The Sun.
London, England, 1860-01-24 00:00:00

CONTENTS.

1. Nil Nisi Bonum.
2. Invasion Panics.
3. To Goldenhair (from Horace). By Thomas Hood.
4. Framley Parsonage. Chapter IV. A Matter of Conscience.
Chapter V. Amantium irn amoris integ-ratio. Chapter
VI. Mr. Harold Smith's Lecture.
5. Tithonus. By Alfred Tennyson.
6. William Hogcarth, Painter, Eng,raver, and Philosopher,
Essays on the Man, the Work, and the Time. 1. Little
Boy Hogarth.
Unspoken Dialogue. By R. 3lonckton Milnes. (With an
Illustration.)
Studies in Animal Life. Chapter 11.
6. Curious if True (Extract from a Letter from Richard
Whittingham, Esq.)
o.Life among the Lighthouses.
11.Lovel, the Widower. Chapter If. In which Miss Prior is
kept at the Door. (With an illustration.)
12. An Essay without End.
London : Smith, Elder, and Co., 65, Cornhill.

ROYAL ENGLISH OPERA,
COVENT-GARDEN.
Under the management of Miss L. Pyne and Mr.W. Harrison.
THIS EVENING, VICTORINE. Messrs. Santley, H.
naigh, H. Cerri, G. Honey, Walworth, &c. Misses Parepa,
Thirlwall.

still closer the bonds of friendly alliance between

them.
A dispute having arisen between Spain and
Morocco, I endeavoured, by friendly means, to pre-
vent a rupture ; but, I regret to say, without success.
1 I will direct papers on this subject to be laid

before you.
My Plenipotentiary and the Plenipotentiary of
the Emperor of the French having, in obedience to
their instructions, proceeded to the mouth of the
Peiho river, in order to repair to Pekin to exchange
in that city the ratifications of the Treaty of Tien-
tsin, in pursuance of the Llath Article of that
Treaty, their further progress was opposed by force,
and a conflict took place between the Chinese forts
at the mouth of the river, and the naval forces by
which the Plenipotentiaries were escorted.
The allied forces displayed on this occasion their
usual bravery, but, after sustaining a severe loss,
were compelled to retire.

I am preparing, in concert and co-operation
with the Emperor of the French, an expedition,
intended to obtain redress and a fulfilment of the
stipulations of the Treaty of Tien-tsin.
It will be gratifying to me, if the prompt acquies-
cence of the Emperor of China in the moderate
demands which willbe made by the Plenipotentiaries
shall obviate the necessity for the employment of

;brce.

I have directed that papers on this subject shall
be laid before you.
An unauthorised proceeding by an officer of the
United States in regard to the Island of San Juan,
between Vancouver's Island and the mainland,
might have led to a serious collision between my
forces and those of the United States. Such colli-
sion, however, has been prevented by the judicious
forbearance of my naval and civil officers on the
spot, and by the equitable and conciliatory provi-
sional arrangement proposed on this matter by the
Government of the United States.
I trust that the question of Boundary out of
which this affair has arisen may be amicably settled
in a manner conformable with the just rights of the
two countries, as defined by the First Article of
the Treaty of 1846.
The last embers of disturbance in my East Indian
dominions have been extinguished ; my Viceroy has
made a peaceful progress through the districts
which had been the principal scene of disorder,
and, by a judicious combination of firmness and
generosity, my authority has been everywhere
solidly and, I trust, permanently established. I
have received from my Viceroy the most gratify-
ing accounts of the loyalty of my Indian subjects,
and of the good feeling evinced by the native
Chiefs and the greatlandowners of the country. The
attention of the Government in India has been
directed to the development of the internal resources
of the country ; and I am glad to inform you that
an improvement has taken place in its financial
prospects.
I have concluded a treaty with the Tycoon of
Japan, and a treaty regarding boundaries with the
Republic of Guatemala. I have directed that these
treaties shall be laid before you.

