The Sun.
London, England, 1851-05-17 00:00:00

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LONDON, SATURDAY, MAY 17, 1851.

Oa the CHAIRMAN putting the question that the pm,
amble bo postponed,

Mr. KEOGH moved that it be taken first. This led
to conversation, in the course of which,
Mr. DISRAELI declared that he would support no le-
gislation on this subject that did not apply to Ireland as
Well as to England, and that he would support any pro-
position which should make the Bill a retaliatory act to
vindicate the national honour.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL expressed his willingness to
adopt certain of the amendments of Mr. WALPOLE, and I
to reject others.

Mr. WALPOLE explained his intentions in proposing
certain of these amendment,,, and it was ultimately ar-
ranged that the Bill should be committed pro forma, to
be re-committed on Monday, and that in the meantime it
should be reprinted in the form in which the Government
intended it should stand.
The House having resumed,
The Coalvvhippers (Port of London) Bill was read a
second time, and alter a desultory conversation on the
manner in which the accounts of the Court of Sewers
are kept, and whie.h led to no result, the House Edjourned.

The Ecci,?siastical Titles Assumption Bill has at
length got into Committee. The devotion, we may
almost term it the self-immolation of the Brigade,
retarded but could not prevent that consummation
—a consummation which, it was manifest to every
disinterested person at all acquainted with the state
of public feeling in Parliament and in the country,
could not possibly be averted. If any doubt could
have previously existed as to the motives of
those who, by an abuse of the forms of
the House, compelled the large and overwhelm-
ing majority to succumb to less than one seventh
of their number, it would b 3 completely set at rest
by the proceedings last night. Where were the nu-
ErItTOUB " brigadere," brimful of eloquence and anxious
to pour forth the enlightening torrent on the be-
nighted nation? Tiaey were all determined to he
heard. The refus2l of an audience would be but
adding bitter insult to deep injury. Where was the
Honourable Gentleman the Member for Clonmel, who
moved the adjournment of the debate, and thus ob-
tained a prescriptive title to resume the proceedings ?
Where were those whose claims were so feel-
ingly expatiated on by the Hon. Gentleman the Member
for Mayo? None were forthcoming. Human
patience had been exhausted, and none could be
found with sufficient temerity to brave the national
indignation that would be excited by the sacrifice of
another evening, and the expressions of impatience
with which the orator would he greeted during the
progress of his harangue. We have heard of a
barrister speaking against time, in order to delay
matters until a necessary witness could be procured
from a considerable distance. We have been pre-
sent at the cross-examination of a witness to cha-
racter for more than three hours, in order that a

special messenger might be dispatched for a
learned Queen's Counsel to take advantage of the op-
portunity for reply afforded by the indsffetion of the
adversaries ; and we were not astonished, for in each
Case something was to be gained by procrastination.
In the one a nonsuit was avoided, in the ether an elo-
quent and feeling address was delivered to the jury
that must have materially influenced their verdict.
An advocate might submit to the censure of the
Court for such purposes. On th Bill now
under notice the procrastination his been just as
palpable as in the cases above alluded to. But
nothing was to be gained by the success of the
manoeuvre. They could not throw out the Bill by a
temp):ary su-ne33, or bestow upon a foreign po-
tentate the privilege of invading the prerogatives of
the British Crown and the independence of the
British empire. Leland, their native country, will
be the chief sufferer in consequence cf the precious
time thus recklessly wasted, a considerable portion
whereofmight have been devoted to subjects intimately
connected with her welfare and prosperity. But
it can never be reclaimed, and doubtless we shall
hear some of the chief obstructives complaining, at
the end of the session, of the neglect of Irish interests,
and demanding justice for Ireland with voices of
liunder. They will not thrn receive their own fac-
tious proceedings as an adequate excuse fur Ministerial
backslidings ; but they must be contented, for the
good sense of the country will discern that they are
the parties responsible for the evils that may arise.
The debate has been again 'adjourned to Monday
evening, but on this occasion there has been a suffi-
cient reason for the delay, viz., that the Bill should
be reprinted in the form in which the Government
intend to proceed with it, so that Honourable Gen-
tlemen might understand exactly that on which they
are voting. We can now only express our hope
that no further time may be misapplied, but that at
length, in the fourth month of the session, the House
may really enter upon the important duty of legisla-
tion, and avoid all future escapades unbecoming the
dignity and character of the " first body of gentlemen
in the world."

