The Sun.
London, England, 1846-08-19 00:00:00

1111 X
ttnllng

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 19, 1846.

A question, asked by Mr. BERNAL last night on
the bringing up of the report of certain resolutions
agreed to in a Committee of Supply, respecting the
important subject " the means of manning our fleet,"
elicited from Captain BERKELEY the pleasing intelli-
gence that " he had long given his serious atten-
tion to the subject of providing a reserve
force of seamen in cases of emergency ; and
that he hoped before the next session, though there
might be some difficulties in the way, to submit a
plan to the Government which would place at their
disposal a body of thorough seamen who, within 48
hours, would be available at either Portsmouth or
Plymouth in sufficient numbers to man a fleet."
Should Captain BERKELEY succeed to this extent, and
attain the object by just and equitable means, the
country will indeed have cause to rejoice at his ap-
pointment as one of the Naval Lords of the Admiralty.
We have so often exposed the enormities of the
vile system of impressment, the gross injustice
thereby inflicted on a large body of our fellow-sub-
jects, that it is unnecessary, at the present moment.,
20 recur to it. The public are now fully alive
thereto, and they demand, at the hands of
those to whom the control and superinten-
dence of the navy is entrusted, that justice
shall at length be extended to our gallant sailors
that they shall no longer be torn from their homes
and friends—forced into an unwilling servitude, at
a rate of remuneration far below that which they can
obtain elsewhere, and subjected to punishments of
the utmost stringency and severity, of the most re-
volting gnd degrading character, at the mere

whim and caprice of an individual ; that they
should be deprived of the protection which is afforded
to all other classes of Englishmen, and so punished,
not only without proof of guilt, but even without
being heard in their own defence, or permitted even
to explain their conduct. It is an extraordinary, but
undoubted, fact, that while the number of our mer-
chant seamen falls little, if at all, short of
400,000 men, many of whom must frequently be
in want of employment, that if even 4,000 men, the
one-hundredth part of the number, should be required
for the service of their country, on any sudden emer-
gency, they cannot be obtained in less than six or
twelve months, so as to have the vessels, for which
crews are required in efficient working order,
fit to support the honour of the British flag, if it should
be entrusted to their care. Why should this
be so ? In every other department of the public
service the candidates for employment far
exceed the number of vacancies, and much anxiety is
evinced to obtain such employment ; in the navy
alone there is such a deep-rooted dislike thereto, that
volunteers cannot be obtained in a case or cases of
emergency ; and, notwithstanding the proverbial su-
periority of volunteers to pressed men, it is
from the latter class that the royal navy is
expected to be supplied under any extraordi-
nary or pressing circumstances. The causes
however, are numerous, and until they are thoroughly
and entirely removed, it is useless to hope for any
great or important change in the feelings of seafaring
men. The very power of impressment itself being
suffered to exist, has been one of the principal causes
for this want of popularity, and for its own alleged
necessity. Were it not for this unconstitutional
and un-English practice, persons in authority would
be obliged to take measures for the removal of the
grievances that so unduly and unfairly affect our
naval brethren. They have relied on the system by
which they can compel the services of competent
men in the time of need, and have not sought to
obtain by persuasion that which they can command
by brute force. Many are to be found who will
raise the cry of necessity, and say that the
safety of the empire demands its continuance,
but no plea can justify that which is essentially con-
trary to the first principles of mce-al right.
First, amongst the necessary steps for redressing
the evil, the pay of our seamen must be increased ; it
must be made at least equivalent to that which the
individual could obtain if permitted to carry his
labour to the best market. It is well known that the
pay of an able seaman in the merchant service amounts,
on an average, to 2/. ss. per month, while in the
royal navy 1/. 14s. is only given to the same man.
This is manifestly unjust. Why should the nation
expect to obtain labour at less than three-fourths of
the ordinary rate ? Our naval estimates amount to
no less a sum than 7,400,0001. sterling per annum.
The article wages does not exceed one-eighth of that
large amount, and a judicious curtailment and diminu-
tion of a part of the unnecessary expenditure would
provide a fund amply sufficient to enable us to do
justice to the bard-working and inadequately-paid
sailor. But, were it otherwise, we do not believe
that the most zealous advocate for economy in the
House of Commons, or in the nation at large, would
object to a proper remuneration being paid for the
services rendered by the sailor. The expense would
be trivial in comparison to the benefit conferred,
the injustice avoided by the nation,
Again, the sailor should not be cast adrift the mo-
ment his services can be dispensed with. A ship re-
turns from a distant station, and the crew perfected
in discipline, efficiently trained, and fitted for
any duty, are dispersed throughout the
country ; their connexion with the service is
severed; they are suffered to fall victims
to the arts of designing persons who
congregate together to prey upon the simplicity of
the weather-beaten tar, to rob him of his hardly-earned
pay. The men thus turned adrift may beg or starve;
they may at the time be unable to obtain employment
of the description for which alone they are fitted, or
if they can procure it they are removed from this
country, and their services, valuable in the highest
degree, cannot be obtained when required.
This ridiculous, this absurd system must be put an
end to. The lash must be abolished in the navy ;
other means for procuring submission must be resorted
to, and that stigma and disgrace must be removed
from the British sailor. By these and other similar
means the popularity of the service can be restored,
and when that is once effected there will be no want
of men ready and willing to come forward at a mo-
ment's notice. We shall look with much anxiety for
the promised plan of the Gallant Officer, but to be
effectual it must strike at the root of the evil.

