The Sun.
London, England, 1848-05-27 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY

longer realise an income, in consequence of ill-health,
want of employment, or any of the numerous casual-
ties to which every person embarked in any de-
scription of trade or employment is constantly ex-
posed—to contribute as largely to the national
expenditure as the inheritor of landed estates or funded
thousands. The Chancellor of the Exchequer was
resolved that the objectionable and inequitable principle
should be perpetuated, and that direct taxation should
not be levied in any other manner. This was the
real question at issue, and it is not fair, or in ac-
cordance with the real facts, to place the temperate
but firm and determined opposition of the people, and
their energetic protest against the unjust and un•
equal charge, upon any other basis.
The entire income and expenditure of the country
should be immediately inquired into in every point.
Although the present state of the national finances
may be such that no tax can be relaxed until a sub-
stitute is provided, that only affords a stronger reason
for a strict and searching investigation. If a private
individual found his affairs getting seriously embar-
rassed, and himself involved in difficultiss, should he
persevere in the system, which had led to such a
result, or should he not, on the contrary, maturely
consider the nature of his transactions, in order to
ascertain which were profitable and which the reverse,
with a view to an immediate abandonment of the latter,
and an extension of the former ? A nation should
pursue a similar course. The obsolete doctrines of pro-
tection and monopoly have been formally and for ever
abandoned by the Legislature. We cannot retrograde : it
is impossible to remain stationary ; we must, therefore,
progress. Our trade and commerce must be made
really free and unrestricted ; it cannot be so, while
such enormous and disproportionate duties are levied
on the products of other lands, and even of our own,
which we are thus unable to bring into the market at
such a price as to obtain purchasers. Our productive
powers are thus paralyzed, and employment is kept
from the people. All the burdens which press on in-
dustry, or which impede commerce, should at once
and unconditionally be repealed, and this can only
be done by the imposition of a tax on every descrip-
tion of realised property, sufficient to defray the neces-
sary expenditure of the country. We doubt not that
this expenditure would speedily be placed on a re-
duced scale when it fell exclusively on the owners of
property, and, therefore, on the classes from whom
the representatives of the people must, by reason of
the property qualification, be selected. What was
essential would be provided, but extravagance would
be carefully eschewed. We trust that the asso-
ciations which have been formed for the pur-
pose of promoting this valuable reform, will pur-
sue their object steadily and energetically : they
must, in order to obtain success, agitate without
ceasing, and keep the injustice and the impolicy of
the present system constantly before the public. A
great lesson has been afforded. " The Anti-Corn-
law League" have pointed out the course by which
great constitutional reforms may be peacefully
achieved. Why should not that League again start
into existence ? Its members effected much for the
country, but why should they relax their exertions
until their doctrines were fully carried out They
obtained one great instalment of justice—why should
they not persevere until every restriction was removed
—and England made, indeed, the emporium of the
world—the land where commerce and every descrip•
tion of manufacture could be carried on without any
impediment whatever? This would, indeed, be worthy
of a struggle, and the sooner the contest is commenced
the more speedy will be its complete and triumphant
termination.

