The Sun.
London, England, 1848-05-12 00:00:00

tii.iitn

LONDON, FRIDAY, MAY 12, 1848,

ostler and a potboy, that, therefore, the results of that
original inquiry were scarcely worthy of considera-
tion. The hit was by no means so unsuccessful as
that made the other evening in the National Assem-
bly of France, when one of the Republican repre-
sentatives, an intelligent ouvrier, interpolated the
exclamation into an apologetic discourse de-
livered by M. Louis BLANC, that it was surely
unjust to stigmatise the conduct of the Com-
mission of the Luxembourg, seeing that that Com-
mission had actually done nothing ! The joke of
Mr. STAFFORD about the ostler and the potboy as
" mysterious persons" was, when contrasted with
this, an exceedingly dry jetke, a joke as unprofit-
able as an empty filbert, all vegetable leather and
shell. Even the most aristocratic could not pre-
cisely comprehend why an ostler and a potboy were
not calculated to be the most important witnesses,
from the very circumstance of their calling, in
reference to any imputation of election-treating.
Nor was it incomprehensible to our representatives
that a reported conversation outside a tavern door
was just the very incident most likely to affect in a
visible manner the decision of a Parlia-
mentary Committee upon questions of elec-
tioneering corruption. It was because the report
of the Committee upon the borough of Horsham was
so peculiarly inconclusive that it became necessary
for the House to procrastinate the issuing of a new
writ. Either the accused electors were acquitted, or
they were convicted, or their guilt still remained
questionable. If acquitted the case would not, could
not have continued ten minutes before Parliament. If
convicted the constituency would long since have re-
ceived intimation of its disfranchisement. As every
circumstance has tended to demonstrate, the corrup-
tion of the electors was neither proved nor disproved.
Parliament was undecided as to the morality of
the constituents ; it therefore delayed the issuing
of a new writ. The Prime Minister him-
self acquiesced in the justice of this determina-
tion, and the opinion of the Noble Lord was coin-
cident with that afterwards expressed by the Right
lion. Baronet the Member for Tamworth. For this
reason, ,
a reason sufficiently cogent, we take it, there
was in the first instance a procrastination, coupled
with that procrastination there was the promise of a
Bill affecting the integrity of representation by Lord
JOHN RUSSELL, and ultimately private
Member Bill of a
N
Member (Sir JOHN HAMER)a h.been su
bstituted
for
fOrthe Bill announced by the Government.
In
all these transactions we see no cause whatever
for
complaint, inasmuch as the Committee, the Par-
liament and the Ministry have acted from a con-
sciousness of their several responsibilities. If the
constituency of Horsham has reason for complaint,
the complaint should certainly be directed against
those unprincipled electors who have cast discredit
upon the entire borough, and rendered their reten-
tion of the franchise singularly dubitable. If one
truth more than another has been exposed by the
various cases of corruption brought under the
scrutiny of the Committee of Inquiry into Elections,
that truth is most assuredly the necessity of the
Ballot. In France the Ballot has been tested under
very severe and unparalleled circumstances, and we
are bold to say that but for the protective
influence of the Ballot, Universal Suffrage would
only have proved a most disastrous boon. Guarded
by the Ballot, the Re-publican Institutions of France
have been inaugurated under favourable auspices.
We are now satisfied that the time has come for a
successful agitation of the Ballot.

