The Sun.
London, England, 1836-04-07 00:00:00

THE INQUISITION.

The following document is a pretty good specimen
of what the Spanish Inquisition was, and would be
again, if Don Carlos were restored:—
We/ the undersigned Inquisitors-General against here-
tical depravity and apostacy, to all our dependants,
familiars, and dfieiolvados, make known for tlseir satis-

faction :
That, occupying ourselves incessantly to check the evils
which the accursed spirit of the age is introclu'cil)g into do-
cile Spain against the necessary privileges of our Holy Tri-
bunal, we have at last discovered that a foreign commodity,
Felled knowledge (illustration), is the cause of all this in-
jury and scandal. It consists in a diabolical beverage,
which upsets received ideas, and causes those who unfor-
tunately happen to taste it, to deem themselves rational,
and consider us (oh, barbarism !) less wise and prudent
than we were formerly thought to be. Were this prejudi-
cial madness to spread, it might succed in destroying the
pious institution of the Holy Office ; unless we root out
such bad seeds by the sweet and efficacious remedy of per-
suasion, which the most sapient antiquity deposited in our
most pure and soft bands. Wishing therefore to revive the
happy times, when the sovereigns of the earth carried on
their royal shoulders the blessed wood that was to burn
those whom we declared heretics, and deserving of the
fire and flames in this and the other world, we deign, by
these present writings, to make wretched mortals hear our
voices, whilst the torture, the rack, and other bland instru-
ments are preparing, wherewithal we are accustomed to
divert the visitors of joyous and much frequented house.
Using, therefore, so holy and justly exercised power, we
ordain and command :
1. That the herb, called knowledge, be declared poison-
ous, indigestible (for Eo we hear our physicians say), and
illicit in traffic, and that its introduction and sale be prohi-
bited, under pain of the infractors being roasted two hours,
twenty minutes, and sixteen seconds in our blast furnace.
2. It is declared that all the progress foreigners are said to
have made by virtue of this poison, are solemn lies, deserv-
ing of vituperation ; for what is called the good administra-
tion of a state, the happiness of the people, and other trifles
of this kind, are witchcraft and snares of the Devil : so let
this be a guide to the good and well-disposed, and a terror
to the wicked.
3. To counteract the propagation of the use of the afore-
said poisonous knowledge, all books, of any kind or descrip-
tion, are in future prohibited, as involving the said herb.
There are excepted only the savoury and most discreet
History of Bertosir, and the most exemplary book of Rarc
Cases of Vices and Virtues, the diverting and most enter-
taininm work of the Cries from Hell, which are to serve as
text-books in the schools, that children, Ivhoi learning to
read, may become astute and wise, and be instructed in the
salutary fear which our parental authority ought to Inspire
in the faithful. _ _ _ _

4. It is declared as a general point, and as laid down by
authority and settled, that notwithstanding anything said
by four clowns and ignoramuses, that there have been, there
are, and ever will he, wizzards, witches, and enchanters, in
proof of which, though our word ought to be sufficient, we
ourselves have often discovered infinite charms and en-
chantments in the eyes and other parts of a pretty girl.
Nothing more need be said, for let every one lay his hands
on his own breast.

5. It is declared moreover, against the same slovenly
bachellors, that there exist whole armies of cats, who are
following the modest style of the preceding article, as we
shall prove by citing the Pepas, Manuelas, and Antonias,
whom more than four of the faithful of either sex have had
occasion to know, and who, by virtue of the aid of the
Devil, or aiding him themselves, have done things that
would appear impossible, had they not been seen and felt. ,
6. Females to be amenable to the Holy Tribunal for
any extravagance in their dress ; infractions of this article
to be punishable at the discretion of the Inquisitors, cor-
porally or otherwise.
7. Males, ditto.

