The Sun.
London, England, 1860-04-19 00:00:00

THE WEATHER,-SUN OFFICE, APRIL 19, 1860,

THERMOMETER, IN THE SHADE.
52—highest since noon yesterday.
3i—lowest this morning and during the night.
42—this day at noon.
BAROMETER—Down to 30.05 ; now up to 30.12.
WIND, Northerly ; strong and squally, with occasional
shewers of sleet and snow. It was very cold yesterday
afternoon, and during the night.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
THIS DAY.—Morning, 12h. 52m.—Afternoon, lh. 9m.
To-mounow.-Morning, lh. 26m.—Afternoon, lh. 42m.
_____

We really expected better things of the
Quarterly. That distinguished organ of Toryism,

or as we must call it nowadays, Conservatism has in

its latest number (but just now published) under-
taken to raise anew upon a most extraordinary
plea the drooping standard of the Opposition. It
assumes to do this authoritatively in the name and
on behalf of the Great Party marshalled in the
Commons by Mr. DISRAELI, and in the Lords by
the Earl of DERBY. The occasion selected for the
enunciation of the astounding views to which we
are about very briefly to direct the attention of our
readers is that contrived for itself by (evidently) a
practised " hand" among the skilled corps of
the Quarterly Reviewers--namely, that of
the "political" article closing the current num-
ber of the Quarterly, a double-barrelled criticism
discharged simultaneously at the obnoxious Budget
of Mr. GLADSTONE, and at Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S
" Poor Little Billd for the Reform of the Lower
Rouse of Parliament. We shall say nothing what •
ever, at this moment, about those important sec-
tions of the elaborate paper here referred to, which
relate more particularly to the Fiscal and Finan
cial schemes of our certainly rash and (to say the
least of him in this particular), over-ingenious
Chancellor of the Exchequer. Our design just now
is nothing more ambitious than to concentrate our
readers' regard for a few moments upon the singu-
lar method by which the writer in the Quarterly
endeavours to excite a feeling of repugnance
against what is really the one redeeming feature
in the Ministerial scheme of Reform in the
popular representation—namely, the extension of
the elective franchise in the boroughs from the ten
pound martin, as we may term it, to one embrac-
ing within it what the Quarterly designates (ob-
viously with a shudder), " the six pounders !"
It is tolerably certain, we believe, that if Mr.
D!SRAELI'S Bill had only been allowed to go into
Committee, instead of being disingenuously shirked
and evaded by Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S " dodging"
Resolutions—that plastic and elastic mea-
sure of the Tory Reformers would have been
so modified in Committee that it would have
been enabled to embrace within it prior to
its coming on for the Third Reading, this very
class now objected to so violently and vociferously
by the Quarterly, namely, the one but just nose spe-
c-Med as the class of the six-pounders. Of course,
while writing thus, we are aware that we are
writing quite hypothetically. But at any rate, we
distinctly assert, that what we have here stated is
beyond any manner of doubt, has teen, ever since
the adoption of Lord JOHN'S trickery " resolu•
lions," the prevailing impression—almost, we
might say, the universal conviction. Yet—
here is the great quarterly organ of the
Tory Reformers, now that Lord DERBY'S
party is in Opposition—here is the. Quar-
terly Review, in the name of that party, de-
nouncing the scheme of a six-pound franchise for
the Boroughs as a project (to represent its views
in the very mildest terms) very little less indeed
than absolutely revolutionary ! The language of
denunciation, in truth, is such, as directed against
the six-pound franchise, that we might conclude at
once that the Quarterly reviewer has very con-
siderably benefitted by the broad and ample
scope of Igr: BRIGIIT'e favourite vocabulary.

