The Sun.
London, England, 1839-03-26 00:00:00

from a really honest Executive. Far be it from us,
however, to throw the shadow of an obstacle in the way
of a speedy and amicable settlement of this troublesome
question:; and we trust that when the negociations are
begun, under the authority of the new Bill, the Bri-
tish Ministry will be prepared to make every reason-
able concession, short of a direct compromise of
our national dignity, for the maintenance of friendly
relations with a Government and a people with
whom our commercial interests, and a regard for the
extension of civil and religious liberty, require that we
should henceforth live in amity. If the Governments
on both sides be sincere in their efforts to maintain
tranquillity, and if the Commissioners are solely
actuated by like motives, the whole question will
admit of a very simple, and very speedy adjustment.
It would almost appear, however, that the United
States has already resolved upon commencing hos-
tilities, if every claim put forth by the State of
Maine be not conceded. If this be so war is inevi-
table ; and therefore it will behove us to be pre-
pared for whatever may happen.

Since the above was written the Liverpool
steamer has arrived, bringing us New York journals
to the 10th inst. They bring no later news horn
the frontier of any general interest. The news
from Canada is not important. According to the
Montreal Herald of the 2d inst. Sir JOHN
COLBORNE had given orders to the 11th
Regiment to proceed immediately to New
Brunswick to prevent all disturbances on the fron-
tier. Two other regiments bad received orders to
follow the 11th to New Brunswick in the course of
a day or two. We subjoin the latest report of the
state of the New York Money Market :

MONEY MARRET, &C.-MARCH 9.

The Stock Market yesterday was again inactive ;
both monied men and operators seemed indisposed to make
purchases. United States Bank Shares sold at 1161
dollars to 1161 dollars; Phcenix Bank, 1021 to 103;
North American Trust and Banking Company, 97 to 98;
Farmers' Trust Company, 108; American Trust Company,
101 ; Bank of Commerce, 102}; and all other descriptions
of Shares sold at the Exchange Board, rather re-
ceded in prices. The offerings in insurance stocks have
for some time been quite limited. The great depression
that has existed in the share market the past week, appears
to be rather " a panic" that has again risen up in conse-
quence of the unsettled state of affairs, connected with our
north-eastern boundary difficulties, and which seems
to us to have too extensive an influence. The state of
the foreign exchanges have been but little affected,
rates for bills on England:continuing at 4 dollars 82 cts. to 4
dollars 84 cents. the pound sterling, and on France at
sf. 20. c Money remains much in the same position as the
past week or two, and we see nothing in the prospective
to materially vary its condition at present.
The Bank of Commerce have given notice that a second
instalment of ten dollars on each share is required to be
paid on the Ist of April. " Persons desirous of making
scrip shares full shares, can do so by paying interest from
the 9th of February. This will entitle them to rateable
dividends from that day."
. . .

Our advices from New Orleans are to the 27th ult. At
that place money matters had considerably improved, and
good paper was much more sought after, and at some re-
duction in rates. There continued to be a fair demand for
flour, at 7 dollars 50 cents. to 8 dollars per barrel ; corn,
68 to 70 cents. per bushel. Freights unchanged. i dols.
for cotton to Liverpool, and Li cents. to Havre.

In the House of Commons last night, Sir I

PEEL stated that it was very important to the
country generally to be acquainted with the inten-

tions of Lord JOHN RUSSELL, as to his motion
concerning the Ministry, and therefore he asked
when the Noble Lord meant to bring it on. Lord
JOHN RUSSELL immediately fixed Thursday, the
11th of April, for the motion. Till that comes on
all interest in other political questions will be sus-
pended. The existence of the Ministry is at stake,
and all the trading politicians of the empire have

their hopes or their fears intensely excited. We
must say, that if this is to be the last act of Lord
JOHN RUSSELL'S leadership, it is rather a bolt}
one. He meets and braves the danger, and if he
can he will overcome it.

Mr. WAKLEY'S language last night, is an in

dex to what the Ministers, we are afraid, may
expect from a considerable portion of Radical Mem-
bers of the House of Commons. " The Whigs,"
he said, " were in the mouths of every one, and
there was nothing but one universal feeling of dis-
approbation expressed against them." The
former enormites of the Tories, he added,
were forgotten, being concealed and hidden
beneath the more ample measures of Whig
delinquencies. We cannot, however, wholly
forget history, or assert that it will be more
favourable to a repeal of the Corn-laws to have a
Cabinet united against it, than a Cabinet which
keeps it an open question. We cannot think it
will be an improvement to exchange those who say
the Irish Church is an extravagance, for those who
will maintain every rector and every beadle belong-
ing to it, at all hazards, as a religious obligation.
We will not even affirm that our cause would be
served by substituting for those who profess obe-
dience to popular opinion as their creed—though
they have too often forgotten their professions—