8. Dancing prohibited.
9. We also forbid masquerades, for ever ; because, not-
withstanding our delicate tact, we ourselves might mistake
a cat for a hare on such occasions, and be deceived, which
is contrary to good manners, and productive of bad conse-
quences. If there should be, nevertheless, people so im-
pious as to countenance these prohibitions of the Holy
Tribunal, they shall, for the diversion of all the world, have
the penalty later scntentice ipso facto incurred or inflicted,
besides receiving our secret curses and chastisements.—
Amen. Amen.
10. As it appears to us that for the purpose of spread-
ing the poison called knowledge, certain persons styling
themselves modern philosophers, have formed a society,
known under the name of Propaganda, we declare as a
general point, in order to cheek so great an evil, we our-
selves shall propagate every thing we think worth propa-
gating ; and using our ultimate authority, we declare our-
selves the only and sole Propagandists, and are determined
to cut off from all others the means of further propagation.
Given in our Inquisitorial Hall, &c.
(Signed) DON SIGNUDIO PALLAZZA,
DON ROQUE APRETON.
By their command.
CARIUS TOLLENDUS,
Secretary of the Holy Office.
This pleasant quizzing of the Holy Inquisition is highly
amusing now ; but there Was a time when the mandates
of the Holy Office filled the whole Peninsula with terror,
and that time would.be sure to return should the Pretender
get the upper handin Spain, he having promised to restore
the Inquisition, and to carry on his own royal shoulders the
faggots upon which the Liberals of the Chamber of Peers
and Procuradores arc to be burnt, who voted his exclusion
from the throne and from Spain, in the Cortes ; blaming
his brother Ferdinand for not having revived it before, as
even some of the members of the Cadiz Cortes proposed.
The fear of its revival still predominates in most minds,
and will continue to haunt them till the Pretender shall be
put down for ever. Many citizens recollect that their
wives and daughters—even after the auto de le had ceased
—were snatched from their arms, and thrown into the
prisons of the Holy Office upon pretence of heresy, where
their bodies were polluted by the Inquisitors, without any
chance of redress—the parties theimelves not daring to di-
vulge their own disgrace. These arc sad and revolting
realities.
Though the Inquisition, and now even monkery itself is
abolished, the correspondent of a London Tory Morning
Paper (the Post), travelling the other day only from Lis-
bon to Madrid, fancied himself to have been put into the
Inquisition at Truxillo, where monks with lighted tapers
walked round him, bowed, and made faces at his heretic
person, of which he gave a dismal and incredible account
here. Having been suffered to proceed on his journey,
though not without being kept, as he imagined, under
the serveillance of the police, taking the passengers, who
happened to be his travelling companions in tie diligence,
for police °facers, and these perceiving his weakness,
humoured the joke. On his arrival at Madrid, Le made a
sad and doleful complaint of his sufferings, but Mr. Villiers
soon saw how he had been imposed upon, and comforted
the poor gentleman as well as he could.

RAILROADS IN AUsTRIA.—The iron railroad to
Galicia is to be commenced in April. It is hoped that it will
be completed as as far as Brunn in 18 months. The journey
from Vienna to Brunn, with post horses, now takes 15 hours ;.
then it will take only four hours. The dearness of provisions,
which has for some time past Leen much felt at Vienna, will
be remedied in proportion as the railroad is laid down, because
the supplies from Galicia will come more rapidly, and at less
expense, than they now do. It is true that it will be full five
years before the road can be finished. When we reflect that
potatoes cost in Galicia only one-third of what they do at
Vienna, and that all the productions of the sort are in the
same proportion, we can infer what advantage the capital will
derive from the railroad.—Alivemeine Zeitang, April 1.
Yesterday mornine., between nine and ten o'clock,
Mr. Webster, a gentleman residing in Charlotte-street, Port-
land-place, who had been for some days previous in a nervous
state of excitement, cut his threat in bed, and almost imme-
diately expired. Mrs. Webster, who had not left the room
many minutes, on returning with the breakfast she had pre-
, pared for Mr. Webster, discovered him weltering in his
blood. He had procured a razor during her temporary ab-
sence, though he was apparently asleep when she left the room.
• THE Housu FLY.—At the Entomological Society,
on Monday, a paper was read by the Secretary on excluding
the house fly. The mode adopted was a 'ie.:made of different
coloured meshes of about three-quarters of an inch square,
and which, when placed against a window, was found quite
effectual in excluding the visits of these troublesome insects
from the outside of the room. The same experiment was
tried with meshes made of the finest black thread, one inch
and a quarter square, which proved to be equally effectual.
The approach of wasps was also prevented by the above mode,
very few finding their way within the boundary. This was
accounted for by an optical illusion in the eyes of the insect,
of the highly magnifying power of vision, and the small focal
length.
On the 27th ult. a windmill at Pillorge, in the de-
partment of the Deux Sevres, was struck by lightning. The
electric fluid smote the arm to the East, broke it, and black-
ened it ; entered the mill, going through it in every three-
tion ; and then fell to the ground, where an explosion took
place that broke and destroyed the mill from top to bottom.
The door was thrown more than thirty paces against the wind,
and one of the sails, by the force of the wind and the electric
matter together, was thrown 200 paces from the ruins.—French
Paper.

bISCIPLINE OF TIIE FRENCH ARMY.—The
Courrier Francais says, that General Lallemand, in some
observations which he made upon a proposition relative to mili-
tary punishments, in the Chamber of Peers, has indirectly an-
swered the imputations of the Duke of Wellington against the
French army, and has shown that, so far from being badly dis-
ciplined, the greater number of the French soldiers return
home after their service without having received the slightest
reprimand.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS..

