The Sun.
London, England, 1869-09-03 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, SEPTEMBER 3, 1869.

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LONDON, FRIDAY, SEPT. 3, 1869.

Nearly forty years ago, Lord MACAULAY wrote in
the Edinburg Review—it was in the June of 1830, in
his criticism on " Moore's Life of Lord Byron"—these
remarkable words [the Reviewer, it should be re-
membered, was referring more particularly at the
moment to the insensate outcry which had
hounded Lord BYRON out of England because of cer-
tain vague scandals in regard to his marriage]—" All
those creeping things," wrote Lord MACAULAY, " All
" those creeping things that riot in the decay of noble
" natures hastened to their repast ; and they were

right ; they did after their kind. It is not every

thy that the savage envy of aspiring dunces is

" gratified by the agonies of such a spirit, and the
" degradation of such a name." Those burning words
of indignation, written upwards of thirty-nine years
ago, might have been written yesterday.
Half a century almost has elapsed since the date
of the Poet's death at Missolonghi. And within this
interval of upwards of five-and-forty years all Lord
BYRON'S nearest and dearest, all his most intimate
friends, all his most malignant enemies, have, one
after another, also disappeared. Not a single indi-
vidual who could personally adduce any evidence
whatever, bearing on one side or the other, sur-
vives. The Right Hon. Sir STEPHEN LUSHINGTON is
still amongst us, it is true, a very old man indeed,
having been born as far back as in 1782, and having
consequently, at the present moment, attained not
far short of the patriarchal age of a nonogenarian.
But Sir STEPHEN LeSHINGTON was only consulted, at
the time of Lord and Lady BYRON'S separation,
by the latter or her emissaries. And therefore all
that Sir STEPHEN LUSHINGTON could say now,

if he said anything, would be that more than
half a century ago he bad been told so and so
by Lady BYRON or by Lady BYRON'S representatives.
No direct personal evidence, we repeat, is, by any
possibility, adducable nowadays by friend or foe of
the great man who is, now,' suddenly and posthu-
mously, accused, upon Lady BYRON'S reported ipsi
dixit, of a hideous abomination. Already we have
expressed our own profound conviction that, in this
deplorable matter, Lord BYRON has been wrongfully
accused. Of the foul sin imputed to him, we believe
him to have been utterly guiltless. Not one atom of
testimony in support of the charge has to this instant
been adduced. Direct or personal evidence in the
matter, as we have just now said, is no longer
by any possibility adducable. All those who were
intimately acquainted at the time with Lord
and Lady BYRON are dead and buried. It
is not merely that the noble, erring, warm-blooded
poet, and his exemplary, cold-blooded wife have
both of them passed away. Their beautiful, gifted
:laughter is also dead—Ana, late Countess of Love-
lace. The infamously maligned half-sister of Lord
Byron, his beloved sister AGUSTA (the llon Mrs.
LEIGH) to whom all these shameful slanders all point
so cruelly and detestably—slae also has disappeared
from the scene. And not only are the principals
thus hid away in their scattered graves before the
atrocious calumny is thus distinctly promul-
gated, but it is thus likewise with regard to every
one of Lord BYRON'S most intimate friends,
with such bosom friends, for example, as his bio-
grapher Tuomas MOORE and his fraternal
associate and travelling companion, Sir JOHN CAM
HOBHOUSE, afterwards Lord BnouGuroN. All that
Mrs. STOWE has now related in her catch-penny article
amounts simply to this—tlmt Lady BYRON made to
her, several years ago, such and such a statement.
All that Sir STEPHEN LUSIIINGTON could possibly say
now in corroboration of this (Ye Gods !) " True
Story"--told not by an idiot, certainly, but by a
Yankee Blue-Stocking, would and cou'd alone be
that, so many more years ago, he, in his turn, had re-
ceived from Lady Bynos's lips, or from the lips of
some one sent to him by Lady BYRON, such and such
similar assurances. The whole amounts to an ex parte
statement, and that, moreover, are conveyed to us vica-
riously. We repeat now, onFriday, the 3d of Septem-
ber, what we asserted most distinctly and most un-
hesitatingly on Monday last, the 30th of August, that
there is not, to this moment, one tittle of evidence
adduced, that there is not one tittle of evidence ad-
ducable in support of the atrocious charge directed
against Lord BYRON'S memory, with a view to the
utter blasting of his reputation. We declared
on Monday our absolute conviction that there
never was one atom of truth in the imputation
directed against Lord BYRON by his unhappy wife—
the charge arising, as we believe, wholly and solely, out
of a craze on her part, or what is called a hallucination.
We were all the more earnestly desirous to make our
meaning upon this point quite plain, in our impres-
sion of Monday evening, because the 7imes of that
morning contained an extraordinary article
not an editorial, however—in which Lady BYRON'S
" True Story," so-called, was swallowed wholesale,
and accepted, just as it came to us from the hands
of Mrs. STOWE, as a revelation altogether conclusive.
With a satisfaction that, in describingit, we could
not possibly exaggerate, we now read in the Times
of this morning, four days afterwards—in
an editorial this time ! let it be observed
the following most deliberate and most em-
phatic admission—" While we see no possibility of
Mrs. STOWE'S having misapprehended Lady BYRON,
we think it perfectly possible—and, indeed, probable—
that Lady Byron was herself the victim of a delusion,—
that she wrongly suspected her husband of the crime
with which she charged him." That is the stand-point
of our whole argument. That is precisely what we
insisted upon, in these columns, on Monday last, the
30th of August, namely, at the earliest possible
moment after our perusal, with a pang of grief and in-
dignation that no words could in any way adequately
express, of Mrs. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE's cruel and
afflicting statement—not of facts but of hallucinations
—in Macmillan's Magazine for this current month of
September.

