The Sun.
London, England, 1862-07-08 00:00:00

ously supported by the noble lord the member for
Hastings, with a voice and manner of such sonorous
and rhetorical solemnity, that one might have ima-
gined for a moment that the veto under debate was as
serious and momentous a subject of discussion as the
Royal Veto of King Louis XVI. at the outbreak
of the French Revolution—the clause was declared
in favour of upon a division in committee : 145
voting for it, and 162 against it. So that it was
retained by the decision of a clear majority of
seventeen. The rest of the clauses, with a little
wrangling here and:there, passed muster pretty
fluently. Once, and once only, was the equaminity
of the bated Minister in any way seriously dis-
turbed, and then merely for a few moments by a
more than usually galling insinuation blurted out
by the hon. member for Devizes. The worst
is now, we may rejoice to know, over, in
regard to the more serious obstructions raised
against this the grandest of all our great metropo-
litan improvements. Time, money, and labour
will hereafter slowly perfect above-ground the
subterranean works now rapidly advancing
towards their completion ! Perfect these works,
that is to say, by adding to the useful and salubri-
ous Main Drainage scheme the useful and magni-
ficent scheme of a Thames Embankment.

Lord PALMERSTON got quite in a passion with the
member for Rochdale last night, and we do not
much wonder at it. He begad, as excited people
are very apt to do, by telling the House of the
quietness" of his mind under Mr. COBDEN'S " ac-
cusations." But the excitement of our veteran Pre-
mier soon began to show itself by his declaring him-
self "proud" of the attacks of the hon. member.
By his informing him, as Lord RUSSELL did Mr.
BRIGHT years ago, that he " went beyond his last"
when he discussed the question of the defences of
the country—that he was a commercial sage, but a
naval and military ignoramus—a " dangerous ad-
viser"—" blind and infatuated," and so forth, after
which the noble lord cooled down sufficiently to
repeat his usual arguments, though still working
them at a pretty high temperature, if not at a white
heat.

The truth is that though our Premier is, in the
main, right enough, he and Mr. COBDEN are two
old antagonists. They are both men of extraor-
dinary geniality and good temper, and yet they
cannot help getting a little hot with each other;
the real aim of both is the same. Mr. COBDEN has
the advantage generally in the appeal to facts,
and the understanding; Lord PALMERSTON in
the appeal to popular feeling and sentiment. As
the latter is the one to gain votes, the lord
is generally successful ; but as facts and
reasoning based on them, cannot be denied, the
commoner comes in afterwards, and too frequently
" takes the shine" out of the Premier's success.
This is very provoking. The argument—" I can
show that Lord PALMERSTON has already duped
you, therefore beware of being duped now," is
above all annoying, and it was the argument of
this kind which drove our Premier last night to
mingle so much personal vituperation with his
statements: The country, however, needs both
men, and is proud of both. 'We need them to check
each other. COBDEN desires us to be as wealthy as
he can make us, and would waste the smallest
possible amount of public money on fleets, armies,
and forts which he thinks little likely to be wanted,
and which is sinking so much capital unproduc.
tively. He wants the ten millions a year which
Lord PALMERSTON spends in excess, to be in our
pockets, or rather fructifying in the processes of
trade. Lord PALMERSTON'S policy is directed,
nominally, to national security, really to national
power. He is not indifferent, of course, to our
wealth, indeed, it is an obvious source of power ;
but his Lordship was trained in the school which
saw England triumphant against the world in arms,
and ho glories in her displaying now a navy, an
army, and fortifications and dockyards which shall
proclaim her the mightiest nation in Christendom.
The mightiest for aggressive purposes.
We apprehend that this is the secret of Lord
PALMERSTON'S vulnerability under Mr. COBDEN'S
attacks. If he could speak openly—if he
could say, give me a ninepenny Income-tax
that England may stand at the head of the na-
tions—that her guns afloat may outnumber
in every sea those of all other nations put together
Mr, COBDEN'S remarks would fall harmless. They
are pointed by Lord PALMERSTON'S aiming at power
and arguing only for defence. His demands ob-
viously far exceed all that can be needed for our
home defence in a state of peace. His own best
military authorities have shown that they could do
quite as well without his forts as with them, per-
haps better; and his own official reports on the state
of the French Navy left him completely aground—
that is, so far as anything like urgency for defen-
sive preparations was concerned. He was left
without a case at all for spending any extraordinary
amount of money, at a time: especially when the
national income is so jeopardised by the cotton dif-
ficulty and its consequences. His lordship evi-
dently feels all this, and his only defence last night
was that of first " abusing the plaintiff's counsel,"
next dealing in generalities and platitudes about
the temptation our wealth would be to other na-
tions, and about preserving peace by preparing for