The late Tory Magistrates of Bristol may claim the
merit of having done all that they possibly could to de-
stroy the commerce of that city. With unrivalled fa-
cilities for the establishment of manufactures—with

coal, water, iron, and copper, with extensive means of
internal and coastwise communication—with the po-
pulation and markets of the whole of the west of
land, South Wales, and Ireland at its command—with
an easy access to the sea, and unrivalled facilities for
intercourse with foreign ports, Bristol seems destined
by nature to be what it long was, second only to Lon-
don as a great commercial emporium. By gross ft, is-
management the late authorities threw away all their
advantages, and not only suffered Liverpool to rise
far above it, (the duties collected in that town being
nearly four times the amount collected in Bristol,) but
actually, by their exec sive taxation, raised up in
Gloucester and Newport powerful rivals at its door.
The tonnage of Hull engaged in foreign trade now
exceeds that of Bristol by nearly 260 per cent., and
in 1835 the number of vessels clearing out of Newport,
exclusive of those sailing to ports in the Severn,
was 8,000, while the total number cleared out the
same year at Bristol was 4,246. The cause of the
dcdine of Bristol is involved in no mystery. From a

able including the principal articles of import, it ap-
pears tha: where London paid in local taxation 10s. 4d.
Liverpool 5d., Hull 7s. 3d., Gloucester 6s. 2d.,
Bristol would hue to pay 11., or, before a late redgc-
tion, 11. ss. sd. On some articles the difference be-
tween London-and 13rist6.1 was as 421. to 6141. In
1823 the Chamber of Corn:nerce memorialized the
Common Council for a ieduction the town-dues and
other municipal imposts, to which they chiefly as-
cribed the depression of the port, but the Corporation
turned a deaf ear to their application. And when,
some years afterwards, a reduction did take place, it;
failed to effect the object for which it was intended, be-
cause Bristol still paid far higher dues than any rival
ports. The trade declined, the population did not in-
crease in proportion to the rest of England ; but the
poor-rates in the city parishes in a few years in-
creased about 50 per cent. beyond the average in-
crease of England. So much for the doings of the late
Tory authorities of Bristol. But amidst all this decay,
the Corporation gave immense salaries to the mayor and
sheriffs, that they might be enabled to give sumptuous
dinners to aldermen and common councilmen. The
disgraceful conduct of the magistrates during the riots,
proved that, however pre-eminent in feasting, they were
destiilite of the qualities which fitted them for a due
discharge pf the duties of their situation. Toryism at3d
mismanagemeni, and decay of trade as its consequences,
being thus associated with the recent history of Bristol,
one should have thought that, after the late Municipal
Reform Act, the Tories would hardly have dared to
face the community they had so deeply injured. Dur-
ing their ascendancy they rigorously excluded all Re-
formers from the magistracy. Every alderman was a
Tory. When vacancies in the Corporation arose, they
were uniformly filled up by Tories. They went every
where for new members but to the respectable Refor-
mers of Bristol. At a dinner given to Lord Edward
Somerset, in January 1833, Alderman Daniel ob-
served, that " there were a few vacancies in the
Corporation, and he should be exceedingly grati-
fied if they were filled up by volunteers from the
present company, because he was persuaded that their
objects were to support the King and Constitution,"
and in due time Alderman Daniel read the names of
the Marquis of Worcester, Lord Ellenborough, Lord
Redesdale, Colonel Grxme, R. H. B. Hall, and Jos.
Neeld, Esq., M.P. The Corporation candidates for
the representation were always flaming Tories. In
short, abuse- of power was never' carried so far as by
the Tory Corporation of Bristol. But with proofs of
their mismanagement and inefficiency everywhere staring
them in the face, they are not ashamed to claim a right
to impose whom they please on his Majesty's Minis-
ters for Magistrates. Because Lord John Russell
did not, on their recommendation, name Alderman
Daniel to the Magistracy, Sir Richard Vyvyan ap-
plied language to his Lordship so inappropriate, that
even the Tory Members in the House were ashamed
of him ; and by universal confession of his own party,
the Cornish Baronet made himself supremely ridi-
culous. So apparently thought the Times, which was
prudently silent for some days with regard to Sir
Richard's achievement ; but at length, inordei not to
be outdone by its Tory allies, it now begins also to
trumpet forth the praises of the Honourable Ba-
ronet. What effrontery in the Tories, who di-
rectly or indirectly excluded all who were not of their
party from the magistracy, to complain because Lord
John Russell does not choose as a matter of cours,
to appoint every one to the magistracy whom they
commend ! At a meeting of Bristol Tories on the
2d instant, an address was voted to Alderman Daniel,