The recent extraordinary changes in the political
affairs of Europe have given rise to so many incidents
of a remarkable and interesting character, from their
historical associations, and from their striking evidence
of the mutability of human fortunes, that such inci-
dents have now almost ceased to attract attention.
Nevertheless, there was one event which took place
last week of too memorable a nature to
pass over without comment. A meeting took
place in Paris last Friday, which has been almost
overlooked in the general interest excited by the
meeting of the National Assembly. On Thursday,
the 4th instant, the first Parliament of the new
French Republic was inaugurated, and that inaugu-
ration attracted the attention of all Europe, for on the
doings of this new Parliament the destinies of France
and, indirectly, the destinies of Chri.tendom, in a great
measure depend. The meeting of the National Assembly
was, however, most propitious, both on account of
the high character of its leaders and the moderate
spirit evinced by the people they represent. The
presiding deity of the great solemnity of Thursday
was undoubtedly Hope. On the day following,
Friday, the sth of May, another solemnity of a very
different nature, possessing a retrospective rather
than a prospective interest, took place. On
that day, the anniversary of his death, a
funeral service is annually celebrated in the
Church of the Hotel des Invalides in memory of the
Emperor NAPOLEON. This commemoration is of
annual recurrence, but on Friday last it possessed a
peculiar and extraordinary interest. The members
of the family of NAPOLEON, fin- the first time, as-
sembled around the grave of their illustrious chief—
and for the first time the brother and nephews of
NAPOLEON were permitted to kneel and weep
beside his remains. And those remains now repose
not only in France, as he fondly desired thay should--
"au milieu du peuple Francais que j'ai tant aime"
They repose not only in France, but in Republican
France. The mutability of human fortunes, the in-
stability of royal dynasties, has long been too mani-
fest to need the additional corroboration of events like
these. Were such evidence required, however, it is here
most emphatically afforded. On the sth of May
1821, NAPOLEON expired in his exile at St. Helena—
NAPOLEON, whose own career had been an amazing
series of vicissitudes—NAPOLEON, who had been a
student at college during the monarchy of a Bour-
bon King, who had made his debut in the army
during a reign of terror, who had been General-in-
Chief under a Republican Directory, who had
been First Consul during the establiAment of
a Consular Government, who had been Emperor
when the French Republic merged into an empire,
who had been Emperor of France, King of Italy,
and directly or indirectly arbiter of nearly all the
kingdoms of Europe ; who had suddenly found his
vast empire a realm—

Although we object as strongly as any one to the
gratuitous disfranchisement of a constituency simply
upon suspicion, we cannot but regard with satisfac-
tion the decision of the House of Commons last
evening, in reference to the issuing of a new writ
hat
for the borough of Horsham. Not but w
we deprecate as strongly as the ,Honourable
Baronet the Member for the University of Ox-
ford anything like a partial adjudication in a
matter of this character. Writs have been granted,
it is true, in succession for Lancaster, Carlisle, Sligo,
Lincoln, Aylesbury, and'Harwich, and ta veto has
been suddenly put upon the bestowal of a similar in-
dulgence to Horsham with some apparent degree
of prejudice. At the first superficial view
of the transaction there is certainly an aspect of
undue harshness towards the constituency of Hors-
, since the corruption of the electors is as yet in
a great measure only conjectural, and the majorty of
the cases of bribery and treating very far indeed
from being settaii
ipr.oven. Nevertheless we are
rejoiced at thearneesYowutio.n of the Commons refus-
ing the issuing writ for Horsham by a rcajo-
city of 94 out of a House Our gratification at
this result of last night's division4o.f is in no manner
contradlietory, because it ari'es ou r sense of the
dubious probity of the inhatobitants of Horsham, as
witnessb the previous
well as from our solicitude
the Honourable
success of the Bill introduced
thy,
Flintl boroughs.
Baronet the representative
of
an
Before any concession
bye ectoral. kind
can be conscientiously granted
to the population of Horsham,
from motives of simple justice, that
therela2Lifloinly
it is essential,
of the elect
two preliminary proceedings ; first, a further investi-
gation be
into the imputed corruption
and secondly, the rapid passage of Sir John HANmr'
Bill through the Lower House. Until these twoas
essential preliminaries have been completed, parlia
went would be acting with an inexcusable lenity in
issuing a fresh writ to a constituency whose purity,
to say the very least of it, is so amazingly suspicious.
It was argued by Mr. STAFFORD with some indig:
nation, that because some of the most conspicuous wit-
fietnes examined before the Committee in reference to
the treating system praetiud at Flor,hans, were as

emotions of sorrow and rejoicing, to do honour to the
memory of him whom they had loved. The au-
spicious circumstance of the reunion were height-
ened by the fact of three of NAPOLEON'S nephews—
the son of JEROME, the son of LUCIEN, and Joacnim
MURAT, his sister's son—appearing as members of
the National Assembly of France—the two BONA-
PARTES being Deputies for Corsica.

