The Sun.
London, England, 1831-06-27 00:00:00

on this subject is absolutely worthless: All men love
power ; and we all know that the licensiag systeM was tip;
main-stay of the rural tyrants of tbgland.—korning
Chronicle.

Sir Robert Peel seems to be very much in the situation
of the person described in the old adage, who, in endea-
vouring to sit upon two stools, retained a permanent seat
upon neither ; or, in other words, hike trying to please
ill parties, he eucceeds littatisl'YPht none. The Right Hon.
Ex-Secretary's iiileettlt on the first day of the present
Session it'd this description—his partisans complain of it
,9 ts trimming speech, wanting etergy and decision, and
leaving a Mew penits.ntite, should the speaker find it con-
venient hertal'ter to adopt the principle Which be now re-
pudiates ; while his opponents condemn it as couched in a
qrain of insidious Candder, Which, like a poist ned arrow,
wounds more deqy and incurably than the stoutest
weapon 'Aurled in open warfare. The truth we believe to
he this, that Sir Robert Peel, with a personal integrity
totally unassailable, possesses a mind ortio gieat calibre,
or stored with any ets-Aordilitary share of statesmanlike
qualitiesa. As a Ittiblic mln lie has been at all times,
Ind tnt &il subjects, behind the age—not as a statesman
,hn d he, in advance of it, ready to prompt and take the
lead in all measures essential to genera! it'api-oVement and
public welfare. At the tun tithe, with a mind slow to
foresee or to tatZ-Z-St what the spirit of the age may call
for, Wobert Peel has too much honesty not to be open
to conviction—an amiable weakness, if we may so call it,
which exposes its possessor to continual charges of ter-
giversation. while, after eil!
"The heart News il'anest, though the head was weak."
Having said this, we would not by any means wish to
disseroble our conviction that there are a host of persons
who think more favourably of Sir R. Peel's political ta-
lents and character than we (1'.•:, and with whom the in-
fluence of that character, if not unbounded, is at least con-
siderable. taut, the greater weight a man's character poa-
sensts in the political world, the snore strongly is he calltd
upon not to trifle with it—still less with those who repose
in him their confidence, soil (-cosign to him their interests.
These, especially, ate hot times when public mete can be
allowed to bills-. The excellent ad' ice of the poet—
" Resolve not quick, but, ohre resolved, be strong"—
ought to be engraven oh the mind of every man who
seeks to serve his country in a high public station. In
Sir Robert Peel's instance such has not been the case.
On the great question of Reform his mind seems vi-
brating ; and we should not ourselVes at all wonder,
after all, to see the Right Hon. Baronet yielding to the
current of pullic bliinion, and falling in with that spirit of
the ads, of which, with a little more foresight, he
Might have been the distinguished leader. At present,
however, he vacillates on the edge of a dangerous preci-
pice. To be "every thing by turns, but nothing long,"
is an awkward predicament for any public man to place
himself in. We do not say that such is literally the case
With Sir Robert Peel ; but, looking both at the past and
at the present, we should say that such an imputation is
treading fast upon the heels of his political career.—
Morning Herald.

The Noble Mover of the Reform Bill, in the course of
his speech on Friday last, very properly attempted to pal-
liate some small irregularities of his colleagues' youthful
and new Constitution. That modern charter contains
indeed a certain schedule D, whose merit is extranely
mysterious. In last March our Ministers, viewing with
unprejudiced eyes their mere carte-blanche of an English
constituency, did accordingly with that tremendous scythe
schedule A, mow to the ground sixty ancient boroughs,
and afterwards with that formidable sickle schedule B,
severed by the middle forty-seven more. How did they
proceed to divide the precious spoil of 167 disposable seats
which had been earned? As they had before constructed
two schedules marked A and B, for total or partial destruc-