in which they declare that " when, by a most arbitrary
and wanton act of Ministerial power, the city finds
itself deprived of the services of the oldest, the moi
experienced, and the most respectable of its magistrates,
we, your brother citizens, indignant at the affront
which has been offered to you and to our city in your
person, are led by a strong feeling of what is clue to long
proved worth and excellence, to mark, by some public
expression, our sense of the enormity of' this proceed-
ing," &c. This is strange language applied to the act;
of a responsible Minister of the Crown ! Lord John
Russell consulted the town-councils, but he was not
more bound to attend to their suggestions than to sug-
gestions from any other quarter whatever. It was ne-
cessary that he himself should be satisfied with the
fitness of the appointment, because he was responsible
for it. It is a new reading of the Constitution, that
men should consider themselves affronted because
the Minister of the Crown, in his appointments,
does not blindly resign his judgment to them,
and become their tool. Lord John Russell naturally
thought that Alderman Daniel, having declined to fill
the office of Mayor on account of his age and infirmi-
ties, was not a proper person to be made a Magistrate ;
but if Alderman Daniel had been in the full vigour of
age, there is no reason why his Lordship should be
obliged to take him against his own judgment. Alder-
man Daniel might have great merits in the eyes of the
Tories, and vet not be a person whom a Reform Mini-
ster would choose to make a Magistrate. Upon the
same principle the Times, echoing the Bristol Tories,
exclaims, " the imputation of physical imbecility thus
ofFensively cast upon a [rentlaman whom age would
never have rendered unfit for the bench, if independence
had not made him unpopular in Downinp,--strect, is
indignantly rebutted by the affectionate addiess of his
fellow-eitizsns." Independence ! What sort of inde-
pendence ? Opposition to Reform principles? Did the
Tories select for office men who showed their indepen-
dence by opposing them? 'What would have been said
if, under a Tory Ministry, the Reformers had com-
plained that their recommendations to the Magistracy
were neglected on account of their independence ? It
is the first time we ever heard of a Ministry being
bound to confide authority in men to whom they are
politically opposed. The great fault of the Reform
Ministry is, not that they have refused to adopt every
Tory recommendation, but that they have suffered so
many Tories to hold the Lieutenancies, and to fill the
maaisterialbenches. In fact, theirgreat fault is (and this
they have been again and again told by the Times)
that they have not done justice to the cause of Reform
in suffering the powers of the Crown to be wielded by
Tories. We know of no men who arc less entitled
to the countenance of a Reform Ministry than the
Bristol Tories. That so many of them have found
their way into the council of the town they have
done so much to ruin, is to be attributed to the
influence they still possess from the numerous
charities they administer. Lord J. Russell, had
he followed Tory precedents, would have ex-
cluded all of them from the Magistracy. His
wish to conciliate them has only provoked an
impertinent assumption of a right to dictate to
the Crown. Sir Richard Vyvyan is enraged
st d f
because he feels that, on a 'future election, he
rn him
ques-
tioning b y
has no chance of being returned ; and he had
not the (rood sense to thecfaolultTovuslya
ba
example
set
St Sir Robert o bt
e rig
r Peheth of the Crown to name to the maei-
stracy according to its discretion, and merely suggested
that Lord John Russell had departad from the prin-
ciple by which he declared he would be guided in his
appointments. The vulgar abuse of the Bristol
Tories, and their orT'
gaa the tines, are like Sir R

Vyvian's rhodomontade—beneath contempt.-111orn-
incr Chronicle.

