The Sun.
London, England, 1841-11-24 00:00:00

*At -SIM

LONDON:
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1841.

morsel of food from their mouths, and, for their I
own sensual gratification, dooming them to po-
verty, famine, disease, and death as uniting in
themselves all that is cruel and dishonest Of
the feudal, and all that is mean and mercenary of
the commercial systems; and as being the authors
of the most worthless, dismal, and suicidal policy
that ever outraged human nature. Something
like that, but written with words of fire, will be
the character branded on the aristocracy ofEng-
land by that democracy from whose stern justice
they cannot escape. Better were it to have no
name in the records of the world than to be in-
scribed in them with imperishable ignominy.

The present condition of society is provoking
a discussion into first principles, and compelling
men to fill back on the rights they derive from
nature. Independently of the discussion on the
great principle of obedience, which has been fairly
opened up, and will be followed out in due season,
a commencement has been practically given to
the discussion of another most important quest
tion, namely, the extent to which Governments
should extend the sphere of their operation's.
Strange as it may seem, though Governments
have been so long established, and though their
acts have been repeatedly examined, no writers
have yet laid down with accuracy the boun-
daries within which Governments should confine
their labours. What can best be done by indi-
viduals, by companies, or must be done by the',
power of the whole community wielded by the
Government, is nowhere defined ; and as the
chiefs of a Government are ambitious or negli-
gent, so they interfere with every form of human
business, or allow individuals to pursue their own
course. Between these opposite and extreme
systems of let the people do for themselves and
do for them, the limits at which a Government
can or cannot act with advantage are not defined,
and must now be discussed.

Till lately England was considered to be the
model of the system of letting the people do for
themselves ; and philosophical writers on the
Continent, such as M. B. CONSTANT, M. SAY,
Madame DE STAEL, W. SCHLEGEL, &c., were
wont to point to our canals, our roads, our ma-
nufactures, our machinery, our agriculture, our
commerce, our noble mercantile marine—all the
results of private enterprise, uninterfered with,
as proofs that the system of letting the people do
for themselves was infinitely the most advan-
tageous. France, particularly under the Impe-
rial regime, was considered a model of that sys-
tem which would do everything for the people;
and her one great and little-used canal, her
great military roads intersecting the country,
while every other means of communication was
neglected, her splendid and well-ordered Court,
with every little hook and peg of a gigantic Ad-
ministration surveyed and fixed in its proper
place, while her manufactures and her commerce
were most slovenly, imperfect, and limited; her
splendid national monuments, and her want of
all useful tools, even to a common knife, were
always quoted to show that the system of doing
every-thing for the people by the Government
was most mischievous in its results. Latterly,
hove rev, that knowledge seems to have vanished
from amongst us, and England, conquered by
the arts of France, whom she conquered, has
bowed her head to this mischievous slavery.
Under the influence, we regret to say, of pseudo-
Liberals and Doctrinaires, as well as of mar-
tinet military Tories, she has retrograded to
French ignorance and French presumption, and
is now continually acting on the French system
of allowing the people to do nothing for them-
selves, and of doing everything for them, except
paying- their taxes. .

_
Circumstances now lead men to discuss this
great question, which seems latterly to have lost
ground in theory as well as in practice. BEN-
THAM.-WIIOSC denial of natural rights led him to
make the Government decree and decide con-
cerning all things—and his disciples, have found
'more:willing ears in Courts and Houses of Par-
liaMent than SMITH, whose practical observa-
tion of , the mischievous consequences of nume-
rous commercial regulations, and beautiful ex-
tension of the principle that what an individual
found for his advantage could not he injurious
to nations, led him strongly to advocate th e
principle of let the people do for themselves.
It is, unfortunately, a fact that the disciples
and followers of SMITH, not being recluse stu-
dents like him, but men plunged in the affhirs
of the world, engaged in commerce, Mem-
bers of the Legislature, writers for newspapers
and for bread, or active aspirants for high legal
honour: 1, have in their practice forgotten the pre-
cepts o f their master, and have perverted the
natural . science of the production and distribu-
tion of wealth, which he cultivated and taught as
a philosopher, into an instrument of government.
The doctrines of BENTHAM, and the practices of
SMITLI'S followers, have almost banished from the
public mind the theory as well as the practice
of let ting the people do for themselves. It is
plain, however, that the time is coming, if it be
not come, when this theory must be revived, and
when the practice of doing everything for the
people! must be diligently examined, and the
boundaries of legislation defined and enforced by
a powe: r superior to the Legislature.

