The Sun.
London, England, 1856-07-21 00:00:00

LONDON, MONDAY, JULY 21, 1856.

There is an ominous silent) respecting the
affairs of Spain that renders it more than pro-
bable that the movement is of a more serious
character than tha despotic Powers would wish to
be believed. It is true that we are told that
" tranquillity has been restored at Barcelona,"
and that " the National Guard has been defeated
and dissolved." But these statements come from
Paris, not from Spain ! It is therefore manifest
that the telegraphs are no longer within the
power of those acting in the name and under the
direction of the QUEEN, and who have joined in
the reactionary conspiracy against constitutional
government and liberal institutions in the Spanish
peninsula.

The scheme for a coup cretat has been steadily
carried out. O'DONNELL is the present instru-
ment ; but he may ere long feel that he has been
only a tool in the hands of others, who will cast
him aside without hesitation when lie has served
their turn. It is greatly to be apprehended that
the Duke of Vieronet—the man whose name was
a tower of strength to the Constitutional party—
has fallen into the hands of the conspirators, and
that he is for the time being in durance. Pro-
gress and reform, of which ESPARTERO
was the representative, is too greatly
dreaded in certain quarters to permit
his Government to be regarded with favour. His
ireiluence might be used in the hour of danger to
prop up the tottering throne ; but the moment
the emergency has passed away, tha', it was pos-
sible to do without him, all his former services
were forgotten, and he would be readily offered
as the earliest victim on the reactionary altar.
The first step taken on the nomination of the
new Ministry was most significant. It was a
proclamation placing the whole of Spain under
martial law. This was not founded on any
outbreak or insurrectionary demonstration. It_
was published at the same tini 3 as the nomina-
tion of the new Cabinet, and was ready cut and
dry in the hands of the author of the plot at the
time, that he pretended to be acting with good
faith towards the colleagues whom he hail male
up kis mind to deceive and betray. It may in-
(toed be regarded as the official declaration of the
Ministerial policy—the evidence of the palpable
intention to subslante despotism for freedom,
and the authority of the strong hand for that of
law and justice.

But will the Spanish nation submit to this ini-
quitous attempt ? General GUERAEA, the tried
and faithful friend of ESPARTERO, is at Saragossa
with a large body of troops, and We hear nothing
from Saragossa. There is a strong liberal party
in other quarters, and we believe that a protracted
contest must take place before the freedom so
highly prized is tamely surrendered. Meanwhile,
NAIIVAEZ has hastened to the frontier, like a bird
.of ill omen, ready to turn the crisis to his own
Purposes, as on a former memorable occasion.
There are other significant movements. Two
French regiments have been despatched to Bay-
onne, by the orders of Louis NAPOLEON, and it is
more than hinted that peculiar facilities have been
granted to the members of the Spanish reactionary
party, now or lately resident in France, to return
to their own country. This would seem to show
that the French Government has not been
altogether ignorant or indifferent to the progress
of events. We would, however, emphatically
protest against any foreign interference. Had
such a thing been attempted in France the Em- ,
peror might not have succeeded to his present
position, and the precedent may be made use of

in a manter by no means auspicious to his own
interests, or the continuance of the dynasty he
has so earnestly endeavoured to perpetuate. The
question now rests between Queen ISABELLA and
her people, and none bat the legitimate parties
can be suffered to participate in the s. intim of
the great problem.

In nine cases out of ten popular instinct is

ike the first decisions of conscience—right, far

more generally right than the elaborate decisions

of cabinets and diplomatists. There is a great
ndeal of coyness just now amongst our Par Eamo-

;ary orators on the Intervention question ; none
iko openly to say, " force if nothing else will

do •" or at least to say it in SD firm a tone as to
blue the nerves of the Foreign Secretary and his
Premier. They hope, and hope, and hope, for
the twentieth time, that moderate counsels will
prevail—that Imperial Majesties and Royal Ma-)

esties will learn wisdom from the very polite

wisdom of other majesties and their servants
" Representations" are the artillery with which
royalties play their game, while Austrian regi-

ments are pouring down the Alps and inundating
half Italy, and while, as a French officer tells us,
the cannon of Naples are pointed at the city !