A noble example of independence was yesterday
afforded by the Honourable Gentleman the represen-
tative of Nottingham. It will have been observed
that within the last few days two gentlemen, one of
them distinguished by his forensic reputation, were
iummorily requested by an arrogant and bigoted
majority to retire from the Conservative Club, having,
it was intimated, ceased for some time past to enter-
tain sentiments consistent with the principles of
Conservatism. The individuals thus virtually ex.
pelled were, it is by this time well known, no other
than Mr. BLTHELL and Mr. TINDAL. Without
having in any manner provoked the insult
gratuitously directed against them with so
much impertinent ostentation, these quondam members
of the club suddenly found themselves called upon to
withdraw from the midst of their former associates.
Anything more indecorous in tone than the requisition
addressed to them can scarcely be imagined. Regarding
the occurrence, moreover, as a precedent, it must be
looked upon as the inauguration of a system by which
the opinions of every member of society similarly
situated will be subjected to the scrutiny of a body
of inquisitors. Hence, therefore, it cannot but be
reprobated as a circumstance calculated to prove sin-
gularly detrimental to the liberal and enlightened
spirit of the age, reducing each person, as it does, to
the possible supervision of a faction arrogating to
itself the secret authority of the Carbonari or the
irresponsible despotism of the Vehmgericht. Feeling
.
this, We remarked with the utmost gratification the
course taken by Mr. WALTER—a course:as brilliant in
its deciiveness as it was
chivalric in its promptitude.
Indignant
at the disgraceful manner in which his
associates in the club have been treated, he has boldly
flung down
any furtherP
still remaining numbered
the privileges of
or ,
,jf
its
members,
amongst the ranks
preferring this haughty
rojeciin of
which night sooner
capri-
cious majority, render him liable • to
ration of insolence. Every one will continuance in a position
at the whim of a i
assuredly coin-
cide with ourselves in admiring
ho-
nourable to the Member for Nottingproceedingbarol and one
which must, we feel satisfied, inevitably afford the
ut-
most gratification to his numerous supporters in the
His conduct
by in
thatthe matter
generous has evi-
constituency.
dently been inspired and
masculine spirit of independence peculiarly
befitting the English gentleman under all
circumstances, bat more especially when to his own
ned that of one of the
personal dignity has been joi

Popular representatives.
It will probably be as well for those who may be at
all solicitous to maintain the Conservative Club in its

_
state of Prosperity to bear in remembrance the jeo-
pardy incurred by pursuing the path just vdveutured
upon by the late virtual and ill-advised expulsion•
Supposing the precedent be adopted as inaugurative,

The Llouse of Lords sat last evening fors short time,
but transacted no business of importance.
In the Commons,

On the order of the day for the resumption of the
debate on the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill being read, a di-
viaion took place (after an abortive attempt, on the pan
of Mr. REYNOLDS, to occasion further delay) on the
question that the ►SPEAKER leave the chair, and the
motion was carried by 116 to 35. The House then
wait into Committee on the

The strengthening tendencies of the convictions of
the thinking portion of the public towards the prin-
ciple of direct taxation, receive a fresh impetus from
the rapid development of commerce which
.every
monthly return of the imports and exports of our
trade and navigation confirms. As the effects of ou:
free-trade policy gradually unfold themselves, and it
is seen that while we produce at home more food than
ever, we import four times as much as we did under
the system of protection, we consume all we produce
and import, and it is eaten by those who could not
afford to purchase it under the higher prices of mono-
poly, the conclusion becomes inevitable, that the
economy of unrestricted commerce improves the con-
dition, net only of those who are dependent upon
manufactures and foreign trade, but of the great
masses of our rural population. Increased imports
infallibly indicate enlarged powers of domestic con-
sumption and means of internal purchase. Equivalent
exports equally prove that trade is strictly reciprocal,
and that with every importation a new and growing
demand arises for the labour of our producers. Not
all the statistics of CHOWLER, end all the "ex-
ceptional cases" of GEORGE FREDERICK YOUNG, can
rail this free-trade seal from off the bond of nations.
As the significancy of these facts becomes better
understood, a growing conviction arises that it is
essential to the full development of our powers of
barter, under the new dispensation of commercial
intercourse, that all unnecessary restrictions upon the
naerch.int should be removed, and every practicable
facility afforded for the full development of our
trading capabilities. It is now understood that tariffs,
import duties, taxes upon the exchange of commodi-
ties, are not only pernicious to the consumer, who has
ultimately to pay them, but obstructive to an in-
calculable extent of the enterprise and energy of the
distributor ; and that indirect taxes are not only the
least economical in collection, and the most burden-
some to every class of buyers and sellers, but inci-
dentally deprive us, by the irksome restrictions with
which they encompass business, of a vast amount of
profitable trade, which might afford large profits to
the capitalists, and inexhaustible employment to the
labouring classes.
It was from this conviction that Sir ROBERT PEEL,
in what may be called his regenerate political state
aimed, in the reduction of taxation, to repeal rather
than to reduce duties—to take off entirely the im-
posts from those commodities whose produce the re-
venue could spare, rather than merely to diminish a
little of the duties of everything, leaving still a little
for every article of import to pay.
One difficulty he failed to anticipate, which has
effectually frustrated all his expectations. He re-
membered indeed that we had taxes, but he forgot
that we had a Custom-house. He relieved trade
from the fetters in which duties had bound it, but he
left it the slave and captive of the iron chains of Red
Tcpery, and the farcical technicalities of a Thames-
street board. "Her MAJESTY'S Commissioners for
Foreign Revenue" have been the PENELOPES who have
industriously unwound in the board-room the web
which the Minister had warped and woofed in his
Cabinet. They have accumulated their forms, rules,
regulations and orders, just in the proportion in
which his policy dispensed with the need of them;
and the product of his total repeal of duties on twelve
hundred erticles of revenue has been an increase of
800,000/. per annum in the cost of collecting the
duties that remain.
Here we might stop. Q. E. D. There is no forty-
sophist power which can explain away this simple
fact. The less the Board of Customs have to do, the
more they charge for it. The fewer the duties to be
collected, the greater the labour of collection. As
goods cease to be the subject of revenue, they become
daily more liable to the supervision and inspection of
the fiscal officers. The fewer the objects of taxation,
the more numerous are the ceremonials of entry,
clearance, examination, pricking notes, cockets,
seizures, stoppages, and confiscations. Upwards of
half a million added to the expenses of the service
15,000 petitions per annum to the Board ; rules and
orders so voluminous that the additions reach an
average of 460 printed pages annually, and embrace
is all upwards of 4,000 different regulations; forms so
intricate that the clearance of goods wholly free of duty
requires, outwards thirteen different official solemni-
ties, and inwards nine, while dutiable commodi-
ties are favoured with nineteen inwards and twenty-
three outwards ; and an ignorance so omni-nescient
that the chairman denied that these were the forms,
while his deputy admitted it, and the presiding genius
of the whole gravely informed a committee of Lon-
don merchants that no cotton was imported into
London ;—these are a few of the indications of the
spirit in which the Board of Customs carries out the
policy of free trade. Not one of the Commissioners
had any connexion with the service till he took his
seat at the board ; each of them takes fifteen weeks'
holiday in the year, besides dedicating the chief part
of Monday to its patron saint, and futile visits to the
outports.

