The Sun.
London, England, 1853-06-14 00:00:00

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It.

LONDON, TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 1853.

Reassured, to a considerable extent, the public
cannot fail to be after the statements made last
evening on the part of the Ministry in both
Houses of Parliament. It appears, as had been
anticipated, that the declarations of the Monitcur
are strictly correct, and that orders have been
transmitted simultaneously from the Cabinet of
St. James's, and from the Cabinet of the Tuileries,
empowering the British and French Ambassadors,
at the Court of Turkey, to summon to the aid of
the Sublime Porte, at the first emergency, the
fleets stationed in the Mediterranean. It is gra-
tifying to learn that these instructions were for-
warded from Paris to Monsieur DE LA COUR, and
from London to Lord STRATFORD DE REDCLIFFE,
with the utmost promptitude. They were des-
patched, indeed, according to the avowals made
yesterday in the House of Peers by the Earl of
CLARENDON, and in the House of Commons by
Lord JoirN RUSSELL, either on the same day
or on the day after the receipt of intelligence
that Prince MENSCUIKOFF had hurriedly quitted
Constantinople. The extraordinary power thus
accorded by their respective Governments on the
one hand to the representative of Queen VICTORIA,
and on the other to the representative of the Em-
peror NAroLEoN, will, of course, be employed by
those diplomatists with the utmost imaginable
degree of circumspection. They will neither act
with indecorous rigour, nor With unjustifiable pre-
cipitation. But theywill, at the same time, pur-
sue uninterruptedly that energetic, manly, saga-
cious, and honourable policy upon which, it is en-
couraging to reflect, they have, both of them,
long since adventured. They will persist in main-
taining at all hazards the rights of Turkey, the
independence of the Divan, the integrity of the
SULTAN'S dominions—no matter whether those
rights, that independence, and that integrity
are assailed by the military forces of the
CZAR concentrated at the confluence of the
Pruth and the Danube, or by his maritime arma-
ments collected together in the roadsteads near
Sebastopol. Acting thus in perfect concert, with
an identity of interests, and with an inspiriting
sense of the justice of the cause they have simul-
taneously undertaken to vindicate, France and
England may rest assured of upholding the Empire
of Turkey—of quelling the haughty spirit of Russia
—of preserving intact the balance of power, and
the peace of Christendom.

The promised division on the Succession Duty
Bill was taken last night, and, as we had antici-
pated, the amendment was rejected by a decisive
majority—there being 268 votes against, and
only 185 in favour, of Sir JOHN PAKINGTON'S
proposition. The time had indeed gone by when
any effective opposition could have been offered
to the Bill. The grievous injustice to which the
middle classes had so long been subjected, had at
leilith.„ albeit at the eleventh hour, been unequi-
vgetAly acknowledged, and that acknowledg-
nieut rendered a remedial measure of some
kind. imprative There *as no alternative.
The Pu eattention having once been concen-
trated on the
it was impossible, as Mr.
GLAnwroliz deastiarueon,
ed
"to maintain a state of the
law so wholly devoid of foundation, and of war-
rant in truth or rem
equalisation of the rt,,2: There should be an
onnialtY, to settled or'un-
whether to realty or Personalty, on all succession;
settled -property. The
tegiiiture was to theyzation
anaffd:rdeb:dahn.thttooe
that
exte
the
equality was .to be attained
the tax, or itsly
he
total repeal of,'
every description of accumulated
property. The repeal of the duty could
only have been accomplished by the
sub,
stitution of tth ample equivalent ; so productive
source of -revenue could not have been alto-
gethiOluizendered without creating a deficiency
very injurious to public credit, The substituted