Referring distinctly to the six-pound franchise
for boroughs—forming the chief, and, as we have
already ventured to call it, about the one only re-
deeming feature of Lord JOHN'S " Poor Little,"
weak-eyed, weak-voiced, and otherwise addle-
Leaded " Bill " for the Reform of Parliament—the
article in the Quarterly endeavours at once, as a
last resource, to excite a feeling actually of alarm
against this sufficiently moderate project of extend-
ing the elective franchise to the sixpounders
Considering the extravagant character of the
epithets applied to this project by the
Quarterly this project of a six-pound
franchise for the boroughs—we are left in utter be-
wilderment as to what additional strength of
epithets could by any possibility be applied to a
really " Big Bill" instead of a " Little one"—a Reform
Bill, let us say, that should go the length among
other things of proposing the adoption of the
Chartist principle of Universal Suffrage. After
the adjectives here applied by the Quarterly to
the projected " six-pounders," the reviewer may be
literally said (in reference to the proposal of uni-
versal suffrage) to have " beggared description !" As
affording very readily proof positive that we are not,
in saying this, by any manner of means speaking at
random, we will just quote a few of the polite
allusions made by the Quarterly to this
Ministerial plan of extending the privi-
lege of the franchise to the six pounders.
Quoth the Quarterly then, in sepulchral accents of
warning :—" The leap which the House of Com-
mons is taking with such philosophic calmness
is a leap absolutely in the dark. We are humbly
carrying our homage to some new king, but we
know neither his name nor character. When the
transfer is effected, when the new reign is opened,
when the old rulers are irrevocably dethroned,
then the veil shall be drawn aside, and we shall
see the form and lineaments of the now unknown
Power which will thenceforth dispose of the fortunes
of England. Until this interesting revelation is
made, it is scarcely worth while to speculate.
Some say that the publicans will be our masters;
others declare that it will be the trades' unions.
It is a blessed choice between debauchery and
crime. On the whole, we pray for King Publican
and his merry rule., If the sceptre is to be
wielded for the benefit of one, and that the hun-
griest, class, the weaker the hands that it falls
into the better. Anyhow Blagabalus is more tole-
rable than Caligula. All the evils that we inveigh
against in the constituencies where freemen pre-
vail, the chronic corruption, the sickening de-
bauchery, the wide-spreading fraud and wholesale
perjury that adorn the working of our represen-
tative system in such places as Berwick and
Norwich would be ill exchanged for the strong,
steady, deadly gripe of the trades' unions. These
bodies have shown a tenacity of purpose, and a
pliability of organisation which would make them
redoubtable antagonists if they were actuated by
morality and guided by the most enlightened wisdom.
But the stupid barbarism of their economical creed,
the feroci4 with which their secret conclaves pro-
nounce the doom, of a horrible death against all
who thwart their projects, the readiness with which
they find instruments to execute their murderous
decrees, warn us that, if ever England should really
pass under their power, WE SHOULD WELCOME THE
MILITARY DESPOTISM THAT SHOULD RELIEVE US."
The expressions we have here taken the liberty of
emphasing with italics, and especially the closing
sentence, which we could only fitly quote in small
capitals, will be accepted by our readers—cannot
fail to be so accepted by them—as ample justifica-
tion of every phrase above applied by us to this as-
tounding denunciation of Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S
" Poor Little Bill" by the Quarterly. Epithets so
applied, are, surely, something equivalent to the
discharge of a park of artillery at a cock sparrow ;
or to adopt the famous metaphor in POPE'S Satire,
the breaking upon the wheel of a butterfly.

Every now and then the subject of game preser-
vation is forced on public attention. Sometimes it
is by the terrible monition of a horrible murder, as
it is termed, and horrible enough it is, yet wanting
after all in the worst incidents of a murder—the
waylaying with intent to kill. Game murders,
which so awfully remind us of the existence of
game laws, are rather duels between persons whose
occupations make them bitter enemies to each other.
Occasionally, also, a pamphlet, like the one now
before us,* serves to keep the subject before the
public. Mr. CORBET'S essay was originally read at
a meeting of the " Central Farmers' Club " this
spring, and is very properly printed in this form,
being too long to appear fully in the daily press.
It specially invites attention to the evils of the
" over preservation of game," and takes a view of
the fair use of game which ought to content any
reasonable man.