Contributions, it appears, have been received
from America, to aid the Anti-Corn-law League,
which places the Corn-law in a fresh light. It
is no longer a mere English question—it is not
even a European question—it is a question
which concerns the whole family of civilised
man, and all future time. It is a question be-
tween aristocracy and democracy; and the grow-
ing democracy of America is making common
cause with the democracy of Europe. It is no
longer merely a pecuniary question, or a ques-
tion of commerce, or even a question of life or
death, but a question of high morality, by
which the character of the present actors on the
stage of life will be stamped or branded in all
after ages.
We have sometimes thought that we would
appeal to the better feelings of the aristocracy,
that we would place before them the pining,
suffering poor—the ragged, toiling, and half-
nourished women, who call titled ladies their
sisters and fellow- countrywomen, and who have
not nourishment for their infants—the hungry,
crying children, of the towns, and the half-
starved, industrious workmen,—with our sus-
pended manufactories, teeming with greater
wonders than ever were recorded or imagined
in antiquity—our halting and decaying com-
merce, which shares that universality which is
characteristic of the Supreme Being; and, asking
the aristocracy to look at all these, also appeal
to their generosity whether they could, for any
gratification of their own, peril these mighty in-
terests, or run the risk of adding one-thousandth
part of a grain to the heart-rending distress of
the people. But such appeals, by us at least,
must be made in vain, and we turn to a sterner
view, suggested by the high moral and historical
chaMeter, which
.the question has now assumed.
The aristocracy must desire, we know they
do desire; to have a fair place in history; but let
us inform them that the history of this age will
be written by the democracy. M. DE TOCQUE-
'ILLE asserts, and appears to have proved, that
the democracy are, every where destined, in spite
of aristocratic laws, to triumph in the end. Who-
ever takes a large view of society, and traces the
gradual rise of the middle classes, the gradual
emancipation of the lower, and the gradual ab-
sorption of the aristocracy into the others; and
whoever considers that GOD creates no aristo-
cracy but the aristocracy of talent, which is op-
posed to a mere political and pecuniary aristo-
cracy, must be convinced that M. DE TOCQLE.
VILLE is correct. Look at the gigantic demo-
cracy across the Atlantic, and look at the effect
it has had in fifty years on the people of
Europe, and ask what will be its effect, fifty
Years hence,when its population is sixty millions !
Democracy must triumph, and that at no distant
day. Democracy- will, here
after, write the 111E-
tory of our times. What will it say of the Eng-
lish landowners?
With what features will it transmit them to
posterity? They are fond of fame, desirous of
the world's homage ; let them cast forward their
glance, and ask what will be said of them by a
democratic historian ? We are unable to sketch
them, but we imagine that such an historian will
describe them as a compound of vile sordidness,
heartless avarice, and base ingratitude ; claiming
power to protect the people, and betraying them
to enrich themselves; as maintained in noble
splendour by the willing toils of admiring subor-
dinates, and rewarding them by snatching the ,

