The Sun.
London, England, 1856-07-04 00:00:00

LONDON, FRIDAY, JULY 4, 1856.

There is a prospect of a vacant throne, and, of
course, there is a Coburg candidate. It appears
that King OTllo.bas no children, and his brother,
who is about to marry a Spanish Infanta, the
sister-in-law and cousin to the Queen of SPAIN,
has refused either to become a member of the
Greek Church or to permit any of his children to
be brought up in that faith. An indispensable
condition under the settlement that elevated the
Bavarian Prince to the rank of a Sovereign will
thus he violated, and a successor must therefore
he found of the State religion.
It is more than hinted that we owe the present
visit of the King of BELGIUM to this cause, that
he is desirous of obtaining the influence of the
British Court on behalf of his second son, the
Compte de FL ANDRES, who possesses all the Cosuim
aptitude for ruling, and with whom a question of
religion would not be permitted to form an ob-
stacle to his elevation. The convenient arrange-
ment by which they have Protestant and Roman
Catholic branches of the aspiring house, so as to
suit any unmarried Sovereign, will be extended
. by having another of the Greek Church ; and
should there be any other dynastic failure, there
will doubtless be a ConraG ready to take any
pledges or profess any creed that may be required
as a quaiification.
But why, we ask, should the English Govern-
ment make any efforts on behalf of the Count of
FLANDERS ! What has King LEOPOLD done for
us, except pocketing a very large amount of Eng-
lish money, and allowing to be kept up at Eng-
lish expense, a princely residence for the accommo-
dation of his foroign connxtions. During the late
War he rendered no assistance to those to whom
he was bound by the strongest ties of gratitude.
On the contrary, there is but too much reason to
believe that to his insidious counsels we are
mainly indebted for the temporising policy, that per-
mitted us " to drift into the Russian War," and
to accept the dishonourable and ignominious
truce which has been dignified with the name of
• Peace. King LEOPOLD has done every thing for
himself, but nothing for Great Britain, and Bri-
tish interests would not be in any degree pro-
moted by one of his family achieving another
Crown. " England has no cousins," and her
Government should cautiously abstain from in-
trigues, from which considerable mischief may
arise, but no possible advantage. Let the
modern ULYSSES fight his own battle without
English assistance. He has doubtless greatly
conciliated Russia by his conduct during the late
War, and if the conversion of the youthful candi-
date be promptly made, the vote and interest of
the CZAR may be obtained. With Austria he
is already connected by marriage, and
has also earned a strong claim to her good-will
by the zeal and energy which he contrived
to display in the cause of Germanism ; and the
Prussian marriage, said to be on the tapis, may
further increase his chances. Let him be con-
tented with these, and if England be wise let it
cautiously abstain from involving itself, by stri v-
ag to influence the election of the future Sove-

reign of Greece, and also from advancing loans
that will never be repaid, or giving 'guarantees
which she most unquestionably will have to re•
decal, for the sake of elevating one of the COBURG
family to the throne of Greece.

