The Sun.
London, England, 1838-12-12 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALb.

The malignant interest shown by Russia in the Canadian
insurrection is not confined to the remote posts of New
Archangel, or the banquet-contributions of Admiral Kup-
reseman, r, hich have been mentioned in the French Papers,
and in the Times of yesterday. We have the best means
of knowing that direct overtures have been made by a
Russsian agent in New York, under the disguise of a
Polish refugee, to the Poles in this country. Money was
lavishly offered to convey recruits to the frontier, and to
equip them in the United States. The party of the Ca-
nadian patriots was insidiously identified with those sacred
rights of national independence which have more claim
than any mercenary cause upon the sword of a Polish sol-
dier. Fortunately, the character of the agent was not un-
known to the Poles in England, and their good sense and
proper feeling led them to reject with contempt proposals
evidently suggested by the desire of embarrassing the Bri-
tish Government in North America on the one hand, and
of rendering the Polish cause unpopular in England on the
other.—Times.

The Standard of Monday evening contains a paragraph
which we presume it means to pass off for a contradiction
of the article in the Morning Chronicle of Thursday last,
pointing out the gross mis-statements of the Flag Officer's
pamphlet. The Standard first asserts that we limited the
effective strength of the French marine to eleven ships of
the line. No such statement appears in our article. We
fully admit the convenience of the course adopted by our
Contemporary, of first putting into the mouth of its oppo
nent the sentence which it is intended to contradict ; bu
our readers will probably entertain the same opinion a:.
ourselves of its fairness. Now for the contradictions. The
Standard professes to have ascertained that the Flag
Officer's list of the French ships of the line, in " commission
or ready for it," " has been copied from the French official
return." Will our Contemporary condescend to particulars,
and tell us what return is here referred to? We did not
say that the ships enumerated by the Flag Officer as " now
in commission or ready for it," never appeared in a Frencl,
navy list, but we did say, and we repeat it, that several
them have ceased to exist. We wrote, and are writing now,
with the last French official return before us ; and we def 3
our Contemporary, or the Flag Officer, to show that ans
of the number which we asserted to have been broken up,
burnt, or lost, are now in existence, or that any of ;the
number that we stated to be " hulks" or " building," are,
as affirmed by the Flag Officer, " ready for commission."
The Standard next relies on a supposed statement made by
the Secretary of the Admiralty in 1836, that " nest summer
(1837) France would have in active service 28 sail of the
line. We were somewhat suspicious when we found
a reference as to what passed in the House of Commons in
a pamphlet by a naval officer. We have since taken the
trouble of referring to the more authentic records of de-
bates in Parliament. In the " Mirror of Parliament,"
which contains the fullest account of the debate, we find
what we have no doubt Mr. Wood really did say :
" From the best information we have, I believe France will
have twelve ships of the line at sea next summer." The
Courier, we observe, represents Mr. Wood to have said
twenty-eight ships afloat—but in not one of the reports of
the speech can we find the expression of " twenty-eight sail
of the line in active service." The next time our Con-
temporary bids us reconcile contradictory statements, we
hope it will, at least, quote them correctly.—Morniug
Chronicle.
A junta of persons calling themselves the' Committee of
the Loyal and Constitutional Association of Birmingham,"
have taken it into their heads to get up a gastronomic ex-
hibition in the " Midland Metropolis," on the 18th instant.
We presume that no one can be at a loss to understand the
objects contemplated by the intended feed. The affair has
its origin in a desire to make a grand Conservative demon
stration in a place which has long enjoyed the distinction of
being the stronghold of Radicalism. We shall keep our
eyes on it, and shall not fail duly to report to our readers,
when " the great, the important day" has arrived, how the
affair comes off. Among the personages of greater •r less
note who are to feed and figure on this occasion, there
is one whose exhibitions are likely to attract peculiar
attention—Sir Francis Burdett is to be there. In an-
swer to an invitation sent him in the name of the
Committee, by a person calling himself " Edward Arm-
field," and dated from a place with the outlandish
name of " Edgbastou ;" in answer to this invitation,
the apostate Baronet " loses not a moment" in informing
the " loyal and constitutional men of Birmingham"—in
other words, the Tories of that town—that he will " make
•ne" amongst them on the 18th inst. But the epistle alto-
gether is too great a curiosity to be lost. Here, therefore,
it is :—" 1 lose not a moment in replying to yours of the
30th, just put into my hand, for an early acknowledgment
of it may be useful and satisfactory to you and the object
you had in view in writing it. I accept, Sir, not reluc-
tantly, but most cordially and cheerfully, the invitation you
have done me the honour to transmit, and proud of being
called upon to co-operate with every class of my country-
men honestly attached to the civil and religious liberties of
England, who, with sense enough to comprehend, and con-
sequently, to justly estimate its glorious and unrivalled insti-
tutions in Church and State—its well-balanced powers, or-
ders, and degrees, all verging to one point—true liberty—and
'having been productive of a state of wealth, happiness, and
senown unparalleled in the history of the ancient, and un-
exampled in the present time, I am proud of being thought
worthy of being called upon at an hour of apprehended
danger to be aiding and uniting with the rest of my coun-
trymen who think as I do, to leave no exertion unemployed
in its defence, maugre the Pope, the Precursors, paid pa-
triot, and pretender. On the 18th I shall have the plea-
sure of making one amongst you at Birmingham " The
jumbling of words in this epistle exceeds anything we ever
switnessed. But leaving the words and coming to things,
wt' see confusion worse confounded. We have the " civil
and religious liberties of England"—" its glorious and un-
rivalled institutions in Church and State"—" its well-ba-
lanced cowers, orders, and degrees, all verging to one
point," and abundance of other jargon besides. We hope
the renegade :ejected of Westminster will treat the Bir-
xn*ham Tories iso similar nonsense, in return for the din-
ner to which they have invited him, and thus make them,
ss well as himself, the laughing-stocks of the whole coun-
try.—Morning Advertiser.
The question of opening the London Post-office on Sun-
days continues to engage the great share of public atten-
tion to which it is so well entitled. This measure we sin-
cerely hope, and no less confidently believe, will never be
adopted. We regret that suggestions favourable to it—sug-
ge'tions as crude and ill-considered as they are irreligious
—should have been hazarded before the Parliamentary
Committee by certain of the Post-office authorities, and can
by no means either condemn or deplore the strenuous and
.active opposition, the natural result of suggestions so mis-
chievous and impious, which we see preparing in many
most respectable and influential quarters against alterations
of the Post-office system, in themselves neither irreligious
nor inexpedient, were it not for the connection which some