GENTLEMEN OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS,
I have directed the Estimates for the ensuing
year to be laid before you. They have been pre-
pared with a view to place the military and naval
services, and the defences of the country, upon an
efficient footing.
I am glad to be able to inform you that the pub-
lic revenue is in a satisfactory condition.
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
I have accepted, with gratification and pride,
the extensive offers of voluntary service which I
have received from my subjects. This manifesta-
tion of public spirit has added an important ele-
ment to our system of National Defence.
Measures will be laid before you for amending
the laws which regulate the Representation of the
people in Parliament, and for placing that Repre-
sentation upon a broader and firmer basis.
I earnestly recommend you to resume your
labours for the impr)vement of our Jurisprudence,
and particularly in regard to Bankruptcy, the
Transfer of Land, the Consolidation of the Statutes,
and such a further fusion of Law and Equity as
may be necessary to insure that, in every suit, the
rights of the parties may be satisfactorily deter-
mined by the Court in which the suit is commenced.
I am deeply gratified to observe that the great
interests of the country are generally in a sound
and thriving condition ; that pauperism and crime
have diminished.; and that, throughout the whole
of my Empire, both in the United Kingdom and in
my Colonies and Possessions beyond sea, there
reigns a spirit of loyalty, of contentment, of order,
and of obedience to the law.
With heartfelt gratitude to the Almighty Ruler
of Nations for these inestimable blessings, I fer-
vently pray that his beneficent power may guide
your deliberations for the advancement and con-
solidation of the welfare and happiness of my
people.

It is the most remarkable and gratifying
announcement her MAJESTY can make to-day in
her gracious Speech from the Throne that the
system of Free Trade has been inaugurated in
France through the agency, by force of the
example, and with the direct diplomatic assistance
and co-operation of her Government. That cer-
tainly is, to say the very least of it, a gloriously
auspicious circumstance. It augurs well for the
maintenance of the Anglo-French alliance, it is
propitious of good for the commercial prosperity of
both countries, it is peculiarly calculated to cement,
or, to put it more strongly, and we believe also
more accurately, to weld together indissolubly the
real interests, and therefore the pacific ambition of
the two populations and their Governments. But
one only drawback there is to check our
exultation. Circumstances preclude France
from immediately reciprocating the advantages
secured to herself by the conditions readily entered
into by England in these arrangements. Several
of the sources of our own revenues will be forthwith
closed and abandoned, in order to secure the admis-
sion by France of the Free Trade principles enume-
rated in the commercial treaty, solemnly signed at
Paris, at four o'clock yesterday afternoon.
The old, almost immemorial monopolists of France
have to be taken into consideration. Their pre-
judices have been so far consulted, and their opposi-
tion to the new order of things so far evaded, that
time may be allowed them, that a moderate
interval of a year or two longer
may be con-
ceded to them, during the lapse of which they
may prepare for the dreaded emergency— or what is
more nearly the case, have their obtuse antagonism
worn down by the sweeping on of the broad flood of
Free Trade doctrines and Free Trade measures,
with, so to express it, all their at first scarcely
perceptible, but, when once admitted, perfectly
irresistible power of trituration. It may be that
but a modicum or instalment of Free Trade has
been yielded as yet by the French Government.
But, however small—there is that modicum, there
is that instalment. The rest will follow in due
course—must follow : it is only now a question cf
time. It is the insertion of the thin end of the
wedge. Every stroke of the pendulum afterwards
will tell upon it. The upas of monopoly will be
riven to its centre and perish. The Flood Gates

of Free Trade, to u se another figure, opened thus, it
may be, but a chink , are, at any rate, so far opened.
They can 'never be. closed again—the mere force of
the current they ari beginning to admit must fling
them wide eventually. Again, we say it is
only a matter of time—the good work has actually
commenced. If Sir Iti.OBERT PEEL could but have
survived to see it! To see that, fourteen years
after he himself, with the Ministerial hammer of
Thor, had given the death •blow to Protection, the like
coup de grace would be administered across the Chan-
nel by the Chief of the French Government. It may
benot un naturally matter of regret to us—it is, let us
avow as much at once, it is unquestionably matter
of regret to us that the full scope of our own imme-
diate concessions to France through the new Com-
mercial Treaty, dating from yesterday, cannot upon
the instant, cannot for that matter simultaneously,
be reciprocated by the French Government. The
reciprocation is to come to us later on—that assu-
rance is our solace for the moment—and meanwhile
the reconko'idation of differences or discrepancies in
our accounts we hand over to that fiscal and finan-
cial wonder-worker, the Chancellor of the Exche-
quer ! Until we can hearken to the scheme pro-
pounded by him in his Budget for 1860, we are
left to the merest conjecture as to the manner in
which Ministers propose to extricate themselves
from the diffieulties of revenue resulting from this
very Boon of a Commercial Treaty inaugurating
Free Trade as the guiding commercial and finan-
eial principles henceforth in the councils of our
imperial ally, the Emperor NAPOLEON 111.
And meanwhile, after all this diplomatic "to
do"—we aro to have No Congress. That is the
next surprize. It follows hard upon the heels of
the Free Trade Treaty yesterday. It will be wel-
comed far and wide in England, in France, in
Italy, in Germany, anywhere, everywhere almost
with a sigh of relief. What an immense quantity
of paper will be saved, what an incalculable length
of time, what an unimaginable waste of words.
The illusion has vanished—bit by bit at first—
and then at last the final remnant of
it has gone out quite suddenly. It seemed at
the outset to resemble a dissolving view that might
turn to something else. But the colours have paled,
the outlines have faded away one by one, and it
has ended at length in—Nothing. Its President
received at the outset his exiquatur. Count
WALEwsxi, who was to have taken his place in
the largest gilded fauteuil, withdrew from the
Foreign Office into domestic retirement. Then fol-
lowed, soon afterwards, an improbability, as to the
embarkation from Civita Vecchia of his Eminence
Cardinal ANTONELLI, the POPE'S Prime Minister
and Chief Plenipotentiary. His Eminence's arch-
antagonist, the Count CAVOUR, was next in his turn
precluded from hastening to Paris by having
devolved upon him, once again, the responsi-
bility of constructing at Turin a new and powerful
Administration. The sequel being, as we now
recognise, not simply the indefinite postponement
of the Congress, but its absolute abandonment.
Free Trade for France—No Congress at Paris—
these are the twin Napoleonic surprises " startling
the isle " not from its propriety, but from its doubts
and anxieties immediately upon the opening in
1860 of this new and momentous session of Parlia-
ment.

