The Sun.
London, England, 1847-07-07 00:00:00

tit Alina 71ent

LONDON. WEDNESDAY, JULY 7, 1847.

Nothing could have afforded the Government such
an unanswerable justification, or have so entirely re-
fUtvtl the malignant aspersions of their antagonists, as
the intelligence contained in the last dispatches from
Portugal.

Anarchy has ceased throughout that portion of the
Peninsula, in consequence of the armed intervention
sanctioned by Lord PALMERSTON. With the realisa-
tion of this advantage the star of COSTA CABRAL
MA his execrable partisans has faded and fallen. It
is obvious, therefore, from that single circumstance,
that the course adopted by the present Administra-
tion is one calculated to prove most beneficial to the
:subjects of her Most Faithful MAJESTY.
Like EMANUEL GODOY, or OLIVIER LE DIABLE,
or any other parvenu favourite who has risen to
official eminence by a neglect of all righteous prin-
ciples, the Conde 1)E TuomAn. has exercised over
t 11• destinies of his native land a power as pernicious
as it was unconstitutional and paramount. In
his discomfiture there is the best security for the
social improvement and political emancipation of the
country in which he has hitherto domineered. The
relentless influence of a will subversive of *all na-
tional immunities is prevented from any further mani-
festation, and a guarantee is thereby afforded that
those immunities cannot in future be violated, or
even so much as threatened. Lord PALMERSTON has,
in a measure, taken example by the conduct of
STLI`IIEN LANGTON. When the Barons—afterwards
tr I.4raphant at Runnynaida—lere preparing the

clauses of Magna Charta, but were as yet sustained but
by a rather doubtful authority against the puissance
of King JOHN, STEPHEN LANGTON threw into the
popular scale the weight of ecclesiastical, and conse-
quently of Papal, connivance. Lord PALMERSTON has in
like manner secured success to the Portuguese
Liberals by affording them the countenance, and,
what is more, the encouragement, and, what is more
still, the physical assistance of England. The imme-
diate result of this proceeding on the part of the Go-
vernment of St. James's is the suppression of those
civil dissensions which have so long desolated the
provinces of Portugal, and the ultimate advantage
ensured by that timely pacification will prove, we
earnestly trust, the permanent dismissal from the
councils of MARIA DA GLORIA of men who, while
pandering to their own individual interests, have cal-
lously diced away the liberties of the land, and
plunged the national fortunes into a Maelstrom of
disasters and embarrassments.

Had the discussion which is reported to have
taken place at Granido between the Plenipo-
tentiaries of the three Powers and the representatives
of the Junta terminated otherwise than it did ac-
tually terminate, we should have been compelled to
declare that the tranquillisation of Portugal had been
bartered for an odious act of injustice, and that the
treaty had been sealed with the miseries of two dis-
tinguished patriots. We allude to the question which
is said to have arisen at these final deliberations, whether
the insurgent chieftains DAS ANTAS and SA DA
BANDEIRA should or should not be excluded from the
promised amnesty. Had those eminent, and in
no respect culpable, personages been visited by
that ignoble mark of vengeance, we should
have been disposed to rejoice in the event of their
possible liberation and triumph in the place of their
expatriation--supposing they had acted with a
promptitude and boldness like that evinced by their
compatriot Bomrim, now described as the Governor
of Angola. In alluding yesterday evening to the
circumstance of this moot-question about the two
great leaders of the Portuguese people, Lord PALMERS-
TON declared, amidst the acclamations of the House
of Commons, " There is no doubt that both SA DA
BANDEIRA and the Count DAS ANTAS are entitled to
the full benefit of the amnesty." It was a remark of
the Emperor NAPOLEON, that whenever you see the
exercise of a rigorous cruelty among the victors on
a battle-field, be sure they had been very nearly
beaten themselves—be sure they are still in awe of
the very men whom accident has enabled them to
vanquish. Those words of wisdom would have ap-
plied with singular felicity to the Royalist party of Por-
tugal in the event of any such an act of inhumanity
and bad faith as was threatened during the delibera-
tions at Granido.

Besides it would have been an extravagant bar-
barity to have excluded DAs AcTAS and SA DA
BANDEIRA from the benefits of the general amnesty
when preparations were actually making for bring-
ing back the unfortunate prisoners of Torres
Vedras. It would have been tantamount to the
brutal jest of the Court minion, that the shores of
Africa are only salubrious to the nobler enemies of
a crown.

