The Sun.
London, England, 1848-09-12 00:00:00

The royal dinner party last night included her
Majesty and the Prince, the Countess of Gainsbo-
rough, Viscountess Canning, the Right Hon. Sir
George Grey, the Hon. Captain Gordon, Mr. Anson,
and Sir James Clark.

This morning her Majesty and the Prince walked
out in the grounds of Balmoral.
The Princess Royal, his Royal Highness the Prince
of Wales, and Prince Alfred, accompanied by Miss
Hillyard, also walked out.
Her Majesty and his Royal Highness, accompanied
by the Countess of Gainsborough and Captain the
Hon. A. Gordon, drove out in a pony carriage on the
road to Braemar.

His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge, at-
tended by Baron Knesebeck, reached the Bishopsgate
Station of the Eastern Counties Railway yesterday
morning at a little after eleven o'clock. His Royal
Highness was received by Mr. David Waddington,
M.P., Deputy-Chairman of the Company, who con-
ducted him to the special train in readiness to start
for Norwich. It arrived at that station at 330 F.M.
On his arrival his Royal Highness was met by the
Mayor and Corporation, who conducted him to the
residence of the Bishop of Norwich, where he will re-
main during the festival.
Dispatches were received yesterday, at the Colonial-
office, from the Governors of West and South Aus-
tralia.

M. DE LAIVIARTINE.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
518,—.1 consider that I would be living in neglect
of a duty which I owe to myself and the public if I
did not give expression to the unmingled delight
which I feel at the way in which you have vindicated
the character of M. de Lamartine ; and also'at the way
in which he has acquitted himself from the foul ani-
madversions thrown upon him by so many of his un-
grateful countrymen.
From the commencement of the revolution to the
present day I have both publicly and privately de-
fended the principles, the policy, and the motives of
M. de Lamartine ; and I felt perfectly satisfied that
when the whole affair was sifted to the bottom, that
he would come out of the furnace like the purified
silver " seven times refined." I am, therefore, glad,
Mr. Editor, that you have taken up your pe.n in vin-
dication of that truly amiable philanthropist, whose
great abilities seem to be so little valued by those he
is so willing to serve. By giving those few lines a
place in your journal you will much oblige,
Liverpool, 9th Sept., A PHILANTHROPIST.IB4B
.

TO LAMARTINE•
Just as the breath on silver oft will stray,
Spreading awhile its polished, surface o'er
With misty haze, then passing swift away,
Leaving the metal lambent as before,
So doth the breath of Envy on thy 'name—
Thou poet-statesman—cast its dimness now ;
So will it pass away, and leave thy fame
Fresh as the Muses' wreath that decks thy brow,
And as the rain-drops on the swan's white wing
No traces leave, but glance into the tide,
So shall the shafts that thy accusers fling
Fall, with their poison, harmlessly aside,
Leaving no mark of their attack behind,
No stain upon thy purity of mind.
Southwark.

J. B.

DEATH OF ME. WOOTTEN, THE WEALTHY BANKER
OF OXFORD.—Richard Wootten, Ec s hanr- L.
1.! banker, Oxford,
died on Saturday last, after a short illness, at his resi-
dence at Iffiey, in the 85th year of his age, lie was a
man of extraordinary business habits, and attended to
banking matters until within a few hours of his
death. Ile is said to have amassed a fortune of 500,0001.
For many years he was a draper as well as banker, but
relinquished the former some tune since. In many of
his economical habits he was not outdone by the late
"Jemmy Wood," of Gloucester celebrity,
THE NEW POST-OFFICE A
!ACT.—The new Act of
Parliament for further regulating the oney.. order de-
partment of the Post-office (11 and 12 Viet., C. 88), re-
ceived the royal assent on the 31st ult. By this Act it is
provided that no money-orders granted under the statute
3 and 4 Viet., cap. 96, 540.11 continuo in force longer than
twelve months, and the liability of the Postmaster-Ge-
neral to pay such orders to cease after that period, ex-
cept in cases with the consent of the Treasury. Power
is now given to the Treasury, by warrant, to alter the
period fixed for the payment of money-orders, to be no-
tified in the London Gazette. The Postmaster-General
may make regulations relating to money.orders, and he
may refund the amount of money.orders to the parties
obtaining the same, or to other persons. An officer of
the Post-office granting or issuing a money-order with a
fraudulent intent, to be guilty
of
felony. For the more
effectual prosecution of offenders, it is declared, by the
fifth section, that it shall be sufficient in indictments to
name " her Majesty's Postmaster-General," without any
other addition.
WEST INDIAN PRODUCE.—A vessel arrived from
Puerto de Taga, has brought
,200 bundles of Cuba grass,
as a portion or her cargo. W e are unaware of the exact
nature of this article so called, and presuming the im-
portation to be one of considerable novelty, the arrival is
of interest. - - .