A variety of circumstances tend at this moment to
attract the particular attention both of the population
and of the Government to Ireland. The calamitous
disease which has again infected the potatoes, and
which consequently threatens to bring increased star-
vation and destitution on the peasantry, elicits the
sympathies of our Legislators, and promises to
delay the period of the prorogation of Par-
liament. Although they may to a disagree-
able extent interfere with divers engagements upon
the moors, the precocious indications which have
been given of the re-appearance of this vegetable
malady must so far be regarded with satisfaction, as
they afford our rulers an opportunity of preparing
political antidotes for an evil which can only become
more perilous as the winter season approaches, and
the scanty harvest is consumed. It will be remem-
bered how much excitement and trepidation, how
many dilemmas and hesitations, how little
alacrity and decision were evolved immediately intel-
ligence reached the late Administration of the pesti-
lence and famine by which the poorer classes of
Irishmen were threatened towards the conclusion of
1845. Parliament had been dissolved--the Cabinet
Ministers were hurriedly assembled together—doubts
and anxieties disorganised the council—resignations
followed, and the whole Legislature of the empire was
thrown into the most grievous temporary confusion
before any adequate steps could be taken to ameliorate
the condition of our afflicted countrymen. It will be
remembered how alarmingly the woes of the peasantry
had accumulated before the differences of opinion
among statesmen could be settled. Fevers and
cholics had spread throughout many baronies ; vast
multitudes had assembled under the black banners of
famine; despair had taken possession of the unemployed,
and the darker passions had begun to develope them-
selves in midnight murders and twilight assassina-
tions, before relief could be tendered by the Executive,
either in the shape of manual occupations or cheap
provisions. During many weeks the ravages of
disease and inanition were altogether unchecked,
and the assistance which Sir ROBERT PEEL
and his new colleagues were at length enabled
to remit was, contrary to their wishes, both
tardy and crippled. Now, however, the prospects of
the Irish labourers are infinitely more propitious, not-
withstanding their accustomed nourishment is prema-
turely and more extensively destroyed. The present
Ministry is composed of statesmen bound together
by a common determination to assuage the
sufferings of Ireland, and to consult the
interests of her inhabitants by every constitutional
effort within their power. However much, there-
fore, our interest is aroused as to the circumstances
of the approaching season, it is neither darkened by
doubt nor sombred by anxiety.
Satisfied that the nourishment and employment of
the Irish labouring classes will be properly attended
to by the Russell Administration, and especially
satisfied with that lenient policy which removed from
a generous and afflicted people the ignominy of an
Arms Bill, we can turn with peculiar curiosity to
that great association in which the opinions of the
population are there embodied. During the latest
meeting of the repealers at Conciliation Hall, namely
on Monday morning, it would appear that
a letter, addressed by Mr. WILLIAM SMITH,
O'BRIEN to the secretary, was duly perused to the
assemblage. And from the purport of that epistle,
and from the subsequent observations of Mr. O'CoN-
NELL, we glean the astounding and prodigious fact,
that he, Mr. WILLIAM SMITH O'BRIEN, had not the
slightest inclination to return to the Repeal Asso-
ciation. There is something wonderfully amus-
ing in the feelings of self-importance which
have ,evidently dictated that very remarkable
document. Speaking of a trumpery squabble ori-
ginating in himself and a few hair-brained mongers
of patriotism, Mr. O'BRIEN facetiously terms it " a
scene not less distressing to those who witnessed it

