in the exercise of their franchise. With what consistency
could any person contend for the principle of freedom of
el:ctioo, and yet endeavour to coerce the votes of those who
might he considered as &pendent upon him ? The letter
which I wrote to my agent on the 23d of July was to the
following effect I wish you would be so good as to ex-
plain to my tenants that whilst I should be far from em-
plo)ing any the very least authority, my strongest wishes
are in favour of the lute sitting Membors, end I shall feel
gratified if any one connected with my estate will give them
support.' In repexing this communication on the 29th, I
again added—' In giving this opinion to my tenants I never
will use any control over the votes of those who may be de-
pendent on me.'
" I have given this explanation lest it should be inferred
that I could be indifferent to the success of candidates who
stand upon principles avowedly Liberal. But, however
false and unjust such a supposition would be, I should in-
finitely prof::- it to the more serious charge of having, in
any instance, endeavoured to interfere with the free exer-
cise of an elector's vote, and of having thus acted on a
principle myself which I have complained of and condemned
when adopted by my political opponents.
" I ani, Sir, your very faithful, &e.

T. SPRING RICE."

All that c?.n be collected from the above letter is what
we knew perfectly well already, viz., that the present
Chancellor of the Exchequer is a marvellously civil-
spoken person, something of a Jesuit withal, and quite
as fond as other people of exercising all the authority
that his possessions place in his hands. The Irish
landlord who writes .to the agent on his estate, request-
ing him to inform the tenantry " that his (the land-
lord's) strongest wishes are in favour of the late sitting
Members, and that he will feel gratified if any one con-
nected with his estate will give them support ;" and
n ho, not content with one communication of this na-
ture, shows his zeal in the cause of " the late sitting
Members" by repeating the same intimation to his agent,
after an interval of only six clays, is not very consistent,
and he can hardly expect to be deemed very sincere
when he adds, " In giving this opinion to my tenants
I never will use any controul over the votes of
those who may be dependent on me." We confess,
however, that as a matter of taste, we like Mr. Spring
Rice's mode of coercion better than the rougher and
more direct methods resorted to unsparingly by such of
his colleagues and political friends as possess landed
estates in Ireland. It is more decorous andgentleman-
like to administer a hint than to fulminate a menace ;
and as; in the case of Mr. Spring Rice's tenants, the
former style of canvassing was sure to be equally effica-
cious with the latter, nothing could have been more in-
judicious than for the Right Hon. Gentleman to throw
away so advantageous an opportunity of being genteel,
considerate, kind, liberal, and all that sort of thing.
The Dublin Evening Post had, it seems, asserted,
on the authority of a private letter, and Mr. Spring
Rice, in the communication to that paper, in . which
he extols his own magnanimity as a landlord, does
not contradict the statement, that the voters on
the estate of the Chancellor of the Exchequer had
almost to a man voted for the " Tory." Whether
the assertion of the Dublin Evening Post's cor-
respondent be true or false, is a question i❑ which we
feel but little interest. If false, it only shows that
Mr. Spring Rice is not regarded in Ireland as a man
upon whom any party can depend ; and if true, it is
conclusive evidence, _when taken in conjunction with
that Right Hon. Gentleman's antecedent expression of
his " strongest wishes in favour of the late sitting
Members," that his tenantry are wiser and better men
than himself, and that they are not conscious of any
debt of gratitude or affection to their landlord, which
ought in the slightest degree to interfere with the free
exercise at an election of their private judgment with
respect to the pretensions of the rival candidates. Upon
the whole, we are not of opinion that Mr. Spring Rice
has gained anything by this correspondence with the
Dublin Paper, although his letter is drawn up with
considerable dexterity, and is full of the stuff best
calculated to procure the instant applause of the news-
papers in the interest of his faction.----Morning Post.

The following gratifying and singular incident took
place on Monday in the Strand. A poor woman, once in
better circumstances, named Althorpe, who had long endea-
voured to earn a miserable subsistence by selling fruit in the
streets, and whom time and age had rendered blind, was
accosted by a genteel-looking young man, with a request
for some fruit. The little girl who officiated at the stall, in
consequence of the old woman's malady, gave him the
quantity he desired, when the woman, apparently recog-
nising the tones of his voice, desired him to approach. She
inquired after his mother ; was she living ? He did not
know, having been in Spain for many years in the army,
but when he had called at
.her former apartments he had
learned that she had ex'perie9eed a series of vicissitudes,
and was very poor. He had since understood that she was
wandering about the streets in a state of utter destitution.
" Do you wish to see her ?" exclaimed the woman almost
breathless with anxiety. An affirmative was given, and the
anxious patent, for so indeed she turned out to be, hastily
threw her arms round her son's neck, her hands swiftly
passed over his features to establish his identity, and the
crowd, who had witnessed the transaction with feelings of
the utmost interest and commiseration, giving way to the
unexpected relations, they entered a hackney coach and
drove off, overflowing with tears of joy and gratitude.

On Wednesday last, Thomas Penny, of Wrineton,
for a bet of half a sovereign, undertook to reap one acre. of
wheat and to bind the sheaves in the space of 15 hours, to
commence at half-past five A.m., and to finish at half-past
eight P. M. Between four and five in the afternoon he was
retarde 1 in the operation of his arduous task by a heavy
shower of rain, the proprietor of the wheat being unwilling
to have the sheav( s tied in the wet. After a delay of two
hours he strenuously resumed, and at five minutes within
the limited time he had completed the reaping and binding,
one acre and three perches, thus having won the bet in 12
hours and 55 minutes.—Bath Herald.