The Sun.
London, England, 1831-05-20 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

Although the opinions of independent men' are
made up as to the necessity of preserving entire the
two great principles of the measure of Reform,—
viz. the demolition of rotten boroughs, and the ex-
tension of the elective franchise, as well as of tht
right of being represented to large communities rind
classes of property, which are now excluded Iron,
both, there is, we see, some discussion going on with
respect to one or two points of qualification. 1.
Proprietors of land let Out on building or other
leases, whose tenants can vote, while they,
itk,
landlords, are disqualified by the mere fact that tde,r
tenants derive a qualification from the same pre-
mises. At this rate, Mr. Coke, of Norfolk, or Sr;
Francis Bardett might have thousands of voters or,
their property, withou, beingthemsele es recognized
IT
as electors. This is a manifest error in the wording
of the Bill ; from ncting too pedantically upon the
principle,—in itself most salutary,—that two qualifi-
cations shall not be founded on one and the same
portion of an estate. A remedy may, we humbly
conceive,
be easily provided for so obvious an inad-
vertency in the Bill. 2. Many persons are
disposed to think, that when not only free-
ho!ders and copyholders of 10/. per annum.'
but leaseholders for a term of 21 years, paying
50/. per annum, are destined to exercise the right
of voting in court. ies, the disqualification of tenants
at will, no matter how extensive or valuable may be
the premises which they occupy, is a defect in the
measure which cught at once to be corrected. On
the face .of things, undoubtedly, it appears harsh,
nay capricious, to refuse the franchise to a lease-
holder of 500 acres, at a rent of 6001. or 8001. per
annum, while the occupant of 50 acres, at a tenth
of the sum, can show himself manfully at the
hustings. Yet are we decided in our belief that no
tenant ouglat to be a voter, in respect of any pre-
mises from which he may be ejected at the arbitrary
will of another individual. A 50/. leaseholder for
twenty. one years is secure of his holding for what-
ever portion of his teim may remain unexpired. He
may therefore vote for whom he pleases, and against
his landlord's wishes, with impunity. He is an
dependent man, and as such possesses the first at-
tribute of a useful elector. But is that the case with
a tenant from year to year, or, what has just the same
meaning, with a tenant-at-will, in any part of Eng-
land ?. Is any tenant at the will of his landlord
an independent man? It matters little that we
are told of the great responsibility of the man who
pays a rent of 5001. per annum. It is of no moment
that you assure us of the well-known fact that
several great estates are parcelled out to yearly
tenants; and that the occupants at the present day
are descendants of those who tilled or pastured the
same farms from the early part of the 18th century.
We are aware of the fact; but what does it amount
to ? Why, that the tenants in question, haVing no
qualification to vote, did nothing to excite the resent-
ment of their landlords, and therefore have lived
long and contentedly under them, on the single
condition of paying their rent when called for. But
give them votes, and what will happen ? Every
man of them will be a slave, and the tenant of 500
acres a more servile slave than any other, as having
the most beneficial interest in the land, aed therefore
more reason to dread his landlord's displeasure.
