The Sun.
London, England, 1854-06-10 00:00:00

The changes in the distribution of several of the prin-
cipal offices in the Government, which were partly an-
nounced last night to both Houses of Parliament; and
which appear to have arisen from the separation of the
Department of War from that of the Colonies, are stated
to be as follows :—The Duke of Newcastle retains the
duties of Secretary of State for War, and relinquishes
the Colonies ; Sir George Grey succeeds his Grace in the
latter department ; Lord Granville resigns the office of
Lord President of the Council to Lord John Russell,
who is to fill that post without being raised to the peer-
age, and still retains the leadership of the House of
Commons. Lord Granville is to retire for the preient
upon the Chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster,
with a seat in the Cabinet, that office being vacated for
the purpose by Mr. Strutt. Upon the whole, these
arrangements appear to have been dictated by motives
of personal consideration for certain individuals rather
than by a liberal and energetic sense of what is due to
the public service. With more than one member of 'the
Government well qualified to assume the' direction of
the Colonial Department, that important office has been
thrust upon a Minister who is understood to have had
other objects of ambition, and who has been always less
remarkable for his administrative abilities than for the
purity of his private character. Lord Granville, who is
of an age and a character which qualify him to take
an active part in the administrative business of the
country, is transferred to a sinecure office, commonly
reserved for the dignified retirement of- a veteran:
Indeed, the only result of this change is to place
Lord John Russell in an office which has been almostin•
variably filled by a peer, and never, we venture to affirm,
by a member of the House of Commons. The Lotd Preei‘
dent of the Council may, we are told, best Commoner,
and so, in truth, may the Lord Chancellor, hitt such de-
partures from ancient constitutional usage are not to be
recommended unless they are justified by obvious publics
utility, and Lord John Russell should be the last man
to break through these traditions, when no case of public
utility can be said to require it. It may, indeed, be a
serious question for the Government how far it is desi-
rable to intrust the department of public education to a
Minister who has never succeeded in gaining the confi-
dence of the Church, and who is to this day the head of
the Dissenters' Educational Society. Experience has
proved that the cause of education is most effectually
promoted by the cordial co-operation and mutual confi-
dence of the authorities in Church and State, and it
would be a matter of deep regret if the appointment of
Lord John Russell to the Presidency of the Council were
to give the signal for a renewal of that warfare in which
it has been his misfortune to be too fiercely engaged.
Certainly, the probable results of the appointment of
Lord John to a department such as the Privy Council-
' office has become, since it administers the educational
grants, are not such as to palliate an act which is, to say
the least of it, invidious to several younger and more •
efficient men. Lord Granville had filled the office of
Lord President with complete success. The failure of
the Education Bill of last year was not_ laid, Whin
account, but to that of Lord John Russell ; and the Or- ,
ders in Council which have recently remodelled the
maritime law of the empire, by establishing important
limitations'of the rights of war in favour of neutral and
friendly trade during the present hostilities, emanated
from the Privy Council while Lord Granville was at its
head. • It' might have been supposed, that if Lord
Granville was asked 'to quit such a position at all, it
would have been to discharge a more laborious duty
in the Cabinet, for he was a Secretary of State under
Lord John Russell's Government. Instead of such a
change, however, we are told that be is to fall back
upon an office of minor importance, from which Mr.
Strutt is to be extruded to make room for him. Mr.
Strutt has on a former occasion received similar marks
of consideration from Lord John Russell ; but, how-
ever resigned he may be, we cannot approve a trans-
action by which the younger and more active members
of the Government seem to make room for their elder
colleagues. Lord Granville, Mr. Sidney Herbert, Sir
William Molesworth, and Mr. Cardwell may fairly be
ranked among the statesmen of whom more is expeeted
by the country than they °have yet been allowed or
called upon to perform. If a vacancy occurs, either.by
increase of business or by any other cause, the young*
members of the Administration are entitled_to the id.
vanceinent it may afford them, and such promoticib,
would be' equally of advantage to the public servile,
and to themselves. It is disheartening to find, on the
contrary, that an occasionef this sort is used only to gal.
vanize the dry bones of Lord J. Russsell's extinct Admin.
istration, which perished not less by the unpopnlarit,
of his colleagues than by the inefficiency of its chief
Minister. The changes mow made remind us but
too painfully of those which preceded the dissolu-
tion of the Ministry in 1851. The state of affairs,
at the present time, is far more momentous than it
was under that Government, and although the Parlia-
mentaryes when
ed u) the
be
wdiastcchhaerdg
difficulties of the Cabinet may not be serious,
thereneverstrie functions de"
v was
a
time discharge
itsadw
n a tclosely.
Our desire, and the desire of the co is
country, undoubtedly
to see the present Government airengthened, so as to
maintain its position with hostour, and to carry on the
war with success. But it is • •
impossible to deny that the
defeat of Government measures in
Parliament, and espe-
cially the manner in which Lord John Russell first
brought on and then withdrew his new Reform Bill, fol-
lowed by the defeat of his Oaths Bill, have materially
shaken the confidence of the house in the ability and poli-
tical sagacity of such a leader. The moment, therefore,
is singularly ill-chosen t 3 propitiate such a divinity by
sacrifices, and to set about the improvement ofthe Govern-
ment by raising a ci-devant Premier to an office of high dig-
nity in the State, and by appointing a ci-devant fol-
lower to the Colonial Departmont. It was observed at
the time of the formation of Lord Aberdeen's Cabinet
that the materials were exoellunt; but the distribution
of them defective. With three or four brilliant excep.
to depart from that criticism,
tions, we see no reason
' but we the more regret that, instead of amending the
distribution of the offices, the present opportunity
should have been abused to put forward the weaker
elements of the Government to the prejudice of younger
and abler men, and to satisfy the craving of personal
pretensions and of party connexion.. In the times in
which we live that courET is pre-eminently destructive
• bliss men and the duration of
of the authority of pu
; Governments, for a single selfish and ungenerous action
costs a statesman more in the estimation of the people
of England than all the political errors he may commit.

FATAL OCCURRENCE ON THE LONDON AND SOUTH-
WESTERN RAILWAY.—On Thurs3ayafternoon, between 2
and 3 o'clock, one of the guards of the train that left
the Waterloo terminus at 2 o'clock, p.m., named Hoare,
had Char,re of the breaks, and had proceeded as far as
Wimbledon, when by some means he was either knocked
off his carriage by his head coming in contact with some
projection on the hne or from falling, The unfortunate
man dropped upon the metals, and the wheels of the
train passed over one of his arms, cutting his hand off,
and mutilating llifn in Pi frightful rammer.