With her Most Faithful MAJESTY herself will re.
main the power of rendering this pacification of poli-
tical parties in her dominions a permanent blessing
to the people. Let her royal title, hitherto associated
only with turpitude and dissimulation, be an augury of
her sincerity. Let MARIA DA GLORIA be in truth
her Most Faithful Majesty. Her proceedings will
be scrutinised with the most jealous attention by her
subjects, and, consequently, there will be a twofold
necessity for the preservation of integrity both in
act and appearance.

The debate which took place last night in the
House of Commons, on the motion of Lord GEORGE
BENTINCK, for an address to her MAJESTY, praying
" that she might be graciously pleased to take such
steps as might be deemed advisable to secure for the
British holders of unpaid Spanish bonds redress from
the Government of Spain," was indeed remarkable,
and must prove in the highest degree satisfactory, not
only to the Spanish bondholders, but to all the Eng-
lish creditors of repudiating or defaulting states.
The Noble Secretary for Foreign Affairs spoke out
boldly and manfully. He recognised to the fullest
extent the principle advocated by the Noble Lord the
Member fur Lynn, " that, according to the law of
nations, we should have a fair and full right to enforce
obligations of this kind with the same rigour as
those of a different character." He impressively
warned the various defaulters of the consequences in
which they might be involved by a continued per-
severance in their disgraceful and dishonest policy.
Every reasonable indulgence should be afforded to
those states who acknowledge the full measure of
their responsibilities, and who would gladly de-
fray every just liability, and satisfy the fair
claims of their creditors, but for various unforeseen
circumstances that have interposed obstacles in the
way of the discharge of their undisputed obligations,
which for the time being were practically insur-
mountable. It is not to the honest but impoverished
Governments, who are willing but unable to pay
their debts, that the observations of the Noble Secre-
tary are especially directed, but pre-eminently to
those who, with ample means, continue to mis-
apply the funds that should be devoted to
the payment of the interest on their respective
debts, to what they are pleased to term "the public
service," and offer only frivolous and insufficient
excuses to their national creditors, in place of the
payment to which in equity they are entitled ; and
also to others, who by a rigid adherence to a mani-
festly erroneous policy, and a ridiculous mismanage-
ment of the national resources, wilfully sacrifice the
resources of the state, and render them insufficient for
those purposes which could be provided for if a wiser
course were adopted. The Ministers of such states
will do well maturely and attentively to consider the
significant language of the Noble Lord. He says—
" I take this opportunity of reminding those Govern-
ments who may be debtors to the British people that the
time may come when this house can no longer sit pa-
tiently under the wrongs and injustice inflicted upon the
subjects of this country, that the time may come when
the British nation may no longer see with the same
tranquillity 150,000,0001. due to English subjects, the
interest and principal of which are alike unpaid; arid
that if more proper efforts adequately to fulfil their en-
gagements are not made, the Gorernment of this country,
whoever may be the men who compose it, may be com-
pelled by public opinion, aye, and by the votes of
Parliament, to deviate from the hitherto estab-
lished practice, and to insist upon the payment
of those debts. Sir, that we have the means
to do so I do not for one moment dis-
pute. It is not that we are afraid of any of these
states, or of one or all of them put together, that we
have abstained from taking the steps which my Noble
!Friend has urged upon us. I trust that we shall always
!have the means of obtaining justice from any country
ion the face of the earth. and also of compelling them to
discharge their just obligations to us ; and, th•refore,
let no foreign country that has done a wrong to British
subjects leceive itself by the false impression that the
British nation and the British Parliament will for ever
remain acquiescent and passive under the wrong ; or,
that whenever they call upon the British Government to
interfere and enforce the rights of the people of England,
the Government will not have ample means and power
to obtain fur them a full measure of justice."
The energy and decision of that Nlinister are too well
known, too universally admitted, to suffer them to
suppose it possible that this was a mere
1 brutum falmen, an idle threat. They may be
well assured that if the occasion should arise (and
that must wholly depend upon themselves, and the
line of conduct they may pursue), the interference
will be an effectual one, promptly and vigorously
lexecuted.
We shall trust however that the hint
may be taken i ''n good time. That they may,
stermine on doing full justice
compelled to do so by g_race, and before they are
rsnooft only to their" de-
Bri-
tish, but to all their credit of their
own accord, with a good
the force of British arms
that they may promptly take such steps nation; and
creditors
P
sd
eatse will
i n a tindi-
cateion to the world their firm and zealous
henceforward to pursue a more honourable policy
! Another portion of this singularly able adlr-es.,o il'
of
s
:the Foreign Secretary conveys an instructive add
not merely to the Spanish nation, to which especially
'it was directed, but to all the nations of the earth, of
the evils incident to, and the abuses and mischiefs
that result from, what has been foolishly termed
" protection to native industry," and the adoption of
1 the various prohibitions and restrictions by which it is
erroneously supposed that protection is afforded and
:I maintained. The Noble Lord says—

