The Sun.
London, England, 1831-02-02 00:00:00

GPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The -privatc accounts from Dublin announce unani-
mously a decided improvement in the state of the public
opinion throughout Ireland within the last few days; and,
by consequence, a sensible abatement of the hopes and
spirits of the agitators, as may indeed be collected from the
increased fury and extravagance of their language. The
gratifying fact above mentioned may be ascribed to two
causes, dependent on each other, and operating almost
simultaneously—viz. the exasperation produced (as we
had prophesied it would be) in the minds of all the trailing
classes of the country, by O'Connell's frantic run upon
the banks, and the public developement of that feeling in
the tesolute address of the great banking, mercantile, and
tra iing bodies of the Irish capital to the Lord Lieutenant,
presented at the very moment when his Excellency's law-
officers were prosecuting Mr. O'Connell and his compa-
nions ;n turbulence for illegal and seditious practices.—
The commercial property and respectability of Ireland
may now, therefore, be said to have declared themselves
against the repeal plot, as the landed proprietors had
already done by their signature of the Leinster declara-
tion But there seems to be another cause fur this bene-
ficial change in the aspect of Irish affairs—one which,
though less definite and tangible than the former ones,
is rioted in the nature of things, and could not fail,
even if unaided by the recent vigour of Government, or
by the indignation of the higher landed and commercial
classes, to contribute somewhat towards the re-establish-
ment of peace. We mean the weariness of the people
themselves, overstimulated as they have been by O'Con-
nell, and with no visible, nor any probable, advance to-
wards that consummation for which he had hallooed them
on against the laws and Government of the realm. The
project of a separation from England was one, which any
man, not bursting with vanity, might have known could
not be carried by sudden storm. His only chance of suc-
cess was by persuading the intelligent and independent
pu t of the Irish nation, and a large portion of the Eng-
list., that it would be good for both countries to dis-
solve tl.eir Union. Reason, temper, argumentative
discussion, motions in Parliament, supported by a
profound knowledge of the subject in its facts and
principles,—great forbearance towards those who dif-
fered float him in opinion, great patience, and the in-
fluence of time itself,—these were the weapons to
which au intelligent Statesman would have resorted for ef-
fecting a great legislative change, on which the right and
wrong of the question—that is, the justice or injustice
of the pi oposition—was not, as in the case of the hideous
penal code, a matter for common sense and right feeling
to decide upon without much difficulty. But does Mr.
O'Connell, because he flattered himself with the notion
of 'teeing carried the Catholic Relief Bill by " agitation"
—that is to say, by throwing the physical weight of the
multitude into the scale of reason and p itriotism, when
the sympathies of all enlightened and honest men had
placed themselves there before he began to " agitate,"—
does he fancy that the mere mob would enable hint to pro-
delve a similar effect on another question, when nothing
but the mob is in his favour? We say that no excite-
ment of the populace could ever have promoted (it did,
in fact, for some time retard) emancipation, if the more
enlighteeed classes had not been already roused; and as-
suredly the gradual progress of their sentiments on the
subject Itml not been the work of such coarse blusterers as
this would-be repealer of the Union. We say next, and
repeat. that with any view towards a repeal of the Union,
Mr. O'Connell ought to have laid the ground-work of his
proceedings, not in the mob, but in the educated and in-
dependent classes, inasmuch as it was a measure, the
fitness of which ought to be determined solely by a
calm and discriminating calculation of complex interests.
Well, then, wh it does ho do? He begins with the
mob of Public. He inflames the wretched creatures
against Erglish policy and against Irish property, by
way of diminishing the manifold obstructions in his
path. What does he do next ? Having chosen the mob
for his instrument, how does he employ that instrument?
It is another name for physical force. An able and con-
sistent revolutionist, seeing that he had armed himself with
an engine adapted only to sudden and overwhelming vio-
lence, would have employed it to its natural purpose, and
addressed it in characteristic terms. He would have said
" Here we are, 5,000,000, 6,000,000, or 7,000,000"
(as the muster roll of the Learned Gentleman's imagina-
tion might have served him)—" here we are, boys. A
fig for the cowardly English—we defy them ; a fig for
Lord Anglesea ; let us storm the Castle and hang him."
That would be throwing away the scabbard—that would
be cutting off all retreat—that would be a course con-
sistent with tie means and resources of a thorough
ruffian 'elder. Emmett and his companions, ite 1798,
were unfortunate in their undertaking—they misjudged
strength;their but they did not commit the wretched
blunder of talking to a mob, as if it had been a legislative
assembly. No, the chiefs of the rebellion sat in secret
conclave—they argued the political questichs among
themselves—the use they made of the multitude was the
proper use—they wade an army of it, and sent it forth to
battle. So the younger Emmett, in 1803—so the Belgic
conspirators in 1830. The first failed—the second
succeeded; but they both showed an infinite superi-
ority over O'Connell and his agents. They did not
tell the rabble, " You have all these several sorts of mo-
tives and reasons for being dissatisfied : therefore, because
we are sure you don't understand one particle about the
matter, go and discuss—and instruct the upper classes;
but, above all things, obey the laws I" Why, a mob once
inflamed, and brought into a state of eagerness for posi-
tive action, will after a little while begin to laugh in the
face of any pedantic blockhead who enjoins them to
" obey the laws," which he had spent so much breath in
giving them a thousand reasons why they should disobey
and °vertu! n. Mr. O'Connell, then, has, in a very silly
and preposterous manner, mistaken—first, the only rea-
sonable means by which a repeal of the Union could have
been carried ; and then, having made that first blunder,
the second is, the applying the mob, an instrument unfit
in itself for his purpose of repealing the Union, in a way
according to which it is impossible that a mob could be
employed successfully to any purpose whatever,—namely,
the attempting to make of it an argumentative or contro-
versial engine, instead of simply a fighting one. The
true state of the case, then, seems to be, that the rabble
power begins to be fatigued at the same moment in which
the intellectual and wealthy power of Ireland begins to
show i,self,—a coincidence doubly ominous to Mr. O'Con-
nell's Vot. Our Irish letters give some particulars touch-
ing the law procedure.— Times.
- -

