The Sun.
London, England, 1851-04-05 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, AVRIL

his lust for the tax upon incomes. In all this—what
far-seeing wisdom, what logical prudence, what
astuteness, what subtlety, what earnest and
conscientious regard for the interests of
an industrial and mercantile population ! Not
a syllable, moreover, about any one of those in-
tolerable imposts, the maintenance of which has long
proved to be altogether indefensible. Not a word,
for instance, about remitting the taxes pressing most
heavily upon toil and upon knowledge, such taxes as
those levied upon paper and upon advertisements.
True it is, the CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER
mentions the fact of his having been requested by
various classes to forego this, that, and the other,
among the motley sources of the revenue. But he
appears to intimate that these demands only affected
him in so far as to confirm his views regarding their
retention. He recognizes so many reasons for re-
laxing the pressure of taxation that he determines to
refuse compliance with the wishes expressed by every
deputation. He resolves to keep all the screws of the
State machine twisted down as tightly as possible, from
a fear of having a screw loose somewhere. If in one
solitary instance he comes reluctantly to the con-
clusion that he must abandon a tax in one quarter,
he immediately puts it on again in another—not
reflecting, perhaps, that JOHN BULL finds it equally a
matter of disgust to pay unnecessarily out of one as
out of the other pocket. Forgetting also, possibly,
that this stubborn system of rivetting down
the screws of taxation is about as dangerous as
tying down the valve of a steam-engine. Let it
be continued beyond a certain power of endurance
and good-bye to all the hopes and fortunes of the en-
gine-driver! An explosion after a certain period be-
comes inevitable—and with that explosion away
goes the Government. Sir CHARLES WOOD has re-
cently experienced the pleasant effects of a " blow-
ing up." One might have expected him to evince
some change for the better in consequence. He ap-
pears, however, to be so far incorrigible that the im-
provement in his financial statement is one disco-
verable, not in the manner of its appliance, but in the
declaration of certain financial principles. As Mr.
DISRAELI very wittily expressed it, "we are go-
verned just now by a Ministry who de-
pend upon their speeches and not upon
their measures." The " statement" was beyond
all doubt the most successful yet submitted to the
Commons by Sir CHARLES WOOD, but the "Budget "
was as pitiable a make-believe as any he has laid upon
the table of the House since the moment of his un-
fortunate nomination to the head of the fi-
nancial department as CHANCELLOR of the Ex-
CHEQUER. Than the opinions expressed by him
last evening in reference to the proper sources from
which the public revenues should be derived, from
property and not industry, by direct taxation and
not indirect taxation, nothing could scarcely be more
highly commendable—according as they do 80 en-
tirely with those broad principles which are the basis
of all sound political economy, and harmonizing
as they do completely with those great truths which
are the guiding lights of modern civilization. Front
its tendency, doubtless, the speech of the Right Hon.
Gentleman must have been especially unpalatable to
politicians like Mr. OURANG-OUTANG HENLEY, or
shall we call him, as the Hon. Representative of
Finsbury suggests, Mr. KANGAROO HENLEY ? For
the sentiments contained in the,CLIANCELLOR of the
EXCHEQUER'S statement of last evening, if carried out
into their only rational application, would effect in
the end all those most desirable improvements which
the whole body of Financial Reformers have been so
long and are still so earnestly striving to realize. As
it is, the speech is but an empty bubble, like the
Budget—and is only acceptable as a substitute for
something worse, accompanied by the declaration of
principles less consonant with those cherished in the
hearts of the population.

Anything which can facilitate the extension of the
telegraphic system throughout the United Kingdom
is entitled to our most earnest encouragement. In-
somuch is this universally felt to be the case, that
the utterance of the opinion formally almost amounts
to the absurdity of pronouncing a most obvious truism.
Nevertheless, impeiimenta have until now been
thrown so repeatedly in the way of any such develop-
ment amongst ourselves, that it 13,comes advisable
to assert the fact here enunciated, even at the risk of
appearing ridiculous in the estimation of some indivi-
duals. A contrast of the progress made by American
enterprise in the laying down of the electrio telegraph
in the United States, and of the miserably insignificant
advance made by English enterprise in the same direc-
tion,may unhappily afford the evil we are now comment-
ing upon only a too ready and a too glaring illustration.
Let it not be forgotten, therefore, that while in 1849
but 2,215 miles of railway were in England furnished
with the wires necessary for this mode of intercom-
munication, in the Transatlantic Republic there were
actually no less than 15,000 miles of telegraph in ac-
tive operation. The reason for this very lamentable
discrepancy may be readily conjectured, monopoly
having in this instance stunted the growth of a sys-
tem which contrived in the other to thrive so ama-
zingly under the fostering influence of a wholesome
scheme of competition.

