The Sun.
London, England, 1848-11-24 00:00:00

eft.

LONDON, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1848.

RUMOURED CHANGE OF
MINISTRY.

It is rumoured that the state of Lord Joust
RUSSELL'S health will compel him to retire from the
arduous duties of office at an early period, and that
this retirement must necessarily bring with it exten-
sive Ministerial changes.
The declaration made by Sir ROBERT PEEL to the
highest personage in the realm that the state of his
health would prevent him from ever again under-
taking the onerous duties of Prime Minister, unavoid-
ably compels those who think on such subjects to con-
template the composition of a Government that would
not include him as the head of it; but no one would
desire to see a Government formed that had not the
advantage of Sir R. PEEL'S cordial support. To ob-
tain this some of the leading Members of the late
Cabinet must be comprised in the arrangement.
The bond of union in such a Government would be
unity of principle—" ideas relic et idem nolle."
The members of it must agree on the financial, the
commercial, and the colonial policy. It is unneces-
sary- to advert to foreign policy, for in the present
state of Europe it is impossible to predict what the
fori?ign policy of this or of any other country is to be.
Tile following sketch of the alteration in the
holders of office, which such a fusion of parties would
involve, is submitted as one that would at once ob-
tain the entire confidence of the country :
Lord CLARENDON—instead of Lord JOHN RUSSELL.
Sir J. GRAHAM—Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Mr. GLADsxot4E—Board of Trade.
Lord ABERDEEN--Privy Seal.
Lord LlNcoms—Board of Control.
Lord HARDINGE—Lord-Lieutenant.
Mr. CAnDwELL--Secretary for Ireland.
Lord MAHON and Lord JOCELYN Secretaries to the
ea
Board of Control ; and other arrang"4
Presuming that the cordial support;:tn.
b
R. PEEL to such a Government would be followed
by by the support of his friends in and out of Parlia-
ment, it is not too much to estimate the addition to
the working Ministerial majority of 30 votes.

. ,
It is also highly probable that a large portion of
the Conservative Members, who, although they
differed from Sir ROBERT PEEL on the great ques-
tion of the repeal of the corn-laws, never lent
themselves to the virulent hostility displayed by a
few individuals, would support such a Government.
The motive for doing so is sufficiently obvious—the
present state of the British empire, and the un-
s-ttled and alarming condition of Europe, imperatively
requires that there should be a strong Government
in England.
It may be confidently asked from what other cot-
binationp can a strong Government he formed? The
elf,vation of Sir C. Woon, Sir J. Honnonsr, and
M-. LABOUCIIERE to the Peerage, will give additional
strength to the Administration in the House of
Lords.— Communicated.

Now that the Hon. CHARLES FITZWILLIAII has
secured himself from further derision by withdraw.
in;' from the contest for the representation of the
West Riding of Yorkshire, three men, whose names
are familiar to the population of the United Kingdom,
are already recognised, if they are not all of them
positively put forward, as candidates for the suffrage
of that immense constituency. Those three men
are—Mr. ROEBUCK, one of the most eloquent and en-
thusiastic of the radical reformers—Mr. DENISON,
the Parliamentary hybrid, half free-trader, half pro•
tectionist who in 1846 only partially ratted from the

principles of Toryism—and Sir CULLING EARDLEY,
a person as liberal as a politician as he is conservative
as a Churchman. From among these three aspirants
for the votes of 35,000 electors, the men of the West
Riding of Yorkshire will have to make their selec-
tion. Let them not act with undue precipitation.
Their proceeding is of a momentous character ; for
the largest of all the constituencies of England must
necessarily influence the political opinion of the rest of
our elective population. They must not falsify the
many glorious retrospects of the legislators sent by
them to participate in the high labours of Parliament
—representatives such as HENRY BROUGHAM, as
RICHARD COBDEN, and as Viscount MORPETH. The
c mstituency of the West Riding must rival the assi-
duity of the rival candidates : before the candidates
canvass the votes of the constituents, the constituents
must canvass the merits of the candidates.
Of the merits of Mr. ROEBUCK we are very far
from being ignorant. His long and energetic
labours in the House of Commons as one
of the Members for the city of Bath, his
perfect devotion to the cause of Reform, his
perpetual allegiance to the great political creed of
Civil and Religious Liberty, are all of them truths
as indisputable as the vigour of his terse and sar-
castic oratory. It remains, nevertheless, to be de-
monstrated whether the souvenirs of his Parliamen-
tary life are precisely those which would best accord
with the character-and the endowments looked for in
the representative of the West Riding of Yorkshire.
How far Sir CULLING EARDLEY possesses a claim
upon the consideration of the great liberal consti-
tuency may now be tolerably well estimated from
the address just published by him, in which he reveals
to the electors his exact views as to the political in-
novations at present required. Conspicuous among
these revelations of his liberality is the declaration
made by the Honourable Baronet in favour of the
BALLOT ! And still more conspicuous among the
great questions which must be agitated during
the forthcoming election is the question of
the day par excellence—the question of the endow-
ment of the Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland.
The necessity of such an endowment Sir Col.-
LING EARDLEY is prevented, by his religious scruples,
from perceiving, and in his devotion to the Protestant
Establishment, he announces that he will never consent
even to a restricted and conditional endowment. The
arguments contained in a recent pamphlet' respecting
this important question are not yet comprehended by
Sir CULLING EARDLEY; and assuredly the decision
arrived at upon this great question of religious tole-
rance will exercise no feeble influence over the judg-
ments of the candid and enlightened electors of the
West Riding of Yorkshire.

