The Sun.
London, England, 1848-01-25 00:00:00

monetary code now in force. Whatever difficulties
may at first intervene will, we are convinced,
speedily vanish when the energies of his intelligent
and enlightened mind are brought to bear on
the point; and we fondly anticipate that the
Honourable Member for the West Riding
of Yorkshire will ere long assume that prominent
part in the discussion and agitation of the
question for which he is so eminently qualified.
He has already borne the most powerful testimony as
to the injurious effects of fluctuations in the currency.
In his evidence before the Committee of the House
of Commons on the banking question in 1840, we
find Lim stating his belief " that great evils have
been occasioned to the trade and manufactures of the
country in 183(3 and 1837, and the subsequent
periods, by fluctuations in the currency—greater
evils, Pecuniary, social, and moral, than by the direct
failures of all the banks of issue since they were first
established in this country." Impressed with such
opinions, it cannot be supposed that the Hon. Gen-
tleman will continue to lend his powerful support to
a system which has rendered such fluctuations
of constant recurrence, producing on each successive
visitation calamities of still greater intensity.
The great evil at present lies in constituting that
as the sole measure of value, of whiQh there is not a
sufficiency to give a circulation adequate to the wants
of the country. Mr. BENNOCII has clearly shown
how utterly impossible it would be for the Bank to
satisfy all its liabilities in gold. He says—" The
bullionists issue notes to such an extent that their
stock of gold available would not on an average
pay over 9s. or 10s. in the pound." Ile might carry
the argument much further, and show that they
would scarcely pay anything like such a dividend ;
for it is not merely twenty•six millions of notes that
should be thus paid, but also the deposits, public and
private, which amount to at least an average of
fifteen millions sterling, in addition to the notes
issued. The country might become bankrupt, and a
universal ruin of all classes ensue from the abstraction
of fifteen or twenty millions of gold, and that when
we have accumulated and realised property to the
amount of five thousand millions sterling. This is
surely too absurd. The happiness and prosperity of
' the people is all made dependent on the possession of
an article which cannot be produced at house. Their
labour is made to depend upon the labour of Russian
serfs in the Ural mountains, and we are ren-
dered dependent on a foreign potentate,
and that potentate the Russian Autocrat, for
a supply of that which our own impolitic
regulations make an article of absolute necessity. It

is as if a law was enacted that no corn should be sold
in the country unless it was previously weighed or
measured by a standard kept at certain public places,
and by which, in the event of any great demand,
the quantity required could not be ascertained-
Granaries might be full, and the people starving ; ten
thousand quarters of corn might be wanting to sup-
ply their wants each day, but although the corn was
there, not more than five thousand quarters could be
measured by the recognised standard. Ought
people to starve under such circumstances, or would
they not rather indignantly demand that new
measures should be supplied sufficient for their wants?
Most assuredly they would do so, and the Ministry
that refused the concession of their just demands
would speedily be driven from power. We are,
however, subjected to an evil of this very descrip-
tion. There is an ample supply of labour, the
only real capital—but our monetary code will permit
of only one measure by which that labour can be
disposed of, and that insufficient for the purpose.
Our operatives must remain unemployed, wasting
their energies in unproductive idleness, be-
cause there is a deficiency in the only
recognized measure of value. Who is there
who, in contracting for the remuneration he is to
receive, calculates or thinka of the weight or fine-
ness of the gold in which he is to be paid ? As the
able writer in the iVestminster Review points out, it
is not 5 dwts. 3 grs. of gold that buyers or sellers
mean when they bargain for a pound sterling, but

rather " that command over the necessaries and com-
forts of life which was conveyed by a sovereign or a

one-pound note, in the average of transactions in
which they have seen it employed." This is the real
fixed value that should be sought for. It is not that
a pound sterling should always be satisfied with a
fixed quantity of gold, but that the holder should
obtain therefor as nearly as possible an equal pur-
chasing power. At present this cannot be the case.
At one: period it will command 30 or 40 per cent.
more than at another, and if a large addition should
take place in consequence of the discovery of new

and more productive mines, there would be a still
greater change in this measure, which, according to
the true principle, should be kept as unvarying and
steady as possible. We heartily commend Mr.
BENNOCH'S admirable letters to our readers, assuring
them that they will receive much valuable informatio
from the perusal.