Every man has a right to draw his own political infe•
rencee from any given facts, but no man has a right to vio-
late the truth of history in support of his political opinions.
As long as politicians support fallacious doctrines only by
false or casuistical reasoning, their errors or deception may
be at any time exposed and refuted ; but when they mis-
represent facts it is necessary that detection should imme-
diately follow, lest the fiction of to-day may become the
established truth of succeeding ages. In General Sebas-
tiani's attempted vindication of the policy of France to-
wards Belgium, he has endeavoured to support his argu-
ment by taking a very great freedom with historic truth.
He gi avely says, " As soon as the late grand separation
had taken place, without looking at the condition of our
strength, we hastened to proclaim the tutelary principle
of non-intervention ;—we need not be afraid of saying
that France saved Belgium from foreign invasion." Now,
if what the French Government did to avert the threa-
tened violation of the Belgian territory by the " armed
legislators" of the despots had been all that had happened
to prevent that calamity, we are of opinion that, long
before this, Diebitsch, with his Coceacks, would have un-
dertaken to cut the " Gordian knot" of the Belgic question
which it now tasks all the ingenuity of the diplomatit.: artist,
of the Five Great Powers to unravel. No—if the French
Government, " as. soon as the late grand separation had
taken place," proclaimed the tutelary principle of non-
intervention, they did it in so weak and timid a voice that
it is uo wonder it rather encouraged than repressed the
warlike preparations of Russia and her Allies. Notwith-
standing the proclamation of the " tutelary principle,"
every succeeding arrival from Germany brought accounts
of new levies of troops and movements of armies by the
Northern Autocrat and his brethren of the Holy Alliance.
Russia had not assumed so military an attitude since she
had collected her stiength'throughout her vast dominions
for the war that subjugated the Turkish empire. But
Turkey was then tranquil, Persia submissive, and Poland
had given no sign of awakening from the long torpor of
suspended animation. The revolutions of Rance and Bel-
gium could alone account for the sudden activity with
which the Muscovite eagle whetted her beak and plumed
her wing for some far and fierce flight of desolation and of
conquest. In the mean time France, lulled into a fancied
security by either weakness or treabanii remained supine,
without making a single effort to place herself in a
position of vigorous defence. It seemed as if her
political sagacity and martial energies bad pined a
aw -
beneath the benumbing influence of the idle garru-
lity of the Chamber of Deputies. Nothing like
genius enlightened her debates—nothing like original vi-
:grew of intellect directed her Councils. It seemed is if
all her feelings and powers were absorbed by the compa_
ratively insignificant subject of the trial of the Ex-Mi-
nisters—as if the fate of four miserable culprits, who had
no longer any power to do harm, was worthy of such ex-
clusive consideration while the destinies of thirty millions
of people were at stake ! Yet we caw all Paris—nay, all