THE FRENCH REPUBLIC.

THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY.

We have received the Paris papers of yesterday.
The position of DE LAMARTINE OR the poll for
members of the Executive Committee of Government
(fourth instead of first) is the subject of comment in
all of them. The Journal des Debals says—

" The composition of the committee did not surprise
any one. The list which was adopted is that known in
the Chamber by the name of the list of conciliation. But
hat excited general surprise, on the contrary, was the
order in which the names issued from the balloting-urn,
M. de Lawartine passing only fourth. It was said in
the rooms outside that this sort of unexpected check
ought to be attributed to the discontent produced the
day before by the support given by that gentl,man to
M. ',Am Rollin. Oh, popularity, on how small a matter
du) ou depend? Fur us, who look at this matter with
the most complete coolness, we believe that M. de La-
mariine, if he does not feel himself strong enough to
bear alone the burden of power, is right in dividing it.
We shall not have a good Government, but we shall
have the least objectionable one that it is perhaps pos•
sible to have at this moment. Even that is much. Be-
sides, let us wait. We shall see the committee at work,
and it would be only fitting for a country which has
already had so much revolutionary experience, not to
set up idols for itself which it would be necessary to
overturn at the end of three days; or bugbears which
become dangerous only by the very terror which they
inspire."
On the other hand, the partisans of LEDRU Ronnug
abstained, it is said, from voting for LAMARTINE, and
thus he was left with merely his own personal
following.
The composition of the New Ministry has not yet
been decided on. M. Ledru Rollin wishes to have
M. Jules Favra as Minister of the Interior, an ap-
pointment to which the moderate party are opposed.
They wish the Ministry of the Interior to be given
either to M. Marrast or to M. Recurt. It is said that
M. J. Bastide will have the portfolio of Foreign
Affairs ; General Duvivier that of 'War ; M. Du-
clerc, that of Finance ; M. Flocon, that of Marine ;
M. Pagnerre, that of Public Works ; while MM.
Cremieux, Carnot, and Bethmont will retain their
present places.
Both the Reforme and the National express them-
selves as well pleased with the composition of the
Executive Committee of Government.
The fete of concord remains fixed for the 14th.
The towns neighbouring to Paris within a distance of
sixty leagues have decided to send a certain number
of National Guards to Paris to fraternise with the
people and army. Already, on the Boulevards and
front of the national edifices, works of decoration and
illumination are in progress. The grand estrade is
being constructed in the Champ de Mars, as well as
the woodwork for letting of the fireworks. It has
been decided that the suspension bridge of the Inva-
lides shall be closed on that day, as, though perfectly
firm, it could not safely be entrusted with the great
Mass of people that would pass over it on the day of
the fete.

It was rumoured in Paris yesterday that the Go•
vernment had received information of the outbreak of
an insurrection in Madrid.

The Conslitutionnel states that the magnificent
cavalry barracks of Saumur have been burned to
the ground. The loss is estimated at one million of
francs. The cause of the fire is unknown.

The Journal de Rouen of yesterday states that
several houses have been consumed by fire in the
Canton of Fauville, supposed to have been occasioned
by incendiaries.
The Presse states that M. TIIIERS is spoken of as
the representative of the department of the Seine,
in place of M. LAMARTINE. M. TRIERS has made a
communication to the electors of that department,
informing them that " proud of their suffrages, he
would accept the honour of being their representative
in the Constituent Assembly."
The Constitutionnel states that " the Military
Commission appointed by the French Government
has recommended that the fortifications of Dunkirk
be restored. They were rased in the year 1713, in
virtue of the Treaty of Utrecht, and the port
filled up. The Convention wished to restore those
works, but time failed it ; and it appears that the
second Republic is destined to fulfil the wishes of
the first."