Suppose the voters of Newark and of Stamford had
held their premises for long and definite terms,
could the enlightened Duke and the generous Mar-
quis have visited their vengeance upon the muti-
nous tenants with any effect worth complaining
of ? When the Duke of Newcastle talked about
` his own" property, he meant to describe as
part and parcel of that property the consciences
of the Newark voters, and treated the un-
fortunate people accordingly, in a way which
is pretty notorious. Now it is because we
object to see any Englishman invested with a right
which he cannot exercise honestly without the risk
of ruin, and which he therefore may be tempted to
exercise in violation of his integrity, that he may
save himself and family from ruin ;—it is for that
reason we wholly dissect from the wish expressed
by many worthy individuals, that the qualifications
proposed by the Bill should be enlarged so as to
embrace the tenants at will, on the pretence of an
analogy, which really does not exist, between them
and other classes of their fellow-subjects. In that
respect at least, we are desirous that the measure
may remain unchanged. It will be seen that Lord
Milton keeps a-head of Mr. Cartwright in North-
amptonshire, though the laurels of the Reformers in
that county are few and far between. The names
of the non-residents who have not yet voted ought
to be printed in a separate list, that such lukewarm
patriots may receive from their countrymen that re
c tliar species of respect . and consideration whic-h
they have so jus ly earned. We lately alluded to
the anticipated result of the Scotch elections in fa-
vour of Reform, and now find that in one or
two instances, such as that of Admiral Fleming
for Stirling, we were disappointed. The excite-
ment in Scotland is greater than in England, be-
cause the Reform Bill will create a more important
change in the constituency of that part of the United
Kingdom than in that of this; but for the same
reason tie people have the less power in the choice
of those who are now by courtesy to be called their
- representatives. This was seen at the election for
Lanark, where some 75 landed or paper freeholders
disposed of the electoral privileges of a large county ;
and a similar scene was expected to take place at
Ayr, the election of which was Gxed for Wednesday
last. Mr. Oswald, a grand nephew of the Com-
missioner Oswald, contests that county with the
Tory Member, and the violence of the Anti-Reform
party is so excessive as to threaten some violent out-
rage. It is even said in a letter, which we have
seen, from that quarter, that the Tories would re-
joice in some disturbance or bloodshed, which was
calculated to fix a stigma on the cause which they
now feel themselves unable to arrest. The ad-
mirable good sense and intelligence of the people i
which defeated a similar plot, and resisted a similar
provocation at Stirling, will, however, it is to be
hoped, prevail over their enemies in this instance
also.—Times.

A Morning Paper has laid down, in a tone of
dogmatic authority, what it would have the public
receive as the application of international law to
the case of the Polish General ])wernicki and the
Austrian authorities. Its arguments are founded
upon the alleged facts of the case as given in the
German Papers, where, if a man looks for truth upon
Polish affairs, he will betray an egregious simplicity,
touchiag the ingenious process by which those
journals of despotism set about illuminating the
world, whenever freedom and oppression, civiliza-
tion and barbarism, are struggling for the mastery.
But let uc, for the present, take the facts in the
German Papers as correct : let us suppose that
General Dw'ernicki, with his gallant little band, was
compelled to seek protection on the Austrian terri-
tories from an overwhelming force of Russians ;
and we think it is not difficult to show that, from
right Premises, the journal in question has drawn a
Wrong conclusion. The question is, had the Aus-
trian authorities, in that case, a right, not only to
disarm the Poles, but to deliver. up their arms and
all their materiel to the Russians? The Paper alluded
to says they have that right, and proceeds to estub!ish
its assertion
supona ea principle and precedent. The
principle is
Austria can only catnau'sd:—"ln the first place
aeknto eir the Poles (till their
independence is
Czassr,eated) as the rebel-
lious subjects of the
are Russian
indebted
to him for their arms, which
declared enemies proper 7 y
or, in the second place, as
Russia, whose arms must have become Ire"; iteostit,':
Russian Generals had not Austria offered
asylum. In either case the Russian authorititcsern an
have been entitled to the Polish arms, and, therefore,
the conduct of Austria in surrendering them cannot
be regarded as any indication of hostility or any
breach of the laws of neutrality." The first of these
suppositions we meet by stating that it is that sort
.of vicious argument which, by proving too much,
proves nothing. It is not pretended that the Aus-
trians would not have violated the principle of nett-

trality if they had delivered up the Poles themselves
to the Russians, anti yet the reasost here given as a.