We, in common with the Times, spoke in severe
terms of the conduct of Lord Brudenell, when the
publication of the sentence of the court-martial brought
his case before the public. We have seen nothing to
induce us to abandon the opinions we expressed at
the time, of the unfitness of his Lordship to command
a regiment. It is, however, we know, the opinion of
several distinguished officers, that Lord Brudenell has
been hardly used ; but be this as it may, we are quite
certain his Lordship, with the best intentions
in the world, can i.sver obtain that authority in
a regiment which its colonel ought to possess..
We, therefore, must regard Lord Brudepell's appoint-
ment as indicative of anything but sound discretion.
But we do not wish to bear hard on his Lordship. In
.he has been placed by the Commander-in-Chief
in a situation which is anything but an enviable one.
It is the system which call e for our reprobation. Lord
Hill is an inyerium is inyerio. He is the irrespon-.
sible head of the army. It is quite clear that Mini-
sters would never liave given a regiment to Lord Bru-
denell, and we have seen that they carefully repudiated
the responsibility of the appointment. The subject
will soon come before Parliament, when the anomalous
state of the command of the army will no doubt obt?sln
the attention which it deserves. Sir William .I.'ioles-
worth, however sensible of the unfitness of -Lord Bru-
denell for the command of a regiment, car, have no vin-
dictive feelings in the. case. His ()hied, no doubt, is
to secure to the people the bent of constitutional
principle of responsibility in t'ne army as well as in the
other branches of authority. It has always been under-
stood that the King can do no wrong, but that every man
who acts under him is responsible for what lie does. But
the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, can do no wrong
any more than the King. To what consequences may
not such a protection .from responsibility lead? A
Commander-in-Chief may be undermining the au-
thority of his Royal master, and that master may be
in a delusion with respect to his conduct, and yet there
are no means of repressing the evil. When the King
names Ministers who abuse his confidence, Parlia-
ment may interpose, and his Majesty must select
other advisers. Without such a power of interpo-
sition, there would be no difference between a con-
stitutional and an arbitrary monarchy. So long as
Kings are liable, like other men, to err, it is fitting that
the people.should have a negative on their choice. But
in withdrawing the command of the army from re-
sponsibility, the infallibility of the Monarch is ries
dared. We trust that this unconstitutional pate of
things will not be suffered to continue mach longer.
Every branch of the Royal authority snust be executed
by responsible Ministers.—Morning. Chronicle.
The public actor, whose serformances form the most
attractive feature of that farce presented to the nation
under the title of the " Melbourne Ministry," has just
appeared at Nottingham. The secret of this display it
is possible that we may not possess ; but, at all events,
we shall hazard a conjecture, and leave it to time to
prove how far we are correct. Before so doing, we
will shortly notice the acting of the political mounte-
bank just mentioned. With considerable stage effect,
the all, but unseated Member for Dublin accompanied
his first bow to the Nottingham audience with the fol-
lowing words :—" There was only one calumny ever
uttered against me that I ever thought it worth my
while to deny. It is so base a calumny, that I scarcely
find it possible to pronounce it from my lips. They
dare to assert that I was degraded enough to traduce
the maids and the matrons of England. It is the only
calumny I ever deigned to answer ; and my answer to
it is, that it is a lie." The depth of " degradation" to
which this man is capable of descending is a matter on
which he is more competent than ourselves to decide.
So, also, on the magnitude of a lie he is undoubtedly a
great authority, having had wider and more irrespon-
sible experience in " lying" than any man in the three
kingdoms. But we beg to say, that something more
than the bare assertion of one who had the brutal au-
dacity to call the brother of the King of England a
" mighty great liar"—something more than such a
person's assertion is necessary to falsify any charge
whatever. When Lord Stanley filled the office of
Secretary for Ireland, with a vigour and ability, and a
resolute determination, which made the Agitator quail,
this very O'Connell softened his style of eloquence to a
tone which then (the Whigs not being yet debased by
political prostitution) lie deemed necessary to conciliate
the attention of a British House of Commons. Lord
Stanley begged the House to beware of receiving this
mode of expression as a fair sample of the Agitator's
rhetorical resources. The Secretary for Ireland told
the assembled Commons of Great Britain, that Mr.
O'Connell had one style of eloquence for the Senate, and
another for the slavish populate over wham he wields
his mean and mercenary sway. In England, we are
honoured by his admissism of the bravery, the enter-
prise, the energy, the patriotism of our national cha-
racter. In Ireland, " Saxon," " Sassenagh," and
every opprobrious epithet which the basest mind can
dictate, and the foulest mouth can utter, is applied to
the same people before whom this cowardly spirit
shrinks when meeting them face to face. And when
they, the manly population, who probably deem his
disgusting ribaldry against themselves unworthy of a
thought, evince a disposition to resent his outrageous
language employed against the defenceless women of
England, he at a public meeting invites any one
amongst the assembled crowd to refer to the precise
speech in which a passage so inexpressibly disgraceful
is to be found ! If we are not mistaken, this burly
declaimer, at or about the time when Lord Brougham
from the woolsack quoted that withering sentence from
the Italian poet, describing the sense of dependenee as
being one which made every fibre quiver with shame,
and denounced the rent as the vilest degradation—if we
mistake not, Mr. O'Connell revenged himself by stat-
ing, that Lord Brougham talked a greater amount of
nonsense than any man in Britain. He added, that
more nonsense at any given time might be spoken by
some individuals, but that the aggregate of that com-
modity was undoubtedly furnished by the Noble and
Learned Lord. We have no wish to deprive Lord
Brougham of any portion of the fame thus assigned
to him, but, giving him credit for the nonsense spoken
of, we venture to say that in another respect Mr.
O'Connell surpasses the Noble Lord, and all other men
who have ever disturbed the peace of society—we allude
to the unmitigated ruffianism of his rhetorical displays.
Never, we believe, in any civilized community did a man
of the average order of talent disgrace the very language
in which lie spoke, by a series of vituperation directed
indiscriminately against all ranks, from the throne to
the cottage, before this Mr. O'Connell, protected by his
" vow in heaven," and his priest on earth, carried
contumely and cowardice to the very climax of
their detestable distinction. And it is somewhat too
impudent even for the brazen front of this man, that
lie, when reproached .with his villainous insinuations
against the womenjof our country, should refer us to
his abusive career, and- rcquest us to select from that
mass of filth the special abomination complained of.
Inasmuch as this person has the oratorical distinctions
of strong lungs and a patient audience, it may be worth
while for a moment to say a word on his claims to the
attention of an intelligent body of men. In a country
free and enlightened as our own, nothing can be more
natural than that one of the most graceful and manly
arts, that of eloquence, should be sure of attaining
public distinction. But on this very account ii
is highly important that the national taste should not
be vitiated. When Mr. Canning, perhaps the most
accomplished speaker that ever addressed the House of
Commons, permitted himself an expression with refe-
rence to physical suffering little worthy of his accus-
tomed taste and kindly feeling, it required not the
stern rebuke of Sir Samuel Romilly to awaken repug
'lance in the public mind. The national mind re.
volted at such a style of remark. And are we to en.
lure from a mercenary adventurer, alien in feeling, in
principle, in all that constitutes character, a con-
stant succession of such violations of propriety
merely because he has that which Mr. Canning certainly
bad not—a cowardly protection in his so-called vow in
Heaven ? We are in the recollection of the average
amount of our readers when stating, that since this
man s appearance among us, since he transferred the
exercise of his boasted powers from the drunken rabble
of Dublin to the Senate of England, more unjustifia-
ble abuse of the privileges of debate, and of public
oratory generally, has occurred than ever before de-