France—kept in agitation about the fate of these wretched
men for the space of nearly half a year, during thegreater
part of which time thg dangers which threatened the inde-
pendence, or rather the existence, of revolutionized
France, excited little or no attention on the part of the
French Government, and produced no corresponding
preparations to preserve peace, if hostile demonstrations,
on the defensive, could preserve it, or to meet invasion,
if that should be inevitable, with energetic resistance. It
is notorious that at the accession of Marshal Soult to the
Ministry, France was in the most deplorable state of
military decrepitude and weakness. No step had been
taken to raise the levies that h td been spoken of in "the
Chambers, or to put the forces which the Government of
the Ex-King had deteriorated into an effective condition.
The new Sovereign contented him,elf with talking of the
warlike exploits in which he shared at the commencement
of the former revolution, but he did not consider that, if
France had at that crisis exhibited the same supineness and
insensibili►y to foreign dangers, the invading army of the
Duke of Brunswick would not have been swept from the
earth by the legions of young warders who formed a
Spartan rampat t round the threatened institutions of their
country. Under such circumstances what was it that
saved Belgium, and, with Belgium, saved France from
invasion ? It is clear it was not the " tutelary prin-
ciple" which France so inefficiently proclaimed. We will
tell General Sebastiani what it was. He will find it
written in that page of modern history which records the
recent change of Ministry in England. Here was the
event which first made the Holy Alliance pause in their
wicked and ambitious project—and the Revolution in Po-
land luckily succeeded, to make the intended invasion of
Belgium and France appear still more desperate. Though
we cannot approve of all that our present Ministry have
done with regard to the Belgic negociations and to some
other matters at home, yet to them undoubtedly belongs
the credit of having, for a time, at least, and we hope per-
manently, stopped the mad career of despots, who, in their
hatred to freedom, and in vindication of their usurped au-
thority over the rights of nations, were preparing to inflict
Europe with the curse of a war, of which no man could
forecast the tremendous consequences.—Morn. Herald.
Our Paris correspondent inform■ us that it was confi-
dently reported at Paris that the Duke of Nemours bad
been chosen King of Belgium. We suspect the report
originated in the confident anticipation of such a choice.
That the Belgians and French intend a political marriage
we do not in the least doubt ; and, considering all circum-
stances, we should doubt either the wisdom or policy of
forbidding the banns. Annexation of territory by forcible
means is quite distinct from such a re-union as that of
France and Belgium. The Belgians know that, but for
French protection, they would have been delivered over to
the King of Holland by the Alliance ; they look on
France as the only Power disposed to protect them ; and
they are, besides, anxious to obtain the benefit of the
French market for their industry. As to the balance of
power, the less that is said about it the better, so long as
Europe is doomed to connive at the partition of Poland
by Russia, Austria, and Prussia, who retain the spoil in
defiance of the public opinion of Europe. The lovers of
good Government are certainly far more deeply interested
in the strength of France than in the strength of the three
powers, banded against all improvement in the institutions
of nations. Far be it from us to wish to abet France in
any ambitious views of aggrandisement ; but this we say,
that France is not the Power of which Europe has at pre-
sent the most cause to be jealous.—Morning Chronicle.

