The Sun.
London, England, 1846-04-23 00:00:00

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LONDON, THURSDAY. APRIL 23, 1846.

The House of Commons met at Twelve.

The order of the day for the further consideration of
the report on the Friendly Societies Bill was read. A
long discussion ensued, and eventually clauses up to 16
were agreed to, with amendments, and the further con-
sideration of the report was postponed to Friday.
A new writ was ordered for Falkirk, in the room of
Mr. BAIRD, who has accepted the Chiltern Hundreds.
Mr. ELPHINSToNE moved the second reading of the
County Eletions Bill, which limit the time of polling in
elections for counties to one day.
Colonel WOOD moved as an amendment, that the Bill
be read a second time that day six months.
The Bill was supported by Lord WORSLEY, Mr.
BRIGHT, and Mr. BICKHAH Escort, and opposed by
Mr. NEWDIGATE, Mr. BECKETT DENISON, Sir JAMES
GRAHAM, Colonel SIBTHORP, and Lord G. BENTINcK,
and on a division it was rejected by a majority of 23 ;
there being for the second reading, 32, against it, 55.
The Railway Deposits Bill, and the Commons En-
closure Bill were respectively read a third time and
passed, and the House adjourned.

The Earl of ABERDEEN, some weeks ago, made some
brief remarks in the Lords, expressing, with more
warmth than he usually displays, his disapprobation of
the conduct pursued by the Greek Government towards
England in regard to the interest of the loan, and an-
nounced that it was the determination of the British
Government, as well as the Emperor of RUSSIA, to take
some strong measures to enforce payment, in
case the present Minister, COLETTI, should per-
sist in refusing redress. The subject was ad-
verted to in the French Chamber of Deputies, when
M. GUIZOT took part with COLETTI, blamed the lan-
guage of Lord ABERDEEN, the Members approving of
M. GrizoT's remarks, and a few days afterwards the
amount required to meet the interest was voted unani-
mously. A wide difference has thus sprung up between
England and France about this small bankrupt state,
though it may be regarded rather as a personal than a
national feeling, the two foreign Secretaries having
their respective favourites at Athens ; and
the Greek :Minister seems resolved to make
it still wider by setting the British Govern-
ment at defiance. After a great many shuffling
promises of payment, either by setting apart a portion of
the revenue, or including the interest in the budget, or
some other equally improbable step for meeting the debt,
the budget, according to the last accounts, had just been
presented to the Chamber, without any provision what-
ever for meeting the demands of Lord ABERDEEN.
The foreign loan is not even alluded to in it,
and care is taken, in exhibiting the income and
expenditure, to show that payment at present
is utterly hopeless, as the revenue falls short of the
amount absolutely necessary to carry on the affairs of
Government. What step, then, will Lord ABERDEEN
adopt to enforce payment ? Will he seize upon some of
the more thriving seaports and collect the customs'
duty, or lay an embargo on the shipping, or threaten
to put: an execution into the royal exchequer at
Athens ? We fear he would be opposed, in every
efficient attempt to enforce British rights, by the
French Minister, backed by the Chamber, for Greece,
insolvent and ungrateful Greece, is a great favourite
there at present. COLETTI is devoted to French inte-
rests, and he will make his devotion more conspicuous
by insulting both England and Russia under the wing of
France. It is, however, at best a contemptible quarrel,
and the interests at least of two of the powers require
that it should be settled without delay. Greece is not
worth contending for ; she could render no assistance
whatever to either of the two countries, should
they unfortunately be brought into collision. She
is bankrupt, her KING remains what he was when
he was first placed on the throne, there is no Minister
that really takes an interest in the welfare of the state ;
COLETTI, and AfAVROCORDATO, and METAxAs, are en-
gaged respectively, when out of office, in devising
schemes fur supplanting a rival, and Greece, whose
emancipation from Turkish dominion was so ardently
desired by the enthusiastic admirers of her former
deeds, and; which has now existed as an inde-
pendent kingdom for eighteen years, is, per-
haps, next to Spain, the worst governed country
in the world. Does it become the dignity
of England and France to embroil themselves with her
affairs, and to rouse old national antipathies in their re-
spective Houses of Parliament far a people so lost to
all sense of gratitude and honour ? Looking at the case
impartially, we can make excuse for Lord ABERDEEN'S
irritation. Greece owes her independence to England.
Englishmen left their country and devoted themselves
and their property to her service. Loans were raised
and battles fought to release her from the yoke
of Turkey ; and all these services aro repaid
by refusing to acknowledge her just claims, and
by treating. England with contempt. These are
just causes of annoyance to the British Minister, but
they furnish no sufficient reason for quarrelling• with
France, or adopting any strong measures that might
call forth a national display. Two men so little pugna-
cious as ABERDEEN and GUIZOT, and generally so much
guided by sound discretion, might settle the differences
by official negotiations without at all involving the sus-
ceptibilities of two rival nations.