Amongst Mr. GLADSTONE'S money-squeezing
tricks, one is a modification of the game licenses, in
which he proposes to cancel one of the most practi-
cally useful of the game preservers' concessions, by
making rabbits game again ! Probably this ill-
advised proposal may have suggested to Mr.
CORBET taking up the subject just now. And,
though to townsmen the rabbit-killing license may
not seem much worse than a stamp on every letter
which is to make a bargain binding, it will prove,
in the country, a cause of the most wanton annoy-
ance. To the farmer all the furred game are the
most odious of vermin. Hares do an incalculable
amount of damage. They cannot, like a flock of
sheep, be penned and required to consume an
assigned portion of food—they roam over a field of
turnips, bite far more than they eat, and thus
expose to the rotting effects of frost, perhaps
twenty times the weight of roots requi-
site to sustain them. Hares, moreover, eat
the young grain crops which sheep are, of
course, never allowed to do ; they also, being
rodentia, seem to take a pleasure in nibbling off the
blades for the pleasure of nibbling. 'Worse vermin
on his farm than hares the farmer cannot have.
But next to these come Mr. GLADSTONE'S rab-
bits. They too are great eaters of green crops, but
they do not ramble so far as hares. They keep in
the neighbourhood of their burrows. In their
vicinity they are as mischievous vermin as hares
themselves. But, as if to compensate for moving
in a smaller circle, they do far more damage within
it. They destroy banks and hedges by their bur-
rows, and have been known to cause endless trouble
by stopping up costly under-drains. To the farmer
both hares and rabbits areas great a nuisance as rats
and mice. The charge against Mr.GLADSTONE is that
one of these pests having been degraded from the
rank of game, Mr. GLADSTONE, for the sake of
thumb screwing a trifle out of the farmer, proposes
to make them game again. We hope some inde-
pendent member will notice this shabby little trick.
Will not some of our cowity members do it ? They
retain, we suppose, as their motto—"Farmers'
Friends"—will they not look out for the farmers ?
If they consult their gamekeepers, the latter, who
always regard the rabbits as their perquisite, will
give them twenty reasons why rabbits should be
declared game ; but if they ask their tenants they
will bid them declare rats game next, and Mr.

* Over Preservation of Game. By Henry Corbet.
Loudon ; J, Ridgway,

one to kill rabbits.

GLADSTONE might quite as reasonably require
farmers to pay for a license to kill rats as for

There can be little doubt that "over preserva-
tion" is the cause of the worst results of our game
laws. To this, more than to anything else, is due
the great extent of poaching. The temptation is
so great—the crime regarded as no crime at all,
and the prospect of food or of profit so enticing.
We have expressed long ago the views indicated
by Mr. CORBET - that battue - shooting is
an inglorious, unmanly sport. It may be
all very well for a heavy, inactive Ger-
man Prince, or Graf, or Herr Von—but it is not
the sport for an English gentleman. He ought to
seek his game on the saddle, or on foot, not to
stand watching a woodside, an opening, or a run,
whither men are driving the hapless victims whom
he Rill murder close at hand, as fast as servants
can load guns for him. Battue shooters are not the
stuff that good volunteers or regular soldiers are
made of. Old XENOPHON taught us, when we were
boys, how much in the chase was kindred with the
art and practice of war. And this is true now of
fair sport, though none of our game be lions and
boars ; but think of a colonel or field-marshal
keeping his hand in for actual service by standing
to shoot preserved creatures driven to his gun's
muzzle. And yet it is for this unmanly amuse-
ment that landlord perpetuate a practice which is
the cause of the greater part of rural crimes !
We need not now enter on the general question
whether there ought to be laws at all which make
wild creatures property. Our readers indeed
know our views on that point ; but we are pleased
to see that Mr. CORBET points to what we have
always held to be the best of game laws—the law
of good feeling between a landlord and his tenantry
and peasantry. We speak what we have known
when we say that a landlord may keep all the game
he needs on a very large estate by behaving
liberally to farmers in regard to furred game, and
making the mowers and reapers his friends by
donations at hay and harvest time, which did not
amount to a tithe of the cost of a gamekeeper: We
have known the men mow round a sitting bird,
leaving the grass to shelter her and her
eggs ; and have seen them deeply grieved
at having accidentally cut off a pheasant's head
with a scythe. On an estate, where the landlord
takes the right course, he may have a gamekeeper
in every farmer and farm-labourer, and make the
place too hot for any poacher. That course, how-
ever, includes the utter renunciation of battue•

shooting.
Landlords will do well, both in the interests of
good farming and of social morals, to bethink
themselves seriously of setting the game laws to
rights. They are a remnant of feudality—of the time
when half the kingdom was wood, common, waste,
and marsh—and are wholly unadapted to the present
state of society and of agriculture. Their funda-
mental principle is vicious, and we may be sure
that artificial and revolting protection, for game
cannot long survive the death of all other kinds of
protection.

