The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-12 00:00:00

HUNGARY.

A letter from Pesth, dated March 7th, says :--
"The patent by which the Emperor of Austria
augments the number of his Council of the Em-
pire has been most unfavourably received in this
country. The measure is universally considered
as of no sort of value, and as adopted only to de-
lude foreign nations into the belief that the Haps-
burgs are becoming liberal. It says that the Coun-
cil shall be composed of archdukes and prelates,
and civil and military men of note, and of:' repre-
sentatives' of the provinces. But the archdukes
may be so numerous as to out-balance every other
section of the Council ; the prelates will of course
be of the Rauscher and Schwarzenburg stamp ; the
military and civil notables will naturally be taken
from the most servile creatures of the Govern-
ment; and the representatives' will be chosen by
Francis Joseph himself ! To regard, then, such an
institution as this with anything like seriousness is
impossible for a man of sense : it is purely and
simply a commission of men of confidence,' of about
the same value as the pitiable commissions which
were got up in this country on the communal law.
But, apart from its absurdity on general grounds,
the patent about the new Council is marked with
that offensive injustice to Hungary which has dis-
tinguished all the recent measures of the Govern-
ment. Thus, out of 38 representatives who are to
figure in the Council, Hungary Proper is• only to
have six; while her dependent provinces of Croatia,
Transylvania, and the Servian Voivodina, which,
since 1848-9 the Austrian Government has separated
from her, are to have eight. Evidently this is scanda-
lously unjust; and the injustice is more glaring
from the fact that Hungary, even though despoiled
of the said provinces, still composes one-third of
the Austrian dominions in extent, and still contains
one-fifth of their total population. After all, how-
ever, it matters little whether the Austrian Go-
vernment gives 6 or 20 representatives to Hungary
in its Council; for no Hungarian will condescend
to be nominated. I doubt even that the six men
required can be found.

The Austrian Government is displaying great
irritation at the publication of letters from Hun-
gary in foreign journals, and especially in the
Times. Its deeds are so evil here that it trembles
at their seeing the light. M. Prottmann, the Direc-
tor of Police at Pesth, has received positive orders
to find out who the writers of the letters are,
and to thrust them into gaol. The poor man is
consequently in a state of fussy excitement, writ-
ing here, bribing there, questioning this servant,
sounding that master, and making the Post-office
clerks open letters by wholesale. The other day
some good-natured friend, desirous to make him
look exceedingly silly, told him that the Pesth
letters to the foreign newspapers were, in order
to escape his clutches at the Post-office, for-
warded to certain persons at Vienna, and by
them sent on to their destination. He accord-
ingly made the Vienna police search the houses
and examine the papers of those persons. But
neither at Pesth nor at Vienna has he been able
to obtain any clue to the correspondents. He
will continue his searches of course, but, as regards
the correspondence of the Times, which he is more
anxious to get at than any other, it may be doing
him a kind turn to tell him that it is sent from this
city, not through the post-office, but through per-
sonages whom he is not at all likely to discover,
and whom he would not dare to touch if he did.
" Persecutions of the Protestants are reviving.
Baron Fr. Podmaniczky and Messrs. Kubinyi and
Szekacs, of this city, have been cited before the
examining magistrates for having taken an
active part in the Protestant agitation against
the Imperial patent, and have been subjected to
severe interrogatories of several hours' duration. It
is probable that they will be ordered for trial on a
trumpery accusation of being perturbators of the
public peace, or something of that kind.' The afore-
said Prott m a nn ,in his qua lityo t Police Direotor,is ales
anxious to have the Rev. Mr. Forok and the elders
of one of the Protestant confessions of Pesth prose-
cuted for their resistance to the patent. He insists
that they are rebels.' But the magistrates thus far
have not been able to discover the s dadow of legal
accusation against them, and Prottmann is racking
his wits to concoct proofs of their rebellion.' "

AUSTRALIA.

LIVERPOOL, MARCH 11.

The Saldanah, which left Melbourne on the 9th
of December, has arrived; she has 16,315 ounces
of gold on freight.