graded the intellectual history of these kingdoms. His
satellite, Mr. Shed, had the distinction of wounding,
Prince, then heir presump-
tive best he might, a dying
But it was "reserved
to the Throne of
fui the " mighty great liar" himself, in the course of
one short ;•ear, shielded by a Geethment so un-Eng-
lish and utterly unworthy that we know of no language
strong enough tz express the national scorn entertained
for their political slavery—it was reserved for this than
to nutrage every decency of social life=to attack his
Majesty in the person .?f hip nearest relative—to heap
abuse on the flecks° of Lords, and to call the most Illus-
trious man ni this, or perhaps of any age, " a stunted
corporal"—to denounce the men of i3iiglanil as ty-
rants over his country, and the Women of England
as strumpets in then own. This, we are happy
to say, is the most perishable of all modes of securing
public distinction in England. That in the ferment
which for the last few years has brought the basest
particles to the surface of the social stream Mr. O'Con-
nell and " his tail" may have found encouragement is,
we fear, not without some truth. That he, or they,
can by such means maintain any hold on the respect of
our felloir-countrymen we cannot, we will not, believe.
For surely personal demeanour which would not be
tolerated at a parochial meeting in any part of the
kingdom can receive no continued countenance from
the British public. In the calm to which we are
firmly convinced the Conservative feeling is settling
down throughout the country, Englishmen will, while
rallying round the institutions, be reminded of the
usages of their forefathers. Then, of course, the
reign of ruffianism will be at an end. It does not
recur to us that any particular remark is called for by
the recent specimen of the " sprawling" style of oratory
with which the Hibernian mendicant has favoured " the
children of a larger growth" at Nottingham. But, as we
said at the outset, we shall hazard a conjecture as to the
primary cause of this display. It is as follows. And should
we happen to be in error, it will be competent to Lord J.
Russell, Lord Palmerston, Lord Morpeth, or any other
" ready writer" of the Government to contradict us. We
are given to understand that the Ministers, finding our
foreign and colonial policy beyond the scope of their
capabilities, are disposed to amuse themselves with a
domestic disturbance in the shape of a general election.
In furtherance of this object, they renev: ed the
" mission" of Mr. O'Connell, and sent him to Not-
tingham for the purpose of addressing the factious of
all classes throughout the empire. To give a thorough
Wh.and Ministerial colouring to this mission, Sir
0
Ronald Ferguson was appointed aide-de-camp to the
Agitator. Never was a worse tactician, we think,
employed than this gallant officer. He is reported by
the organs of Government to have delivered the fol-
lowing sentence :—" He (Sir R. Ferguson) would
tell them honestly and shortly, that h§ mind was made
up, and that his thorough conviction was, that it was
one of the foulest conspiracies that was ever concocted
by a dying faction." Now really, from the perusal of
,his passage, one might naturally suppose that the
Honourable Gentleman was characterizing the very
"mission" on which he was sent. Was there
ever a " faction" more manifestly " dying" than this
of the Whig-Radicals ? Was there ever a " con-
spiracy" more " foul" than that in which the degene-
rate Whigs and rampant Radicals are now engaged ?
But let us be just to Sir R. Ferguson. This was not
his meaning. The " foul conspiracy" of which he
complained was that so shocking to the sensibilities of
his " dying faction"—namely, the inquiry into the
conduct of Mr. O'Connell as regards a matter which,
to use the words of Lord Stawley, it was incumbent
upon the Hon. and Learned Member to explain to the
satisfaction of the House and the country. Sir Ronald
Ferguson is more amusing than he intended when
calling a necessary inquiry a " foul conspiracy." Sir-
Ronald told the meeting that he had been a Member
of the Carlow Committee, and that he thought it his
duty to repudiate the aspersion which it had been
sought to cast upon Mr. O'Connell. The evidence of
this inquiry is before the public, and we leave every one
of our readers to adjudge the palm between the gaping
gullibility of the Nottingham feeders and the astound-
ing assertion of the Agitator's Aide-de-camp. In
short, our notice of the whole affair cannot be better
concluded than by repeating the quotation employed by
Mr. O'Connell with reference to the leading Commoner
of England—a quotation wholly inapplicable to that
distinguished Senator, but containing a condensed esti-
mate of the Agitator's own claims on the popular re-
gard : _ _