Our unfortunate colonies in the West Indian ar-
chipelago have at last obtained the assistance of Go-
vernment. Assistance is the right word—not sym-
pathy. There has been too much impoverishment,
and, latterly, too near an approximation to insolvency
among the proprietors of the sugar and coffee planta-
tions, to admit of any very sympathetic feelings in the
heart of a Legislature. Especially was this inevitable
with a Legislature like that of Great Britain—a Le-
gislature whose remorse is extravagance, and whose
aspiration is retrenchment. To appeal to the sensi-
bilities of a mere machine of Administration, indeed,
would have been as idle as to intercede with that im-
placable mechanism of destruction which one reads of
in oriental romance as closing, inch by inch, upon its
victims, and ultimately crushing them to " a jelly of
death" by an exquisitely graduated assassination.
Had Parliament been susceptible of emotion in the
instance of our West Indian proprietary-, we doubt
not that, like a CORIOLANUS of Cockaigne, Mr.
SPEAKER would have been confronted by the orators
of Berbice and the quadroons of Tortola, pleading
to him is behalf of those regions of panic and desolation.
As it was notorious, however, that the senate-houses
of Westminster are little less impassible than oracles,
they have been assailed alone by the homely weapons
of the petition-monger, the deputationist, the
pamphleteer, badgering, reiteration, and pertinacity.
After a more protracted hesitation than any, perhaps,
that can be adduced even from the records of the
British Parliament, Government has at length com-
menced an effort in behalf of our colonial planters,
but its concessions are now too tardy to appear bene-
ficent—it is visible to the most mediocre intelligence
that the mother country has been importuned into
generosity, and impelled to her present determination
less by sentiments of honour than by the embarrassing
deductions of a Committee. We are driven to these
considerations by a circumstance which transpired
the other evening in the House of Commons, when,
on the propositio❑ of Mr. IlawEs, the third resolu•
tion of the Committee on Tobago relief and immi-
gration into British Guiana and Trinidad was " further
considered and agreed to, and a Bill, founded thereon,
ordered to be introduced." Subordinate as this
incident may appear in the midst of the more
striking vicissitudes of legislation, it brings to our
recollection a fact which has frequently recurred to us
of late, a fact pregnant w'..th the events of futurity,
and one which is more worthy of reflection than the
fluctuations in the consumption of muscovado or the
indiscriminate employment of sugar in distillation.
We allude to the comparative oblivion into which
our colonial interests (in their entirety) have fallen,
in consequence of the superior attraction of the in
ternal administration of England, of the nascent re-
bellion in Ireland, and of those extraordinary occur-
rences which, since the January of 1848, have
convulsed the European Continent ani transfigured
the whole face of Christendom.

Occasionally, it is true, during the last quarter,
there have been references to the position of our
colonial possessions both in the columns of The Sun
and in those of our contemporaries; but the para-
mount importance of those possessions, as a whole,
ins topicsseemst of
o have been subordinated to the more engross-
the journalist. We would terminate
this temporary forgetfulness; we would recal to the
remembrance of our Legislators the necessity of
scrutinizing more systematically than they have done
recently the requirements of our colonists; we would
enforce, if possible, the consciousness of those enor-
mous responsibilities which affect the con-
science of a State as powerfully as the sense of
certain moral obligations affects the conscience
of an individual. Of all the responsibi-
lities of Government, those which are asso-
ciated with the colonies of an empire are unquestion-
ably the most imperative, and, in the event of their
being overlooked, are the most certain to be followed
by a disastrous retribution. It ,was this which was
illustrated so forcibly in the dismemberment of our
North American dominions. It is this which we
would see avoided by a more sedulous attention to
the interests of our colonists. And it is precisely be-
cause we have recognised the growth of this peri-
lons indifference fur a very considerable time past,
that we are solicitous to revive en masse the exigen-
cies of our situation. If any country upon the sur-
face of the globe is peculiarly answerable for the
manner in which its energies have been distributed
over its remote and scattered territories, that country
is assuredly England ; for no other has ever con-
centrated under a single sceptre such vast and diver-
sified dominions. It has not remained for us to remark
that the colonial possessions of Great Britain are
Asiatic, European, African, and American, that they
extend over gigantic tracks in both hemispheres, that
they include entire archipelagoes, and peninsulas,
and, as in the instance Of Australia, a whole conti-
nent. But it has remained for us to declare that the
incongruities of the scheme of legislation applied to
these stupendous conquests—the conquests less of
war than of commerce and navigation—are cal-

culated, unless modified effectually and betimes,
to redound to our ignominy as a nation,
and to lead in the end to the disruption
of our empire. Before we particularise a few
of the most prominent of these incongruities, it is by
no means unadvisable to reflect for an instant upon
In each of
the
colonyire
tthe
e characteristicsestimation
a f a which
statesman. may distinguish a
these characteristics we shall find that the colonial
territories of the United Kingdom are fruitful even to
a wonderful degree. Foremost among the various
classes of colonies are those which must be considered
simply as territorial acquisitions, and of this descrip-
tion of colony England furnishes a magnificent ex-
ample in New South Wales, in Van Diemen's Land,
and in those generous but thinly-populated islands
which were first explored by the adventurous CooK.
Of agricultural colonies again she possesses an almost
embarrassing abundance from her dominions in the
northern continent of America to the comparatively
insignificant estates cf Dominica and Montserrat. Of
colonies exuberant in their exportations of timber she
has sufficient to render her independent of the forests
contiguous to the Baltic; and of those which are
chiefly remarkable as fisheries she has an extraordi-
nary number, besides the spacious shores of New-
foundland. In every particular England is richer in
colonial treasures than any other maritime power
whose history has been recorded either in modern