tion, they next set up two other schedules, C and D, for
entire and for imperfect creation ; certain new towns
were thus set down for two Members, and certain other
new towns only for one. Now in the list of towns half
enfranchised we find some well-known names, Halifax and
Macclesfield, and Bradford and Blackburn. " How
long," we are weary of asking, " how long will Bradford,
with fifty-two thousand inhabitants, return contentedly
one Member, while Mahon has two Members with four
thousand and five ? How long will Blackburn, with
fifty-three thousand souls, patiently enjoy one half of
Westbury's privileges?" Is it not a singular provision of
the Bill, that as towns rise in the scale of population from
two to our thousand, the single franchise should be hap-
pily doubled ; but that when they reach ten thousand,
and expect three Members at least, they should be reduced
for their increased numbers to the original pittance of one
representative ; that thus, on some hidtbn principle of the
new system, one Member should be good for towns with
two thousand inhabitants, two should he required by bo-
roughs of four thousand souls, but one representative
should be sufficient and wholesome for tens, twenties, and
even fifty thousands of citizens? But, " Oh," said Lord
John Russell on Friday, " it is too bad that you, who de-
fend the irregularities of the old system, should attack the
anomalies which we have thought fit to create." The
foundation of our system, we answer, is establishment,
which admits inequalities. The principle of yours is equa-
lization, which contradicts them. " But," again said the
Noble Lord, rather hard pushed, " You would not your-
selves give more representatives to the fifty thousand inha-
bitantsof Blackburn than to the five thousand of Tavistock."
Certainly not; but we would not give irss. We would
allow to all towns the established peaceful measure of two
representatives. If we did break the rule, if we wished to
create an anomaly, we should not call upon Parliament to
pass a proscriptive enactment for one or two yeirs (it
could not last longer) against those particular towns n Melt
are nearest to the summit of population and wealth. But
perhaps this exception in the Bill was unavoidable. The
numbers of the House may have been filled up, the horn
of enfranchisement emptied. Not so ; sixty Members
had been struck off altogether from the Parliamentary roll.
The utmost allowance, however, may have been granted
to this particular class, to the citizens of the new boroughs.
It is curious that not even this ground can be alleged for
giving to Halifax and Macclesfield half of a franchise a
piece. For how does the Bill apportion the forty-three
Members which it accords to towns of new growth ?
Eight Members were bestowed on four purlieus of Lon-
don, whose elective excellence was hidden from all
eyes as in a ki n e of Golconda. Now certainly if
Ely-rents and Retherhithe had been allowed to join
with London and Souihwark in the respective elections
of Alderman Waithman and Mr. W. Brougham, all the
would would have been satisfied. If they had been passed over

.•
by the Bill altogether, none but Mr. Hume, we believe,
would have found out the omission. The eight proposed
cockney Members then are eight supernumeraries; but as
there are semi-boroughs, so there are semi-cockneys in the
new Constitution, yet we should scarcely miss in the Re-
formed House of Commons the representatives of the
bathing and aperient interest•, the Members for Brighton
and Cheltenham. We will not quarrel with the two
Members for Devonport—our old friend Plymouth-dock
with a new name—because, although Purtsea is by the
Bill united with Portsmouth, we rejoice when Whig
Mi-
nisters constt net Treasury boroughs fur their Tory suc-
cessors; but we must once more suggest to our tulrrs
that Gateshead is a portion of Newcastle, and that
South Shields and Tynemouth, which they have sepa-
rated, are but one town. Every one too has heard of
the iron district in Staffordshire. For a tract of ten
miles, from Wolverhampton to Birmingham, you see
the earth covered with furnaces and forges, cinders
and scoria, the sky lowering with smoke by day, by
night with the manufacturing glare. Certainly, if at one
extremity Wolverhampton he enfranchised, and Birming-
ham at the other, we should not require that the casual
assemblages of Dudley on the right hand, and Walsall on
the left, should send two more delegates of iron from this
inland and somewhat radical Lemnos. Striking oft, then,
those parishes which should not have been set down, and
those which should have been more simply arranged, we
find that whereas forty-three Members are by the Bill laid
out in schedules which would leave nineteen half boroughs
in a state of just discontent, forty-two Members may be
so allotted as that every one of these towns which has a
shadow of claim shall be made a whole borough at once.
The one-membered schedule D must be put aside therefore;
whatever the cry for the "-whole. Bill," Halifax and Mac-
clesfield must each have two Members at once. Artificial
anomalies should have been sought elsewhere of a more
durable pattern, if indeed they were required at all, fur the
imitative embellishment of our new Constitution.—Morn-
ing Post.

A WITTY BUTCHER.—During the late elec-
tion at Stamford, a violent Tory went into the shop of a
Whig butcher. " What is our pleasure?" demanded
the knight of the cleaver. " I want a calf's head," was
the reply. The butcher, having two, inquired of his
Tory customer which he would prefer—a Tory one or a
Whig one? " A Tory one, to he sure," rejoined the
purchaser. " Very well, Sir, I'll send it home for you."
When the cook proc,edcd to dress it, the brains were
missing, and the master was speedily made acquainted
with the circumstance, when he returned to the butcher's,
and indignantly inquired of him what bad become of
them. , " Are you not aware, Sir," replied Cleaver,
" that Tory heads do not contain brains? And did you
not choose a Tory calf's head in preference to a Whig one."