justification for the delivering up the arms of the men
who placed themselves under the proteCtion of the
hospitality of the Austrians would equally justify-
the latter in handing over to their enemies—or, as
the paper in question has it, " their old masters"—
rhe men who bore those arms. If, because the Poles
are rebels to the Czar, their arms belong to him,
so do their persons--they are like all the subjects
of his empire, the slaves of the Autocrat, who, if he
has carted the system of grinding exaction and
atrocious oppression to such lengths among Polish
-laves that human nature could endure it no longer
—is he not justified, like a West India planter, or a
ferny boroughmouger, in saying to the world,
" Have I not a right to do what I like with mine
' own ?" Austria says " Yes," and returns him the
arms of the " Polish rebels," as being his property,
lie has a right to say, on the same principle, " De-
liver me up my slaves also." But the fact is, the
Poles, if rebels to any authority, are not rebels to
the Czar—the Czar has nothing to do wi h Poland,
and has not had since the treaty of Vienna, in 1815,
which erected the Duchy of Warsaw into an inde-
pendent kingdom, of which the reigning Emperor
of Russia was to be King; and which he was to
govern by a charter, and liters totally distinct From
rhose of Russia, which he has wantonly broken and
destroyed, and thereby dissolved the allegiance of
the Poles to him, as King of Poland ; for they never
owed him any allegiance as Czar or Emperor of
Russia—nor, because the individual who was King
of Poland happened at the same time to be Em.
peror of Russia, were the Russians, therefore,
" the masters" of the Poles—they were then
fellow-subjects, having, indeed, less freedom
by the pesmission of their Autocrat than was
guaranteed to the Poles by the " Great Powers,"
who were contracting parties to the establishment of
their independence. Now let us look at the second
supposition, or that the Poles are to be regarded as
the declared enemies of the Russians, in which ease
their arms ought to be delivered up to them, because
hey would have become their booty by right of war,
if Austria had not offered them an asylum. We
have a similar objection to the argument here put as
we had to the former one. If the arms of the Poles
would have become the booty of the Russians by
the right of war, so would their persons have become
their prisoners; arid therefore, if the arms ought to
be delivered up to the pursuing Russians by the
Austrian authorities, so ought the disarmed Poles
themselves ? Is our contemporary prepared to assert
that, by delivering up the Polish soldiers who
sought an asylum on their territory, the Austrians
would not commit any violation of the principle of
neutrality ? If he is not prepared to go that length,
his argument is not worth a straw.—So much for
the principle. Let us now look at the precedents.
Our contemporary says, " When, in the end of
1826, the Portuguese Royalists took refuge in the
Spanish territory, the Constitutional Government
claimed their arensorrillery, and horses, and, though
great delays occurred in complying with the demand,
its justice was never disputed." We believe the
justice of it was so far disputed that the said arms,
horses, &c. never were given up. But we will, for
argument sake, allow they were. Is it a case in
point ? There the Constitutional Government was
the Government of Portugal, at least de facto—and
if it chose to ask for the arms of the refugees, with-
out claiming their persons, we presume it did so on
the ground that they were taken from the public
arsenals of Portugal, or purchased with the public
money. But what is the Government de facto of
Poland ? Not a Russian Government—not the
Government of the Czar, either in the capacity of
Emperor or King. It is a Government of the Poles
themselves. Where have the arms, &c. of Dwer-
nicki's corps been procured ? Not from the
arsenals of Russia—not purchased with Russian
money. Whatever of this military materiel has
not been purchased by the individuals using it
out of their own means belong to the kingdom
of Poland, and if delivered up to any authorities,
as their rightful owners, should have been deli-
vered up to the Government at Warsaw—the only
one which the kingdom of Poland now acknow-
ledges. As to the disarming of the Spanish pa.
triots on the French territory, it was an act of op.
pression exercised by power against misfortune, and
at all events, the French did not deliver up their
arms to the Spanish Government—nor did the
Prussians surrender the arms of the Russians who
took shelter in their territory to the Polish Govern-
ment, but allowed them to recross the frontiers armed
as they came. So there is neither argument nor
precedent for the act of predatory wrong which
Austria is said to have committed upon the brave
men,' who experienced upon her soil the gross vio-
lation of those rights of hospitality which even
savage communities respect. But the despatches of
General Dwernicki, give a totally different com-
plexion to the circumstances which led to his cross-
ing the Austrian frontiers. According to those
despatches, which we publish to-day, it will be seen
that the Polish General, opposed with troops
weakened by incessant fighting to the army of Ru-
diger, increased by numerous reinforcements, took
up a position with his front and right wing strongly
posted, and his rear close to the borders of Gallicia.