It is. worthy of notice that the principles laid
down I )y the heads of the starvation party perco-
late through all their inferiors, and petrify their
sensibVities. Even City Correspondents, in
whom. we might expect to find a decent love of
liberty T, are as much inclined to be tyrannical
as the; most rigid follower of the iron Duke.
The I amity article of the Morning Post, yester-
day, i or example, contained the following pas-
sage, • which should be read as a piece of news,
as an intimation that the Exchequer bill ras-
cality has been long known to the notables of
the Ci ty, and as a proof of the petrifying nature
of Tory principles :
In Aui ;ust, last year, the exploits of Mr. Rapallo be-
came a. Ir :atter of notoriety. He was actively engaged in
the outfit of Louis Napoleon's expedition against a
friendly :Power, and, if we are correctly informed, it was
at the tit ne privately intimated to Lord Melbourne by
letter 'that if search were made at his (Rapallo's) office,
documents sv ould be found of a most alarming descrip-
tion. Consulting his personal ease alone, Lord Mel-
bourne paid. no attention to the communication, and
hence it is 'that the consequences of the Exchequer bill
fraud fait a a his successors.

nterest :

The pa ragrapli may be a tissue of falsehood,
but the tr uth it tells of the mind of the writer is
palpable and certain. He would have had the
Prime 11 fi ulster send a police officer to examine
Mr. RA P.ALLO'S desk, at the suggestion of a pri-
vate, ant i probably an anonymous, letter. That is
a terribl E.-• tyranny. The letter could only have
been thr u st into the fire, and had Lord MEL-
BOURNE a .ttended to such a sneaking communi-.
cation hi would indeed have been deserving of
severe re proof. Such a mode of proceeding as is
recomn a :nded by the Post would be spurned by
the me 'chants of London as extremely dan-
gerous. Should Sir ROBERT PEEL, on private
and sec r et information, send the police to ransack
the de: :of a single stock-broker, the merchants
of Lon don would soon repent the support they
had gi wren to the Tories.
The •correspondent of Lord MELBOURNE, who-
ever h k! might have been, knew, we are to infer
from the Post, all about the Exchequer bill
fraud in August, but he made no communication
on th‘ 3 subject, except in such a way as he must
be still could not be noticed. If there be any
such ;an, he has been, let us inform the Post,
a participator in the crime. He kept the secret,
and p ermitted the great forgery to be success-
fully carried on, never, for what he knew, to be
deter :,t ed. Such a man ought to be known ; and
we c a:d on the Post to produce the author of the
asse ction that Lord MELBOURNE was informed,
by 1 .etter, in August, that some strange secrets
mig tit be learntby breaking open Mr. RAPALLO'S
desk and then the public will probably lay its
ham h ; on another party to one of the greatest
fraui that was ever concocted.

Tali -I; OTHO of Greece is so well satisfied with
the ath iirable way in which he has governed his
kinv,d n since the date of its independence, that
his M.A. TESTY now thinks of nothing but how he
may ex tend the blessings of his paternal sway
to al f the European subjects of the Ottoman Porte.

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY, NOVENAER 24, 1841.

Accordingly, in conjunction with M. PISCATORY,
the Frond' Agent, recently on a diplomatic mis-
sion to Athens, the imperturbable OTno formed
a project for demanding from the Porte the
ancient Kingdom of Thessaly, in order to esta-
blish a better defined boundary between himself
and the SULTAN. Thisproject was eagerly em-
braced by France and Russia, and, according to
letters from Constantinople of the 31st ult., the
French Ambassador, the Charge d'Affaires of
Russia, and. the English Minister Plenipotentiary
met on the night of the 20th, at the residence of
the Reis Effendi, to take it into consideration.
This precious scheme would have been brought
on sooner, only it was known that Lord PAL-
MERSTON was opposed to any change of the
present boundary line of Greece. The Chronicle
of this morning has an article upon this subject,
but our Contemporary does not appear to know
why Russia and -France sanction such a scheme,
and why they are so eager to draw England into it.
Now the fact is, that Russia regards Greece as no
better than a Russian province, which it only re-
quires an European war to subject to her
sceptre. Any extension of Greece only in-
creases the reversion of any interest of Russia in
that kingdom. France, on the otherhand, isjealous
of the influence we have acquired in Turkey, by
restoring Candia, Syria, and the Holy Cities, to
the SULTAN, and. therefore she does all in her
power to make us unite with her in,a dishonest
scheme of Turkish spoliation, which she well
knows is calculated entirely to'desti•oy that in-
fluence. France dues not want ''so much •to
aggrandize Greece, as to ruin the moral influ-
ence of England in Turkey. In this policy
Russia is but too happy cordially to co-operate
with her.