"And why is the income of Spain not larger? Be-
callie Spain chooses to persevere in a system of com-
mercial restriction and exclusion, by which she positively
makes her income inadequate to her expenditure. Why,

Sir, Spain goes on to this day, in spite of all the expe-
rience and example of other countries—in spite of all the
lessons which have been read to her—in spite of all the
discussions and debates upon this subject which have
taken place all over the world—shutting her eyes to facts
and her ears to reason—she goes on excluding and pro-
hibiting a great portion of the commerce which would
naturally flow into her ports."
And he traces the fatal consequences of the system,
by showing that there are no less than 150,000 of the
population of Spain employed in one way or another
in the contraband trade, the most active part
of that population, who, if the labour, the energy,
and ability applied to such demoralising pursuits were
applied to industrial occupations, would add mate-
rially to the national wealth. The native industry
protected is only that of the native contrabandist, and
of the capitalists who conduct large establishments
for the promotion of smuggling on a gigantic scale,
and for which, in the words of the Noble Lord,
" Spain loses all the revenue which she would derive
from levying moderate and proper duties on the commo-
dities now smuggled into the country, and no sort of in-
dustry is protected and encouraged except that industry
of smuggling which tends to demoralise the people, to
engender hatred or contempt of the law, and which
makes the man engaged to-day in smuggling become to-
morrow a robber, and which leads the man who carried
the contraband goods over the mountain one day to carry
off the unoffending passenger up the mountain the next
day, in order to get possession of his property. That is
the state and principle of commerce under which the
Spanish Government voluntarily sacrifice a large annual
income more than sufficient to pay all their foreign cre-
ditors, and which income might be received without in-
juring any `panish interest whatever but that which I
have now described."

The same argument has repeatedly been urged
in our own Legislature, in enforcing the propriety
and expediency of reducing the duties on many
articles of merchandise, which are of so exorbitant a
character as to give encouragement to the smuggler
in his illicit career. We trust that when the fitting
season may arrive—when the mode of levying and
raising the national revenue is discussed in the
British Legislature—the principles that have so ably
been expounded by the Noble Lord, and the evils he
has so graphically delineated, may not be forgotten,
but that a speedy alteration in the scale of the import
duties may effectually destroy the system in this
country, and banish it for ever, at least from the
British dominions.

It is said that the Austrian Government, in imita-
tion of that of France, is about to send a Consul to
Calcutta, and that the company of the Austrian
Lloyds has nominated agents in the three presidencies
of Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay, for the steam-
vessels which, in the month of August next, will
begin to make the direct service from Alexandria to
Trieste.

Intelligence has been received from Oporto, dated
June 30, announcing that the Junta had surrendered
on that day, and that the city was occupied by the
Spanish troops, under the command of General
CONCHA.

Madrid papers of the 30th ult-have arrived.

The Infante Don FRANCISCO DE PAULA and his
daughter, the Infanta JOSEFA, quitted the Palace on
the 30th, and returned to their own residence on the
Retiro. In the course of a week they are to leave
the capital for the waters of Cestona or San Sebas-
tian. The removal of Don FRANCISCO from the
Palace is openly exulted over by the hangers-on at
the French Embassy, and is attributed to French in-
terference. The plan of the intriguers of the Tuileries
appears to be to isolate the QUEEN, so as to compel her
to abdicate if possible. The Clamor Publico com-
ments in very indignant terms on the circular which
the Ministers have addressed to the liberal Bishops
appointed since the death of FERDINAND, calling on
them to resign. This circular is considered by the
Liberals as an act of grovelling servility to Rome.
Suspicions having been entertained that General
PRIM was organizing a Progressista movement at
Cadiz, he has been ordered to quit that city.
The Three per Cents. were done at 291 for cash;
the Four per Cents. at 17i; the Five per Cents. at 17i;
the Debt without Interest at and the Coupons at 13.

We have received the Paris papers of Monday.