tax should also be of a similar character to that
about to be abolished ; that is to say, it should
be direct, affecting property, and property alone,
1 as no new burden could be imposed on the indus-
trious classes for the purpose of affording undue
relief to their more favoured brethren. A favour-
able opportunity, however, offered for the equit-
able and satisfactory settlement of the question.
If an equitable adjustment of the Property and In-
come Tax had been offered, while the bill for its
renewal was under discussion, the Legacy Duties
might have been surrendered, and adequate com-
pensation obtained by an addition to the rate on
every description of property. But, a course so
wise and politic did not suit those who, having for
so many years avoided a just responsibility, began
to consider it a hardship that theyshould eventually
be rendered liable. They would offer nothing.
that could be considered in the light of compen-
sation, and during the debates and divi-
sions on the Income Tax they exhibited a
contemptuous indifference with respect to the
wrongs of their fellow-subjects calculated to ex-
cite the utmost indignation. The same selfishness
that induced them to evade the payments to which
the families even of humble tradesmen and of
small leaseholders were liable, kept them away
from the House when theii presence might have
been serviceable. And now, forsooth, they come
forward complaining of the hardships which men
of smaller means and less exalted stations have
long endured in comparative silence. Every ar-
gument last night offered to the House applied
to unsettled as well as to settled personalty,
to leasehold as well as to freehold estates—but
the impolicy of the tax, the inconvenience to
which families would be thereby exposed, was not
discovered until the evil was brought to their own
thresholds, and then at length its real character
became perceptible—and the country party mus-
tered strong in order—not to propose a compro-
mise, but—to reject the proposition for the pre-
sent session. 'We have seen the result, and if the
Liberal party be only true to themselves, if they
insist that the proposition of the Chancellor of
the Excheqner be fully and fairly carried
out, that the " equality " contended for, and
which is the principle of the measure, be indeed
adopted according to its true spirit, they will find
still greater causes for complaint than those so
pathetically deplored by their champion.
Why, we ask, is there to be no change in the
Probate and Administration Duties? They amount,
on the average, from two to three per cent., not
on the net amount of property devised, but on
the entire assets, without any allowance being
made for the debts or liabilities that must speedily
be liquidated. It is also payable at an earlier
period after the decease, but in all other respects
the principle is, to all intents and purposes, the
same ; and the continued exemption of real pro-
perty, or settled personalty, which Mr. GLADSTONE
has shown to be unjust and untenable so far as
the Legacy Duties are concerned, can no longer be
justified or sustained with respect to the stamp
duties on Probates and Letters of Administration.
The impost, too, produces nearly an equal amount
to the Legacy Duties, its average being from
2 to 3, and in some instances 4, per cent., while
the average of the Legacy Duties is 2 4-sths per
cent. Here, then, we find at once that the
Right Honourable Gentleman who so clearly and
unanswerably exposed the grievance, has applied
only a partial remedy, leaving one portion wholly
unaltered. We may, then, once more ask in his
own words, " How can any Parliament suppose
that when once public attention is fairly concen-
trated on such a question, it is possible to
maintain a state of law so wholly devoid of
foundation, and of warrant in truth or reason ?"
But this is not all—this is not the only instance
of partiality and favouritism exhibited towards
the territorial aristocracy, who are now so loud in
their complaints against the justice and expedi-
ency of the tax, and who so feelingly remonstrate,
against its novel application. There is a distinc-
tion drawn in the bill between rateable and non-
rateable property, by which the former will escape
about a moiety of the charge to which the latter is
liable. The person succeeding torateable property is
"never to be charged with the duty on any interest
in the property higher than his life interest." This,
according to the Right Hon. Gentleman's own
estimate, docks off nearly half the payment that
would otherwise be enforced ; and, if a party suc-
ceeds to a mortgaged estate, he is only to be
charged with the value of the life interest on the
net income, in place of on the balance of the value
of the estate, after deducting the amount of the
charge—a balance which he could at any time
realise if he thought proper. Another point
worthy of notice is, that even these diminished
payments are not to be at once enforced, as in
the case of personalty, the duty of which must
be paid by the executor, under heavy pecuniary
penalties, before the legacies are handed over—
while those on rateable property are to be ac-
cepted by eight half-yearly instalments, the first of
which is not payable for a year after the succes-
sion has been attained. And this is the equali-
sation of the duties to which so much praise has
been accorded by Liberals, and of which the
landowners so loudly complain. We trust that
some energetic measures will be made in com-
mittee to remedy the mistake that has been com-
mitted, and to carry out the principle in its in-
tegrity. If that attempt should not be successful,
agitation cannot cease on the subject—the in-
dustrious classes will not, and ought not, to be
satisfied while such undue favouritism is suffered to
remain in operation, and they are compelled to
pay so much more on successions than the landed
gentry of the country.