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
TIMES.—Lord John Russell has just been in 're-
lent'. Lord George Bentinek, as will be seen by letters
we publish to-day, has been entreated to follow the
Premieiss example. We cannot blame Irishmen for
wishing that English statesmen should from time to
time make a senatorial progress through their division
of the empire. Amongst the many hallucinations set
afloat by the inventive brain of Daniel O'Connell, one of
the most monstrous was the ignorance he imputed to
Englishmen of Ireland and all things Iri.b. His was
pretty much the phrase in use among Spaniards, when
asked for an explanation of ,their Peninsular anomalies.
Cosas de Espana, be.ignorant and be content.. So with
the late Mr. O'Connell, "Irish peculiarities" were a
sufficient explanation of all that was strange or unsatis-
factory in his countrymen's proceedings. Englishmen
knew nothing of Irishmen. Morally and physically
life in Ireland was developed upon anomalous principl. F.
Children were born upon anomalous principles. Corn
ripened, bogs stcod unreel:timed, pigs waxed in
stature- upon anomalous principles. The brains cf
Englishmen could not compass the mystery. Ireland
was like one of those pictorial rebuses in the Charivari
that nobody ever yet guessed. O'Connell and his kii.d
alone hell in their pockets the solution of the enigma.
These llibernian Levites could alone stand as mediutors
between Irish impulse and English calculation. They
were the only Vundits to translate the wants of their
countrymen from en unknown dialect into an intelligible
tongue. Never was a more monstrous fable invented
even by the deceased Liberator, and that is saying
much. He succeeded, however, in giving currency to
the opinion throughout his country, and in the present
invitations to Bnglish statesmen to visit Ireland, and
imbue their minds with the true indigenous theory of
Irish misery on the spot, we see a result—certainly a
harmless result—of O'Connell's constant, efforts to per-
suade his countrymen that Ireland was a great social
mystery. ,It is difficult to see how Lord John
Russell can have added much to his stock of ac-
quired knowledge upon Irish affairs by his jour-
ney, nor is it likely that Lord George Bentinck would
have had I better success, even had he travelled through
the most distressed districts of the country. To see
potatoes rotting in the ground is merely suggestive of a
crop destroyed. To be surrounded by a crowd of
wretched half- starved Irish peasants would tell one
nothing new. We should know that their case was very
pitiable indeed, and we knew that before. Such sad
spectacles may arouse the careless to" forethought, and
the hard-hearted to compassion; but they cannot indicate
a system of relief where the experience acquired in two
years of starvation and all the efforts of an ingenious
humanity have proved at fault. The character of the
people may be an anomaly, but there is nothing in
Ireland abnormal in the condition of earth, air, and
water—nothing beyond the fact that agricultural processes
which are well performed in the Lothians or in Suffolk
are badly carried out in Galway, or the county, of Clare.
The relations of master and servant, landlord and tenant,
employer and :employed, upon which society must ulti-
mately depend, are, as we know too well, throughbut 4
.great portion of Ireland in a state of hopeless disorder.
We have had blue books and commissions, and reports
upon Irish matters, until not a grievance or an inch of bog'
remains unstabulated or unknown. We are full of informa-
tion upon Ireland, and we have acquired our information
from nearly ever source but the one to which we had
most right to look—the speeches of the Irish Members
in the Imperial Parliament. Lord George Bentinck
brings a graver charge against the Representatives of
Ireland. He goes straight to his point, and tells his
correspondent that when. any measure is proposed for
the real benefit of Ireland, the Irish Members are the
first WWI off at the 'slightest hint' of favour from the
Treasury Bench. Lord George writes,—" It is not re-
peal of the union that Ireland wants; she wants men to