We have read in one of the essayists of the last cen-
tury, that where two politicians of opposite views have
been for some time discussing the character and stabi-
lity of a Government, if the disputant, who is unfavour-
able to its continuance, should feel that his different
views and arguments have been well challenged and re-
futed, his dernier resort is, not unfrequently, to take a
familiar hold of one of the buttons of his adversary's
coat, and sinking his voice into a confidential whisper, to
assure him that he has good information of the Pre-
mier's health being in a most unsatisfactory state.
If such a conversation should happen whilst Parliament
is not sitting, a few days suffice to set aside the gratuitous
assumption ; if it should occur during the session, a few
hours establish the same thing. In the mean while the
discontented politician has beaten his retreat, rejoicing
that whilst his own mind is rank ling with his failure in
not having combined another's with his own prejudices,
he has, at least, started a presumption, calcu-
lated to disturb for the moment the triumphant
Afterbeating
composurewah of his antagonist. Much in the same
expedthbee been driven
for aa r e
rtaol
si myiserasblea morningilingent. Contemporary
months with every conceivable weapon drawn from the
armoury of ancient and exploded prejudices, after using
up every species of invective, and hurling its missiles in
every direction against the Government, tot it with
the degrading marks of incompetency, t
treachery, and
national suicide, it confidently announces that there is
to be an e irly, if not an immediate, dissolution
Par-
liament. In cases of galloping
consumption' there of
here is
generally what is known to be a "lightening
before
death"—the surest sign of the patient being
his health
his end,
is the sudden impression he is under, thatthealth is
fast returning to him. The same delusion has
taken our Contemporary. He takes it into his
headovers
that
a state physician can be found to uphold a worn-out
CoT,Stiiution 1)y• the power of the corn-laws ; that th,,
1:0u.,e of Lords w>il still find means to prolong life b
the continuance of the same stimulating regimen in.
which it has so long indulged, and without which
it is fancied existence must immediately close. Such
is the tenacity with which he clings to his own
opinion, that he astonishes everybody by the strength
of his hopes when they can only recognise
the elements of despair. The dying monopolist builds
his chance of recovery first upon his belief that after
July the Whigs will be strong enough to check the
further progress of Sir B. PEEL as Prime Minister, and
next upon the assurance he gives us that the Peers will
reject the Corn-law Bill. We look in vain for any suffi_
cient grounds for the latter opinion, and, without some
specific reasons, we cannot csncede the likelihood that
the prophecy of a speedy dissolution comes from
a quarter better enabled than others to judge
of such a contingency. On the contrary,
we confess that the vaticinations upon which ho von-
year do not inspire us with suffi-
tured during the past
cient confidence to receive implicitly the augury pro-
mulgated for the future. These are not the times when
the House of Lords would willingly repudiate any great
measure passed by a powerful majority in the Commons.
They tried such a course under Lord GREY'S Govern-
ta'mt, and were obliged to recoil from the shock
that emanated from their inconsiderate policy. Sub;
secs entlY they refused their consent to several