times or in the enterprising ages of antiquity. The
glory of Tyre and Sidon pale before that which sheds
its lustre over the vista of her illustrious annals. The
prowess of the Phoenicians and the audacity of the
Carthaginians were alike unable to render them her
competitors in greatness. The boastful ejaculation
of PHILIP the SECOND has been realised by her
children, and the daring of Portugal has been, by
her, successively emulated and surpassed. Nothing
of all this is dictated by an idle spirit of braggadocio,
but solely by that wholesome dread of the calamities
which must infallibly result from the protracted
apathy of our administrators, unless that apathy be
spontaneously and resolutely abandoned. Vast and
prolific our colonies may be, vast and prolific they
unquestionably are, but for that very reason our re-
sponsibilities in regard to the conservation of their
interests and the development of their rights are in-
disputably still more vast and innumerable.
In one of those beautiful but Utopian visi▪
ons
which the lyre of LAMARTINE has thrilled into the
very soul of the nations, the hypothesis of an ori▪
en-
tal colonization has been expounded. Islotwithstand-
ing the obstacles of prejudice, in defiance of those
instincts of antipathy which are inherent in the
mind of the Asiatic, the project has seemed feasible
to the author of La chute dun ange, and his imagi-
nation has already revelled in the anticipation of
" prosperous peoples, and millions of men marching
under the dEgis of Europe to a nlw
Whatever M. DE CORMENIN may think to the con-
trary, we are satisfied that with a judicious impetus
the dream of LAMARTINE might he realized
not in the colonization of the Rest,
but in the diffusion of religion, and know-
ledge, and enterprise, and good government,
throughout the scattered colonies of Britain. By this
means the slope of civilization would not be directed
exclusively towards Palestine, or to the banks of the
Bosphorus—it would be diffused over the globe with
a catholic impartiality. Before, however, any scheme
so gigantic could be adventured upon, in relation to
the colonial possessi ins of England, what mighty
innovations would be requisite as rational prepara-
tives l Mighty as they are, nevertheless, these inno-
vations are still practicable, and upon their accom-
plishment depends the duration of our nationality.
Numerous as such necessary innovations are, they
may be defined in the enunciation of a single neces-
sity—the necessity of assimilating together in one
congruous system the anomalies of our colonial
legislation. When that has been effected, we shall
have obtained the standing-ground for which ARCM..
MEDES sighed, we shall have acquired the vet) crvw
from which we may move the world. How remote
this achievement is, however, can be conjectured from
details as conclusive as the calculations of M'Cur.-
LAcu. When it is remembered that among the
nineteen divisions of our West Indian pos-
sessions, one (Honduras) is governed by a superin-
tendent and magistrates, four (St. Lucia, Trinidad,
Bdrhice and Demerara, with Essequibo,) by a Go-
vernor, a Council, and the orders of the QUEEN in
Council, while the remaining Eurteen (Tobago,
Tortola, Anguilla, Bahama, Bermudas, Antigua,
Barbadoes, Dominica, Granada, Jamaica, Mont-
serrat, Nevis, St. Kitts, and St. Vincent,) are
governed by a Governor, a Council, and an Assembly
—it will be acknowledged that the splendour of our
colonial greatness is likely to be as fleeting as the
oriental vision of LAMARTINE. Give but symmetry
to this empire, by giving unity to its government,
and its splendour will ba perpetuated, and the poetio
vision may be realized.

According to the latest accounts, Madrid was per•
fwctly tranquil.

THE FRENCH REPUBLIC.

THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY.

