The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-28 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

TIMES.—The public will learn with the deepest
sorrow and anxiety that news has been received of
the dangerous illness of Lord Elgin, and that there
are but slight hopes of his being still alive. The
last accounts were up to the 14th, and he was then
daily becoming weaker. We will hope for the best,
but we must prepare for the loss of one of the most
able public servants that the country possesses.
Lord Elgin, who, left us but the other day to re-
lieve the dying Lord Canning, as the latter relieved
the dying Lord Dalhousie, will in all probability
never again see the land of his birth or enjoy the
rest and honours which should be the recompense
of his great services. It is, indeed, a dreadful price
that we pay for the possessiou of an Asiatic empire.
Whether the constitution of men in these days or
their previous habits of life are less fitted to a
tropical climate, or whether it be that the work
and the responsibility are more oppressive than of
yore, there has been certainly a mortality among
the chiefs of the Indian Administration which is
enough to deter men of eminence from attempting
it. Every mail brings us the tidings of some one
breaking down; of some one retiring for a time or
resigning altogether on the ground of ill-health ;
and besides the two former Governors-General
whom we have mentioned, there is also Lord Eiphin-
stone, who, in scarcely lower posts at Madras and
Bombay, showed great administrative abilities, and
was snatched away in the full vigour of his age.
Should it unhappily be the case that Lord Elgin has
succumbed, the country will have lost the third of a
remarkable list of men, who, after having governed
India with transcendent brilliancy and success, have
been removed without having au interval granted
them to repose in the greatness they have
achieved. Lords Dalhousie, Canning, and
Elgin were almost of an age; they were all
at Christ Church together, and entered public
life about the same time. Lord Dalhousie
at an unusually early age was placed at the head of
the Indian Empire, and governed with an ability
and spirit which must be acknowledged even by
those who look upon some of his measures as unjust
and in their result calamitous. He returned home
to linger and die, and was succeeded by Lord Can-
ning, who, going to India with the hope of passing
his term of service in the furtherance of peaceful
prosperity, found himeelf engaged during the greater
part of his reign in suppressing the most formidable
insurrection in modern annals. Lord Elgin suc-
ceeded him with the general approbation of the
country, founded on his able services in other de•
partments. In 1842 he was made Governor of
Jamaica, and was promoted in 1846 to the Governor-
Generalship of British North America, where he
carried through the well known reciprocity treaty
with the United States, which has been the source
of such benefits to Canada. Lord Elgin's services
during his missions to China are so recent and so
well known that we need hardly recall them to the
memory of our readers. In the spring of 1857 he
was sent to the East, and though the Indian mutiny
delayed operations for a time, he did not leave
China until he had not only signed a treaty with
the Imperial Commissioners at Tien-tsin, but had
also broken the spell of Japanese isolation, and, en-
tering the harbour of Jeddo, surprised the Govern-
ment into consenting to intercourse with the Euro-
pean world. His second embassy to China was as
successful as the first : the capture of Pekin was
followed by the treaty of October 14, 1860, and the
viay opened to that extended commerce which pro-
mises to bring the Chinese Empire under the
influence of European civilisation. These emi-
nent services pointed out Lord Elgin for the
most splendid viceroyalty under the Crown, and
he proceeded to the East, for the third time,
to relieve Lord Canning as Governor. General of
India. We believe he had suffered from heart
complaint ; and though he took great care of
his health, particularly avoiding the heat of the sun,
it was this malady which, assuming an acute form,
prostrated him with the illness which it is feared
has ended fatally. The Governor-General was in
the North-West Provinces ; he had passed the hot
season at Simla, had lately been traversing some
elevated tracts in the Himalayas, and had, it is said,
a few days before his illness ascended to a point
13,000 feet high. It may be that this exertion was
too much for a constitution which, though appa-
rently good, had suffered somewhat from repeated
residence in hot climates. Lord Elgin, who was to
meet Sir Hugh Rose at Lahore, was taken, it ap-
pears, suddenly and dangerously ill, and by the last
accounts there were scarcely any hopes of his rally-
ing. So probably falls another of the able and pa-
triotic men by whom the empire of England has
been founded and maintained. It may be some con-
solation to a man to know that he dies serving his
country ; but, on the other hand, it is bitter for him
to feel that he is cut off when only in middle age,
with his work half undone and the happy prospects
of public prosperity and private honour clouded for
ever. Lord Elgin, we fear, is not destined to see
the full consequences of his courage and ability in
China, nor the development of Indian prosperity
under his peaceful rule. To successors he must
leave the carrying out of the changes which be
began, and there can be no greater disappointment
to an active and ambitious spirit. Unless the news
which reaches us be grievously exaggerated, he has
already passed away like the rest of his predeces-
sors in the government of the great Asiatic Empire.