- _
of the wiseacres of the Post-office have contrived to esta-
-- - -

Ilish in the public mind—between them- and a whole-
s Ile scheme of Sabbath desecration
thatin the metropolis.
does seem absurds
It certainlywhile the mail
coaches come into London every tnerning, and
leave it every Sunday night, all thetletbtenrdsay which they bring
in from every part of the country,
forward by forwarded through
London, instead of being sent oby the mail of that
night, should be locked up in London for
The twenty-four ad-
ditional hours to wait the Monday's mail. unequal
operation of this regulation is alone sufficientt
to prove its
a absurdity. For instance, a man living St. Albans,
whose relatives, friends, and other habitual correspondents
without
reside further north than himself, receives his letters
the least interruption on account of Sunday ; while his
next door neighbour, whose relations, friends, and other
habitual correspondents live beyond London to the south,
is compelled to submit
to a delay of twenty-four hours in
the of i
delivery letters whenever Sunday intervenes be-
tw,-'en the day of their
their. destination. If being posted and that of reaching
a man resides at Hounslow he
may write to his friend
or correspondent at Bath or Bris-
tol, or .anywhere in the west,
hislate on Saturday night, or at
any time on the Sunday, and letter will be conveyed by
the Sunday mail ; but tohisfrend or correspondent who
or Lincoln he has no
happens to reside at Northamptono In cases of urgency, how.
regular means of expediting
any communication between
Satu,rday night and Monday Ili
ever, irregular means can be found. Any
n of the western coach-
men who drive through liounslow,
it into the
' willfor a shilling
take charge of a letter, undertake t
hands of one of his brethren of the whipp who who drives
to the north, and, when the latter has
ia
Post-office at Barnet, it goes right away, just ast if it
the
not passed through London at all, or as if the i,otn- had
i
Post-office was not a barrier to inter-provincial oomrnu"
mication. All this to be sure seems very wretched work
when it is considered that the evil might be effectually
cured by the employment, on the Sunday morning, before
-.the hours of Divine Service, of a dozen or two of men at the
Wondon Post-office. Necessary or natural connection be-
tween the cure of this evil and the liberty of posting or re-
c -nving letters in London on the Sunday there is obviously
me, rye. The only connection that exists between the two
con, fists in the appehension which the Post-office authorities
have tooJishly excited, that the former might eventually
lead to' the latter. We think the well-meaning and religious
part of the community are fully justified in resisting to the
utmost, ally alteration in the Post-office system which will
require tl se employment of a single additional man on Sun-
days, until every ground of apprehension as to any design of
opening the Post-office on the Sabbath is completely re-
, , moved. Nor is it difficult to point out a very efficacious
ay ,d not only unobjectionable but highly meritorious
le of removing it. Let the Post-office be required by
rrio._
law t oipreserve the sanctity of the Sabbath in the counties
as wed
l as in the papital of England. Why should the