Since the above was in type we have received the
Paris evening papers of yesterday.
The following is a list of the Ministers appointed
by the Executive Committee of the National As-
sembly :
Foreign Affairs
War
Finance M. Duclerc.

Justice
Public Instruction
Commerce M. Flocon.
Public Worship .. M. Bethmont.
Public Works .. M. Trelat.
Marine
Interior....

The Paris journals are otherwise devoid of interest.
The appointment of M. BASTIDE is considered as
unobjectionable. He was the Under-Secretary of
State for Foreign Affairs under M. DE LAMAILTINE,
and gave satisfaction.
There was a report at Paris that LEDRU ROLLIN
had tendered his resignation.
The National Assembly, which met yesterday, was
engaged up to the hour of post in framing and dis-
cussing standing orders for the regulations of its own
proceedings.

" Surassing of Ch,
Which stretched fromthat Moscowarl to theemagne southern seas
dwindled into one small isle, so insignificant in extent
thatfrom exclaim
the Emperoron of Elbe could not refrain
surveying it, "Eh,
men isle est bien petite !" and who, lastly,
to complete the chain of marvellous circum-
stances, had died in exile, subjected to every species
of privation—who had died in exile in St. Helena,
while Europe was once more subservient to the here-
ditary rule of Kings, and the theories of Re-
publicans considered as the vi,ionary dreams of
madmen. Twenty-seven years have elapsed since the
memorable and mournful sth of May, 1821. During
that period most astonishing events have taken place.
The ashes of the French Emperor have been re-
moved from the place of his exile to repose in his
yet more happy circumstance—
native
the enmity
t he both
beautifulnations
native land, and--cha
for so long a period existed
between England and France, an enmity which has
been productive of
so
and to Europe,
has
aspiration InauccchordmingerYtoto
grave of him
f NAPOLEON—in
ever in the grave o the
degree, its cause, and,without
of Lord I:ALMERSTON., been interred for
who was, perhaps,
the face ofEurope. France is
once again a Republic.
earthquake has change
Despotism has abandoned his
doubt, its victim. someiSnincde the sth May, 1821, a political
and
dismembered kingdom of
St. Petersburgh. The
andin
the strength of
unity asserting its nationality.
stronghold at Vienna, retreated in forlorn hope to
Italy is again coalescing,
Even in the cold
are manifesting themselves, which promise ere long
ashes of Poland some latent sparks of independence
.11
to kindle into flame. Such is the changed aspec„.t..syof
European affairs, now that another sth of
brings back the anniversary of the death
of NAPOLEON. It is impossible to con-
jecture what must have been the emotions which
thrilled the hearts of the Napoleon family as the
solemn service resounded through the chapel in which,
for the first time, they knelt together round the grave
of their friend and brother. No longer exiles
wandering on the face of the world, expa-
triated from the land of their inheritance, the
land with whose chief glories their name is im-
perishably united, the brothers, and the nephews, and
the generals of NAPOLEON assembled, with mingled

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, MAY 12, 1848.