What a vast difference an audience does make to
be sure in the outpourings of Oratory ! Fancy
Dr. GILLANS, who spoke on Wednesday evening
at the Glasgow banquet to Sir COLIN CAMPBELL
—fancy the learned and eloquent Doctor, with
his eye in a fine frenzy rolling, thus addressing
himself, say, to the House of Commons ;—" Fear-
ful as is its aspect [he is speaking of war], rather
would I see the warrior with garments rolled iu
blood than the tyrant flaunting in purple !"
Fancy excellent Dr. GILLANS, the Grand Gaelic
Boanerges prefacing a sentence like the following
[it is in allusion to the prowess of the gallant
Brigade of Highlanders] with the Parliamentary
and matter-of-fact—Mr. Speaker, Sir,—" Yes,
wherever danger lowered darkest, or steadiness
was demanded, there flapped the kilt, there swung
the philabeg, there nodded the feathers, there
screamed the pipes, and there flashed the
claymore like to the eye of a tiger when
about to pounce on its prey 1" Well,
—a-hem !—to all that about the warrior with
garments rolled in blood, and the tyrant flaunting
in purple, the actual audience of Dr. GILLANS re-
sponded with " Cheers." While to the hugeous
fanfaronade about kilts flapping, feathers nodding,
philabegs swinging, pipes screaming, and clay-
mores flashing—all of these, by the way, clay-
mores, pipes, feathers, philabegs, and kilts,
somehow or other, " like to the eye of a
tiger when about to 'pounce on its prey "—the
sympathetic hearers of Di*. GILLAN replied not
with " Cheers " only, but with " Lead Cheers."
Whereas, had all this been raved and ranted
with appropriate gesticulations—gesticulations
something between the fl•urish of the flail and
the attitude of the teapot—in the House of Com-
mons, the fair fame of good, amiable Dr. GILLAN
would infallibly by this time have "died the death"
amidst an explosion of inextinguishable laughter.
Instead, however, of being incontinently sent either
Coventry or Jericho, the orator of Wednesday
evening seems to ha ye bean cheered rather voci-
ferously. Well—after all—is it not some one in
" PELHAM" who observes sententiously I—
" Every one to his taste, as the Frenchman said,
when he boiled his grandmamma.'s head in a pip-
kin !" And so, we presume, we must leave in
peace those charming judges of rhetoric, the Glas-
gow auditors of Dr. GILLANS, who unconsciously
" fooled him to the top of his bent"
[and a very wonderful twist that same bent
must be !] upen the occasion of the recent
banquet to Sir COLIN CAMPBELL ! Only—it
must really bo permitted us again to remark,
almost with a feeling of awe—What a vast differ-
ence an audiouce does make to be sure in the
mere style and manner of your man of Eloquence.
As Sir HUGH EVANS saith, with a flinging up of
the hands—" 0 what the tifference is !"

The Russians, as we predicted, are now turning
their attention to Circassia, and a desperate effort
is about to be made to annihilate that gallant race
and their Prophet-chief SCHAMYL. A Russian corps
of 40,000 men has been despatched against him,
and no effort will be spared to subdue or destroy
those who so long and so efficiently resisted
the Russian Power. A word from the Eng-
lish representatives at the Conferences wduld
have saved them, but that word remained un-
spoken. Sir CHARLES WOOD intimated that they
did not desire assistance, inasmuch as they bad
not flung themselves without solicitation into our
arms. Had England acted fairly towards the
Circassian tribes we should have had no just
cause of complaint. But we held aloof from
them aid, then, forsooth, felt surprised and vexed
that they had not flung themselves into our arms,
and directed all their efforts fur our advantage
and because they did not do so, felt perfec ly
easy in our consciences at abandoning them
to the deplorable fate intended, and from which
they can only save themselves by their own
unflinching courage and desperate resolution.
We fancy that the English people will not con-
cur with the First Lord of the Admiralty in the
views which he put forward, nor will the deli-
berate sacrifice of the Circassian tribes, and the
war of extermination that will nosy be waged,
increase the popularity of the Precious Truce—
we cannot call it Peace—recently patched up at
Paris. It is something to know, as we d
on the evidence of a Cabinet Minister, that
the omission of any stipulation on behalf of
Circassia or the Circassians was not occ -
sioned by any oversight or carelessness—it
was deliberately planned. We refused to
stretch out our hands when it might have saved a
gallant nation, and "sarved them right" is the
verdict of Sir CHAP.LES WOOD and his colleagues,
who, by not repudiating, have adopted the santi-
ment that so deeply excited the national indigna-
tion. There is yet time for remonstrance. Will
the English Government see them destroyed with-
out oven uttering a word in their behalf?

