The Sun.
London, England, 1853-04-16 00:00:00

tiroirb litittov
441/

SUN OFFICE, Six o'clock,

ELECTION COMMITTEE.--(THIS D.AY.

STATE OF TRADE.

(Prom the Manchester Guardian of this day.

GLAaGOW, April 15.—Our cotton market has been
animated during the week, and a good business has been
done at the full rates of Friday last.

THE CHARGE AGAINST M. KGSSUTH.

(From the Daily News. )
The answer given by .Lord Palmerston last night to
the questions put to him by the hon. member for Leices-
ter, will be read with no little interest by the public
generally, and with considerable surprise by those who
perused the extraordinary statement relative to M.
TKossuth, which appeared in the Times yesterday morn-
ing. In substance, the statement amounted to nothing
less than that the Secretary for the Home Department
had issued a warrant, under the authority of which the
police had proceeded to search a house belonging to M.
Kossuth, and had found therein a large amount of arms
and ammunition, such as amply to verify the suspicions
previously entertained of the possessor's intention to
levy war upon our humane and enlightened ally the Em-
peror of Austria. How the information which had led
to such a proceeding had been obtained our contemporary
did not say ; and its readers were consequently left in
doubt whether it was derived from ssurces. of foreign
espionage or from the revelations of domestic spies
—from treachery in the Austrian Post-office, or vio-
lation of confidence in that of St. Martin's-le-Grand.
Unpleasant recollections associated with the names
of the Bandieri might naturally suggest discretion
as to such disclosures to the organ of Lord Aber-
deen. Be that as it may, however, no pains were
spared to invest the announcement with the cha-
racter of circumstantiality ; glorify the prophetic
wisdom of those who had unscrupulously vilified the
Hungarian chief, and foretold his eventual detection as
a pirate and impostor ; above all, to heap upon Lord
Palmerston reproachful praises for his discovery, though
late, of the duty which he owes to foreign sovereigns as
a Minister of the Queen of England.
Lord Palmerston, to do him justice, seems to have
been not at all ambitious to remain longer than was un-
avoidable under the fatal load of such laudations. In
his place in the House of Commons last night he did not
hesitate to deny the accuracy of the tale of which he had
been made the suppositious hero. With remorseless
ingratitude he not only explained that the military stores
which the police had placed under detention had not
been found at the residence of M. Kossuth, but at a dis-
tance of some miles from it, and that he was in posses-
sion of no information which would justify him in assert-
ing that they had been purchased or placed where
they were found with the culpable cognisance of
that gentleman. But Lord Palmerston did not stop
there. In answer to a second question, his Lord-
ship declared he was not aware of any under-
taking having been given by her Majesty's Govern-
ment that they would perform the duties• of sur-
veillance over the political refugees resident in this
country. The Noble Viscount has too long played the
distinguished part of Foreign Minister to a free people
to sit easy under the imputation of turning head police-
man in his old age, or principal spy to the despots on
whose cruelty he was once the check, and in whose ears
his name is still a sound of terror. Lord Palmerston's
position as member of the Cabinet, constituted as the
present is, must be as intolerable to him individually as
disreputable to the character of our fellow-men, if it im-
plied such self-abandonment as that on which, with
sinister emphasis, his implacable enemy the Times
affects to congratulate him. For the honour of British
statesmanship, we rejoice to think that, true to the
principles of 1850, Lord Palmerston disdains to be "the
Minister of Austria." Lower and more degraded still
he would be if, upon any suggestion conveyed through
the foreign office, from Vienna, or upon any information
furnished by spies and informers, or supplied by equally
infamous means, the Hbme Secretary were to violate
the sanctity of political hospitality, or to harass an un-
fortunate exile who had sought the shelter of our shore,
by instituting against him proceedings in the nature of
a State prosecution, as the Times eagerly recommends,
unless he were really guilty of an offence against the
laws of the country which affords him a secure asylum.
The duty of a Secretary of State in regard to foreign
governments with whom we are at peace is simple and
plain. Whenever authentic and legitimate information
shall be given him of warlike preparations being made
within our confines of a nature calculated to excite just
suspicion as to their object, he is manifestly bound to
interpose, in order to prevent any infraction of interna-
tional rights being committed under the tacit sanction of
our name. If arms or ammunition be found secreted,
or in such quantities as cannot be reasonably or satisfac-
torily accounted for, it is the duty of Government to
seize and detain such stores, and to hold all persons,
whether natives or foreigners, in whose possession they
may have been found, responsible when legally called
upon for their peaceful conduct and intentions. But
there the duty of a British Minister ends. Whatever
may be said or insinuated to the contrary, it is no part
of his business to act as one of a foreign gendarmerie, to
play the part of a letter opener, a detective, or a spy,
or to prostitute the power and authority which belong to
the executive of a free nation in political prosecutions,
to appease the baffled fury of despotic Governments
abroad,

(From the Morning Advertiser.)