The speech of Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE to his con,

stituents, at Liskeard, is one of the ablest that the
hon. gentleman has delivered for some time. Mr.

OSBORNE is well known as one of the cleverest of
our Parliamentary debaters, his speeches are always
shrewd and telling, and his animated style and
sarcastic humour always secure him the ear of the
House. Sometimes he has allowed his wit to de-
generate into flippancy, and his sharp thrusts have
lost their 'point from their personality. On this
occasion, however, he made one of his happiest
efforts. The tone of his speech throughout showed
a calmness and moderation that did credit to
his judgment, and his views on the ques-
tions of the day are distinguished for
their sound sense. After remarking on the im-
portant subjects that had been brought before Par-
liament since the commencement of the session, he
proceeded to consider the measures on their indivi-
dual merits. The first question, he said, in which
he had taken part, was Sir JOHN TRELAWNY'S
Bill for the Abolition of Church Rates. Mr. Os-
BORNE, like many of its supporters, disavowed all
hostility to the Church. He was a Churchman, he
said, and he believed it to be the best safeguard
against intolerance on the one hand, and delusion on

the other. He was aware that many Dissenters
were not unwilling to subscribe in support of the
Establishment, but they objected to have their
raoney forced from them. After further expressing
his views on this subject—views which we
have always supported— he proceeded to consi-
der the Treaty and the Budget. On these points
we differ somewhat from his opinions, although,
notwithstanding his strong advocacy- of the treaty,
he supported it rather on general than particular
grounds. He expressed an earnest hope, which all
must share, though we fear it is somewhat un-
stable, that the importation of light wines might
diminish that frightful consumption of spirits which
is the bane of our country. In Paris, he said, there
were in 1851, 30,000 cabarets, or low wine shops,
yet drunkenness was so inconsiderable a vice that

it had not a place in the category of public
offences. At a rough estimate of the re-
turns of the spirit duties in Great Britain
and Ireland he calc'ilated that the quantity con-
sumed allowed to every Englishman, 24 gallons ;
and to every Scotchman, 11 gallons; and to
every Irishman, 3j gallons. With regard to
the refreshment-houses, Mr. OSBORNE supported
the proposed amendment. Unfortunately, how-
ever, the excessive regard of interested parties for
public morality has disposed of the question.
Mr. OSBORNE, in analysingthe Budget, expressed
a very general opinion when he said that he very
much doubted whether this were the proper time
to take off the paper duty. It certainly must appear
somewhat singularthat a year of such enormous defi-
cit and so heavy an increase of direct taxation should
beselected for the removal of a tax which presses
severely on no class, and whose removal the very
parties which its abolition is supposed to benefit
look upon with doubt and suspicion. In his re-
marks on the unfortunate Reform Bill, Mr. Os-
BORNEfoareyl
as
et
ehappy,slight.
f R He
Amid
Reform
mrmid expressedht ha de 1
pa
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he regret
laughter
gr
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in was very
the audience he compared his friend Mr. BRIGHT
to the celebrated foreigner who had lately
visited this country—the famous Benicia Boy.
The combative propensities of the hon. member for
Birmingham are certainly strongly developed in
his provincial orations, however his eloquence may
collapse when he enters the Parliamentary arena.
The tendency which we have often commented
upon in Mr. BRIGHT'S speeches to foster and exa-
cerbate class dissensions was very sensibly dc..
flounced by Mr. OSBORNE. He observed that
reform should be advocated on its own merits not
by abuse of any particular class ; particularly
when it was a class like the English aristocracy,
which any man of industry an :1 talent might aspire
eto a
oesnet er
with 111 r.
IhanlG
y 3 asiobteirs:
mh
ials no do
1 d,
ed perus
ebnt
s,by
tinjuredhe his
vio-
lence of his views, and the injudiciousness of his
tempe-
rate principlesoeaey.iNlenseoef
hint
moderate
stirring og opinions
up
anew
wd t theem
op
led-