than injurious to the cause of Ireland and
disparaging to the character of Irishmen."
Mr. O'BRIEN need not entertain such melan-
choly sentiments one moment longer if he
will only recognise what is so manifest to every-
body else, namely, that the fact of his walking out of
the Corn-Exchange in a bit of a huff cannot possibly
damage the interests of his country ; that his beha-
viour previous to that movement was rather amusing
than distressing, and that the eccentric eonduct of a
little posse of individuals cannot in the slightest de-
gree tend to the disparagement of the character of an
entire nation. The corollary to the above paragraph
is no less grandiloquent ; it explains how Mr. WIL-
LIAM SMITH O'BRIEN "is compelled to record his
dissent ;" how Mr. WILLIAM SMITH O'BRIEN "feels
that entire silence on his part might be construed into
acquiescence ;" how Mr. WILLIAM SMITH O'BRIEN
"disclaims connexion with the Nation news-
paper ;" and how Mr. WILLIAM SMITH
O'BRIEN thinks and does a great number of other
things—just as if the reveries and proceedings of the
said Mr. WM. SMITH O'BRIEN were of the most in-
tense and consummate importance to the whole
civilised world ! The Liberator observed, during
the course of his harangue, that he would
sacrifice everything but principle and the
safety of the association, to induce Mr. O'BRIEN
to return—" that he would, in fact, make
a bridge of gold to get him back !" We regard those
expressions as the most emphatic and conclusive tes-
timony of the magnanimity and benevolence of the
nature of Mr. O'CONNELL. He is pained at seeing
a former colleague cutting so sorry a figure, and, in
his charity, he endeavours to redeem the unfortunate
delinquent from contempt, by resorting to hyperboles.
There is more mercy than justice in the regrets ut-
tered by the Liberator.
Let us examine the circumstances of this move-
ment in the Repeal Association; and when we have
glanced at the few and simple facts of the case, com-
mon sense will compel us to acknowledge that-the
Arms Bill was not a greater anomaly in a liberal and
enlightened Parliament, than a party advocating
phyaical force was an anomaly in Conciliation
Hall !—that the withdrawal of the former was not
likely to entail more credit upon the national legisla-
tors than the expulsion of the latter was likely to re-
dound to the credit of the Repeal Association. The
fact is—Mr. O'CONNELL establishes a society to
agitate for the abrogation of a certain Act of Par-
liament, with an expressed proviso that that
object should be struggled for only by
" peaceful, legal, and constitutional means." A. few
inexperienced interlopers, after the association has
long continued under the guidance of its veteran
founder, declare in favour of physical force, and
malign that venerable patriot for not coinciding in
their opinion, when, without the assistance of Mr.
O'CONNELL, they would have had no organised body of
repealers to regale with those sentiments. And what,
let us inquire, is the nature of this physical force
movement ? Why, according to the assertion of the
Liberator (no small authority, by the way, in legal
matters), it involves a principle by the adoption of
which the association would be guilty if high treason!
O the sagacity of that patriotism of the
Young Irelanders, which has developed it-
self in the Nation, according to their recusant
leader, "by the extraordinary vigour of its style, by
the dazzling splendour of its prose, and by the glowing
beauty of its verse!" Mr. SMITH O'BRIEN had
formerly a kind of negative public existence—he has
now, however, committed nothing less than political
suicide.