The Sun.
London, England, 1847-07-01 00:00:00

THE EX-PREMIER.

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The ex-Premier is now in his glory. Exempt from
the responsibilities of office and the assaults of Opposi-
tion, from the reluctant hostility of Sir R. Inglis, and
the unsparing wild-fire of Disraeli—from the taunts of the
forsaken and the irony of the outdone—and, better than
all besides, delivered from the necessity of making and
listening to Parliamentary speeches in a sultry June,
Sir Robert has betaken himself to the most inglorious
tranquillity of Tamworth and the unoppressive festivi-
ties of the Trent Valley. There, amid scenes which
soothe and listeners who applaud, docile admirers or
silent foes, he consecrates the altar of Peace with an
appropriate sacrifice to Commerce. The undertaking
which he began in 1845 he consummates in 1847. The
rails are laid, the works are completed, and the car
e-
riages have run on the very soil of which h
turned the first sod in that memorable year.
What, a contrast between the inauguration of
that day and the celebration of last Saturday Not
more unlike is June to November, cloud to sunshine,
and fog to fruitage—than are the recollections, the
hopes, the fears, an the anticipations of the one occasion
to those of the other. In the one all is light and cheer-
ful ; in the other all was heavy, full of fears, full of
doubts, and, may be, full of suffering. On the one
loomed the dark cloud of a coming famine and the
dilemma of an inevitable apostacy. A party was to be
abandoned fir a principle ; or a principle maintained at
the cost of a convulsion. The question at issue was
formidable ; the mental conflict which arose from it
tremendous. To be twice a recreant is given to few
Ministers with impunity. But to be a recreant after
restored confidence and renewed allegiance, can be ex-
pected by none without temerity. Yet this was the
question—to desert Protection or to brave the people ;
to stand by the Corn-laws, or to be twitted with
abetting famine ; to be patted on the back by Mr.
:slewdegate and the " territorial interest," or to
be saluted by Mr. Cobden and " the great
towns ;"—more than this ; to be statesman-
like and provident at the expense of pledges, or staunch
at the expense of statesmanship—this it was which
brooded heavily on the mind of the Premier Peel. It
spoke in every syllable, it sounded in every tone of his
tongue and every effort of his spade. It added intensity
to his gout, and ponderousness to his commonplaces.
Elie mind was not in the Trent Valley, but on those
dusky and smoky towns, to whose anxious and tumul-
tuous multitudes the Trent Valley line was but an in-
strument of the multiform traffic, the vital interests of
which were then at stake. All then was uncertain,
lowering, and oppressive. But the change is nowt
pleee.- The times and seasons. are not the sale. The
scene is not the same. The man is not the same.
The verdure of teeming spring and the buoyancy of
elastic youth are eloquent in every gesture and every
tone of the enfranchised Premier. The fetters are off
his hands and the gloom off his mind. He grows young
again in the meadows of the Trent and the proxi
mity of Tamworth. The Parliamentary garb is still
'bout him, but it is loosely and pleasingly worn.
lie has only one dilemma, arta that is, the absence of a
dilemma. He has net his three courses to pursue.
There is only one before bite, to return thanks on his
health being drunk. This, indeed, he diverts from its
obvious directness: but his obliquity is neither unnatural
nor ungraceful. He makes the acknowledgment of a
compliment the vehicle of antiquarian instruction and
historical associations. He digresses from himself to
Mr. Stephenson, and from Mr. Stephenson to Agricola,
with a rapidity which is startling, rather from the junc-
tion of their names than the contrast of their actions.
But the association is pleasing not only in itself, but
because it shows that thirty and odd years of public life
have not made Sir Robert forget his Tacitus, and that
his poetry has not been repressed by the tug and wear
of a long political warfare. These is one point of his
speech which, in our admiration of his classical and
poetical raptures, we were nearly overlooking, and yet it is
too characteristic to escape notice. Speaking of the work
the consummation of which he was then watching, he
says, " I have given it my suppot t, because I felt confi-
dent that it must ultimately be completed." This is
candour and self-knowledge. It explains a twofold
desertion and a twice-braved obloquy. Hereafter, we
are confident it will explain a course wherein success
may be achieved without obloquy and without desertion.
Unless we have much mistaken the character of Sir
Robert, he will henceforth be found on the side which is
destined to be " ultimately successful." The solemnity
at which he assisted was favourable to good nature; and
good nature is rife of compliments. Accordingly Sir R.
Peel complimented everybody. Contractors, engineers,
and navvies came in for his good word. The Manche&
ter men were lauded for their energy. Mr. Stephenson
wait the antitype of Julius Agricola ; so also—
for want of another prototype—was Mr. Bras.
say- The day which saw a direct road commenced
under Roman auspices from London to Chester, was
contrasted with the day which will see London, Ches-
ter, and Wales, or Scotland, all connected together by a
moz close and far more expeditious route. The com-
mercial interests which this communication will serve,
and the social benefits which it will confer, were elo-
quently dilated on; nor, while he descanted on the ra-
pidity with which London could communicate her wants
to Manchester, or Manchester satisfy the demands of
London, and likewise on the certainty and velocity with
which our few and scanty garrisons in the north could
transmit their armed succours to the invaded south, did
he forget Ireland; Ireland would be brought nearer.
Some, perhaps, of his audience may have felt that she
was near enough already. But Sir Robert was
toa sanguine to think of aught evil. Plague,
famine, and begging fled before his imagina-
tive view of wealth, commerce, andcomfort.
What he would not realise they would not remember.
So, the leader of her Majesty's Opposition (by ceeirtesy)
has dexterously seised another opportunity of wafting
his kindly sympathies to Ireland from the midst of an
assembly which recent events might be supposed to have
rendered rather sulky towards the sister isle. It was a
happy spirit which breathed in his words. May his
experience justify his hope ! In office he failed where
all others have failed equally. Out of office he has time,
and we are glad to see a wish, for study. We will, there-
fore, refer him to his favourite model, and trust that a
Minister " under four sovereigns," may, at the close of
his career, discover that which was early known to the
deputy of one Emperor, Legione and et modicis auxiliis
obtineri Hiberniam posse.—Times.

EXTRAORDINARY HEAT OF THE:WEATHER.---011
Monday the barometer at the Royal Humane Society's
receiving-house, in Hy-de-park, stood from eleven, A.M.,
to five P M., in the suu at 101 deg. of Fahrenheit, and in
the shade at 83 deg.