The metropolitan public were yesterday startled by
the announcement in the Times, that a house belonging
to Kossuth had been searched on the previous day by
the police, and that a large store of arms, ammunition,
. and materials of war had been discovered and seized. It
will be remembered that a few weeks ago we stated that
information had reached us from a reliable source, to the
effect that the British Government had responded to the
wishes of Austria to play the part of spy on the move-
ments of the refugees resident in London. We added,
however, that, excellent as was the source whence the
information came, we co ild not bring ourselves to be-
lieve in its accuracy. We t'iought, and said, that there
must be some mistake in the matter. We felt that the
national honour would be compromised by such a pro-
ceeding, and could not therefore give credence to the
representations made to us.
Unhappily events have since shown that we had
thought too favourably of our Government. If the
Times may be believed, the Home Secretary has become
the servile tool of the Court of Vienna. Assuming that
our contemporary is correct, we can only say, that if
the discreditable work was to be done at all, we wish it
had been done by some one else than Lord Palmerston,
The country will be pained, as well as surprised, to learn
that he, who was formerly the terror of all the des-
potic courts of Europe, and whose name was held in
execration by every royal tyrant in Christendom, should
now have descended so low in the political scale as to
become the submissive servant of the very Court by which
he was most hated and abhorred. We may well be
Rupposed to feel especially grieved and mortified at this,
because no journal took his lordship's part so zealously
and so perseveringly as ours, when he was ignominiously
ejected from the Russell Ministry because of his unpo-
• pularity with continentalo courts. While we eulogised
the noble lord on that the Times loaded him
with its coarsest and most virulent abuse. Now he is
the god of that journal's idolatry.
We see in the fact we have recorded r
la
of
ft
Aberdeen,and edify
ing commentary an the speech of the
ago, animadverted
in the House of Lords, a few w:.elcse
by " An
on with such surpassing Powers of language,
- Englishman." Lord Palmerston hasngalupsarogedet:itoTe the
instrument of carrying, out the Austrian
"the good Aberdeen. Again, we must express our
regret at the sad change which has taken place in othre
noble lord's position. We wish, for his own sake, that
he had not joined the Coalition Cabinet. We wish he
• had better consulted his own high character than to sub-
mit to serve under a man viith whom he had been for
years at variance. Had he kept aloof from the mongrel
Ministry, he would have lived and died one of the most
popular statesmen of the day.

The Times, as might be expected, is in the third hea-
ven of happiness, that something has, as it fancies, been
a', last found which will compromise the illustrious
.Magyar. There are no bounds to its exultation. It
cannot restrain itself. What if, after all, it be doomed
to the mortification of discovering that its fiendish re-
joicings are groundless ? Before it raises its shout of
joy, it would be well to wait until it see the issue of the
trial, which it is to be presumed awaits Kossuth. That
distinguished man is not convicted yet, No British '

NEW ROSS.
The committee this afternoon came to a decision to
the effect that Mr. G. Duffy was duly elected.

MANCHESTER April 15.—The American accounts
report a further advance in the price of cotton at
the southern ports, consequent upon the very large
actual and prospective falling off in the receipts.
These advices have bad the effect of slightly
strengthening the tone of the Liverpool cotton market ;
so that the trade, though still wary and sparing in their
purchases, have to pay some advance on the terms of
last week for what they may want. The great body of
spinners, however, and the buyers of yarns and goods,
keep their eyes steadily fixed upon the heavy stocks of
cotton which are held on both sides the Atlantic,
amounting to 820,000 bales of all classes here, and nearly
800,000 there, together with a considerable quantity on
the seas ; and they do not seem inclined to let any reports
of diminishing receipts, or any such statements as we re-
ceived yesterday about the' lateness of the season, divert
them from the sound policy of buying with that prudent
caution which hesitates to follow any further advance in
prices. Accordingly, the Liverpool market receives no
impulse from the action of spinners, nor does ours from
that of merchants or dealers. So well engaged are spin-
ners, however, that they not only hold to their quotations
for the medium and lower counts with unflinching firm-
ness, but in general are harder to deal with than they
were last week. For fine spinnings the late consider-
able advance is easily obtained. Printing cloths are
without change, as are also heavy. domestics. The
lighter domestics, together with long cloths, are in
some degree improved. The very meagre telegra-
phic announcement of Eastern intelligence received to-
day, stating some improvement at Bombay, has caused
a partial inquiry for shirtings, which have of late been
dull, though steady in price. Altogether, the business
of the week has been inconsiderable ; evidently checked
in those articles for which any advance has been de-
manded.