Blackwood's Magazine, and other publications of the
same sort, are heaping every species of abuse upon Mr.
Poulett Thomson for his reduction of the duties on ba•.
rilla. They ascribe to the late Order in Council the ap-
proaching ruin of the kelp manufacturers, and affirm that
it will throw 60,000 persons oat of employment ! Those
conversant with the real state of the fact do not require to
be told that there coir!d not even be the shadow of a foun-
dation for such a statement ; but as the confidence with
which it has been put forth may impose on others, it may
be worth while to offer a few remarks upon it. Every
one, the*, who knows any thing of the matter, knows
that the kelp manufacture has been substantially annihi-
lated for these three years past, and that its ruin was
brought about, not, as is pretended by those who know
better, by the reduction of the duties •n barilla, but by
the repeal of the duty on salt. The purification of kelp,
so ss to render it fit for soap-making, is a much more
troublesome and expensive process than the decomposition
of salt; and as soon as the duty on the latter was taken
off, the alkali made from it almost entirely superseded that
of kelp. Had the duty on salt been continued, kelp might
still have been manufactured, notwithstanding the reduc-
tion of the barilla duties. During the war kelp was occa-
sionally as high as 201. a ton; and the price was reckoned low
when it was underlo/. orl2/. ; bat during the last threeyears
it has only fetched from IL to Si. a ton—a sum quite inade-
quate to defray the cost of its production. In conse-
quence, its manufacture was last year almost totally
extinct, and shores that had formerly brought 5001.
a year of rent would not bring a single shilling.
We have at this moment before us a letter from a
most intelligent Ross-shire Baronet, himself a large
proprietor of kelp-shores, dated the 10th of October last,
in which he says, in answer to some queries that had been
addressed to him on the subject, that " the manufacture
can hardly be said to exist at all." And he also says, it
is quite idle to ascribe its fall to the reduction of the duty
on barilla. After this decisive statement, we trust we shall
hear no more of the ruin of the kelp manufacture being
occasion by Mr. Tnotnpson's order. We believe, indeed,
that his predecessors in office intended to issue an order of
the same kind ; but whether this was the case or not, the
measure is one for which Mr. Thompson is well entitled to
the thanks of the public. The use of barilla is of vast
consequence in many manufactures ; and the imposition
of a high duty on it was in every re,pect most mischievous.
The abuse:of Mr. Thompson in the Journals in question
is too contemptible to deserve notice. It is heaped on
him, in company with many other distinguished persons,
and is really a tribute to his talents and principles —Morn-
ing Chronicle.

A Twkith physician, who had been sent to
Russia to investigate the causes and effects of the cholera
morbus, reports it to be the fever common in some parts
of Persia and in the lower part of Smyrna ; and that it is
contagious to the greatest degree he had ever experienced.

TIFLIS.—A reading-room and library has
just been established at this distant watering-place. It
already possesses two newspapers, one of them in the
Russian language, which appears twice a week, under the
title of Gazette of Tiflis ; the ether in Persian, and
published daily.—Literary Gazette.

HINT TO ANGLERS.—AII American Paper
states that a person at Enfield, crossing a pond, being
thirsty, and perceiving a hole cut, he stooped down to
drink ; being possessed of a long red nose, a fish, suppos-
ing he had some bait, made a bold snap at it, when the
man threw back his head, and drew out a trout, weighing
31b. 4oz.

A young woman, named FANNY FOWLER,
was last week sentenced to six months' imprisonment in
Abingdon House of Correction, for bastardy, it being her
fifteenth transgression.

