The Sun.
London, England, 1856-07-26 00:00:00

shafts fell pointless on the Ministerial shield, or
rebounded so as to damage to a much greater
extent thoAc: by whom they were originally dis-
charged. He virtually exonerated M nisters,
.in.l tramsferrPd the blame to his own party and
his own followers ! The gist of his argument
was to the etfeot—that Lord PA.LM•RSTON had
exercised a conservative policy which led to
the extinction of party, but that that policy
ought to have been carried out by men professing
Conservative principles ; and that, therefore, the
DERBYITE skirmishers had prevented or retarded
what would, if carried, have been very beneficial

to the country.
So far on matters of domestic interest ; but
On Foreign Policy he was still more unsa•
tisfactory. He alluded to the questions
concerning Russia, Austria, and America
~pints on which the Ministry were 'even
wore open to attack than on any others, and
is which the strongest feelings of disgust and
indignation were excited throughout the entire
country. But in these respects he praised the
Government ! ! He declared that they had acted
in harmony with Conservative principles 1 Was
it, then, a part of the Conservative policy, that
all the sacrifices of men and money made during
the continuance of the contest with Russia should
be deliberately neutralised, and we should refrain
from taking advantage of the opportunity so
dearly purchased ? If so, we rejoice that we have
not had a Conservative Government ! Was it
part of the Conservative policy that the sanguine
hopes " entertained by the sincere supporters of
Liberal opinions" respecting an interference in
Italy should be disappointed ? If so, we
again exult in their absence from office
Was it part of the Cantiervativo policy
to submit to deliberate and intentional in-
sult from the PIERCE-MARCY Cabinet ? If so,
a Derbyite Ministry would not have improved
the position of the country! Mr. DISRAELI paid
what he must have thought to be a high compli-
ment to the PALMERSTON Cabinet, in stating that
"on subjects of internal interest and the great
question of foreign policy they warp pursuing a
course in harmony with Conservative policy and
Conservative principles." The modern BALIAM
thus blessed according to his lights the man he
was engaged to curse. He gave what he con-
ceived to be the greatest praise in asserting
that the barriers which prevented a thorough
fusion between the parties ware completely
broken down ! The entire debate was, there-
fore, " weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable," and
its only effect will be to induce the people heartily
to exclaim " A plague on both your housas."

According to Hebrew and Christian theologi-
ans the world has served its inhabitants in its
present form pretty well for 6,000 years or so.
To be sure far more than five-sixths of that time
its tenants knew but little of each other. Ame-
rica itself was unknown to the old world three
centuries and a-half ago, and the further East

practically unknown to Europe for nearly as long
a time. It is indeed hardly possible to realise the
change which has brought America as near as were
the Northern and Southern parts of an island a
century back, and made furthest Ind as accessible
as America then was. The wandering tribes of
the Eastern deserts still reckon distance by time,
and we are fast returning to this primitive mode
of measurement. How many among us could
answer the question of the distance between Eng-

land and America, India, or Australia, compared
with those who could name in a minute how many

days' voyage it was to them respectively. Steam
and Lieutenant MAURY have done for the ocean
what steam and theiron rail have done for the land.
Indeed when the lieutenant's admirable oharts are
camplete the sail will have regained much of its
lost prestige for long commercial voyages, or rather,
as the voyage of the Royal Charter seems to show,
they will good-temperedly amalgamate their powers.

Lieut. MAURY will guide the good ship to favour-
able winds, wherever winds blow, and the screw
will propel her through the region of calms.
But it is not enough to put the powers of our

little planet to new uses, and to subjugate even the
rapidity of the lightning to the cravings of human
impatience. Not enough that we should converse
across continents and seas, and propose to talk
with friends even in Calcutta ; not enough that
the screw and the sail should turn ♦oyages of
months into voyages of weeks ; we must fair])
oat up the old earth itself where it is too old-
fashioned or too ill-fashioned for our eagerness, or
at least where it will not suit our purpose. The
Isthmus of Panama has long been an eyesore to
the world-niendexs. Over it we have gone by
rail already, but that is nothing. Through it we
niust go also. The Yankees have decreed it, and
have dragged U 3 half way into a war in
their zeal for a short cut to the Pacific;
or, as they will have it, to bless the region of the
ship canal thither with perpetual peace. Natuie
seems, indeed, rather unwilling to subwir, her

neck to the stroke. The old Isthmus has been
surv?yed and re-surveyed ; was to be cut here and
cut there, but it is still entire, and the two Ame-
ricas are still one body, and seem likely yet to
remain so. It does not seem easy for our engi-
neering HENRY the Eighths to put or cut asunder,
according to their taste, those whom Dame Nature
has joined together.
Some eighth HARRY in this line is, however, the
want of the day, for another neck stands in the
way of our desires, by uniting the old world's con-
tinents of Africa and Asia also. In ages long gone
by, the attempt was indeed made to marry the
separated seas, and to divorce the united conti-
nents ; but land still holds its owe, and the
waters still surge in vain to meet each other,
though only some sixtyorseventymiles of land in-
tervene, and though they have no other chance of in-
termingling except by rolling round a distance equal
to half the circumference of the globe. Twenty-
five hundred years ago an Egyptian Monarch
began a canal, and DARIUS, the Persian,
we are told, completed it, but that was to
be only a fluvial connection by the Nile. A
Marine Canal is the desire of modern commerce,
and has been the frequent project of modern Go-
vernments and men of science, but the vis inertia
of unqualified desert and shallow coasts, has defied
the schemes of science, by intimidating the possessors
of capital. The WATTSES and the STEPHENSONS
have been ready, but the BOLTONS have as yet
been wanting. Perhaps in these days a company
with the magic parenthesis---a parenthesis at the
end of a sentence !—(‘, Limited ") may solve the
diflicaliy.
Will the company now in process of formation
by M. FERDINAND DE LESSEPS do it ? We have
looked with some care at those parts of his last
pamphlet which relate to the physical practicabi-
lity of the scheme, and we certainly think there I
is no difficulty which Mr. STEPHENSON or Mr.
BaUNEL could not vanquish. Whether M.
LEssErs and his literary coadjutor, M. BARTHELEMY
ST. HILAIRE, do not under estimate the cost, and
exaggerate the profits, is a question which must
be well weighed when the previous one of prac-
ticability has been unequivocally decided.
The land part of the business should be,
and probably is, matter of easy calaula-
Um. A %ireful external fauna' and boripgi