There the Russian General, having vainly manoeu-
vred for two days to dislodge him from his position,
had at last recourse to a violation of the Austrian
territory to get in his rear. Then, and not till then,
Dwernicki, who was opposed to force eight times
greater than his own, and who found that the Russ'
sians, to effect their design of attacking him on all
sides, had not respected the neutrality of the Aus-
trian dominions, crossed the frontier, where the
Russians continued to fire at him, though the Poles
did not, as he states, return a shot, until the Aus-
trian Commander caused the Russians to desist.
Thus it appears that the Russians were the original
violators of the Austrian territory, not to seek an
asylum, but to overpower an enemy, and the ques-
tion is, has Austria connived at the aggressive act
of the Russian General ? The event will show.—
Morning Herald.
If it be true that the frightful disease known as
the Indian cholera has advanced so far into the
north of Europe as Leipsic, there must be more than
sufficient ground for our urging again upon Govern-
ment, as we have heretofore done, the necessity of
the most active precautionary measures being used
to prevent, if possible, under the blessing of Pre-
vidence, its reaching our own shores. We would
hope, and have, indeed, no reason to doubt, but that
Government are silently and effectually doing all
that they can do to avert the threatened calamity.
But the danger we are exposed to is not a little
augmented by the difference of opinion which pre-
vails among medical men as to the fact of this
disease being contagious or not : some of them,
we understand, contending that it spreads itself
through the atmosphere as a malaria, and against
which, of course, no quarantine regulations can
provide. This may or may not be so. If on
this, or any other similar topic, we were to
wait till doctors cease to differ, half the human
race might fall martyrs to this and other such
visitations. The Government, therefore, we trust,
will steer clear of adopting the ci otchets, or
even the wisdom of medical professors, on this one
point of non-contagion. The safer course is to be-
lieve the contrary ; leaving to the non-contagionists
all the honours of victory, should they turn out to
be right. Blessed as we are with a sea-girt territory,
we are infinitely better provided with means to avert
this evil than any Continental States can be which
have to rely on a military force to form a sanatory
cordon. On the other hand, our immense mercantile
traffic, as well as our enlarged personal intercourse
with all parts of the Continent, it must be admitted,
in no small degree counterbalances this, and im-
poses a difficult but not the less indispensable duty,
oatrie)art of Government, to leave no precaution-'
means untried to avert so fearful a cal ,mity.—
mornzng Herald.
gained two on Lord Milton ore the day's At twelve o'clock yesterday 11.
cFar,twright had
adjournment took place at that time, OrnsaPc°coll'untAonf

Mr. Cartwiight's insisting on the right of the free.
men of the borough of Northampton to poll. A
subsequent account up to one o'clock rated Lord
Milton to be one a-head of Mr. Cerrwright on th,
day's poll: In Pembroke county, Mr. Greville
55 below Sir John Owen. A slight re-action has,
therefore, taken place in favour of Sir John Owen
The polling in Northamptonshire goes on now so
slowly, that it is evident few remain to be polled.
It is now thought by many that it is impossible foi
Mr. Cartwright to succeed against Lord Milton. It
will be seen that Lord Milton has published an ad-
dress on the subject of the calumnies circulated
against his Lordship and Lord Althorp. It is e
plain and manly statement. The personal questiot,
may now be considered 'as settled. The Standard
is endeavouring to console the Anti-Reformers for
their defeat in the elections, by attributing to them
all the eloquence that has been delivered. If they
can derive any consolation from an eloquence which
seems to have carried with it very little power of
persuasion, we have no objection to it. Reason
must have been as much against them as rhetoric
has been in their favour, if all this eloquence, aided
by the influence of powerful fainlies and parsons,
produced so little effect on the people of England.
We confess, however, we have no recollection of
any very brilliant specimen of eloquence of the Anti-
Reformers. The best and most sensible speaker
among them was old Mr. Bankes; but even Mr.