I measures sent tp by the Commons ; but
then these ;tiers mea,urcs not of tliv vaat?,lA tu Lie
' (with the exception of that which provided f,,r the ep.
propriation of ecclesiastical revenues to secular pur-
poses), and one and all bad only been passed by ma-
jiirities far below the number of placemen having seats
in the popular branch of the Legislature. The corn-
law is a measure second to none in its importance. Its
necessity is felt to be so great, that it has
effected a revolution in the sentiments of the
Premier—a man whose mind is of the highest
order, and whose individual interests are bound
up with the proprietors of the soil. A similar
change has been wrought upon the minds of many other
senators. And the conviction is the more valuable
from having been arrived at free from the excitement of
candidates upon the hustings. The Duke of WxL-
LINGTON is a similar convert. His Grace stands aloof
from any other influence save that of a patriotic desire
to act for the good of his country. Other Peers, like
Lord ESSEX, &c., are daily swelling the ranks of the
disciples of free trade. The country at large, as
stated by the Minister, has within the last twelve months
raised its voice in the same cause. That vast associa-
tion—the League—already confident in the speedy
triumph of the great principle it embodied, seems con-
tent to remain passive. On the other hand, their oppo-
nents have tried every means, and tried them in vain,
to turn the scales of public; opinion by any counter-de-
monstration. These are matters the House of
Peers will not heedlessly reflect upon, and are
to us assurances that their judgment will
unite with that of the House of Commons.
What the Whigs will do in the month of July, and after
the Corn-law Bill shall be enrolled on the statute-book,
it is not perhaps so easy to predict, though this also
has been made subject of speculation. Considering,
however, the honourable support they are now giving
the Ministry, in opposition to the banded supporters of
monopoly, it argues the improbability of their hereafter
taking a line of policy tending politically to strengthen
those whose discomfiture is as marked as their
views are selfish and narrow. If these and
such hairbrained speculations are the only vouchers for a
dissolution, its rumour is a ricketty abortion indeed.
Such Members, also, of the House of Peers, as might
desire a continuance of the corn-laws, must feel uneasy
under the weight of the cumbersome and spurious ar-
guments by which their cause is thus wantonly upheld.
If ever they have felt themselves coaxed, flattered, and
praised by their auxiliary of the press, awl, in turn,
have lent their approving smiles, they must already be-
gin to be sensible that zeal may degenerate into indis-
cretion, and recognise the full force of the adage—
" Pessimum genus iniraloorum laudantes.";