Yesterday the Court of Common Council was pre-
sided over by the Right Hon. the Chief Magistrate
of the city of London, for the first time since his
accession to the mayoralty. From the knowledge
which had long since been acquired by the members
of the metropolitan Corporation as to the character of
Sir JAMES DUKE, whether as a citizen, a merchant,
or a politician, it was but natural that his reception
on his first appearance yesterday, in his high official
position, before the Court of Common Council, should
nave been marked by so much cordiality and enthu-
siasm. Under every circumstance the annual
transference of the office of the mayoralty
is calculated to forward the interests of the
capital and its inhabitants, partly from
the generous emulation excited among the successive
residents at the Mansion-house, partly from the
infusion of new blood, or rather, we should say,
from the imparting of a novel stimulus to the
proceedings of the municipal authorities, partly from
the continual revision of the various public
operations in the City, but, above all, from the laud-
able ambition which is by this means instilled into
the hearts of the more conspicuous members of our
great commercial community—an ambition prompt-
ing them to unremitting assiduity, to probity beyond
the touch of imputation, to skill, to enterprize, to
consistency, to virtue, to perseverance, to equanimity,
to decision, to all those important qualities which
constitute in the aggregate the perfection of the
mercantile character. Of these advantages the City
of London has afforded innumerable illustrations in
the catalogue of her chief magistrates, dating
back from Sir James DUKE to Sir TKOMAS
GRESHAM, and from Sir THOMAS GRESHAM to Sir
1 RICHARD WarrustaroN. That extraordinary list
has, with a few exceptions, presented to the corn-
mercial generations of England an uninterrupted
spectacle of the honours which become the recom-
pense of the trader who, within the circumference of
the City walls, has elevated himself in the estimation
of his fellow-citizens. Insomuch is this the inevitable
consequence of the nobler dealings among our more
distinguished merchants, that the mayoralty has come
to be regarded by Englishmen as the crowning point,
the reward, and the consummation of an honourable
mercantile career in the metropolis.
If this be the case in the generality of instances, it
is indisputably so in the instance of the Honourable
Representative for Boston, the gentleman now in
office as the Right lion. the Lord Mayor of London.
Nor can we anticipate from the elevation of Sir
JAMES DUKE to the mayoralty other consequences
than such as must prove beneficial in the highest
degree to the inhabitants of this vast and populous
capital. As inaugurative of such results the
proceedings of the first Court held by the
Common Councilmen, under his jurisdiction,
may be regarded as a favourable assurance. Among
the topics discussed upon that occasion it will
be observed, for example, that most conspicuous
were the measures relating to the supply of gas and
water to the crowded thoroughfares and byelanes of
the City, as well as the general improvement of the
sewerage and other sanitary regulations.
That the present Lord Mayor will stimulate these
admirable exertions by his own personal interposi-
tion between the citizens and their grievances, is as-
sured to us by a variety of guarantees, guarantees
afforded by his previous labours as an Alderman, and
spontaneously reiterated since his installation at Guild-
hall. While, however, the attention of the Chief
Magistrate is directed in a particular manner to the
furtherance of these physical improvements within
the boundaries subject to his jurisdiction, he will con-
tinue to sustain the character for hospitality which
has hitherto constituted one of the noblest, and cer-
tainly one of the roost proverbial, qualifications of
the first citizen of the British capital. That such is
the determination of Sir JAMES DUKE was suffi-
ciently manifested on the very day which witnessed
the ceremonies of his inauguration, when he pledged
among his guests in the Guildhall so many of those
Englishmen whose names are illustrious whether
as statesmen, warriors, administrators, or publicists,
among the nations of continental Europe. In allusion
to this circumstance we may observe, by the way,
that immediately after the civic banquet of the 9th
of November, a morning Contemporary, generally
supposed to be in the confidence of the Liberal-Con-
servative party, inveighed in no measured terms
against the Lord Mayor for not having invited Sir
R °BEET PEEL to partake of his hospitality, and to
honour the distinguished company by his atten-
dance. It was maintained
illustrious
name
am e thferomomis-
sion this one
list of the guests at
Guildhall was the more re-
prehensible from the circumstance
being the great man
of
thumstance of Sir ROBERT
neighbouring eyes, and one weboasge, the cynosure of
so many of the tokens distinctive eo
f tgheee u s
embraces
and long expected Homo reniens I Thl:U.cdhbruited
of the journal in question sounds oddly
enough
ears, seeing that we have very excellent authorityto four
or
knowing that among the first of the eminent charac-
ters invited by the Lord Mayor to his inaugurative
banquet was—the Right lion. Sir ROBERT PEEL.
ft was hrpossible, in truth, that it could be other-
wise ; for, &though an earnest supporter of the
Government of Lord JOHN RUSSELL, the newly.
elected Lord Mayor had too much political discern-
ment, and too cordial an appreciation of whatever de-
served to be regarded as genuine liberality and prac-
tical patriotism, not to recognise in the career of the
illustrious Baronet those deeds which command
respect and excite admiration.

On Tuesday we alluded to some facts noticed in a
letter to GEORGE CARR GLYN, Esq., M.P., by Mr.
WnITEnEAD, late secretary of the South-Eastern
Railway, and now a member of the Stock Exchange.

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