We have received the Paris papers of yesterday.
The elections to fill up th • vacancies in the repre-
sentation of Paris in the National Asaembly take
place to-morrow, and in addition to the lists of can-
didates put forward by the National and the Reforms,
which we published yesterday, the following have
started. VICTuR HUGO, M. TRIERS, General CHAN-
GARNIER, HORACE SAT, and Dr. THIERRIN
The Journal des Debats published an address to
the electors by VICTOR HUGO, in which the ex-Vis-
comte declares himself the partisan of the republic of
civilization as distinguished from the republic of terror,
and declares his willingness to sacrifice his life to
promote the establishment of the first, and to prevent
the establishment of the last.

Thu Dernocratie Pacifique says, that it is currently
reported that the representatives of the Northern
Courts have protested apinat the resolution of the
National Assembly on the subject of Poland.
The Constitutionnel says that M. LOUIS BLANC and
his Committee of labourers have left a score of 350,000
francs to be settled by the Republic for the expenses of
their table alone. This is a tolerable tavern bill to
be run up in two months.
A projet de loi for the reorganization of the jury
system has been presented to the National Assembly.
By this measure all electors, that is to say every
male person who has completed the age of 21 years,
may be called upon to fulfil the duties of juryman,
with the exception of soldiers in active service, per-
sons who cannot read nor write, domestic servants,
persons who have been condemned to infamous
punishments by the laws of their country, and uncer-
tificated bankrupts.
The Presse announces the death at Rennes of
Madame DE CIIATEAUBRIAND, sister of M. DE CHA-
TEAUBEIAND, in her 87th year.
The shareholders of the Orleans and Central Rail-
ways have just held meetings to consider what
was to be done relative to the Government Rail-
way Bill. The strongest opposition was mani-
fested against the measure, which was declared
to be most unjust, as violating openly the contracts
on which property reposes. Delegates were no-
minated to protest before the National Assembly
against the Bill, and defend the interests of the share-
holders, in conjunction with the members of the
board of directors.

The following petition has been presented to the
National Assembly by the committee of Spanish
bondholders in Paris, praying its iuterference with
the Spanish Government to procure a settlement of
their claims :

"Citizen Representatives,—The committee of the
Spanish bondholders in Paris has the honour to address
Itself to the National Assembly, to supplicate its inter-
' ference in behalf of thousands of French families, whose
condition is most deplorable, in consequence of the un-
justifiable state of abandonment in which the Spanish
4.4overnment persists in leaving them since the Ist Nov.,
1836, the period w hen it again eased to pay the interest
9ri its debt.
" In order to enable the National, Assembly to judge
of the importance of the sums which pain has succeeded
in drawing from France, under favour of the different
loans contracted by her in the Paris market, and by the
of the support which she found from preceding
Governments, we consider it necessary to enter inky
some details on the origin as well as on the suceesithe
emissions of these same loans, which have had the effect,
in addition to the ruin of several thousand fatnilles;' of
iitninishing in a sensible manner the monetary capital
of France.
" The first Spanish loan negotiated at the Aris Douse ,

was contracted in 1820 by Messrs. J. Lafate and Co., and
Ardoin and Co., hankers; other loans followed in 1821
and 1822. In 1823 the French army overthrew the
Consmutional Government; -t-stabli6hed the absolute
power of Ferdinand VII., who, repudiating the debts
contracted by the Constitutional Government, ceased to
pay the interest. 11, did more; he charged two bankers,
not French, but residing in Paris, Mesiiri. Guebhard and
Aguado, to sell by commission the reimbursable obliga-
tions of the perpetual Three and Five per Cent. Rentes;
these emissions had been made from 1823 to 1831 for a
sum of about 400,000,000 f.