The Russian and French Cabinets are said to
have calculated a great deal upon aknown diver-
sity of opinion between Lords PALMERSTON and
ABERDEEN, when the present boundary of
Greece was settled. Now, whatever then might
have been the opinion of Lord ABERDEEN, we
canr.ot believe that, with the experience he has
since had of the stupidity, incapacity, and ingra-
titude of OTHO, his Lordship would now sacrifice
Brit: sh interests in Turkey to gratify the vanity of
this contemptible little Kingling despot. Our
relations with both Turkey and Greece have
entirely changed since that period ; nor is the
fact less important, that a revolution in the in-
ternal administration of Turkey by the procla-
mation of the Hatti Scheriff of Ghulhane has
been followed by the enjoyment of more constitu-
tional liberty in the Ottoman empire than is known
to exist practically in Greece. The torture is
unknown in Turkey; in Greece no political
offender is safe from its application. If the Tories
be wise, they will depart as little as possible from
the Foreign policy of Lord PALMERSTON. Rus-
sia and France are digging a pit for them, into
which they will speedily tumble, if they are not
greatly on their guard.

The Moniteur, received with the other Paris
Papers, brings the following news from Spain :

Barcelona is still in a state of siege. Every individual
of the National Militia, or any person not in the army,
who shall be found armed, will be shot. A Military
Commission is created. The disarmament of the 2d and
3d and Bth battalions of the National Guards has been
ordered.

_____
Foreigners have been ordered to present themselves
with certificates from the Consuls, in order to be allowed
to reside in Barcelona.

The National Militia, in an address to the Regent,
makes excuses for the demolition that had commenced
of the citadel. . .

The nomination of the members composing the mili-
tary commission had been published in the order of the
day.
The municipality of 1841 had been replaced by that
of 1840.

The Constztuctonal (Barcelona paper) contains pro-
clamations of Van Halen of the 15th.

We have pleasure in announcing that the san-
guinary MARTIN ZURBANO has been removed
from Bilbao.

In the Moniteur of Saturday we find the fol-
lowing Royal decree :
" Louis Philippe, King of the French, to all present and
to come, greeting ;
"We have ordained, and do ordain as follows—The
Chamber of Peers and the Chamber of Deputies are
convoked for the 27th of December, 1841.

‘• Our Minister Secretary of State at the department
of the Interior is charged with the execution of the pre•
sent decree.—At the Palace of the Tuileries, Nov. 19.

_____ .
" LOUIS PHILIPPE.
(Countersigned) T. DUCHATEL,
Minister of the Interior."

The following extracts from the French Jour-
nals, include all the news they contain of any

The llavre papers state that, on the evening of the
17th instant, an English brig, moored off Quillebceuf,
was driven from her anchors, and carried with great
force against the apparatus for raising the Telemaque.
The brig was thereby saved from being sunk on the
sand-bank, and escaped with little damage to herself,
but completely destroyed all the scaffolding raised by
the contractors, by which they hoped in a few days to
obtain complete success. It was fortunately after the
men had left work, otherwise many lives might have
been lost. _

