The Sun.
London, England, 1834-09-30 00:00:00

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LONDON,
TUESDAY EVENING, SEPTEMBER 30, 1534.

The Paris papers of Sunday have been received by
express, but they contain no intelligence from Madrid
of a later date than the 20th inst. The same species
of military: devastation which for several months has
been desolating the Spanish provinces, and demoraliz-
ing the people still goes on, and with the usual conse-
quences. Don CARLos is still prowling about, .fol-
lowed by a band of ruthless insurgents, pursued by
RoDIL and the QUEEN'S troops, who scruple not to
imitate him in most of his revolting barbarities. Mi-
litary executions are so frequent that no accounts are
taken of them, and the poorest peasants are daily being
shot by the triumphant party for high treason. The
insurgents have latterly endeavoured to raise the standard
of rebellion in Catalonia, but without success.

The public will learn with great satisfaction, that
most of the reports which have been circulated by
certain Tory Journals, respecting the recent slave in-
surrections in our colonies, are utterly destitute of
truth ; and that the trifling discontent manifested by
the emancipated Negroes, in a few of the plantations,
was wholly caused by a misconception of the extent of
the boon granted to them by the British Parliament.
Our arrivals from Jamaica, which are up to the 20th
of August, state that in every instance where the
slaves declared they were no longer subject to the con-
troul of their masters, the recommendation of a magis-
trate, or other impartial authority, was generally found
sufficient to induce them to return to their employments.
In no instance was the slightest attempt made to injure

property, or to attack the persons of those from whom the
Negroes believe themselves to have suffered the greatest
injuries. The extent of the insurrection amounted to no

more than a determination, on the part of a few indi-
viduals, not to work—a resolution by no means ex-
traordinary, when the previous sufferings of the libe-
rated negroes are taken into consideration.
The proclamation of the Marquis of SLIGO, Go-

vernor of the Island of Jamaica, will well repay the
trouble of a careful perusal, were it only for its admi-

rable simplicity, its paternity of language, and its
happy adaptation to the comprehension of those to

whom it is addressed. This is not the first time we
have had to speak in terms of high commendation of
the proclamations of his EXCELLENCY, which are cal-
culated to inspire the negroes with confidence, and to
beget a ready obedience to the laws. There is a moral
dignity in the simple language of authority, which is

lost whenever the technicalities of the bar are intro-
duced. But what to us appears the most striking part
of the proclamation, is the frank manner in which the
Government explains to the slaves the full change
which has been effected in their condition, and the
extent to which the authority of the masters has been
abridged. There is no attempt at concealment—no sur-
plusage of unnecessary words used for the purpose of
puzzling the understanding of an ignorant people. The
truth—the whole truth—is told in such a way that an
infant might understand its general meaning. There

is a peculiar felicity of illustration in computing the
period of labour and of rest in a week, by hours,
for the purpose of convincing the Negroes of the great
cause they have to be thankful for the redemption
°ranted them. By them it will be well understood,
accustomed as they have been to be tasked by the
hour, under a broiling sun, and what was still more

dreadful, under a continual agony from the proximity of
a ruthless driver, armed with the dreadful cart-whip.
For our own part, we must confess that the peaceable
bearing of the slave population, on their emancipation,
has exceeded our most sanguine expectations, although
we were from the first among the most zealous sup-
porters of that righteous measure. We were always con-
fident that the result would be as beneficial to the country,
as the act itself was a distinguished proof of our national
justice ; but, at the same time, we were not free from ap-
prehensions of considerable danger to the persons and

properties of such of the masters as had been in the habit
of abusing their power. Happily, however, no crime,
manifesting the slightest desire of revenge, evincing the
least recollection of injustice, has yet been perpetrated;
nor have any symptoms appeared of a disposition to
commit outrages for which many excuses might be
made, even were those guilty of them educated freemen,
instead of being ignorant slaves whose fetters were
just struck off. Revenge is rarely banished the bosom
of the most civilized people, when labouring under a
sense of being the subjects of previous cruelty and op-
pression ; nor would the sudden commission of a trifling
wrong which it would dictate, be considered any argu-
ment in favour of the cause which gave rise to it.
The trifling discontent manifested by a few of the
slaves on their manumission, was the mere accident of
a change of being, as it were ; of which change the
anticipation was greater than the reality. This always
will and must produce more or less discontent, in propor-
tion to the knowledge of those who are the objects of it.

On the whole the accounts from the West India
colonies are most satisfactory, when we take into ac-
count the cause which there were for their being the
very reverse, owing to the previous conduct of many
of the slave-owners. This, we believe, is in a great
measure due to the humane and benevolent conduct of
the Marquis of SLIGO, who seems to possess every
requisite for his present high and important office.

Advises from Greece state that the country is show

ing symptoms of an insurrectionary spirit, in conse-
quence of the sentence passed on the traitor CoLoco-
TrtoNr. We arc inclined to doubt the correctness of
this statement, as far as it is intended to imply that the
discontent is general. The whole movement is only a
part of the insidious policy of Russia.