The fashionable coterie so strikingly described
in the new novel of " Mothers and Daughters," with its
Lady Barringhurst, Lady Robert Lorton, and Mrs.
Grandison, is evidently intended as a lively contrast to
that pourtrayed in " The Exclusives." A circle of such
unequalled fascination as that whose secrets are now tan-
talizingly revealed, might reader any one an Exclusive.—
We have not heard what disappointment has provoked tl.e
noble author to withdraw himself from its incantations.--
The lovers of wit and polished satire will, however, con-
gratulate themselves ou the occurrence of a provocation
which has drawn out for the first time such brilliant powers
as those displayed in the above work.
The late Dr. CURRIE of Liverpool, the
judicious biographer of Buitxs, in one of the letters
published by his son, gives the following satisfactory
reasons for extending the elective right to heads of
families :—After mentioning that he was not disposed to
go the length of universal suffrage, he says, " The- young,
the idle, the profligate, and thi se wretchedly poor and
ignorant, form a large class of society, that do not suffici-
ently understand or sympathise in the interests of the
whole ; and those I would propose to exclude. in a great
measure, by adopting another fundamental principle :
giving the elective franchise, not to persons, but to
families; in a word, to the fathers of families only.
Such men have a valuable stake in the community,
however small their property ; and they are (not
without many exceptions, indeed) a selection from the
general mass, as to sobriety and industry. By adopting
this principle, the greater and most dangerous part of the
mob of great cities would be excluded ; the greater
part of the army and navy, and almost all the ser-
vants of great families—perhaps as vicious and dan-
gerous a part of the community as any other—beings
who possess at the same time the vices of luxury
and ignorance." The Literary Gazette remarks that
these thoughts " bespeak a man of a good heart and a
sound understanding." " A family," says the late excel-
lent Bishop of LLANDAFF, "is a small nation." Its head
isits natural representative ; and his vote is the vote of the
whole.— Glasgow Chronicle.

REFORM IN PARLIAMENT.

ST. LUKE'S.

On Monday evening a numerous meeting, com-
posed of the inhabitant householders of the parish
of St. Luke, Middlesex, was held at the Work-
house, City-road, "to take into consideration the
best means of supporting his Majesty's Ministers,
so as to enable them to carry into effect such a Re-
form of the representation of the people in the Com-
mons House of Parliament as will ensure to the
country at large the benefit of good government at
the !wait possible expense consistent with the well-
bAng of all classes of his Majesty's subjects."
Mr. WALKER, Churchwarden, in the Chair.

The resolutions were then read. The substance
was of the first, that the British Constitution ori-
ginally vested the supreme government in three in-
dependent branches of the Legislature—King,
Lords, and Commons. The second :—That the
Commoners, instead of being the independent re-
presentatives of the people, were at present returned
by the Aristocracy and by the Crown, and that nu-
merous abuses had been the consequence. The
third :—That to prevent a convulsion a revision of
the elective franchise had become necessary. And
the fourth :—That the shortening of the duration of
Parliaments, and the vote by ballot, should form
part of that Reform.
Mr. RicitmoND rose to propose the first resolu-
tion. The people were now much less represented
than they were two hundred years ago. Since then
many cities had sprung up—trade and manufac-
tures had greatly extended—yet the agriculturists,
now so inferior in property, intelligence, and num-
bers, to the rest of the nation, retained the almost
exclusive possession of privileges, which had been
given them only because they formed at the time
the mass of the community.—(Hear.)
Resolution agreed to unanimously.
Mr. WOOD proposed the second resolution.
Now or never was the time to obtain Reform;
they had a Ministry pledged to Reform. It was
the duty of the people to petition Parliament''
in support of Ministers, who were no less the Mi-
nisters of the people than of the Crown.—(Cheers.)
Mr. PALLISIER seconded the resolution.
Mr. SMITH proposed the third resolution.
Mr. GREIG seconded it.

A person present said that nothing would be
effectual short of extended suffrage, universal suf-
frage, vote by ballot, and annual Parliaments.
The resolution was then passed.
Mr. TAYLOR proposed the third resolution. It
recommended the shortening of the duration of Par-
liaments and the vote by ballot. The advantages of
ballot were obvious, and the word had been received
with such cheers that he should not detain them
upon that subject.
Mr. JANISSIN proposed that the words " universal
suffrage " should be introduced into the resolution.
The CHAIRMAN observed, that it was obvious
that the resolutions should pass unanimously. How-
ever, if the amendment were seconded, it was his
duty to put it.—(Cries of" Put it, put it ;" "No,
no," and considerable confusion.)
The amendment having been seconded, it was
put and rejected amidst loud cheers.
The original resolution having then been agreed to,
Mr. litcllmoND proposed that petitions founded
on the resolutions be presented, one to the House of
Lords, by the Lord Chancellor, and one to the
House of Commons, by Lord Althorp.—Agreed to.
Thanks were then voted to the Chairman, and
the meeting broke up.