The butchers or meat-sellers in Newgate Mar-
ket—and, we mly add, in many • other parts of
the metropolis—are advised to pay a visit to the
Great Globe on the first -opplrtunity. There is
nothing, we are told, like- teaching by example ;
and if they turn to the right they will speedily be
enabled to read a lesson which, if they are not
entirely lost to virtue, is well calculated to "do
them good." Among the numerous waxen groups
they will find one in which a Turkish baker is
not the least conspicuous figure, and by no means
for his good deeds. The wretched culprit is, in
fact, undergoing the award ' of justice for his
heartless frauds on the poor, and this consists
in having one of his ears nailed to his shop
doorpost. The infliction, as may be gathered
from the expression of his eountenance,
is not pleasant ; but if the population of London
were polled to-morrow an overwhelming majority,
we will undertake to say, would pronounce it de-
served. Look at it, gentlemen t Ponder over it
and instanter bless your stars you don't live in
Turkey, but in Christian England, where nothing
is safer and nothing more common than cheating
the poor.

In recommending this spectacle, gentlemen, to
your attention, we but follow with a difference an
approved example. For really many of you are
greater culprits than he, and consequently deserv-
ing of a worse punishment. He deprived the poor
of an infinitesimal portion of the article of food in
which he dealt, by giving short weight—you con-
spire to raise meat to such a price, that the poor
have to go without it one day to -have any the
next, and in carrying out your atrocious
conspiracy you destroy tons of that food which a
bountiful PROVIDENCE has provide( I for the hard-
working, thrifty, and much-enduring poor.
Rather than they shall have the fo,od necessary to
maintain the animal vigour zequisi to for the per-
formance of their onerous tasks at a fair pride,
you suffer it to rot in your hands, and consign to
the earth as putrid carcase what sh. ould go to the
sustenance of GOD'S creatures. your guilt i

SUN, LONDON, F

greater than his ; should not your punishraent be !
greater ? The designs of PROVIDENCE are never.
outraged with impunity ; and it is to he hoped
your reward, whatever that may be, -will be be-
stowed where your penitence may be otherwise
availing ! The most accursed of all robberies is
robbery of the poor ; and the riches that fastest
make themselves wings and flee away are those
which have. wrongfully been wrung from this
source.

These remarks may be deemed severe ; but let
the reader turn to the letter from Mr. CoßeErr, in
another column, and he will admit there is ample
cause. He will there find that, to maintain the
present disgracefully high prices, 10 van-loads of
prime meat enough to dine 100,000 of
the population—were found last Monday to
have been suffered to rot. The dealers,
.it
is true, were bitten ; the warmth of the
intervening Sunday not having been cal-
oulated on, but their culpability is none the less
on that account. It is revolting—the coarsest
feeling must be shocked at so shameful a waste.
What a world of good those van loads of prime
meat might have done among our hungry popu-
lation, whose choicast luxury in the way of animal
food is stinking fish ! The worst of all, however,
is, this sort of thing is still carried on, and with
success. Surely the revelation just made will
stimulate the friebds of the poor to some efforts
to break up so unprincipled a combination, even
if at the cost of abstinence from meat for a time.
The price of meat throughout the metropolis is
indefensibly high. Why should it be one-third
higher than it was a few years ago ?

ETENINn, JULY 4, 1856,

THE PENINSULAR MAILS.

SOUTHAMPTON, THURSDAY.
The Madrid. has arrived with the Peninsular
mails, having left Lisbon on the 29th ult.

The Marquis de Loule has been appointed Minis-
ter of Public Works. Sanches is appointed Minis-
ter of the Interior.

The new loan is to be the amount of 1,500 contos
of reis.

The interest must not exceed 25,0001. sterling.
The loan is to be appropriated to the construction
of works of public utility.
The Portuguese Government bill on Paris to the
amount of 1,000,000 f., the result of the mission to
Mr. Thornton, is anxiously looked for ; it is be-
lieved the Ministers intend offering the contract
with the bondholders in its original form, and that
Count Thomar's party will be in the ascendant in
consequence.