those who avow their determination to rule in

spite of opinion and coerce mankind into obedience
to what they are pleased to order. At the same
time, though there are many advantages in point of
principle on the side of the Whigs, they have so
managed to affront their best friends by setting up
their finality doctrines, by running wild against the
Ballot—by the Prime Minister's foolish declaration
on the subject of the Corn-laws, and by Lord Jour
RUSSELL'S reliance on the Bishop of LONDON--
by adopting Tory maxims, and imitating
Tory practices, that we are very much
afraid Mr. WAKLEY'S language is exten-
sively true, and that on the day of battle they
will be deserted by some of their battalions. We
have anticipated such a result. We have by encou-
raging them to pursue a bolder and a better policy
endeavoured to prevent it, and if it should come to
pass the Ministers will have to blame, not the
treachery of their friends, but their own desertion of
the principles on which they were placed in power.
It seems probable, from what fell from Mr.

WAKLEY, and what we hear, that the question

on the 11 th will not be confined to Ireland. The
opportunity will be taken by the numerous op-
ponents of the Ministry to make a general attack
on their policy ; and, whatever there is unfor-
tunate in the situation of the country—whether the
result of their policy or of natural and uncontrollable
circumstances—whatever there is of distress at home
and of danger from abroad, whatever causes it may
arise from, will be laid to the charge of the Minis-
ters. Far be it from us to say that a more
vigorous policy on their parts would not have com-
manded more respect abroad, and produced more

unity at home ; but we may be permitted to observe

that for much of thegrowth and extension and increase
of power in foreign countries they are not respon-
sible ; and that the breaking up of parties at home
is partly to be traced to the present unsettled state
of political principles and opinions all over
Europe. It is quite true, as SirJAMES GRAHAM
observed, that everything has been cast loose
and nothing fastened ; but it is not true
that this is the fault of Ministers. Political
society is in a state of rapid transition, and
opinion does but follow events and circumstances.
The bulk of the people are discontented—justly
discontented, we think—with antiquated insti-
tutions that vex, harass, and impoverish, with-
out protecting them ; but, though discon-
tented, they are ignorant both of the true
causes of their uneasiness and the best cure for

it. Nobody knows. A future is rapidly advancing
which has been scanned by no human intelligence,
and who can tell what institutions will suit that ?
Why, we cannot agree as to the effect of those
institutions which now exist, and which are every
day subject to examination, and the effects of which
are forced on attention. What a world of disagree-
ment, for example, is there as to the effects of the
Corn-laws. How then can our opinions be united as
to the future ? For this uncertainty of public opi-
nion the Ministry is not responsible; though, had

it possessed some prophetic sagacity and run a
little before events, it might have done something
to direct the many scattered rills and rivulets of
thought towards one common stream. Herein it has
been deficient, and herein it has not answered expec-
tations. With respect to our foreign relations, in our
humble judgment the political animosity of other
nations, and the comparatively diminished power of
our own, are entirely owing to the cursed Corn-
laws, which have both stinted the national
growth and prevented other nations from uniting
themselves to us by the affectionate and kindly
bonds of commerce. For this the Ministers are
far less to blame than the Tories, and we shall not
approximate towards a restoration of commercial
friendship with other nations by changing the
present undecided, divided Cabinet, for a Cabinet
pledged like that of Sir IIO4ERT PEEL,
formed and supported by Tory landlords and the
Clerical militia, to uphold the Corn-laws at the ex-
pense of national decay and the encouragement of
animosities in other nations.

The Tory gentry and the Tory nobility are a
present in close alliance with the clergy, and we
need not remind our readers that it is principally
by means of this alliance that the Tories have of
late increased so much in political influence. The
clergy being all men of education, and many of
them having very little to do, mingle very much
in secular affairs, and labour most strenuously to
mould them to their own exclusive purposes. One
of them being constantly resident in almost every
agricultural parish, in many parishes there are two,
and the bulk of the electors in such parishes being
in general very ignorant of public affairs, the clergy
take the lead in election matters, and the return of
the county representatives is, in fact, in their hands.
At present the bulk of the squires agree with the
parsons, and matters seem to go on swimmingly.
There is, however, much hope for those who
watch the signs of the times and observe the bear-
ings of things. Formerly there were qtrArrels
between these two bodies—they were jealous of
each other ; but they have now laid aside for a time
their mutual bickerings to get the upper hand of
the Whigs and the Radicals. We do not, how-
ever, despair of soon seeing them at loggerheads
again, and we should have no objection to be in-
strumental in rekindling their contentions. Have
the clergy ever thought of the effect of the Tithe
Commutation Act in throwing the burden of the tithe
war on the shoulders of those who will be better able
to bear it than the farmers ? Have the country
gentlemen ever thought of the advantage which the
commutation will give the clergy in all future dis-
putes between them ? Let us say a word on this
point, and perhaps the Tory squires, now blinded
by their political ambition, love of Corn-laws, hatred
of factory-owners, and terror of the Whigs, may be-
gin to doubt the wisdom of augmenting the influence
and the power of their present allies.