The Breton of Nantes states that the fishermen of
Sables caught on the 11th instant a quantity of sardinias
—so great, as to amount in value to between 25,000 and
30,000 francs.
Upon a report from the Prefect of the Seine Inferiure,
the Minister of the Interior has authorized the town of
Havre to form a Museum of Paintings and Antiquities,
which will require an expenditure of 440,000 francs.
The Curt of Assize at Douai has just acquitted the
responsible editor of the in/partial du Nord, on the charge
of having inserted in two numbers of that journal articles
attacking Royalty, and personally offensive to the
The Moniteur Parisien contains the following, on the
reported formation of a corps of observation on the Bel-
gian frontier :—" Some movements of' troops had been
ordered in the northern departments when the conspiracy
was discovered, but these movements have since been
countermanded. Several journals have seized this as an
opportunity for accusing the Government of irresolution.
We know that in fact orders had teen given in the 16th
military division for an assembling of troops, and the
General officers had been designated for commands. We
also know that these have since received orders to return
to their garrisons ; and we can add, that the journals in
question ought to have considered this prudent and
natural, since the cause which might have warranted
measures of precaution had ceased to exist."
In the sitting of the Belgian Chamber of Represen-
tatives on Thursday, M. Delahaye, addressing the Mi-
nister of Foreign Affairs, said he wished to have some
explanation as to the state of the commercial negotia-
tions with France. If, said he, the accounts published
in the newspapers were true, it was proposed to make
concessions to France which would affect the interest
of certain branches of industry without having an equi-
valent compensation from the French. The Minister,
in reply, said the Chamber would feel that a certain re-
serve on such a subject would be warranted, but he
would nevertheless reply to the question frankly. Hardly
had the Ministry been formed, when it had to occupy
itself with the commercial negotiations with France,
which had been going on for some time. Commissioners
were appointed, and the Belgian Government had reason
to believe that the object was to conclude a Treaty of
Customs on wide bases. negotiations having met
with obstacles, and the Belgian Commissioners no longer
thinking their pres6lce necessary.in Paris, had expressed
their wish to be recalled. ‘‘ At this moment, " added
the Minister, " the affair is going on between negotiators
appointed by the French Government on the one hand,
and by a Belgian Plenipotentiary and a Commissioner on
the other. It would be wrong to think that beneficial re-
sults are no longer to be expected. We have still hope."
A correspondent at Rome writes :—" the Grand
Duchess of Mecklenburg Schwerin, with the Princess
her daughter, and the Princess of Warsaw, wife of Mar-
shal Paskiewitsch, have arrived in the Pontifical capital.
There are not so many strangers and families come to
Rome this winter as usual ; several persons hesitating to
do so
whereasofroman thereappreh areensi apprehension
at thate ait 2
apartments cannot be
found,

We learn from Algiers that, on the 7th inst., a meet-
ing took place with sabres, between the son of General
Bennet and another officer of the Ist regiment of Chas-
seurs, when the former fell from a wound in the heart,
which he survived but a few minutes. The cause of
this quarrel is not mentioned.
The weather has been very bad in the Channel for
many days. During the storm in the night of Sunday
last the brig
Vere, of Newcastle, laden with coals, was
driven on shore at Dieppe, and for some time no hope
of saving the crew was entertained ; but, by the zealous
einrts of some of the seamen of the place and the crew
of the Levrier, coast-guard vessel, a rope was at length
thrown to the Vere, by means of which the crew, six
in number, were enabled to pass through the breakers,
and get to the shore. The ship afterwards went to
Pieces. on the same evening, the Belle Pottle, of Hon-
flour, was driven on shore, but the crew were saved, and
the vessel itself driven so high upon land that at the
next tide it stood perfectly dry. The brig Delphine, of
Nantes, laden with spirits, &c., has
has been lost off Treport
—crew saved. _ _

The number of Italian residents at Montevideo is
rain fever oc-
ctlitcduariofeuws
in Brittany,
stated to be so great that a journal in that language has
been set up there.
'
h
where a young man, attacked with this malady, got up
nightsinstan cseinoefe, tteeareffQecutismopferb,
in the dark, and, with nothing on but his shirt, went
a considerable distance to the river side. There lie
plunged into the stream, and afterwards sat for a long
time oa a stone by the water's edge. Some persons on
the opposite side of the stream, who had seen him, had
time to make a long circuit, and arrive where he was