Accustomed as most Englishmen are, by costly ex-
perience, to the voracity of the judicial mind, our
readers must forgive the weakness of the confession,
that even we were somewhat startled by that mani-
festation of official vigour, and almost super•solicitor

o
energy, which has recently taken the tone of raising
hundred and twenty informations, all at the game
time, at the instance of the Crown, against the Lon-
don and St. Katherine Dock Companies. We
had imbibed an almost mythological reverence for
these vast developments of the large ideas and gigantic
designs of British commerce. W had been, as it
were, born and bred up to regard these leviathan esta-
blishments as the pride and glory of the enterprise and
contriving intellect of the metropolis of the commerce
of the world. We had heard at least that they were
the chief collectors of the revenue, the authors of a
system which had diminished smuggling to its prac-
ticable minimum—the right hand of the CHANcELLois
of the ExcHEQumtthe energetic voluntary substi-
tutes for official imbecility—doing gratuitously the
tht? public received the pay,
fiscal business of the country, while the servants of
thing, oftener for doing mischief.
sometimes for doing no-
But new brooms,

ing in complicity with the friends of the Cossacks ?
The Moniteur Algerien of the 10th has the follow-
ing from the province of Constantina :
" All the Kabyle country through which the division
under the command of General de St. Arnaud is to pass
is in a state of great agitation. Conferences had taken
place between the chiefs of the principal unsubmitted
tribes, and an oath had been taken by them to dispute
the passage of the Christians. The little town of Cello
has been induced, from an unforeseen circumstance, to
join in these manifestations. On the 25th of April the
superior Commandant of Philippeville came with an
escort of Arab horsemen to inspect the works of the
mule road which was being executed by the Kabyles
themselves, and thought he might go on as far as Calls.
While ho was in conference with the Caid, an as-
semblage composed of men of the Beni Isack,
some ill disposed inhabitants of the town and
strangers belonging to the neighbouring tribes,
formed on the road, separated the Commandant
from the main body of his escort which be had left at
the entrance of a defile. After endeavouring in vain to
force a passage through the crowd, ho was at length
compelled to get on board a boat with four officers of
Spahis who were with him. After again lauding at
some distance and again rejoining his escort, ho re-
gained Philippeville with no other loss than that of five
horses, which had been abandoned on embarking.
After this first outbreak, the Caid found himself unable to
keep under the hostile portions of the inhabitants. The
portions of the French were compelled to hide them-
selves. Several vessels which were at ar,chor i❑ the bay
were obliged to remove under a heavy fire of muske!ry,
by which, however, no one was injured. An outbreak
took place at the came time, near Djidjelli, and the ad-