It is not without pleasure that we learn that the
return of Count CAvour. to office has been due, in
a great measure, to the action of our own Foreign
Office. We have always gladly done jastiee to the
goodwill of the leaders of the present Cabinet
towards Italian liberty. Ever since their accession
to office they have adhered to their antecedents, and
have asserted the rights of the Central States of
Italy, in opposition to Austrian notions of the rights
divine of her exiled Lieutenants. They have had,
we fear, a double temptation to another course. Of
the first, though a near one—too near—and most
difficult of all for the QUEEN'S servants to resist, we
shall say nothing. The proof can only be inferen-
tial; and, however clear to us, could at any time
be easily denied. The other is open to the know-
ledge of the world. The Conqueror of Austria, in a
fit of that generosity to the vanquished by which
he had purchased the friendship of Russia, had
sacrificed at Villafranca the independence of the
country which he had entered as a liberator. Like
many others who have made a blunder, he was long
unwilling to own that it was one. He must have
seen very early that it was so ; yet he felt bound
by his engagements, and by his wish to show that
his diplomacy was as good as his soldiers' fighting,
to persist iv translating the stipulations of Villa-
franca into a treaty of peace at Zurich.
Much as our Cabinet must wish to agree in its
policy with the Emperor of the FRENCH, it yet re-
mained firm to the cause of Italian independence.
The consequence was a seeming opposition between
the Governments of France and England, yet one
which never went beyond a conflict of opinion
between two equally honourable opponents. The
EMPEROR had on his side the right to say, " To me
it is due that the Central States of Italy have had
an opportunity, without shedding a drop of their
own blood, to throw off the yoke of all—is it not
fair that the Government which has spent blood
and treasure for their freedom should be listened to
with considerable respect when counselling them
how to use it." To this our Government has op-
posed the inalienable rights of independent States.
Acknowledging the services of the French, and fully
appreciating their generous sacrifices, we could yet
say, and did say—" That to force on the States any
particular form of Government, abos e all, to enforce
the return of the old and detested despots, would
be to deprive the Italian war of its greatest glory.
Louis NAPOLEON ought to find his great reward
in enabling oppressed nations to exercise the most
prized rights of nations." It is equally to the credit
of the EMPEROR that he early took the oppor-
tunity to repudiate the employment of force on
behalf of the tyrants who had pointed their
cannon at Solferino against their own country-
men, and of our Ministry, that they have persisted
in the right course for Italy till the
EMPEROR dismissed the pro-Austrian WALEWSKI,
and he has done all he could to repair the great
blunders of Villafranca.

The King of SARDINIA appears also to have acted
with increasing freedom, which we must attribute
to the remonstrances of our Government with that
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been tolerated had not the English Cabinet stood
very firm. It was a serious innovation on the side
of the Sardinian Government of the Duchies. But
now it appears there is no doubt that Count CAVOUR
has again conic forward, we may say, at the express
invitation of England. Lord JOHN RUSSELL wrote
expressly requesting to have a conference, whether
a Congress were held or not, with Count CAVOUR.
By this step our Government placed the Count in
his right position. Re was the man with whom
the most powerful nation of Europe wished to con-
fer on Italian subjects, And rightly so, He and
GARIBALDI, in their respective parts of statesman
and warrior, have been the two men who have acted,
in everything, as Italians, and not as the citizens
of any small State of Italy merely. Count CATOUR
has preserved his policy against all opposition of
clergy and potentates at home or abroad. At the