The Presse has the following on a subject of uni-
versal interest—the corn harvest:—

" The harvesting of rye has commenced in the Bas
Limousin ttnd Berry; that, of barley is about to com-
mence. This is the end of the food crisis in the centre
of France. In the south an idea may be already formed
of the harvest; the wheat crops will yield as much ai a
good ordinary year. and the grain will be of good quality.
In consequence the decline in prices gains ground every
day. The last quotations of wheat are from 24f. to 30t.
at Bordeaux, 331: at Bayonne, and 24f. at Carcassone.
At Marseilles grain is being amassed in the stores,
acd only finds rare purchasers. In the north the crops
promise abundant products. Speculation seems dis-
posed to openve in potatoes; it makes considerable de-
mand of that article for Great Britain, with the hope of
realising fabulous profits. We warn these adventurous
speculators that their calculations repose on a very
contestable hypothesis. The rumours spread by certain
English journals of the general return of the potato
malady are very exaggerated. Some very limited loca-
lities seem to be, in fact, partially affected by it, but it is
not even proved that the injury done to the plant is to
be assimilated to the special malady of 1845 and 1846 ;
it is generally attributed to the action of a little insect
of the aphis kind. Besides the Mark-lane Express,
much better informed than the political papers with
regard to all that concerns agriculture, affirms that
the vegetation of the potato develops itself with
admirable vigour in all parts of the United King-
dom. We can give the same assurance for the different
parts of the Continent, and especially for France.
No unfavourable news have as yet reached us on this
subject, and our personal investigation in the environs
of Parts have convinced us that their exists thus far no
reasonable motive to suppose a deficiency possible in the
potato crop."

The accounts from the French provinces more
than confirm these cheering statements of La Presse.
There is nothing whatever in these accounts to con •
firm the rumours which have been industriously cir-
culated of the re-appearance of the potato disease.
On the contrary, finer potatoes were never seen than
those now brought to market in France, as the pro-
duce of the early planting.
The Constitutionnel has a long article on the
Ministerial scandals which have recently been
brought to light, and in the vituperation of which the
provincial journals are almost unanimous. The
article, which is attributed to M. TRIERS, declares
that it is by the press that the Ministry will fall.
Certain it is that the Ministry at present has only
the Journal des Debats to defend it, and even that
journal is no out-and• out supporter of the Ministry.
"In Paris," says the Constitutionnel," one paper only,
the Journal des DeGats, defends the Ministry. The Mi-
nisters, after the saturnalia of publicity which they had
themselves organized, and after the ruin of their fa-
vourite organ, returned with dissatisfaction to cast them-
selves into the arms of their old and sole defender, but
at the same time meditating further inconstancy. It
in fact, well known that the Cabinet is urging its friends
to found some new Conservative journal, which would
entertain no vain scruples, which would particularly
praise their faults, find pleasure in acts which ought to
be condemned, brave public opinion, boldly become the
aggressor, devote itself without delicacy, and, if neces-
sary, force the Journal des 'Mats to write favourably,
notwithstanding its indocility and ill humour. But whilst
they are expecting the new Epoque, the Ministers are
defended only by a single journal. But that journal,
properly understood, demonstrates, by the involuntary
concessions it makes to public opinion the profound dif-
ference which exists between the Government and the
French nation. There are few great questions on which
that journal has not hinted some fundamental objection to
the resolutions adopted by the Ministry. It is true, it
disapproves timidity—it contradicts itself from day to
day, and frequently in the same article—it sometimes
assumes the air of a bravo, and raises a shout in favour
of Government ; but it is easy to comprehend that it
would praise a better policy, and that it has but little
taste for what is doing and tor what it is made to say. If
the subject be the foreign policy of the country, it is like
a partisan of the English alliance—it boasts of it on
principle,
and even at the risk of stigmatising the ex-
travagance and the culpable calculations on which the
Spanish marriages were accomplished—it is aware of
the sentiment which prevails throughout France as to
aatntadc
ekvsetnh e
the Emperor mmpuerrdoerrerosf
Russia as
the opprefsrseoqrsuenoftlyPtios lan
itd can,it
of Gallicia ; its language is consequently feeble when
it expresses the gratitude of the Ministers towards the
leaning of our
capitalists of St. Petersburgh, or when it approves the
Government towards the Cabinet of
Vienna, the sacrifice of the nationality of Cracow, of
independence of the Christians of the East,
Pope, of the
the absolute policy of
of the pride of Greece, and
;relates to our domestic govern-
ment,the liberty of Switzerland, of the popularity of the
Austria. If the question .
to the clergy,
as to the amount of power to be accorded
principle of
either on the question of education or on the.
emanci-
it does not accord in opinion with the Ministers
our system of Customs duties. It sometimes.
the new dynasty wishes to surround itself, and the
court
clergy whom wdharoemtoitj
owsitsihfyestthoe prepare
derangementat St. lo)fenis.
pates itself so far as to ridicule the nobility with which
our finances.
In Paris, therefore the Ministers possess but one sup-
porter, who resembles
as much as it can an officious
advocate. In the departments is divided into
the press
Neither
two camps. The Ministerial journals maintain silence,
or are oblged to perform their service
of all shades and colours express, by supporting
some revolting proposittona. The Oosition journals
with an unanimity and