The Sun.
London, England, 1849-02-02 00:00:00

tt

LONDON, FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1849.

The reinvigorating effects of an interval of repose
have been already evidenced by the brilliant discus-
sions which took place last evening in either House
of Parliament. In the course of those discussions,
both the Government and the Opposition displayed
an amount of energy that speaks well for the in-
fluence of the late vacation. In the Lords, as well
as in the Commons, the concussions of a preliminary
debate upon the Address in answer to the Speech
from the Throne, evoked sparks of wit and scintilla-
tions of oratorical genius worthy of the rhetorical ap-
titude and the practised statesmanship of the National
Legislature. The inaugurative assemblage of our repre-
sentatives, whether popular or hereditary, was produc-
tive, it will be observed, of something more than mere
official formalities and state ceremonials. Immediately
after the answer to the Royal Address had been
proposed by Lord BRUCE, and seconded by Lord
BATEMAN, several of the most conspicuous Peers
commented in terms of unusual earnestness upon
the language placed by the Cabinet upon the lips
of the SOVEREIGN. The same laudable determination
to criticise the policy of her MAJESTY'S Advisers
was evinced with correspondent enthusiasm in the
Lower Chamber of Parliament, after a similar docu-
ment had been proposed by Lord HARRY VANE, and
seconded by Mr. EDWARD HERBERT BUNBURY.
By reference to these two important discussions, it
will be observed that the Ministerial majorities

,hrough which the customary amendments were re-

jetted, amounted in the Lords to a minimum
of 2, and in the Commons to a maximum.
of 188. As was inevitable .under the circum-
stances, the different speakers indulged in allusions of
a very discursive character, constituting altogether a
comprehensive retrospect of the events which have
lately transpired in the United Kingdom and on the
European Continent.

Amidst all the orators, however, who last night
claimed the attention of Parliament, two of them
were, in a peculiar degree, conspicuous for that gal-
lantry of bearing and for that felicity of eloquence
which, more than any other qualities, tend directly to
the enhancement of the reputation of a senator.
Lord STANLEY, among our hereditary legislators,
and Mr. DISRAELI, among our popular representa-
tives, simultaneously entered the lists, their vizors
raised, their lances in rest, the
preux chevaliers
and the last champions of the ancient Op-
position—the Opposition of the Conservative
Protectionists. There is instinctively in the
hearts of Englishmen a sympathy for the valour
which survives misfortune, and for that truest and
noblest knightho'od of all, the knighthood which re-
mains erect and dauntless in the last agonies of an
accumulated and overwhelming
adversity. Such
sympathy—a sympathy inspired by admiration—will
undoubtedly be accorded to the leaders of the dimi-
nished phalanx of Monopoly, for to the last they are
unshorn of dignity, to the last they disdain submis-
sion, to the last they fight, back to back, under the
shadow of their old banners, with a pertinacity that
extorts respect and a courage that almost amounts to
the sublimity of a Forlorn Hope. It was with a tone
of manly gentleness that the Honourable Representa-
tive of the county of Buckinghamshire paid the tribute
of his loyal and unaffected friendship to the memory
of his deceased Leader, and it was with a conscious-
ness of his own eminent superiority that he assumed
to himself, as the right at once of his genius and of
his intimacy, the rank previously occupied by the
dead Patrician. On the very first evening of the re-
assembling of Parliament Mr. DISRAELI stood for-
ward in the van of the Agricultural Party, as its in-
tellectual and political Commander in the Commons,
while his brother-Oppositionist, Lord STANLEY, as-
sailed with congenial energy those flanks of the
Administration which were exposed to his attacks
in the House of Peers. It was possibly from the
goading consideration that yesterday witnessed the full
introduction of Free Trade,
as much as from the cir-
cumstance of its being the first day of the Parlia-
mentary session, that the two brilliant orators of
Protection—the Lolod and the Gawaine of our na-
tional conclave—found themselves impelled to ad-
vance at once against the formidable ranks of the
Government. Whatever the impulse, the speeches
as well as diversified
elicited by that impulse from the Leaders of the Op-
position were happily inaugurative of a political
campaign, adorned by genius,
by excitement. Last evening, moreover, was cha-
racterized by an equally adventurous spirit on the
part of more Nobles and Members, than the
prominent debaters already mentioned. In
one House were audible the voices of Lord
BROUGHAM and of the Marquis of LANSDOWNE, of
the Earls of YARBOROUGH and FITZWILLIAM, of
Lord BEAUMONT, and of the Dukes of ARGYLE,
of RICHMOND, and of WELLINGTON. In the other
the discussion was embellished by the various abili-
ties of Mr. GRA.TTAN, Mr. FAGAN, and Mr. JOHN
O'CONNELL, of Mr. ROCHE, Mr. HERBERT, and Mr.
HUME, of Mr. STAFFORD, who carried its adjourn-
ment, and of the Prime Minister, who delivered
an elaborate vindication of himself and his coad-
jutors. One expression in the remarks of
Lord JOHN
RUSSELL sounded to our ears ra-
ther derogatory to his position as a magnanimous
and consistent statesman, we mean that petulant
sneer at M. DE LAMARTINE, now out of office, and for
the time being stripped of hisautwhhoreintyo,novfetshteadt great
with
administrator who was mentioned in syllables of pa-
negyrics by the very same lips
the popularity of thirty millions, he wielded an
almost imperial power over Republican France.
There was a degree of indelicacy, not to say of weak-
ness and inconsistency, in the words uttered last
night by the First Lord of the Treasury, When, re-
ferring to the celebrated circular of the Fo-
reign Minister of February, he sneered at " its
jargon about assisting struggling nationalities,"