represent her who, understanding her material and sub-
stantial interests, are able and willing to promote and
maintain them, and will not, on the one hand, to gain
the shouts of the mob, divert public and Parliamentary
attention to phantom reforms that have no substantial vir-
tue in them; or, on the other hand, sell their votes to win
the smiles, or, may be, something more valuable in the
gift of the Minister of the day." We would gladly see
Irishmen taking these home truths 'to heart. They
should consider if their situation be now one in which
self-deception is any longer possible. Lord Clarendon,
the other day, in receiving a deputation at the Castle,
as appeared in our report, expressed himself indignant
beyond measure at the system of jobbery in the relief
funds which had prevailed from the, highest to the
lowest. Did not the millions which were diverted from
the sustenance of the English labourer or artisan, after.
all, reach the Irish peasant ? Irish Members have
told us they did not. Is England, then, likely to con-
tribute a second time in the face of so terrible a prece-
dent? , Send suitable Irish representatives to Parlia-
ment, says Lord George Bentinck. No more jobbing
amongst the gentry when funds are contributed from the
other divisions of the empire for the relief of the starv-
ing poor, adds Lord Clarendon. This has been the
argument from time immemorial against the possibility
of affording relief to Ireland. Lord Chesterfield, when
Lord-Lieutenant at Dublin, as nearly as may be a hun-
dred years back, in 1746, made the same strictures and
uttered the same complaints as his successor in 1848. If
the following representation was true in 1746, and
pretty much the same tale holds good in 1848, under
what guidance have the bulk of the people acted in the
interval?. In September, 1746, we find Lord Ches-
terfield writing thus to Mr. Thomas Prior:—" The con-
dition of Ireland sufficiently proves that truth. How
different would the state of your lands, your trade, your
manufactures, your arts and sciences, have been now
from what it is, had they been the objects of general, as
they have been of your particular, attention! I still less
recant what I said about claret, which is a known and
melancholy truth; and I could add a great deal more
upon that subject, 5,000 tuns of wine imported communi-
bus annis into Ireland is a sure, but indecen't,,proof of
the excessive drinking of the gentry there, for the in-
ferior sort of people cannot afford to drink wine there, as
many of them can here; so that these 5,000 tuns of wine
are chit fly employed in destroying the constitutions, the
faculties, and too often the fortunes, of those of superior
rank, who ought to take care of all the others. Were
there to be a contest between public cellars and publio
granaries, which do you think would carry it? I
believe you will allow that a claret board, if there
were one, would be much better attended than the
linen board, unless when flaxseed were to be dis•
tributed. lam sensible that I shall be reckoned a
very shallow politician, for my attention to such trifling
objects as the improvement of your lands, the extension
of your manufactures, and the increase of your trade,
which only tend to the advantages of the public;
whereas an able Lord-Lieutenant ought to employ his
thoughts in greater matters. He should think of jobs
for favourites, sops for. enemies, managing partiei, and
engaging Parliaments to vote away their own and their
fellow-subjects' liberties and properties. But these great
arts of government, gconfess, are above me, and people
should not go out of their depth. I will modestly be
content with wishing Ireland all the good that is pos-
sible, and with doing it all the good I can; and, so weak
am I, that I would much rather be distinguished and
remembered by the name of the Irish LOrd-Lieutenant
than by that of the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland." The
extract at any rate is historically curious; as showing
that there have been other evil influences at work in
Ireland besides Saxon misrule. Some' quarter of a cen-
tury, or even half a century ago, this was a fair picture
