The Sun.
London, England, 1838-10-31 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

We believe we may now state, that there is no longer
any doubt of the return of Lord Durham. We have seen

letters from Canada which speak positively of his intention
to leave Quebec (to proceed through the United States)
on the 20th of October. In all probability he will be in
London, as he himself announced, in January. An attempt
has, 'we see, been made to justify the base and factious en-
deavours of the Tories to destroy Lord Durham's autho-
rity, on the ground that the French Canadians being incor-
rigibly aliens to English rule, his Lordship's efforts to con-
ciliate them could never have availed, and that the business
of coercion can be best performed by a soldier. But are
we to keep the French Canadians in subjection by bayo-
nets ? It may be necessary to resort to coercion when dis-
affection has broken out into actual rebellion ; but, when re-
bellion has been put down, it becomes proper to inquire in
what manner rebellion may afterwards be prevented by
other means than the presence of an overwhelming
military force. No sane man would tlfink of maintaining
that if Canada can only be kept in subjection by a large
military force, it would be worth our while to continue the
connection on such expensive terms. If, then, means must
be resorted to for rendering the Canadas secure without
keeping an overwhelming force constantly in the country,
the sooner they are resorted to the better. It was, there-
fore, wise in Ministers to follow up the suppression of the
insurrection by the immediate appointment of a Governor-
General invested with large powers to inquire on the spot
into the causes of the diseased state of Canada, and to de-
vise means for remedying the evils. Lord Durham has
been interrupted in his endeavours to justify the expecta-
tions of the country from his appointment by a most uncon-
stitutional and most wicked and factious attempt on the
part of the Tories to render his efforts nugatory.
If the French Canadians have, under these cir-
cumstances, felt emboldened to resolve on ano-
ther insurrection, this does not prove that under
other circumstances they would not have remained
submissive. If they do rebel a second time, the
crimes of that second rebellion, the distress of the British set-
tlers from the unsettled state of the colonies, and the delay
in the work which shall by judicious arrangements prevent
future rebellions, must all be placed to the account of the
Tories. Still the labours of Lord Durham will not have
been unproductive of advantage to his country. He has
acquired mach useful information with respect to Canadian
affairs only to be acquired on the spot ; and in his place
in the House of Lords he will be able to do great good,
setting Parliament right with regard to the cause of what
has taken place in the two provinces. Our system has
been radically vicious from the beginning in several essen-
tial respects. Under an infatuation without example we
have positively nourished disaffection in Canada. We have,
as it were, taken pains to cultivate the means of rebellion.
What could possibly result from the keeping up the separate
nationality of the French, separate language, separate laws
and uses, but a feeling of alienation, which, sooner or later,
must have broken out in an attempt to throw off the alien
yoke ? The Tory Administrations of the country which
suffered the continuance of such a state of things thereby
proved themselves as blind as bats. If absolute want of
foresight be the best qualification for governing empires,
our Tory statesmen have proved themselves peculiarly
qualified. They never appear to have looked an inch be-
fore their noses. In Ireland, for example, the brilliant idea
occurred to them of retaining the penal laws against the
Catholics, and yet giving political power to the Catholics
through the possession of the Electoral Suffrage. In
Canada they in like manner gave to every cause of aliena-
tion the most ample scope for development, as if it had
been wished that the attempt at independence should have
the greatest possible chance of success. It is fortunate that
the attempt has been made at a time when the powerful arm
of Britain has been at liberty. Our present Ministers,
however, will, we trust, display more wisdom than the Tory
Ministries which preceded them, and proceed man-
fully to a radical cure of the evils. If a second re-
bellion be the fruit of the conduct of the Lords, when
that rebellion has been put down, as it must be, the task
must be entered on without delay of making Lower Canada
a British possession. Ministers will have to repeat what in
the case of Lord Durham's appointment was so happily
commenced. Lord Durham's successor will have one advant-
age not possessed by his Lordship. The Ellenboroughs
and the Lyndhursts (we put Lord Brougham out of the
question, as he is only powerful with the Tories when mis-
chief is in the wind) will not be rendered wiser, but they
will not be able to play their game of faction a %second
time with the same success. A number of the Tory Lords
were merely stupid, and followed their leaders as a flock of
sheep follows the foremost ; but they no doubt feel morti-
fied at the mischief they have unwittingly done. We may,
therefore, predict that if the French Canadians should once
more attempt to make puppets of the Tory Lords, they will
not find them so pliant as heretofore. They will be more
ready another time to listen to the Standard (the Stan-
dard is sometimes a safe counsellor—the Times never),
which tells us yesterday of " the painful necessity under
which it found itself of condemning the proceedings of the
House of Lords—condemning those proceedings, not as
they might affect Lord Durham, but as they must give a
fatal character of weakness to all future government."
There was not a single sentence of common sense uttered by
one of the Tories in the House of Lords (the Duke of
Wellington, strange to say, is hardly an exception) during
all the discussions of last session with respect to Canada.
All the cavillings about the choice made by Lord Durham of
Special Councillors betrayed the very extreme of imbe-
cility. Every person beyond the age of a schoolboy had
known, we should have thought, that in the difficult and
embarrassing sitution in which Lord Durham found him-
self the greater the responsibility thrown on himself the
better. It has often been said that a general never calls a
council of war but when he wants an excuse for retreat-
ing. Had Lord Durham surrounded himself with a
strong Council of Cananians, he might have found
an excuse for doing anything or doing nothing. As
it was he generously divested himself of that excuse,
and yet the wiseacres of the House of Lords
could not see this. It was well observed in a sensible
pamphlet, " The Canadian Crisis," published some months
ago, that " it is absolutely requisite that • discretionary
powers, as nearly unlimited as possible, should be delegated
to the authority chosen by the Crown. It has been said
that such great power ought to be invested in a Board or
in a Commission, composed of several persons, rather than
be entrusted to any individual. But whoever has well con-
sidered or witnessed the effects of giving in grave matters,
particularly when promptitude and energy are required,
power to a Board, even consisting of but few persons, and
of dividin-4, and thus almost virtually destroying, the great
responsibility necessarily attached to such power, will
hardly defend such a course. All such Boards or Com-
missions have in them the inherent defects of the worst of
all possible modes of Government—that of a bureaucracy.
The individual chosen must, then, be invested with great
power, and proportionate responsibility." The author of
the pamphlet in question, who states, he says, the result of
personal observation in the Colonies and the United States,
observes—
" The present state of things is Canada is the work of
many years. The germ of the actual discontent existed from
the very moment of the Canadas becoming an English posses.
sion. In almost every conquest made by Great Britain, where
there has Iren a capitulation or formal cession, one art:oe has
been invariably admitted with a fatal facility, viz., that the
conquered inhabitants shall continue to be governed by their
own laws and preserve their own language. There are other
minor points injudiciously allowed to pass. But this is the
true teterrima cause, the real origin of the difficulties and
unpopularity of the English in their foreign possessions."