" The Government of the restoration, instead of pre-
tecting the compromised interests of the French holders
of bonds issued under the constitutional regime, inflicted
the greatest injury on those very interests, by such.-
rising the emission and the quotation at the Paris
Bourse, of fresh loans, the proceeds of which procured
for the (Government of Ferdinand the resources which
he could not have found, but by recognising the legality
of the loans contracted under the constitutional Go-
vernment.
" After the death of King Ferdinand the constitu-

tional Government was re establisliqt; a fresh loan was
contracted in 1834, by Ardoin and C.., binkers, at
Paris, and M. A. Ricardo, in Laidon; to this was j )fined
the conversion c t a!1 the !eats contracted from 1820 to

1831; a conversion w hich cn,isted in reducing the
capitol by one-third, and .to avoid the appearance of a
bankruptcy bonds were delivered for the said third,
calledsn 1823, the holders 1)
3ssiveßen'is;as to the interest due and not paid
ce
received fresh bonds called De-
ferred Debt,' payable in Active Debt, in twelve yearly
periods, commencing from 1838.
" In consequence of this operation there were created
fresh bonds, viz.:—

" IN ♦CIIVE DEBT.
" For the sum of about 846,0u0,060f. of
capital, or a Five per Cent. Rente, of 42,300,0001.
" IN DEFERRED DEBT.
"For the sum of about 332,000,000 f. in
capital, or in Five per Cent. lientea

Total Five per Cent. Rentes... 59,000,000 r.
" IN PASSIVE DEBT.
" For the sum of about 323,000,000 c. bearing no inte-
rest.
" There remain still in circulation the following