Quarantine regulations are again enforced at
Lisbon.

It is believed there will be no yield of wine this
year.
All the productions of the country, except oil,
are scarce.

Freights are dull.
Exchange on London 54 to 533. ; 90 days, 54i I.

- -
THE CRYSTAL PALACE.

(From the Morning Post.)
As far as the public are.concerned, the late general
meeting of the Crystal Palace Company must be
considered eminently satisfactory. The gigantic
conception is being gradually realised, and the
whole concern is assuming the proportions and
significance originally contemplated. Twenty
thousand people surrounding their Sovereign have
gazed upon the grandest system of waterworks in
the world. The peace fete and the flower shows
have attracted vast multtides—the latter being
at a lower charge for adnaton than has ever been
attempted before in the njig'abourhood of London.
Permanent attractions have been added to the
Palace in the picture gallery, whiph, when properly
weeded, will be both a source of enjoyment to the
public, and of advantage to the profession. The
naval museum, a truly national collection, is in
rapid course of formation, as also the architectural
and engineering models, the court of inventions,
the ceramic court, and the machinery in motion.
The operatic concerts, too, have been a happy idea.
They have furnished Mr. Gye with the means of
keeping his company together—they have given
the subscribers an incredible amount of most su-
perior music, under circumstances of comfort and
enjoyment never to be met with elsewhere. They.
hive raised the tone and character of the under-
taking itself to a higher standard, and they will be
a source of profit to the company to the extent of
six or seven thousand pounds. Everything seems
to prosper—the landscape has that richness and
repose that England alone produces—the view
from the water towers has hardly a rival, reaching,
as it does, to the sea—the tropical plants have re-
covered their removal, and become reconciled to
their new abode—the exhibiting stalls are rapidly
filling—and the visitor is no longer disgusted at
his arrival by the scene of gormandising that for-
merly used to greet him ; in short, the Crystal
Palace is a complete success to everybody in the
world—but its owners. It is not as yet a paying
concern.