The whole of Sicily is in open insurrection. A
letter from Naples of the 14th says—
" The Vesuve steam-packet, which left Palermo
yesterday, brings accounts of a general insurrection
on the 12th in all the principal towns of Sicily. At
Palermo the exasperation was so great that ladies
threw from their windows boiling water and furniture
upon the Dragoons who were charging upon the
people. Thirty thousand citizens of Palermo, all
armed, drove the troops out of the town, after having
caused them great losses. The troops succeeded in
reaching Monte Reale. We are assured that the in-
fantry of the line would not take part in the combat.
The King of Naples, on receiving this news, was so
much agitated that immediate bleeding was neces-
sary ; but in the evening he sent off 5,000 soldiers of
the line in nine steamers from Sicily. On the 12th,
the King's file day, his Majesty went to the theatre
of San Carlos, where some applause having been
commenced by the friends of the Court, it was re-
sponded to by hisses from the boxes and pit. It is
reported that the King's son, having demanded con-
cessions for the people, has been put under arrest.
The Vesuve could not land her cargo at Palermo ;
she merely landed a few passengers, and then left for
Naples without waiting for her papers."

Another letter states that at Messina the tri-
coloured flag was hoisted, and the people, after their
victory, organized a dive guard.
Another of the 15th says—
" As early as the Bth inst. the Sicilians had ac-
quired the conviction that nothing would be done to
relieve them of their burdens; but the period fixed
upon for a demonstration, viz., the 12th, was not
anticipated. As the movement was to be spontaneous,
every man held himself ready for action, waiting for
the signal from Palermo. Without knowing precisely
the nature and extent of the manifestations, the police
foresaw the events by the calm and decided attitude
of the population, and irritated it the more if possible
by effecting on the night of the 9th the arrest of some
of the first persons in Palermo. They are the same who,
in the war demonstrations of the 27th of November,
kept down the popular effervescence and restored to
order, when the authorities declared themselves un-
able to do so, these impatient masses. Amongst the
persons arrested the following are mentioned :
Prince Fiorenza, the Chancellor Amari and his
brothers, Frances Ferrari, and twenty others, all
equally respectable. Count Aceto had been de-
nounced, but when the police went to his house
to arrest him, they found the doors barricaded, and
they began to besiege the house, the first floor of
which is occupied by the English Consul. In the
course of their proceedings the arms of England got
detached, and, falling upon the ground, were broken
to pieces. The police, dreading the intervention of
the representative of England, withdrew, amidst the
hootings of the people ; M. Aceto was thus saved,
and the Consul sent off a communication of the insult
which his flag had received to the British Ambassador
at Naples, who has demanded prompt reparation. All
these circumstances were of a nature to keep up the
energetic resolution of the people. Everything,
however, was organized in silence. Manifestoes were
seta off secretly from Palermo in all directions of the
island. Everything had been provided for, and that
part which each was to take had been arranged.
The patriots, who were without arms and the
necessary means for taking a part in the
insurrection, were invited to go to Palermo,
where they would immediately receive them.
In the morning of the 12th, on hearing the salvos of
Artillery announcing the anniversary of the King's
birthday, the population spread in masses through
the city, and barricades were formed at several points,
under the protection of armed men. The police
totally gave way before this imposing movement; a
part of the troops marched out of the town and took
up a position at the foot of the Monte Pellegrino,
the rest remaining in the forts. All remained in this
state until eleven o'clock, but a few minutes after
that hour a strong detachment of cavalry debouched
by the gate of Saint Antonia, -to disperse an assem-
blage in front of the palace of the Intendant. The
cavalry was hailed with cries of friendship and fra-
ternity, but they fired, and killed one man, wounding