carrying his force, with six companies of Chasseurs and
two of Rifles, under General Zobel, retreated in the bet
order from Pontone. Field-Marshal Radetzky, who dues
not wish, previous to Count Nugent joining him, to ex-
pose his troops to useless exertions and I.sses, has
ordered the brigade, fronted by Pontone, to watch the
points of Parona and Pescantina, and has concentrated
his whole force before Verona.
" According to intelligence received from Field-Mar-
shal Baron de Welden, dated Trient, Ist instant, we
learn that the enemy occupied once more different en-
trances into the Southern Tyrol.
" According to accounts from Field-Marshal Count
Nugent, dated Sacile, May 2, that General's vanguard
had reached Conegliano, the main body having encamped
on that day at Sacile."
The Minister of War has published an official
statement of the losses of the Austrian army in Italy
from the 18th of March to the 27th of April :
" Killed —ln the five days' struggle at Milan, and in
subsequent engagements, six officers, 200 men.
" Wounded— Eighteen officers, 351 men.
" Missing—lncluding the Italian regiment who joined
the insurgents, two officers, 15,935 men."
The total loss, consequently, amounts to 16,512
men, to which are to be added 687 horses, and a
battery of six field-pieces.
The resignation of Count FIQUELMONT was, it
appears, caused by the spreac:ing of the news that
Count DIETRICHSTEIN had paid a visit to Prince
METTERNICH in London. This had caused a great
commotion in Vienna.
Baron Von PILLERSDORFY, Minister of the Interior,
has been called to the Presidency of the Council, and
Baron Von LEBZELTERN, Minister of the House, to
the portfolio of Foreign Affairs.
The Lieutenant Field-Marshal Count HOYOS,
Chief Commander of the Civic Guard, has also ten-
dered his resignation, which has been accepted.
Lieutenant-General Von HESS has been appointed
to succeed him in the command of the Burgher
Guard.

bouring Miloslaw forest. Already two regiments of
Prussian cavalry were advancing to charge us, when a
loud hurrah was heard in their rear. This pro-
ceeded from Bialoskovski, who, with his lan-
cers and mounted scythemen, had hastened from
Pleschen, and, falling upon the Prussian left
flank, their cavalry, thus finding itself cut off,
went to the rightabouts, and dashing in amongst
its own infantry, bore down everything in its
flight. The Polish infantry, which had completely ral-
lied by this time, again advanced, and, attacking the
town on two sides, re-took it, and drove the Prussians
before them in great disorder in the direction of Wres-
nia and Schroda. Had our cavalry been in better con-
dition, and not drooping with fatigue, we should have
taken all the Prussian baggage, and, perhaps, artillery.
Much blood has flown. Many brave men have fallen on
our side. Only think, General, that with only 3,000
men in all, we fought from eleven A.M. to seven r3l ,
against from 9,000 to 10,000 men, with twelve guns."
The letter then proceeds to say, •` Every district is pre-
paring for revolt. The whole province will ere long be
in flames. A terrible blood bath is preparing. To w hat
—to what, I beseech 'if you, can all this lead ? They
have driven us to a state of desperation ! Would they
have us act like madmen ? Is there no means, no
strength, no power, to prevent this ? Do they not
foresee the consequences that must result, if we fall,
murdered by Prussia, in our exertions for freedom ?"

carry out at the commencement of our reign, that
man certainly is mistaken, and cannot justly impute
such things to us, since we have done no-
thing but what appeared necessary for the prosperity
of our temporary state. With respect to those who in
our kingdom have abused our benefits, we shall, in
accordance with the example of our Divine Master,
pardon them from the bottom of our hearts. We call
theca back to better thoughts, and we pray God to turn
away from their heads the chastisements which fall on
ungrateful men. Besides, the people of Germany canntot
reasonably complain of us, becaut.c we were unable to
contain the ardour of such of our subjects in the temporp.l
order who have applauded what was done in Italy, and
who, inflamed with the love of their own nation, united
their efforts to those of the other Italian populations.
Many other Princes in Europe, whose armies wete
more numerous than ours, beheld themselves equally
unable to oppose the uprising of their people. In that
state of things, we, however, gave no other orders to
our troops than to protect the integrity and security of
the Pontifical state. However, several persons manifest
a desire to behold us, in accord with the other popula-
tions and Princes of Italy, declare war on Germany;
in consequence, we judge it our duty to announc in
your Assembly that nothing can be more distant from
our thoughts than such a course, which would be alto-
gether unb, coming our position, as hording on earth the
place of him who is the author of peace."
The Journal des Debuts confirms the reports that
Pope Pius IX. is at present a prisoner in the hands
of his subjects, being virtually confined to his palace.
Rome has regularly rebelled against him, and the
probability is that his Holiness will be deposed as a
temporal Prince. In fact, the entire executive
authority appears to be exercised by the new Ministry
without any control on the part of the PONTIFF.