of the lives of the lords of the Castle-Rackrents' and who
shall wonder at the condition to which Ireland has been
reduced?
CHRONICLE.—WO believe it was Burke who said
that if an unfounded statement, however improbable,
were confidently and continually repeated for, a year, it
would begin to :pass current for a truth. This the
only principle on which we can account for the partial
currency of. the statement that free trade is confessedly a
failure, and that its principal advocates would gladly rev
trade their steps, and recal their measures, if they could.
The precise contrary-is,the fact. In their opinion, at all
events, the experiment has completelyllemonstrated the
soundness
_of the principle; and the evils inaccurately
atttibuted to the partial surrender of the prohibitory sys-
tem, are tither owing to collateral and accidental causes,
such as bad seasons and revolutionary disturbances, or
may be traced to the relics of illiberality, by which our
commercial legislation is still unhappily disgraced.' We
called attention the other day to the striking simila-
rity of doctrine which exists between the English
Protectionist and the French Communist: but, in:-one
important 'particular, the Communist is the more
enlightened of the two. If, for example, we have not
mistaken the argument of the famous Organization du
Travail, M. Louis Blanc's attacks were, almost exclu-
sively, directed against unchecked competition on ac-
count of its tendency to promote the unequal distribu-
tion of wealth; but he does not deny that production is
stimluated, and the aggregate wealth of the collective
people augmented by it. Our own opinion is, that the.
free intercourse of nations is essential to the attainment
of the highest point of civilization and prosperity, at
which, in the natural progress of events, the human race
may be expected to arrive. The interchange of ideas,
as well as of products, accelerates the universal progress;
it is not simply our material comfort, but our moral anti
intellectual culture, that is promoted; and even the gra-
dual disappearance of national prejudices, and rivalries,
which could hardly fail to come to pass, would be in it.
self of inestimable importance to mankind. At thesame
time, we can perfectly understand a political reasoner
who prefers a less complicated, less luxurious, and less
reined condition of society. What we cannot under-
stand is the social theory (if they ever conceived
such a thing) of those who, making wealth, power, and
aggrandivment their main objects, and expecting
all others to follow in their train, perseveringly neglect
and discredit the only true, obvious, and available me-
thod of obtaining them. e will suppose, by way of
illustration, a man who, instead of remaining stationary
in his province, resolves to seek his fortune. He realises
his small patrimony, and embarks it in commerce. His
capital is doubled, trebled, quadrupled; and at fifty years
of age he finds himself at the head of a large and thriv-
ing establishment, with formed habits of liberality and
expense. Suppose, then, that, on the occasion of some
sudden reverse (the failure of a correspondent, or a tem-
porary slackness of trade), an early friend were to come
and say to him, "How much happier you might have
been if you had been content to live like y our forefathers,
eating and wearing the produce of yogi' farm, and igno-
rant of the very existence of the superfluities and habits
of indulgence which have now become a second nature
to you: It is quite possible that a speech of this d
might meet:with a querulous assent. But if theemonitor
had all along encouraged and applauded
enter-
prising spirit of the merchant, and knew that thei.bauersii--
ness could not be wound up without an enormous
fice, or the risk of bankruptcy, with whatfacecld he,
on the strength of slew bad deb tsor unsuccessfulouren:
tures; 'recommend immediate retirepmasetnotrailntloifet?he plain=
Britain is th
ness, megioere hitherto,and
ity,endob
seurityof
(we trust) still, prosperous
merchant; her insolvent debtors are the Irish; and het
ili
f&n customers are the disturbed nations of the coati-
-0