fires of class antagonism and prejudice which are
happily dying out, and they shrink from throwing
' a great increase of power into the hands of the
masses if the leaders who represent them will
support such theories. It is not by setting class
against class, and increasing the bitterness and sus-
picion which difference of social position is always
apt to engender, that the principles of reform and
progress can most fully and fairly be advanced.
It is by breaking down the artificial barriers, by
letting each side know and understand the other
better, by letting them feel that they are country-
men in common, and therefore have a common inte-
rest and common sympathy. As the member for
Liskeard observed, if they read history they would
find that the HOWARDS, the RUSSELLS, and the
STANLEYS had been quite as forward in advocating
the liberties of Great Britain as the BROWNS, the
JONESES, and the ROBINSONS. He would not
depreciate either class, and he deprecated the intro-
duction of such rivalries and antagonisms into the
consideration of national measures. The hapless
Reform Bill he could not say much for, indeed he
expressed his intention of proposing an amend-
ment. Though not quite so cordial in support of
the Ballot as we could wish, he said he was willing
to give it a trial, which would certainly be the
readiest solution of the difficulty.. If its opponents
are really sincerely convinced of the certainty of
failure, why do they not allow the experiment to be
made ? It would furnish them with new arguments,
which they stand much in need of, and a proof a
little nearer home than the worn out examples of
America and Australia. Do they really think the
Decline and Fall of the British Empire would
date from the introduction of secret voting, or
is the possibility of its success a more alarming
anticipation than the fulfilment of their dismal
prophecies ?

THE SUN, LONDON, THURSDAY EVENING, APRIL 19, 1660.

LATEST

___,,,_- -------

Ortega was shot this evening.

AMERICA.

.NEW,

PARIS, MURSDAY.

The Moniteur of this morning states that the pam-
phlet La Coalition serves as a pretext for Bourse
manoeuvres, and endeavours to maintain a feeling
of uneasiness in the public mind. The law does not
give the Government any right to stop the publi-
cation of a pamphlet containing no particularised
offence, but the Minister of the Interior has brought
under the notice of the Minister of Justice the
Bourse manceuvres on the occasion of the publica-
tion of the pamphlet La Coalition, and a judicial
inquiry will be held.

MADRID, APRIL 18.

BERNE, APRIL 18.

The Federal Council has received favourable
news. The signs of a favourable solution of the
pending questions are increasing, and existing fears
will, without doubt, soon be removed.

CHAMBERY, APRIL 18.

M. Laity arrived yesterday at Aix and Annecy

At the banquet given in the evening by the Go-
vernor of Annecy, a toast was drunk to the Em-
peror and France.

M. Laity appeared at the balcony of the Gover-
nor's house, and read a despatch announcing that
the Emperor and Empress will visit Savoy in May
or June next.
Several houses were illuminated.

CONSTANTINOPLE, APRIL 18.
France will make the Porte responsible for the
damage caused by the Greeks on Friday last.

CALCUTTA AND CHINA (HEAVY MAILS.)
The China with the above mails, has put into
Plymouth for coals. Strong gale from E. She
would leave about 4 p.m., and may be expected at
Southampton to-morrow (Friday) morning.
The Massilia which left Southampton on the 12th,
arrived at Gibraltar on the morning of the 17th
instant, and continued her voyage to Alexandria at
3 p.m.

QUEENSTO WN, WEDNESDAY.

The Montreal Ocean Steamship Company's screw
steamer Bohemian, Capt. Grange, from Portland,
Maine, on the 7th April, has arrived.
She landed the Irish mails only.
The Kangaroo and the Canadian had arrived
out.
The Bohemian spoke the ALgtera on the Bth
inst.

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THE SUN.
LONDON, THURSDAY, APRIL 19, 1860.