One reason for this failure, we believe to be, that
it is in a state of transition as regards its audience.
We all remember how, at its original projection, it
was emphatically called the " People's Palace "
how it was expected that the toil-worn Londoners
would rush down in hordes to delight their eyes
and refresh their senses with its artistic glories,
and return with their rougher humours smoothed
and their minds elevated with the contemplation
of its sights of beauty ; but the experience of two
years has effectually dissipated those visions. The
fact is that the masses have not found their way to
the palace. The distance is fatal. They say, we
could easily save and spare a few shillings, but it
takes a day, and we cannot, or will not, give up
the day's work. There is no reason to suppose
that circumstances will alter in this. respect, and
unless the Saturday half-holiday system is extended
enough to justify the directors in abandoning the
five shilling admission on that day—which, how-
ever, can hardly be done this year, and would in
any case devolve the danger of a considerable loss
in the sale of season tickets—or the Sunday open-
ing be conceded, we much fear that the labouring
classes must remain excluded from the best shil-
ling's worth in the world.
This, however, has not involved total failure ;
for, whilst the contemplated audience • have re-
mained at a distance, another has appeared in its
place, and the middle and upper classes, have taken
possession of the place. The railway whirls its
thousands of well-dressed people down to Syden-
ham—at, it must be admitted, a very leisurely
pace. The road swarms with carriages ; and the
visitors approach a million and a-half a-year, and
will probably considerably exceed that number
when the West-end railway is open, with a termi-
nus within the same distance from. Hyde-park-
corner as Portman-square is, and within a few
minutes' drive of all Belgravia. The company,
however, if it really means to pay a good dividend,
or any dividend at all, should consider the require.
resists of this class, and we must tell the company
it has not done so yet. The refreshments are not of
the character that that class requires. No doubt
when any public body has a feast there, which, of
course, is regardless of expense, Mr. Staples puts
down a dinner which would be pronounced faultless
in Leadenhall-street, and very likely may be so; but
that is not what is wanting by those who, as it now
appears, are destined to be the principal supporters
of the Crystal Palace, which from its, for any such
purpose, unbounded space and unrivalled other
advantages, ought to contain the very best restau-
rant in Europe. The wealthier classes and the
pleasure.seekers of the metropolis--those who go
to Richmond and such suburban ruralities, in large
parties, and would assuredly frequent the Crystal
Palace in the same way if their tastes and habits
were consulted—reason thus :—" It either," they
say, " involves the expense of post horses, er it
wastes a day. If we are going oat in the evening,
we cannot keep our horses at work all day and all
night, and so we must have posters ; if not, it is
an exhausting amusement; there is hurry and
scramble, and a dusty road, to get home in time
for dinner, or else dinner must be later "—a consi-
deration which, we may remark, when there is a
papa in the case, is conclusive of most questions,
and any proposition to dine at the Crystal Palace
is uniformly pooh-poohed. If we could get a com-
fortable dinner, as at Richmond, and drive home
in the cool of the evening, i' would be very well ;
but " You can get nothing fit to eat there " is the
uniform answer. The directors may think those
people unreasonable ' • but if they act upon that
conclusion they simply sacrifice their shareholders'
dividends: The opulent classes of London go in
vast numbers to Richmond, and Greenwich, and
Blackwall, and pay vast sums therefor their dinners,
because the dinners are what they require ; and
surely the profit of purveying for those who are
ready to pay anything in reason will be greater by
furnishing them than by stinting them. Let the
fare at the Crystal Palace equal that at the Star
and Garter or the Trafalgar, and the stream of
visitors will be speedily diverted to Sydenham. We
recommend these remarks very strongly to the
shareholders of the Crystal Palace, to which we wish
every success. No doubt their undertaking is con-
ceived in a lofty spirit, and their edifice an honour to
the country, but ordinary human means are neces-
sary to human success, and eating and drinking
are serious matters in this country, especially when
a 16 miles' drive is in the case, and, as we have
already remarked, the Crystal Palace ought to con-
tain the very best restaurant in Europe. Indeed,
unless Mr. Staples' contract has given him an ex-
clusive right, and it has only two years to run, there
ought to be half a dozen restaurants in the Palace
or in the park, each of which would soon acquire
a reputation for some special perfection, and the
park would become the habitual resort of wealthy
thousands, whose example would influence tens o'
thousands more ; for the middle and lower classes
in this country are, as we all know, very imitative
of those above them ; but, in the meantime, the
year is slipping away, and we should recommend,
in the strongest spirit of good will to the company,
very decided action to the directors and share-
holders of the company upon this homely, but
very important subject.

.
A letter from Copenhagen in the _Hamburg
News. says :—" The Bulletin des Lois, of June 29,
publisixes the law relating to the domains of Holm,
stein-Lattenburg, as well as an ordinance deciding,
in conformity with Art. 29,Ofthe general constitu-
tion of October 2, 1855,'811', the private affairs of
the Duchy of Holstein. 4d-COrding to these pub-
lications the domains are comprised in the affairs
common to the whole monarchy.".
THE STRIKE AT PEMBROKE DOOXTARD.—Tbe strike
of the masons employed by the contractors on the exten-
sive works now in progress at the Apyal Dockyard at
Pembroke has, to a certain extent, been broken up. The
contractors, Messrs. Smith and Tregeuna, have brought
round from Dublin a body of 200 men, in order to sup-
plant those who held out ; and of this body a large nun?
ber last week went to work, Some of the older hands
also joined, so that now the works have been fully re-
sumed. At present the workmen are enga3ed upon the
construction of two new building slips at the eastern
end of the yard. The masons have stood out for 43. ed.
a day, but to these terms the masters were not willing
to accede, many of the workmen being but indifferent
hands. It is to be hoped that no further delay will take
place, as the works have been suspended for three
months at the best season of the year,