The JELLYBYS are a rather numerous family, and
the scenes of their exploits extend in other direc-
tions than that of the immortal Boorioboola Gha.
So numerous, indeed, is the family, and so enor-
mous (in two senses) and scattered are its exploits,
that we believe many have sympathised with the
eccentric aspiration, " I wish Africa was dead,"
with which we remember to have been startled on
first forming the acquaintance of CADDY Tim-
VEYDROP. Perhaps the most calamitous result of
these proceedings on the part of the so-called
humanitarians • has been the outbreak of that
deplorable Kafir war, from the harrassing effects
of which our Cape colonists are only now slowly
recovering. Those lamentable hostilities, it can-
not readily be forgotten, have periodically, during
the last twenty years, drained away million after
million from the treasures of the home Exchequer.
At one period, in fact, the payment of the
expenses incurred by carrying on this disgraceful
struggle with a few tribes of half-naked savages
had come at last to be regarded as a regular,
and inevitable, and unavoidable item in the
list of our national disbursements. Precisely
when he may have been congratulating himself
upon having comfortably squatted at Cape-town,
poor JoHN—meaning Mr. BULL—finds himself
saddled all at once with an abominable fiend of a
war in Kafirland—his pockets rifled, .and himself
half strangled like SINBAD, in the dear old story-
book, under the gripe of that horrible Old Man
of the Sea. And so JOHN BULL, like his wander-
ing prototype, has gone on, during two long
decades, wringing his hands, getting his pockets
lightened, and feeling his throat clutched almost
to the limits of suffocation—until relieved at last
of the incubus under the wholesome influence of
a little opportune grape-shot. General HAnny
SMITH removed from the chief command, our
troops have at length taught a salutary lesson to
the Kafirs, aided by the combined skill and reso-
lution of ' General GEORGE CATHCART. Thus
tardily, but, for the, time being, effectually, the
evil has been dissipated. It originated, re-
member, in the benevolence of the race
of JELLYBYS—it was the result of the un-
lucky interposition of that vast gang of
theoretical philanthropists who are always for
doing so much good, but are almost invariably
bungling into so much harm. Better immeasu-
rably was the system (rude though it may have
been) of the old Dutch settlers, than the new-
fangled ways of these intolerable humanitarians.
Under the tape Town and the surround-
in .4tte. enjoyedtie prolonged tranquillity. Under
tviinhaite.ete:irwitetia,
cfoho unfortunatehoeirorzofa colonists have been
p ce3
with
protracted war, with

bloodshed. Directly the ancient scheme of de-
fence was abandoned—the war commenced.
Directly the Boers—constituting generation after
generation the living and impassable barrier
between the English Colonists in Southern Africa
and their barbarous neighbours—directly, we
say, that the Boers were driven away by the en-
croachments of a mock-humane interposition—
the calamities of battle began between the British
settlers and the warlike savages in their vici-
nity. The Boers, disdaining the advance of this
maudlin innovation, withdrew from our posses-
sions at the Cape, and compelled the inhabitants
to look elsewhere for the means of securing safety
to themselves, to their commerce, and to the local
Government. Thereupon the Kafirs rose in their
insolence, their daring, and their determination.
The Boers no longer obstructed their attempts at
predatory incursions into the British dominions.
Fire and lance, pillage and massacre, became the
rule of events in those ill-fated provinces. Eng-
land was called upon to send troops out to the
scene of warfare, to despatch our ablest generals
to carry on the twofold duties of campaigning and
conducting the affairs of civil government—Bri-
tish taxes being all the while drawn, year after
year, for the liquidation of the costs incurred in
pursuing this expensive and bootless labour of
political and military retaliation. At last, how-
ever, by a persistance in the desperate struggle so
long sustained with the Kafir forces, we have suc-
ceeded in crushing out the barbarian lust in those
quarters of murder and spoliation. How are we
to prevent the recurrence of these ruinous and dis-
creditable calamities ? How ? That is the pro-
blem, the solution of which appears to devolve
at this moment upon General CATHCART, in the
midst of his sense of victory. By persisting 'in the
policy of the so-called philanthropists—the policy
which has caused all these conflicts and butcheries,
all this anxiety and expenditure—by giving full
play to the system advocated by the JELLYBYS—
by nailing to the mast the banners of Humani-,
tarianism ? Or by returning to a scheme more
accordant with that in vogue among the old
Dutch settlers Surely the latter of the two
would be the more rational course of proceeding.
As Mr. BAGNET might say—Judging from appear-
ances. Comparing the results of the two systems,
it would be more reasonable, we fancy, to select a
defence like that of the Boers—a defence inex-
pensive and effectual—one marked by uninter-
rupted prosperity and prolonged tranquillity.
But the Boers have passed on in quest of better
fortune in the wilderness. .There remains, con-
sequently, as a substitute—the organisation of a
local Militia.