A Liverpool Journal says, " the GREY diimer has
gone off so well, that the Conservatives at Edinburgh
will not be satisfied unless they attempt something to
rival it. They also wish to do honour to an Ex-
Premier. They want to make a tool of his Grace of
WELLINGTON, by getting up a party dinner, of which
he is to be the victim. This is a contemptible attempt
to rival the GREY festival. We may safely predict
that, should it take place, it will prove an utter failure."
We have not the slightest doubt of it. In the first
place, Edinburgh can with difficulty muster up
Conservatives enough to make a respectable figure at
such a festival ; and secondly, the Duke of WEL-
LINGTON seems to entertain a very natural dislike to
any public exhibition of the sort. He was absent
from the Conservative orgies at Newton and Canter-
bury, though it was expected he would have been
present at both places ; and sure are we, that he will
not be frantic enough to travel upwards of four hun-
dred miles, for the mere purpose of helping the Ultras
to get up another mortifying failure. Judging from
his recent conduct, we should say that. his GRACE had
at length become a convert to Falstaff's opinion on
the subject of " discretion."

We request our reader's attention to a letter which
will be found in another part of The Sun, entitled
" Crimes and punishments in the army : Hints to the
Military Commission." The writer is evidently a man
at home on the subject of which he treats ; .and his
strictures being penned in an earnest but temperate and
candid spirit, are well calculated to produce a good
effect. The flogging system he seems to think has
received its death-blow, so disposes of it in a very
sulinnary manlier, as if all further agitation of such a
question were superfluous. We cannot agree with
W. It." in this respect ; for however revolting
to all manly feelings be the character of the
punishment, flogging has still numerous and
influential advocates, and it is only by keeping the
question constantly before the public—by making the
people sensible of its flagrant inutility as a corrective,—
that it stands the slightest chance of being done away
with. On the subject of the present condition of the
army, " W. R." observes as follows :—" At present,
the army is chiefly composed of the refuse of society--
that is, of the idle and dissolute from the manufac-
turing towns in. England, and every one has witnessed
the ragged vagabonds who join the different regiments
as recruits from Ireland. Now, when this is notoriously
the case, it cannot be expected that any man of re-
spectability will feel very anxious to allow his son to en-
list, knowing beforehand that the young man must, for
some period at least, associate with abandoned characters
in a barrack-room, at a time of life when he is too ready to
take impressions from what is daily passing round him,
even with the certainty, if he escape contagion, of
ulti-
mately being raised to the rank of officer." These are
harsh strictures, but as there is considerable truth in
them, they deserve to be attentively weighed and re-
flected upon. The moral character of the army is,
indeed, a question of first-rate importance. Not only
does it concern the well-being of the army itself, but of
society at large, through all its various grades and ra-
mifications. Wherever there is a demoralized soldiery,
there never can be a peaceful or prosperous community.
The one is perpetually acting and re-acting on the
other, and giving rise to endless feuds and distrusts,
which are the bane of the social system. We shall
return to this subject as space and leisure may permit.

" What nonsense," said the old Highlander, Cap-
tain G., " all the learning of -languages I'd go over the
world with one phrase out of each. I travelled through France
with Combien?' and through England with ' How much?' "

An English critic writing from Florence on the sub-
ject of a new figure of Bacchus, recently executed by a cele-
brated Italian artist, says, that such a starveling duty is a much
fitter representative of a god of vinegar than of wine.

NEW RIVER.-According to some recent investi-
gations, it appears that the quantity of water pumped up by the
New River Company at the New River Head, to a height of
60 feet above that level, making a total height of 144 feet
above the level of the Thames, was for the year 1833, on an
average, 2,100,932 imperial gallons per diem !
_ . _

. -
FINE WRITING.—A writer in a provincialjour-
nal, extolling the quality of the year's growth of Farnham
hops, says, "they were never better in colour and condition,
and will as far eclipse those of other places, as the light of gas,
which now brilliantly illumines our shops, does that of the
glimmer afforded by candles."
A NUMEROUS PROGENY.—There lives at present
at Patrick an old lady, aged 86, whose progeny amounts to
the following :---13 children, 63 grandchildren, 78 great-
grandchildren, and 1 great-great grandchild.--Total 155.
The parties lately met at Patrick, in the house of the vene-
rable matron, who is in pretty good health, for the purpose
of placing on her aged knee her last young friend—the great-
great grandchild. The meeting is described to have been a
very happy one.—Glasgow Courier. •

Colonel Udny, of Udny, has, we understand, in
conjunction with a number of the feuars, and many respectable
farmers, in the neighbourhood of the thriving village of New-
burgh, had the great natural basin of the river Ythan, which
skirts that village, surveyed by Mr. Gibb, engineer, with the
view of forming landing wharfs, deepening the navigation
channel, and otherwise rendering this sheltered basin fit for
the accommodation of a larger class of shipping than can fre-
quent it at present. The execution of this scheme will
no doubt, prove most beneficial to that district of country, as
it will enable the agriculturists to receive their supplies of
lime and coal with greater facility, and to ship off grain and
cattle, at more moderate expense than they can at present.—
Aberdeen [Jerald.