.4 What is the result of these concessions? That laws the
most defective, and that havebee been abolished in every part of
Europe, and in all its dependencies,
asylum in British territories. In the
n find their last refuge and
West Indies, in 3lauri.
tius, &c. &c., similar admissions have entailed upon us the
vriance, in spirit
ad-
ministration and practice of laws totally at a
and in letter, to our own jurisprudence,
andindeed to that of
all civilised countries of the present day.
.. The remnants of old Spanish, Dutch, French, and other
jaws have, by our conscientious quixotism, been preserved
in English possessions. And while the defective French laws
and previously)
and institutions (of Louis XIV. and XV.
,stime
of hersubject
to pos-
sessions,
assremain
et coustulmes de Paris. And our lawyers have
to study
the coutume de Normandie, and to plead in a for e'agns language.te
defective,
The effects of the preservation of the old w
are not so fatal as those which result from h ,
however
con-
tinued use of the language of the conquered colony. By
strengthening national prejudices and enmities, it makes the
line of demarcation between the governors and the governed
more distinct, and causes an additional difficulty in producing
that gradual union and amalgamation which are so desirable."
He then asks if the Americans adopte
thcontrary, e languag
he ob-
e and
laws of their acquired states. On th
serves that " neither in respect to Louisiana nor Florida,
nor in the German part of Pennsylvania, is it thought ne-
eissary to make any exception—the English language is
that of the Constitution, the general government, and the
l imperceptiblylaws a
sense of community of interest and homogeneo feeling,
notwithstanding the great extent of the union, in which
the interests of the inhabitants are infinitely more various
and conflicting than are those of the C anad ians." The
nationality of the French C.nadians must, then, in the first
pl,ce be destroyed, and a system established without loss
of time by which all hope of possible success from insur-
Tection shall be destroyed. Let us open to English settlers
the means of acquiring property, and we shall soon see
ourselves relieved from the necessity of governing Canada
Guards.--Morning
by the Horse Guards. Chronicle.

The statement that her Majesty had written an auto-
grlysh letter, requesting Lord Durham to remain in
Canada, after a tbrtnight's unchecked circulation in this
country subsequent- to its importation from Quebec, re-