Baukes is hardly a Demosthenes. But our con-
temporary had in view, in this reference to the won-
derful eloquence of the Anti-Reformers, the display
of Mr. North at Drogheda :
" At the termination of the poll rsays our contem-
porary) Mr. North, happily the successful candidate, de-
livered a speech which will satisfy all who read it that the
importance of his introduction into Parliament cannot be
overrated. This speech has not been excelled by any that
the present contest has drawn forth, rich as the contest
has been in magnificent displays of eloquence on one side,
but on one side only. We say on one side only, and we
challenge the Morning Chronicle, Herald, Times, Globe,
and Courier, to deny that all the good speeches have been
on the side of the Anti-Revolutionists; and if they confess,
as confess they must, expressly or by silence, that such is
the fact, we will then invite them to explain why all the
eloquence is on one side, and ' all the talent' on ti.e other."
We have la'd this grand display of Mr. North
before our readers, who, we have no doubt, will
draw our conclusion, that this Mr. North abounds
in self-conceit, and speaks of better men than him-
self with a presumption absolutely ludicrous. This
Mr. North, who at most is a frothy spouter of com-
mon-place, and who never in his life delivered a
speech that rose above mediocrity, tells the electors
of Drogheda why he feels bound to oppose Mini-
sters :—" It is because I believe them (he says) to
be the most rash, the most ignorant, and the most Inca-
pable Administration that was evercalled upon to guide
the sceptre in the hands of a British Monarch. What
measures have they attempted to carry in which
they have not failed ? What plan or system of
politics—financial, foreign, or domestic—have they
not been obliged to abandon ? Without practical
experience, without solid information, without
Statesmanlike wisdom or discretion, they tottered on
from blunder to blunder; till they found themselves
obliged to rush upon the clamorous experiment
which they are now making, and which, in spite
of all their sanguine hopes, I confidently predict,
is yet destined to fail." If this mouther had re-
flected a moment on shat he was uttering, he
would not have charged Ministers with bringing
forward Reform as a last shift, when it is notorious as
the sun at noon-day that they made an extensive and
efficient Reform a condition of their acceptance of
office. They have not, indeed, so much practical ex-
perience as their opponents, for the best of all rea-
sons, because they are new to office ; but in the short
time in which they have been in office, they have done
what their opponents declared themselves unable
to do—they tranquillized England by legal and
constitutional means. They found England dis-
contented and a prey to outrage; and it is now con-
tented and tranquil. They have been but a short
time in office, and of that short time, the most has
been engrossed with that all-important question of
Reform; but in that short time the foundation has
already been laid for much good. We wish the
Anti-Reformers much joy of the eloquence of Mr.
North. The people of England are too cold in
their temperament to be seduced by this sort of de-
claration. However, it is but fair to suppose that
Mr. North will have more regard to the Assembly
to which he has been returned than to utter in it
such a trade as he thought good enough for his
Drogheda audience.—Morning Chronicle.
The Reform Bill of his Majesty's Ministers, if it
should ever pass into a law, will give rise to some
scenes of a nature never before exhibited in the
country, and the progress of which will certainly
dissipate the delusion that now enwraps the Mini-

sterial Reformers, dense and impenetrable as it is.
