The Sun.
London, England, 1847-06-19 00:00:00

by Government in the event of a dim possibility; but
Lord PALMERSTON evaded the interrogation by ob-
jecting to give an official response upon a merely
hypothetical casualty.
Ludicrous and frivolous as this pertinacious cross-
examination may appear ; troublesome as it must
undoubtedly be to the Noble Statesman at the head
of the Foreign Department ; calculated as it is to
consume an unnecessary amount of public time,
and engage an unnecessary amount of legislative
attention, we are gratified that general curiosity
is still kept alive in respect to the condi-
tion and position of our Portuguese contem-
poraries. Simultaneously with the glorious realisa-
tion of the free-trade principles, a new and civilising
sentiment has animated the hearts of our fello w-
countrymen—a sentiment of sympathy for the
advancement and elevation of their fellow-creatures
beyond -the shores of these islands, and beyond the
frontiers of our colonial possessions. Hitherto it
had been regarded as an indisputable truth that
the wisest course to be adopted by an English
citizen was to attend solely to the internal pros-
perity of their own country, and abandon the compli-
cated knots of our foreign relations to the subtle and
experienced supervision of the Cabinet. It seemed
to be an universally received opinion that the fingers
of JOHN BULL were too clumsily formed,
and too blundering in their movements, to
be engaged in the loosening and the tying
of those knots without producing an inex-
tricable confusion and ravelling of the bonds of in•
ternational alliance beyond all hope of amendment.
the multitude therefore remained isolated as it were
from the millions of their brother men : and there was
a direct communication with the different divisions of
the human family, chiefly, if not entirely, through
the punctilious correspondence of the state authori-
ties. Even commercially the communion of adjacent
singdoms was, so to speak, carried on through the iron
grating of customs' duties. Hand in hand, shoulder
to shoulder, the millions of the earth could not by
possibility stand until such time as the fiscal barriers
erected by monopolising legislators should have been
beaten down and trampled under foot. A humanising
system of reciprocity could indeed be no more esta-
blished until the trammels of an erroneously distri-
buted taxation should be removed, than the helio-
centric system could be proved until the combination
of the lenses had granted a telescopic assistance to the
gaze of the astronomers. Now, however, that this
dwarfing and insulating scheme of taxation is dis-
appearing, there is not merely a certainty of
the development and expansion of commerce
to its naturally healthy condition, and its
naturally colossal dimensions, but the screen
seems to have been removed which had been pre-
viously interposed between the various states
and races of the globe. A novel interest
has arisen amongst the people of England in the po-
litical and social, as well as in the intellectual and
commercial progress of contemporary nations. While
COBDEN, when speaking of the corn-laws, is saying
to the millions of continental Europe—in the ambi-
guous but impressive languge of CICERO, when that
great Consul spoke of CETHEGUS and LEyruLus, on
the evening of the day on which those companions of
CATALINE were executed—" they have flourished!"—
while those significant words are responded to with
enthusiasm in France, in Italy, and in Spain, at home
the inhabitants are awakening to a sense of the im-
portance of a preservation of friendship with the po-
pulation of both hemispheres.

Hence it is that so much interest is attached at this
moment to the events which are now occurring in the
Peninsula ; and from the evidence of this very in-
terest wP may recognise a new and glorious surety
for the perpetuation and the preservation of the prin-
ciples of freedom.

After an inquiry, extending through several days
the inquest held over the bodies of the unfortunate)
persons who were either immediately killed, or who
subsequently died from the effects of the injuries
they received from the fearful accident that occurred
on the Dee bridge on the Chester and Holyhead
Railway, was brought to a close on Thursday. The
inquiry has been conducted in every way in a man-
ner becoming the extreme gravity of the subject-
matter with respect to which it was the important
duty of the Coroner and the jury to institute the
most searching investigation. The Government and
the :Railway Commissioners have likewise effectually
discharged the duty which, under the lamentable cir-
cumstances, it was incumbent upon them, on the part
of the public, to fulfil. They sent down two cele-
brated engineers, Captain SYMONDS and Mr. WALKER,
to examine into the cause of the catastrophe, and to
lay before the jury the result of their observations.
But, whilst every one must be gratified by the fair and
impartial mode in which the inquest has been
held, the conclusion which has been arrived
at must arouse the most serious apprehensions
in the public mind. The jury have unani-
mously recorded in their verdict that the acci-
dent was consequent upon the breakage of one of
the cast-iron girders, and that the girder was made
of a strength insufficient to bear the pressure of quick
trains passing over it ; that cast-iron is too
treacherous a metal to be used for such a purpose ;
that they had in evidence before them that there are
upwards of 100 bridges similar in principle and form
to the late one over the river Dee, either in use or in
the course of being constructed, on various lines of
railways.

It should be stated that these views of the jury
are strictly in accordance with the opinions of Cap-
tain SYMONDS and Mr. WALKER, who condemned
the principle of the bridge and its security, and who,
" entertaining these opinions very decidedly," not-
withstanding they were opposed by Mr. ROBERT
STEPHENSON (who has erected a number of bridges
on the same principle) and other engineers, never-
theless declared they felt it "to be their
duty (by no means an agreeable one) to ex-
press them l" Under these circumstances, her
MAJESTY'S Government have but one course to
take, which is to have forthwith examined every
bridge where cast-iron girders are used, with a view
to their immediate removal and to the bridge being
otherwise rendered of sufficient strength to ensure the
safety of passengers. As against this recommenda-
tion, which we most earnestly press upon the atten-
tion of the Government, we attach no weight to the
remark of Mr. STEPHENSON, that the recent acci-
dent was the first of its kind, we only feel too
thankful that as yet we have been saved the
repetition of such a dreadful failure in
railway architecture. It is manifest, from
the able and elaborate report of the Govern-
ment engineers, that the public are daily exposed to
the hazard of a similar catastrophe. Instant precau-
tion should therefore be taken against the occur-
rence of such another distressing accident ; and, for
the satisfaction of the public, publicity should be
given to the particulars of the casualty, for the pur-
pose of ensuring such rational measures in future as
shall prevent the recurrence of any similar calamity.