Fortunately we have no longer cause to dread the
continuance of this melancholy non-development of a
system which has by this time risen to be one of the
most conspicuous necessities of civilization. The
shackles which have hitherto encumbered our capaci-
ties for improvement have been happily removed, and
we may now look forward without being unreasonably
sanguine to a spread of the great and almost miracu-
lous benefits conferred by science upon mankind at
large through the medium of the electric telegraph.
Since the first successful experiments of philosophy
in the way of applying this most subtle agency
in the transmission of intelligence—the labour of in-
quirers has been directed to the simplification of the
mechanism employed in the work of intercommuni-
cation. Every one at all familiar with the history of
the subject will readily call to mind the progress
made in this direction, not, we will say, since the
time when Mr. WEDGEWOOD conveyed his ideas
upon the matter to our Government, but since the
comparatively recent discovery (we believe about the
year 18'2,5) of the sJc-iron electro-magnet by Mr.
STURGEON. Out of the crude contrivances of OER-
STED and of AMPERE have come the ingenious and
wonderfully simplified arrangements of COOKE and
WILMATSTON2. From 1837 to the present
time still greater marvels have been accom-
plished in the way of reducing the difficulties
of the scheme to the narrowest limits one would think
to be attainable. The wonders detected in electricity
by a distinguished experimentalist like Caossx, and
by au illustrious philosopher like FARADAY, have
suggested a variety of changes in the telegraphic
machine which have at length brought that machine
to Da) present state, one would almost be tempted to
say, of perfection. Perfection, however, would be a
somewhat rash word to employ upon the occasion,
seeing the extraordinary strides made in an onward
direction after we had reached what many were
tempted to regard as the boundary to all im-
provement.

Wondrous as have been the alterationsmade, never-
thelei,s, in the electric telegraph itself, no satisfactory
development of its capacities for application as an
agency in the transmission of intelligence has been
effected, we regret to think, within the United
Kingdom. This, moreover, while the system was
spreading with such astonishing rapidity in the
United States of America! At length we are
afforded an opportunity of escaping from the thral-
dom under which the railway system of England has
been so long suffering. We have seen from the
management of affairs in the United States, that the
carrying out of the electric telegraph has proved re-
munerative not to one company individually, or to
two companies, but to a dozen. Hence a feeling has
grown up amongst us that much may be effected in
like manner amongst ourselves by the adoption
of a wholesome scheme of competition. The
first step has been taken, and we may now, therefore,
be allowed to look forward with sonic degree of confi-
dence to its beneficial consequences.
As far back as the autumn of 1849, an association
having these objects in view, and entitled the British
Electri:e Telegraph Company, was projected. Since
that tirue the company in question has succeeded in
ag an Act of incorporation. It proposes
among its other objects—" The construction of tele-
graphs for the Government, for railway companies,
and for private individuals, by contract, for a sum in
gross, or for an annual payment, such telegraphs
being worked and maintained by their respective

owners ; the maintaining in efficient working condi- 1
tion telegraphs, whether erected by the British Com-
pany, or by other persons, under contracts for an-
nual payments ; the sale of licences under the powers
of the company ; the construction of telegraphs, to
be the property of, worked, and maintained by the
British Electric Telegraph Company, for the trans-
mission of intelligence at a fixed tariff, or
upon terms to be agreed upon." Under the
influence of this bold and comprehensive scheme
it can scarcely be doubted that before long
the number of miles of railway throughout
Great Britain furnished with the necessary wires for
the conveyance of intelligence, will notbe so miserably
disproportioned to the amount either of the national
resources- or of the popular enterprise. Before the
arrival of 1859 it may be anticipated, without much
extravagance, that the 2;215 miles of telegraph laid
down in 1849 throughout the country, will more
nearly approximate to the 15,000 miles in operation
at the same time in the United States of America;
the Lritish Electric Telegraph Company imparting
the stimulus requisite for the carrying out of this
gigantic labour of improvement.

Under all circumstances, we eannot permit our-
selves to imagine that any argument whatever is
needed to insist upon the advantages accruing to the
community through the medium of this beneficent
and marvellous agent of civilization. The benefits
conferred by it upon the multitude are as obvious us
the discovery itself is dazzling to the imagination.
Hence we leave the matter to the consideration of
those who might rationally regard any formal
reasoning upon the subject as little less than an im-
pertinence. It, as Lord JEFFRY said of the steam-
engine, it can rend an oak and thread a needle, the
electric telegraph can effect wondwrs yet more startling
and incomprehensible, and " by one touch of ileum" can
" make the whole world kin." It can anticipate time
and annihilate space, it can not only traverse a hun-
dred miles in the twinkling of an eye, but must have
returned to its starting point (thereby completing
the circuit) before the possibility of its instantaneous
manifestation. To any individual, or to any body of
individuals, who may strive to place within reach of
the general multitude this messenger of civilization we
utter a hearty Godspeed. Hence we look forward
with eagerness, but without anxiety, to the develop•
meat of the system under the influence of the British
Electric Telegraph Company.