It is strange to reflect that not a single Governor-
General remains alive, except Lord Ellenborough,
who was out two-and-twenty years ago. Lord
Auckland has been long dead, Lord Hardinge is
dead, the Marquis of Dalhousie and Lord Canning
have both been carried to early graves. Lord Elgin,
we fear, follows them at the age of 52, leaving the
great but fatal prize of the official world once more
in the gift of the Premier, who has seen so many
recipients of it pass away.
POST.—The Turkish financial report of the Grand
Vizier and the Minister of Finance, which arrived
from Constantinople yesterday, is now before us.
This document is very remarkable, both for the
clearness of its statement and for the honesty and
absence of exaggeration which characterise it
throughout. It informs us at length what has been
effected for Turkish finance during the last two
years of energetic reforms, and it tells us what
remains to be done, We have, moreover, an explicit
statement of the application of the loans which
have been contracted during the present reign for
the discharge of pre-existing obligations ; and,
what is not less important, and more novel, is the
assurance which is given that the foreign and do-
mestic loans thus contracted are final, and there will
be no need, for the future, to apply to the money
markets either on Constantinople or the West of
Europe. Indeed, there is a peculiarly strong sense
conveyed in the present report of the impolicy of
borrowing within the Turkish territories, consider-
ing the high rates at which it had been customary
to effect loans with the Greek and Armenian
bankers. A policy of economy has apparently been
adopted in earnest by the Sultan and the Divan,
and they are resolved to maintain the establish-
ments and liabilities of the State strictly within its
current resources. It is not the least valuable re-
sult of this document to sh'w how the loans of the
present reign have been applied to the improvement
of the public credit. It appears that not a shilling
of their produce has been consumed in current ex-
penditure. The Grand Vizier and the Minister
of Finance show how the Government was bur-
dened, on the present Sultan's accession, first
with a vast amount of depreciated paper money,
known as the Caimes, and, secondly, with an im-
mense floating debt. In order to restore the credit
of the country it was found absolutely necessary to
put an end to this state of things. The amounts
required for each of these two objects was notesa
short of ten millions sterling, or near twenty 1r
lions in all. For this purpose recourse
was had
had to
two
the foreign and home money markets. The
foreign loans of 1862 and 1863 have furnished, in
round terms, about one moiety of the amount, and
the four issues of internal stock, known as Conso-
lides, have yielded the other moiety. With these
paper money has been
e and:the great part of the
boughtmeans tihne a
nd wholecancelled of th
staoltatasentiss
floating debt has been paid off, having been
already reduced to less than the usual proportion of
floating debt in other countries; and it is probable
that with the payment of the rem::nnineagrilnys
due to the Turkish Treasury the rest of this floating
debt will be extinguished, or
practicable. Meanwhile, the Minister of Finance
states that he has succeeded, after effecting
these
two cardinal reforms, in saving from the proceeds
of these several loans a sum of two- millions sterling,
which it is his intention to apply
of the base coinage, from which 'Turkey
exempt than theinGdeerem, an States—withutrokothytehi callingse
nimo
por
more
in
distinction,
much less frequent
in 'Turkey
~.lurkey than in Germany.
that this base collage is
The Minister further shows that by these means the
ctadit of the country has been
established, while ur
a slight increasa
of interest on the public debt is in
volve:l by them, the wurious local credits having
now been thereby ff.
paid
o • The adjustment of the
debt, and the cancel t men of the paper and base coin