Properly enough, for the enemies of the modern
TIBERIUS are his own subjects, and enemies they
must be to the monster who has incarcerated
POERIO and half killed him with chains, after a
trial to which those of JEFFRIES were justice
itself ; and who is now by threats, by suborna-
tion, by perjury, and by bribery, seeking to in-
carcerate scores of victims mere, not for crimes
even against such laws as Naples has, but for the
dark suspicions of himself or his myrmidons.
This Royal nuisance has dared to defy the mo-
dest suggestions of France and Eagland, and with
reason enough to bid Austria, who, we are told,
read him a lecture on judicial decency " to sweep
before her own door." The reason for this inso-
lence cannot well be doubted. He is quite sure
that the Western Allies will not invade his
tryranuy with other troops than sheets of fool-
scap ; and he therefore has little scruple in letting
them know how much ho cares for what they
scribble upon it. Very different would be his re-
plies if he had to turn his cannon seaward, and saw
the muzzles opposite of some of the broadsides
which we reviewed the other day at Portsmouth.
Now while Secretaries and Kings are playing out
this paper game, we fancy the people of this
country have a shrewd suspicion that they could
very soon settle the business—could make Aus-
tria, and Naples too, as meek as lambs, and
wheel the Neapolitan cannon either round to the
sea, or off the batteries altogether. They re-
member how Lords JOHN RUSSELL and PALMER-
STON behaved in 1830, and in 1849 ; that by
diplomatic silence or courtesy they winked at the
incorporation, the laceration rather and devouring,
of Poland by NICHOLAS ; and at his trampling
Hungary again under the feet of Austria. They
knew that firmness then would have saved us the
cost and the horrors of the recent War. At the
same time our Ministers also connived at the in-
tervention of Austria in the Legations of Modena
and Tuscany, and at that of the French in Rome.
This connivance at intervention by others, this
international cowardice, is now avenged on us by
all we have just paid and suffered; the people now
understand that connivance at tyrants' intervention
is a most costly and cruel thing to ourselves, as
well as to the oppressed. Sooner or later English
blood and money must be squandered to rectify
the mischief.
Oh ! but intervention is a delicate matter !
Would you have us go to war again? By all
means if necessary, but necessary it will never be
if we be only decided in time. The curse of the
whole business is, the vile policy which treats
peoples as ciphers, and Royalties only as realities.
With the Whig doctrine on their lips, that Go•
vernment is to be for the good of the governed,
not of the governors, our Whig practice has
always been to let the Governments run their
course ; and when the people, finding the Govern-
ment to have deprived them of almost all the
good which civilised freemen care about, have but
resisted, to fold their arms while Russia, Austria,
or France have re-established anEmperor, a Pope,
or a Duke or two, at the point of the bayonet.
Austria insolently proclaims her determination
to intervene at the demands of any tottering des-
pot, and to save him from making good laws and
ruling by them. What is the proper counter-
part to this ? A proclamation by England that
she too will intervene, but at the call of the
people, if any despot intervene at the call of
another. It is England's part to say, "we
sympathise with oppressed peoples ; we know
you sympathise with their oppressors, when the
latter have made the evils of revolution more
tolerable than longer submission, we insist, and
will support our decision if you compel us by
force, that the oppressor and oppressed still fight
it out between:them. We should like to fight for
the people, but we shall abstain from doing it if
you renounce your odious claim to fight for any
incarnation in a modeinform of the old CALIGULAS,
DOMITIANS, and HE LIOGAIIALUSES. If Neapoli-
tans, for instance—resist King Bost BA—hands off!
or we visit Naples, Trieste, and Ancona ; and
take Sicily under our naval care and into our
hands entirely. And as to the Middle and North
of Italy if you do quit, after your seven years'
inflictions, we too shall intervene somewhere."
Now wo are confident that decision to this pur-
p )rt would settle the business. BOMB A. dare not
go on if Austria were kept behind the Po at her
peril, and the Legations and Duchies would soon
sqeare matters with their rulers, if the brave
fighters with unarmed citizens, the bullies of
Vienna were Ought to keep at home. We de-
mand no intervention, but we demand it in behalf
of peoples as well as of despots ! We must re-
verse the ignominious Whig and Tory policy
which has disgraced us since the Treaty of Vienne,
and let the incurables know that Holy Allianc,
counsels shall override those of England no longer.
We shall be asked by what test are we to distin-
guish the call of a people for succour ; a govern-
ment we know ;—how we can tell the wish of a
people but by their governments? Now, will any
sane man pretend that we did not know the
wishes of Hungarians, Romans, Neapolitans,
Sicilians, and numerous Germans in 1848.9 ?
Why, we knew aem by the very concessions
which they extorted from their tyrants, as well
as we know what oar ancestors wanted from the
perjured STUARTh*. We turned them out by a
foreign intervention sought by the people. Had
WILLIAM M. been a red-tapist of course he
could not have ventured to intervene. There is
one infallible teat, howbver, of unendurable mis
rule, and that is revttlution. In no country of
Europe now could agitators get up an insurrec-
tion against a really- beneficial rule. Revolution
is always a proof that ithe thousands who prefer
their daily business to everything would rather
jeopardise it than liv. aon beneath the yoke. All
revolutions convict Government they would
subvert of having fits t subverted the rights of the
people for whose sal ,:ce they should govern.
How long, then, 'is t; he wretched Holy Alliance,
Coburg, Court, and. del ;pot plan of non-interven-
tion for
people, .and
_prompt intervention for