bonds :
" 1. Deferred Debt of 1831 for about 128,000,000 f.
which, by a forgetfulness, the motives of which cannot
be explained, was neglected at the time of the conversion
of 1834.
"2. A portion of the preceding loans of about
64,000,0001. which bad not been presented for conversion
within the delay prescribed.
" Moreover, the Government caused to be presented
for conversion in 1834 some bonds of 1323, which then
remained unemployed, in order to affect the sale of them
secretly and without the authorisation of the Cortes;
and in order to complete the measure, M. Mendizahal,
in his report, which was read on the 27th October.
1836, boasted of having made a good bargain for the
Treasury in causing the sale in London by M. Ricardo
of the Active Debt of 50 at 421-, and the Passive Debt of
16+ at 14i.
" Four days after the reading of that report the
Spanish Government ceased to pay the interest on its
debt; now the Active Debt, comprising the interest due
since 1840, is only worth 13k, and the Passive Debt 3;
per cent.
" In 1841, under the regency, of the Government of
Espartero, the shareholders obtained, in default of pay-
ment in cash, the capitalization of four years' interest
overdue, which was delivered to them in Three per
Cent. Rentes; but since the Ist May, 1841, the creditors
have received neither cash nor Three per Cents ; it is,
therefore, necessary to add to the sums pointed out
above that of 350,000,000 f., for fifteen half-years' arrears
unpaid on the Spanish debt.
" Admitting that there now only remains in circula-
tion in France but a third part of the loans contracted
by Spain from 1820 to 1834 there would be still due to
the French creditors a sum of
In capital ••• •••
Arrears of interest ...
In annual interest ... •••
The reductions already made in 1834.
" The privati, n of this amount of capital is an im.
mense loss for France, and is a cause of ruin to a grea
number of families; the c.rnirnittee, full of confidence in
your solicitude for the national interests, ventures to
hope that in acting in a cause which so closely affects
the honour of the country and the interests of its citizens,
the National Assembly will not refuse its intervention
with the Government of the French Republic, in order
that due justice should be done to such h gitimate de-
scends, and which, instead of finding an efficacious sup-
port on the part of the late Government, seas only on
its part the object of fallacious promises, because a
dynastic interest prevented it from supporting and ob-
taining justice for the rights of the French creditors at
Madrid.
s h
e"
canitn
And leta it
y when
hneo be be
et
shechlioeovsed es t;haht Spain is in
erresourcesihsaoylveent—
been
improving for several years, and the revenue of the
first three months of 1848 shows an increase of
20,000,000 f. over that of the corresponding quarter of
1847. Spain, moreover, is the most fertile and the
most lightly taxed country in Europe ' • she has only to
increase her taxes to be able to meet all her engagements.
" The French' creditors of Spain are now convinced
that if the National Assembly takes their interest a'
bears, the Government of the Republic will be able to
obtain justice for them at Madrid.
" We remain with respect, Citizen Representatives,
" Your humble and obedient servants,
" Members of the French " GUYNET,
BOULET,
}:
l SCEoNroLtooi
Committee
of ,
DUBOURG,
SARItANS,
" May 20, 1848. Spanish Bondholders."
The celebrated GEORGES SAND (Madame DUDE-
PANT) has been obliged to withdraw from Paris, it
having been discovered that she was deeply impli-
cated in the attack on the National Assembly on the
15th inst.
It appears that a decree was published in the
Moniteur three days since, appointing seventeen
officers to the Garde Mobile a Cheval. In the sitting
of the National Assembly on Thursday, M. ADELS-
WAND drew attention to this fact. He asked by what
law were these officers appointed ? By the decree
instituting the Garde Mobile the officers were to be
elected by the men. By whom were they elected ?
How did it happen that among these officers there
were subalterns taken from the army ? Besides this,
General BAaAGUAY D'HILLIERS inquired how the
expenses of this new force were provided for without
the concurrence or even the knowledge of the army.
To these questions the reply of M. RECUET, the
Minister of the Interior, was that the decree in ques-
tion was a surprise (un surpris). Though his own
name was attached to it, he knew nothing of it, nor
was he aware of it till some days after it appeared in
the Moniteur— and he added, that the decree was to
be annulled, and that the officers of the Garde Mobile
Cheval would be elected like the officers of the
Garde Mobile I Pied. It does not appear by whom
these extraordinary appcintments were made, but it
was generally supposed that M. LEDRU ROLLIN is
not altogether ignorant of the matter. Ultimately
the subject was referred to the Committee on the
affairs of the Interior.
The Committee sat yesterday, and were to sit
again to day, to hear the explanations of M. LEDRU
ROLLIN. M. BACLE, the Colonel of the Garde
Mobile, appeared before the Committee yesterday,
but they refused to examine him until they had
heard M.. LEDRU ROLLIN. It appears when M. La-
mm Rows was Minister of the Interior M. BACLE
was the commandant of M. LEDRU ROLLIN'S special
guard of Montagnards, which was established in the
residence of the Minister. At the time of the orga-
nization of the Executive Government M. LEHRU
ROLLIN wished to have M. Baena appointed go-
vernor of the Palace of the Luxembourg, which is
the seat of Government; but the other members of
the Government did not choose to have the guard of
devotion
nhto
M. LEDRU Rows, and he was who
adevo
man
was merely known for his unscrupulous
then appointed to
their residences placed in the handsof
the command of the Garde Mobile. M. CARTARET,
the Under-Secretary of State at the department of
of M.
the Interior, who is also a devoted adherent
hed the
LEDRU ROLLIN, is the person
article in the Moniteur. appointing War-officers of the
Garde Mobile without the knowledge of the Minister.
It is said he is to be dismissed.
passed the Assembly
majority. The following
yesterday by a very large
The decree interdicting the French territory to the
members of the Orleans family
is a report of the proceedings:--
The Assembly met at twelve 'cl
tolice discussion of thek.
The order of the day. was for
following decree respecting the expulsion of the Orleans
family from the French territory:— t_ t
.t
of
" The National Assembly decrees that he ern ory
o
France and her colonies being interdicted in perpetuity to
the elder branch of the Bourbons, by the law of April 10,
1832, it is equally interdicted to Louis Philippe and his
family."
On the motion being read by the President,_
M. Basin rose and said that he could not_ see any
reason for the adoption of such a measure. The neces-
sity of it had not been felt for the last three months;
and he would ask, what new danger hadarisen to make
so extreme a measure necessary? lie thought that the
question should be adjourned until the necessity of its
adoption had- been proved by a judicial inquiry, formally
instituted.
M. Laurent would vote for the expulsion of the O-
rleans branch for the present, becaus,! he thought it called
for by reasons of state; but be thought it right that the
expulsion should not be perpetual. lie therefore would
.move an amendment to the effect that the exclusion
should not be perpetual,
but as long as the state of the
nation rendered the measure necessary.
After few-words from M. SaFritt, who declared that
the perpetual expulsion of all pretenders was necessary,
Vignsrt must insist on the banishment being
voted a perpctuiti. The Orleans family had done too

... 563,000,000 f.
... 116,666,000 f.
20,000,000 f.