Let the gentry and freeholders of the counties of
England figure to themselves two or three Privy
Councillors, nominated by Earl Grey .arid Lord
Brougham, probably the Right Hon. J. Calcraft,
the new Member for Dorsetshire, who has so highly
distinguished himself upon the Reform question and
other matters, together with Mr. Wellesley, the
new Member for Essex, another character equally
distinguished, and perhaps Mr. D. W. Harvey, the
celebrated Member for Colchester, the two latter
having previously been created Privy Councillors
for the occasion—let the gentry and freeholders of
England, we say, figure to themselves these, or
three other equally worthy and respectable men,
visiting our counties in succession, in order to divide
them into convenient districts for the purpose of
representation, Let them imagine the great Whig '
landholders paying their Court to these three, or
any other three equally Right Hon. Commissioner,,
and whispering into their ears, " draw the line of
demarcation thus, or thus, and we, steadfast friends
as we are of the dynasty of Grey arid Brougham,
shall always be sure of our two Members, while we
shall have our fair chance at least with the other
gentlemen of the county, less devoted to that dy-
nasty than we are, in the division of the county on
the other side of our line." Of course persons so
eminently trustworthy and respectable in every point
of view, as the gentlemen we have mentioned,
would altogether disregard any suggestion of
this nature; but yet, when the scene comes really
to be acted, as if the Bill should pass it must,
perhaps the spectators will upon the whole M-
I cline to the opinion that it would have been as
well not to expose such Right Honourable per-
sons to such improper solicitation. It must no
doubt be conceded that Earl Grey and Lord
Brougham are the very last persons in the world to
sanction any partiality on the part of their Com-
missioners; but yet, when the scene comes really
to be acted, the spectator may begin to think that
upon the whole it might have been as well not to
expose those eminent persons to a temptation so
strong as that of securing to their party, pertna-
newly and indefeasibly, no less than thirty-four
county seats in the House of Commons. Again,
with respect to the eighty-five boroughs, the con-
stituency of which, according to the Bill, will
have to be patched up from some adjacent dis-
trict, a Commission of the Privy Council, to be
appointed by Ministers, will also be called into
play ; and who more fit, we 1)g to ask, for the
task, than the three Right Honourable Gentlemen
whom we have already supposed to have distin-
guished themselves by their stern and inflexible
integrity in the division of the counties ? We
should have implicit faith of course in the impar-
tiality arid rectitude of these or of any other persons
whom honest and high-minded statesmen like Earl
Grey and Lord Brougham might appoint. But still,
when the scene comes really to be acted, and when
one hundred and seventy votes in the House of
Commons, not for one Parliament, but for a long
arid indefinite succession of Parliaments, are to be
gained er lost to the Ministerial, that is to the
Whig party, by Vie manner in which it is acted
suspicions may undoubtedly arise, among the more
illiberal class of s?ectators, that it is not acted
quite fairly. And surely it would be a grievous
pity that Ministers so immaculate as Earl Grey

and Lo'd Brougham, or that their equally imma-
culate Commissioners—to wit, the Right Hon. J.
Calcraft, Mr. Wellesley, and Mr. D. W. Harvey—
for something whispers us that these will certainly
be the men—should he exposed even for a moment
to injurious suspicions. This Privy Council part of
the affair at least, we suppose, will be abandoned,
unless perchance it involves one of the principles of
the Bill, which can on no account admit of modifica-
tion. Sir C. Knightley, one of the Anti-Reform
candidates for Northamptonshire, places the subject
)f the Privy Council Commissioners in this, which,
with all our friendship for Sir Charles, we must
call very unfair point of view. " Now," says the
worthy Baronet, " suppose a borough happened to
lie half way between my estates and Earl Spencer's,
is it not easy to suppose which way the Commis-
sioners would go to make up the number of voters ?"
Really this is too bad. How could Sir Charle,
th'nk of comparing his estates or his tenants—he at;
Anti-Reform Candidate, opposing the Chancellor of
the Exchequer at an election—with the estates and
the tenants of the Chancellor• of the Exchequer's
father ? How could he be so extravagant as to
imagine that the Commissioners ought to hesitate
fee an instant in a cast: so clear? Why it is plain,
,o unreasonable are Tories in their expectations, that
he will not be satisfied with the appointment a•
Commissioners of men merely of unblemished ho•
nour and incorruptible integrity, such, for example,
as Messrs. Calcraft, Wellesley, arid Harvey, but
that he expects Ministers to find for this office per-
fect Quixotes of political impartiality. Does not
the Hon. Baronet perceive, that if Ministers and
their select Commissioners are to act upon his ab-
surd notion of impartiality, they might just as well
give up the whole of this part, supposed by many
persons to be the favourite, the most indispensible,
the really essential part of their measure of Reform ?
—Morning Post.