" Of promise prodigal, when power you want,
Great speeching skill, and self-approving cant."
—Times.
Although the public have been for some time in
possession of selections from the evidence-taken by the
Irish Poor Law Commissioners, their full report is yet
to be produced. It has been forwarded to Government,
and will soon, we presume, become a prominent object
of Parliamentary discussion and public attention. In
the mean time, the slight sketch which has transpired
of the leading points in the report calls for some no-
tice, and the rather as this is a subject which can
scarcely be too frequently or too earnestly urged upon
the Consideration of the people of this kingdom. The
motives of enlightened humanity, of national respec-
tability, and of personal interest, all conspire to make
the question of the improvement of the condition of the
Irish population one of almost paramount importance.
It must be continually a disgrace and an injury, and
it may become a matter of very great danger, that in
a part of the United Kingdom which, in consequence
of the modern facilities of communication, is not
more than thirty hours' journey from the richest parts
of England, an immense population should exist, which
is periodically brought to the most desperate con-
dition of extreme want, and is always upon the verge
of it. It seems to be, as it were, losing time to enter
into minute inquiries of the particular causes, moral
and political, which have led to this effect. The ap-
palling, dreadful fact, and the immediate remedy for
which it calls, are enough to occupy us for the present.
When we find a fellow-creature perishing, from expo-
sure, or from some accident not duly attended to, we
do not stop to inquire whether the imprudence of the
individual, or the neglect of those who should have
taken care of him, has occasioned the misfortune. We
instantly .give our own aid, and call for the aid of others
to alleviate or put an end to the suffering ; and we
would deem it to be unmanly and inhuman to hesi-
tate. In what does the case of a great number of our
fellow-creatures differ from the case of an individual,
save in the greater importance of the former ? If the
greater difficulty of affording relief be suggested as a
reason why
,it should not be attempted when the mis-
fortune of a multitude is concerned, we may reply that
the difficulty to the British nation, if it were but en-
countered with earnestness, would not be greater in
proportion than that of one individual to relieve
another. The nation which spent a thousand millions
of money to resist and overthrow the military tyrant of
Continental Europe can surely elevate Ireland from
pauperism, if it sets about that object with an earnest
heart and a firm resolution
.to persevere. The report
states, according to the sketch of it which has been
published, that there arc five agricultural labourers in
Ireland for every two that there are for the same quan-
tity of cultivated land in Great Britain. Now every
one who knows anything about the state of the cul-
tivated land of both countries, must be aware that the
most marked difference between the two lies in this—
that whereas in England every thing seems to be done
for the land which labour can do for it, in Ireland
nothing is done for the land, except that without
which cultivation of any kind could not go on. It is
ploughed and sowed, and reaped, and ploughed again;
but fencing, and draining, and dressing—clearing of
ditches,
and planting and cutting of hedges—repairing
gates and farm buildings, and the thousand et ceteras
which are all attended to in England, arc not at all
attended to in Ireland as a general rule. It is, then,
no wonder that the report should proceed to tell us
that in Ireland there are upwards of half a million
of labourers out of employment for the greater part
of the year, and that they and their families, to the
amount altogether of more than two millions, are
in a state of destitution. Who is there that can
hear this and say "let it thus continue ?" Two
millioals of people in utter destitution I The eleventh
part of the whole population of the United King-
:loin of Great Britain and Ireland—the richest, the
nost powerful, the most intelligent, and the most
humane nation of the earth—rn a state of per-
petual and hopeless hunger ! Can such things be,