It has been said, as a proof of the keen, plodding,
and wary habits of the Scotch, that a Jew is a very rare
sight north of the Tweed, and that the huekstering
Hebrew, if he chances to cross the river, hurries back
with the most inconceivable speed, in order to escape
death from starvation. On the cause of this singular
phenomenon we will not venture any suppositions, but
about the paucity of the Jews in the north there can be
no doubt—the very small numbers of that industrious
race found in Scotland forming only exceptions to the
general rule. There is another point, however, in
which a similarity of manners and customs are infinitely
more striking, and which has excited the wonder of an-
tiquarians as well as learned philosophers. In their ob-
servance of one day of the week as a day of rest a
considerable portion of the Scotch follow the example
set by the Jews, and consider it a heinous crime to do
any work on that day. They forget altogether the
new dispensation, they disregard the precepts of the
great FOUNDER of our Religion, who was persecuted to
death by Sabbath-worshippers, and perversely consider
it one of the great objects of Christianity to render the
first day of the week, which ought to be observed with
joy and gladness, a day of sorrow and punishment. Our
readers will remember the heaps of petitions that were
poured into Parliament during the days of Sir ANDREW
AGNEW, praying for the better observance of the
Sabbath in Scotland, a country where all foreigners,
even the Jews themselves, consider it would be im-
possible to make the observance more strict. Some of
them will also remember that when the first important
line of railroad, that between Edinburgh and Glasgow,
was opened, the most strenuous and unfair means were
adopted by the Agnewites to influence the directors and
shareholders, and compel them to stop the trains on
Sunday. We look back with satisfaction to that period,
because The Sun took an active part in defeating a
scheme which, if established in that instance, might have
been made applicable to all the lines throughout that
kingdom. We *wed from the best of all authority,
the New Testament, that the Jewish observance of the
first day of the week was at direct variance with its pre-
cepts, as well as the example of the Apostles, and the
more rational portion of the directors, we are glad to
say an overwhelming majority, took the same view of
the question. A Glasgow clergyman, after a silence of
three months, attempted to refute our arguments, but he
could not refute matters of fact, nor language plain to
the commonest understanding, nor the direct injunctions
laid down by divine authority. But still this party
interfi-res with the more liberal habits of the great body
of the people, and have fallen upon a new scheme to effect
their purpose. They now pour petitions into Parliament
praying that the license granted to toll• bar houses to
furnish refreshment for travellers may all be withdrawn
by an Act of the Legislature ; and one of their most
weighty arguments for this harsh step is, that the
Sabbath is desecrated at these places by drinking
spirituous liquors. We find, however, from a number
of petitions presented to the House of Lords on Tuesday
evening, by Lord CAMPBELL, that this step will not sa-
tisfy them, and that all house:, licensed for the sale of
spirituous liquors on Sunday must be forthwith closed.
'We cannot say that it is an electioneering scheme, but cer-
tainly it has all the appearance of a trick of that description
The Earl of MINTO was the determined supporter of a
Bill to abolish licenses for toll-houses, which the Com-
mons manfully rejected. It was brought forward by
Mr. Fox MAULE, and mainly supported by Mr. P. M.
STEWART, two pillars of the Free Church ; and the
parties who are bent on a still further encroachment on
the liberty of the subject entrust their petitions to such
Whig Lords as BREADALBANE, MINTO, and CAMPBELL.
The Tory peers seemed to take little interest in the
matter, and the Bill was allowed quietly to pass. But
in the other House that party acted a more noble part.
The Scotch Tory Members, though few in propor-
tion to their opponents, mustered strongly, and threw
out the Bill. Sir JA➢IES GRAHAM and the Lord Advo-
cate, who ought to know something about the internal
Government of the country, voted against it, and could
see no reason fur believing that there was any truth in
the arguments urged by Mr. Fox MAULE, or that the
Sabbath could be desecrated more at occasional toll-bar
houses on the high road than at the thousands of places
open for the same purpose in large towns. To meet
this difficulty, these meddlers with the rights of private
conscience—those men who are eternally seeing motes in
their brother's eye, but consider not the beam in their own
eyes, have adopted a more comprehensive scheme, and
are determined to forbid refreshments on Sundays to all
parties except those who have well-stocked cellars at
home, or can afford to pay the high charges of a hotel.
This is an abominable attempt to tyrannise over the
lower classes ; it is one of the most glaring instances of
class legislation, and we consider it therefore our
bounden duty to the unrepresented classes to do all in
our power to protect their rights, and put down bare-
faced schemes of oppression, which never would have
been broached by Whig Lords or Whig Commoners,
under a more extended system of representation.

Constantinople papers to the 6th, and Athens papers to the
9th, have been received. Everything was tranquil at Con-
stantinople. The Ministry had paid up a considerable por-
tion of the arrears due to the troops, and were progressing in
their measures of reform.
At Athens the Minister, Commit', had obtained from the
Chamber a vote. for a provisional credit for four months, by
a majority of 69 to 33. A motion for an address, praying
the KING to dismiss his Ministers, was lost by a similar ma-
jority. On the 6th the anniversary of Greek independence
was observed with all the usual solemnities and rejoicings.
On the 7th a curious scene took place in the Chamber. The
Deputy for Syra, M. DARAS, informed the President that he
had just been assaulted in the Chamber itetelf, by General
Gutztorri. M. Gnivas said that the General intended only
to inflict a little corporal discipline upon M.. Dimas, but
that he had interfered and prevented any blows being given.
M. DAnas wished to make a speech on the oc,:,asion., but the
President informed him that he could not arlow him to do
so until the affair should have been regularly inquired into.
Several of the Deputies complained of this cionduct of the
President as partial, and demanded that M. DALLAS tshould
be heard. Great confusion ensued, and eventuality the sitting
broke up in most admired disorder.

A letter from St. Petersburgb, of March 25, states that a
deputation of the nobility of Livonia has been.. summoned to
that city to draw up a new set of regulations between the
nobles and peasants of Livonia. Some high_ .functionaries
have been joined to them to direct their labo,cirg.
The disturbances in Austrian Galicia still contfitue.

The Universal German Gazette says thrtt the cholera had
entered Russia from Persia, and had broken out at Casln and
Orenburgh.

Madrid papers to the 15th Inst. lave arrived. Me He,
raldo, the organ of NARVAEZ, says that it is not improbable
that another change of Ministry may take place, Ma.cmuch
as differences haye arisen in the Cabinet oq the subjopt of