Formerly the tithes were a sore subject with the
tenantry, and a theme of continual quarrel with the
tithe-owners. Then the landlords, whenever they
were so inclined, could play the tithe against the
parson, and nourish in their tenantry no inconsider-
able animosity, to be used on proper occasions
against the clergy. The Tithe Commutation Act
has put, or will when it is carried into complete
execution, an end to this state of things, and while
it relieves the tenant from all payment in kind, and
all compositions, will take from the landlords all
their power to set the tenantry against the priest-
hood. Tithes by the Commutation Act are be-
come, or soon will be, a pure rent-charge; the
tenant will be vexed with them no more, he will
only have to give up his money to the landlord,
with him only will he dispute and quarrel—with
the resident clergyman he will share all the toils and
joys of neighbourhood and fellowship, and the
influence of the clergymen over the rural population,
already very great, will soon go far ahead of that
of the landowner. And who shall say that the
clergymen, ministering to the prejudices, and
sharing the cares of that population, if not
soothing their afflictions and ministering to
their wants, are not much more worthy of
their respect and attachment than the absent re-
ceivers of rent ? Whenever these landlords, there-
fore, shall hereafter disagree with the clergymen,
they will find themselves as much overshadowed by
them as the landlords of Ireland are by the Catholic
priesthood. That is their look-out ; we can but
rejoice in the prospect of a contention between the
owner of the soil and the clerical militia spread
through the land, as in the palmy days of the Pope-
dom, who are now united to oppress and to starve
the people.

Great credit is due to Lord WRIOTHESLEY R us-
SELL for the excellent practical rebuke he has given
to greedy pluralists in our Church, by resigning
one, and that the best, of two livings, conferred on
him on his first entrance into the Church. He gave
up 1,2001. a-year, and remains content with a third
of that sum, devoting his time and care to the
sacred duties of his office, fully convinced, no
doubt, that the smaller income is amply sufficient
for the maintenance of a minister of the Gospel.
The very fact, however, that a newly-fledged clergy-
man, connected with the Aristocracy, can on first
entering the Church receive two livings worth
1,700/. accounts for the miserable results of the
Ecclesiastical Commission. The Whigs as well
as the Tories have an interest in Church abuses,
and it is too much to expect further, or indeed of
any public body or party proverbially devoid of
shame, that they will introduce any change affecting
their individual interests, unless that chancr°e is
forced on them by the pressure from without. Look
at the Corporation of London. All the Re-
formers then cried out for the Municipal Re-
form Bill, their representatives in Parliament,
supported it, and though the disinterested public
believe and know that abuses exist there to as great
an extent as they did in any of the old unreformed
Corporations, they have not made, now for five
years, one serious attempt to reform themselves. So
it is with the Church, and we might as well expect
the Court of Aldermen to introduce a radical Mu-
nicipal Reform, as expect either the Whig or Tory
aristocracy to remove the abuses of the Church.
The resistance to further Parliamentary Reform,
to the repeal of the Corn-laws, and to the reform
othfetleteyesCohfurcthhe, however,phuasbldico,naenrdnutcohc,onvineethem
toopen
that
the work must be doneby a third party—the party
of the people. Every day only proves that reform
can only be effected by those who have little interest
in the abuses—who can reap no benefit from the
six millions a-year expended on: the Church, from
the tax on corn, and from the patronage of boroughs
and counties. Thanks to the obstinacy of both Whigs
and Tories, who have so long alternately ruled this
country, more for their own selfish purposes than
for the public good, this party is becoming every
day more powerful and more intelligent. They are
unconsciously creating the pressure from without.

We have occasionally been called on in this Journal
of late to state and contradict certain facts concerning
the condition of the agricultural labourers of Wiltshire.
We feel some satisfaction, therefore, at finding in the
following paragraph, apparently an authentic account of
their condition. Such of our readers as remember the
controversy which Mr. HARTWELL originated, will see
how far his statements are borne out :
" POOR-RATES.—On Tuesday a large number of agri-
cultural labourers and other very poor people, were sum-
moned by the Devizes Guardians before Major Oliaer and
other Magistrates, to show cause why they did not pay the
sums at which they were assessed for poor-rates. The
unfortunate defendants pleaded extreme poverty, the majo-
rity having five and six children, and a wife, to keep on
wages averaging 9s. a week, which, at the present high
price of provisions, scarcely gave bread to their families.
The Magistrates consulted together, and, after inducing