and not startle us from our dreams df Ode and
security to iiteint. ekeftion ? It is not merely that
tWd inillirms of human beings suffer privations—
that they have not quite enough. No, it is much
more than this—it is the horrible extremes of want
of food, and clothes, and shelter, which they suffer.
Many of them die annually of tilted. Watit, heaps of
them ate sick, and of such as have not the happiness
to be released by death, the recovery is retarded by
want of proper nourishment. There are dispensaries
to provide. physic for them but What they want is
food, and there is no establishment that provide that.
The most noxious food—weeds, and unripe roots,
and unwholesome shell fish (if they be near the sea),
are eagerly devoured at certain seasons of the year ;
and all- this happens at a time when political eco-
nomists tell us that we are over producing wheat, and
that we have no right to complain of the low price,
because we glut the market with the produce of lands
which ought not to he cultivated ! Shall these
frightful anomalies go on, without notice or
remedy, while Members of Parliament are worked
out, of all patience with COmmittees upon every piece of
nensense which pampered discontent insolently thrusts
upon the attention of the Legislature ? Government
has evidently a reluctance to enter upon this question.
Ministers are too much perplexed with party matters,
and the demands of their "Liberal" supporters, to have
leisure and resolution for so great a subject. It is one
which only concerns the rescue of two millions of our
fellow-creatures and fellow-subjects, and near neigh-
bours, from the horrors of periodical famine and per-
petual want. It is, therefore, postponed, while ques-
tions which concern party influence, and the transfer
of local power from men professing one set of opinions
to men professing another, are discussed and adjusted.
The leaders on the Opposition side of the House seem
as little disposed to press this question as the Minis-
ters are to introduce it. It is too great and too prac-
tical a subject 'for either party to take up until it is
forced upon them by some strong manifestation of na-
tional feeling, the time for which is, we trust, not far
distant. The modes of relief which we understand are
suggested for the existing distresses of the Irish poor
we shall take another opportunity of noticing and dis-
cussing. To those who would wish to make them-
selves more fay acquainted with the nature and ex-
tent of those distresses, we recommend a perusal of the
" Selections" from the evidence, which have been pub-
lished by authority ; or, for a yet more condensed, but
very powerfully-written account, to an article on the
" State of the Irish Poor" in the Dublin University
Magazine for April. There are some observations in
that article, upon the spirit in which the subject
ought to be considered, which are in our opinion so
just, and proper to be impressed on every mind, that
we cannot more appropriately conclude our present
notice of the matter to which they relate- than by ex-
tracting them :—" Above all things we would impress
upon our readers the madness as well as wickedness of
regarding as a party question, a question with which
party has nothing to do ;—a question in which bene-
volence should still every disturbing emotion that
might draw us off from the glorious, the politically
Catholic object of relieving distress ; in which the
sacred voice of charity should hush into silence the
angry jarrings of political discord. It is, we repeat,
evident to any one who studies the evidence before us,
that Ireland is in a state which cannot continue, and
which is growing so rapidly worse, as to render a tho-
rough change of system imperative. To render that
change a blessing instead of a scourge, it must be, as it
ought to be, guided and produced by a calm, steady,
and wise—and that is by a Conservative—hand."—
. Morning Herald.
•
The subject of flogging in the army continues to
engross much of the public attention. It is a mode
of preserving military discipline so foreign to the feel-
ings of Englishmen, that the great body of the people
of this country cannot contemplate it without any
other emotions than those of unqualified disgust.
With the tide of public feeling setting in so strongly
against the revolting practice, it will be impossible
for its advocates to enforce that species of punishment
much longer. It ought to have been abolished long
ago. The Duke of Wellington, Sir Henry Hardinge,
and other Tory officers, men who know no other prin-
ciples of government than those of terror; may talk as
they please of the impossibility of preserving discipline
in the army by any other means ; but the people
of England will attach no credit to their re-
presentations. How happens it that not only- do
no such obnoxious punishment exist in several
of the continental armies, at this moment, but
that, in many instances, those Generals in our own
army, who have applied the lash least frequently to the
backs of their offending soldiers, have found the least
occasion for having recourse to so brutal an expedient.
Facts, as well as reason, will be found in this case to
prove what has been so often proved in the case of the
punishment of death for crimes of minor magnitude,
,namely, that examples in which the punishment so far
exceeds the offence are no examples at all. Instead of
inspiring a detestation of the offence, they inspire sym-
pathy for the offender, whom they regard in no other
light than that of a victim. It is notorious that re-
spect for the laws, or obedience to them, have never
been effectually inculcated by the gallows ; it is equally
demonstrable that the laceration of the body of a fellow-
soldier does not uphold the discipline of the army.
There is, besides, something degrading to a man in
his own estimation, to be every moment haunted by
the idea that he is so much at the mercy of his superiors
in the army as to be liable to be flogged in the pre-
sence of his comrades for the most trivial offence. The
very thought inspires him with such a strong detesta-
tion of the service, that instead of performing his duty
from the more elevated motives of honour, love of
country, &c., he does it from a principle of slavish
fear. Need we ask whether he who performs his duty
from either of the former principles, or he who per-
forms it from the latter principle, is likely to prove the
best soldier ? There are various modes of punish-
ment of sufficient severity which might be resorted to
to enforce a system of strict military discipline, with-
out having recourse to this revolting practice. Until
these have been tried and found ineffectual, let us not
be told that nothing but " flogging will preserve disci-
pline in the army."--Morning Advertiser.
Mr. O'Connell assures his entertainers at Notting-
ham that, if the House of Lords shall be mad enough
to crush the measures which he deems indispensable
for what lie calls " juStice to Ireland," lie will let his
thunder sleep no longer. From that hour, says Mr.
O'Connell, " the Union is but a cobweb." This is
really too bad. IVIr. O'Connell should not so cruelly
insult the weakness of those whom he condescends to
call his friends. They, indeed, have pronounced their
determination to uphold the Union with their lives.
But if the Lords wrest the property of the Irish Cor-
porations from his grasp, and decline to hand over
the revenues of the Irish Church to his direction
—presto, " the Union is but a cobweb." For the
Union Mr. S. Rice may calculate ; for the Union
Lord Morpeth may declaim ; Lord Melbourne may
study for its defence ; Lord Gleneig may wake for
its rescue. All will be in vain—" the Union is but
a cobweb." Nay, the House of Commons may
pledge itself by the solemnity of a recorded reso-
lution to the maintenance of the Union, and the
Sovereign may denounce the enemies of the Union
almost as rebels to his throne. Bah ! the Union
is but a cobweb. We shall have an opportunity, h osv-
ever, of trying the prophetic, powers of Mr. O'Con-
nell ; for that Mr. O'Loghlen s Bill should be read a
third time in the House of Lords is about as impos-
sible as that Lord John Russell's tragedy should be
thatt the
event of the coming struggle may be written
y and
read at all in any house whatever. The Ministers by
whom the Bill was introduced never intended the Bill
to become law. They have madeoflirtitselni
already
a s
Reform just what they made of Irish Church Appro-
apmriabtiitooinl. —1 a
Mr O'Connell
honornseellfomr
atyherierstowanssucruepdidi
if it were history. The Lords will adopt the proposal
of Lord Francis Egerton, in spite of the remonstrances
of Lord Melbourne—the Commons will pass the Bill
" with amendments," in spite of the shrieks of Mr.
Shiel--the Ministers will retain office, notwithstand-
ing their defeat—the Forty will support the Minis-
ters,ir disobedience—the world
n otwithstanding tee
'
will go round as before, though Mr. O Connell may
per Cents. will keep up,
be army—and the Three
web.—Mornina Post.
though ;the Union may be a cob