before he moved. On their coming up, however, he •
suddenly started off as hard as he could run, and was.
caught with difficulty near the town. There was only
time to convey him to the corps de garde, before he died
in the arms of his captors.
Yesterday morning M. Demons, first huissier of the
Court of Peers, served upon the sixteen prisoners about
to take their trial the decree rendered on Thursday by
the Court. They are thus divided :—At the Concier-
genie are twelve, namely, Quenisset, Boucheron, Colom-
bier, Brazier, Petit, Jarasse, Lawnois, Dupoty, Boggio,
Mallet, Fougeraye, and Bazin. At Sainte Pelagie three
—Prioul, Bouzer, and Considere ; and one at La Force,
Martin. In the afternoon the, same officer gave them
formal notice that the President of the Court had fixed
December 1 for the commencement of their trial.
Mr. Standish left Paris for Fontainebleau on Sunday
last, on a visit at the Castle, and to enjoy the sports of
the chase with their Royal Highnesses the Duke of Or-
leans, the Duke of Nemours, and the Duke d'Aumale. Mr.
Standish returned to Paris on Tuesday, highly gratified
with the sport and his gracious reception.
A man named Peyre, alias Peters, has just been con-
demned, by the Paris Court of Assizes, to the pillory
and nine years' imprisonment with hard labour, for a
fraud upon M. Delamarre, the banker. It appeared
from the evidence, that, after the death, in London, of a
M. Courtois, a Frenchman, who acquired an immense
fortune in England, Peyre went to London, and there
having induced a man to assume the name of Jean Cour-
tois, and to pass as the heir of the deceased, obtained
from him .a power of attorney to manage the affairs of
the estate, and, having two witnesses at hand, this
forged act was clothed by the notary with all the
requisite formalities. Peyre now forged a deed,
purporting to be a sale to a Mr. Richardson, acting
as agent to Messrs. Thompson and Company, of
Newcastle, of all the property arising from the
succession of Courtois, in exchange for two millions
of tons of coals, valued at twenty-five millions of francs,
and had the address to obtain the signature of the British
Consul in Paris to this act, although the pretended Mr.
Richardson never appeared. With these forged docu-
ments Peyre presented himself to M. Delamarre, and
placed in his hands the sale of this enormous consign-
ment, borrowing, at the same time, from M. Delamarre,
a sum of B,ooof. to pay, as he said, for some furniture
which he had just purchased. In a few days M. Dela-
marre ascertained that he had, as well as others, been
the dupe of a swindler, and Peyre was apprehended. On
his trial he declared that the transaction was a real one,
that the documents were not forged, and that he still
expected the coals; but .he brought forward no evidence
to disprove the facts of the accusation.
His Majesty the King of Prussia has just given his
decision in the affair of the celebrated composer Spon-
tini, against whom, it will be recollected, a cabal was
formed at Berlin about a year ago, which led to some
-scenes of unseemly disorder at the Opera House in that
city. The King has decided that M. Spontini dial' be
relieved from further duty as Director of the Music, but
shall continue to receive the salary attached to the office,
and to bear the honorary title of Musical Director-
General. The composer is permitted to reside wherever
he pleases, and, if he desires it, to superintend the pro-
duction of his own works at the theatre. M. Spontini
is at present in Paris.
The Obsertiateur des Pyrenees-, under the head of Pau,
Nov. 16, has the following article:—
" A letter from St. Jean de Luz informs us that the

troops of Espartero are stationed all along the frontier
one, and the Light Artillery, accompanying a regiment
of the line, has been sent towards the Valley of Bastan to
prevent the introduction of French goods till the Tariff
of Customs should be finally established.
"The. 3d battalion of the 38th regiment, with its staff,
has arrived at St. Jean de Luz and at Cibourne. The 2d
battalion is in cantonment from Hendage to Itzatson.
The Ist battalion is expected very shortly to reinforce
the line. A battery of artillery and some squadrons of
cavalry are likewise announced to reinforce the troops on
the frontier."
Positive news was received yesterday that two regi-
ments of Dragoons are to come very shortly to be in
garrison, one at Pau, the other at Orthez.—Memorial des
Pyrenees.