moTßHßEisSops.eCtaattorp,
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Sheffield, says, with respect to the remark of the
former member, it wherever I look I find myself
stopped by the phantom of the House of Lords,"
that the note of reform having been struck, " the
phantom ' will, we imagine, be a point in every
speech delivered during the recess." The Spectator!
expects too much. The great bulk of M.P.'s,
whether Conservative or Liberal, dread more
than anything, rashness. They believe, as GOLD-
SMITH used to say, that " cautious dullness is always
in the right," and if not naturally dull, they assume
a dullness in order to avoid the risk of displeasing
their supporters. Among these last are official
members, or those who hope to be official. They,
rightly enough, refrain from starting new topics,
because they feel that when they speak they
are supposed to speak, not for themselves
only, but for their colleagues, the Ministers of
England in esse or in posse. Then, again, there are a
large number of M.P.'s who really never study
politics. Such are railway directors and the young
scions of noble houses. The first have entered Par-
liament in order to guide their schemes through the
dangerous shallows and rapids of the committee--
room. The second, in order to maintain the social
and political pcsition of their family. When all
tllese classes are taken into account, we have elimi-
nated a large portion of M.P,'s, and leave a compa-

ratively small number who have either the wish or •
the power to take up new and important political
problems. The junior members for Plymouth and
Sheffield are among them, and to these we may add
the member for Lisheard and the junior member for
D evonport.
It was Mr. HORSMAN who first started the ques-
tion of a reform of the House of Lords. He pro-
posed a complete scheme, which, so far as we
remember it, contained some wise provisions. Of
course such a change as this will not take place
suddenly, and will not be assented to by those whom
it affects, on the first demand. Still the Lords have
shewn that they recognise the necessity of some
changes. They have voluntarily surrendered the
right of vote by proxy. They have admitted the
principle, vehemently repudiated a dozen years ago,
that the Upper House does not necessarily consist of
hereditary peers plus the bishops, and though the mea-
sure introduced to give effect to the innovation was
absurdly small and rejected on the third reading, yet
their lordships cannot reverse the great concession
of principle which they have made. If it should
lead to the introduction into their House of men like
our principal judges and the ex-governors of our
chief colonies, such as Sir GEORGE GREY and
Sir WILLIAM DENISON, a great advance will have
been made. A still more important change would
be to confine the entry into the House of
Lords to those peers who are really pre-
pared to do the duties which belong to that body.
That House is a legislative chamber, and yet three-
fourths of its members were never trained to legis-
lation, and do not care about it. The elective test
which Mr. MORRISON proposes would probably be
difficult, yet not impossible, to devise. Far more
feasible would be the limitation of the right of veto.
The experience of last session shews that eloquent
debaters though the chief peers are, they are very far
from being able to appreciate the wishes and the
resolves of their fellow-countrymen. It would be
to destroy their function as a drag upon the wheel
of the State chariot if they were compelled to pass at
once a measure of which they disapproved. There
have been times—there may be times again—when
the people go too fast, and when the interval given
by the resistance of the Lords has been of great ad-
vantage to the nation. This, however, is less likely
to happen now that the people, instead of being
compelled to make their wishes known by tur-
bulent clamour, can do so in a representative body
which they themselves have elected. The same reason
—the all but certainty that a course sanctioned by
the House of Commons will be the matured resolve
of the nation—is a reason why it should not be frus-
trated, why the right of veto by the Upper House
should be restricted to a certain number of times. Mr.
MORRISON proposed three, and this is the number
to which the royal veto is restricted in Norway.
We trust that other members may have the industry
to think of, and the courage to speak upon, this
important topic during the recess. We are heartily
weary of the Irish Church. We need no retrospect
of events which are fresh in the memory of each
one of us. We do not want our members to be
telling their battles o'er again. Let them point us
to fresh fields and pastures new, and then we will tell
them if we will follow.

LATEST INTELL MENGE

(REUTER'S TELEGRAMS.)

AMERICA.

NEW YORK, Sept. 2.
President Grant has gone to. Saratoga, where he
will remain a fortnight.

The Hamburg an 3 American steamship Saxonia
arrived out to-day at 5 a.m.

COMIERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.
CLOSING PRICES.

Gold closed at 135 ; the highest quotation dur-
ing the day was 135 k; the lowest, 133 k.
Sterling Exchange on London lO9
5-20 U. S. Bonds, 1889
" 1885 199;1.
" 1867 l9ll.
10-40
Illinois l3Bl.

Erie
Cotton —Mid. uplaud
Petroleum—Standard White

.. 341.
~. 35c.
3212.

Flour, extra state, $6.5c. to $7.5c. Corn, old
mixed, $1.17c.

PRINCE ARTIIUR IN NOVA SCOTIA.
HALIFAX, Sept. 2.

His Royal Highness Prince Arthur attended at
a pic-nic yesterday given by the citizens of Ha-
lifax.

QUEENSTOWN, Sept. 3.

The Cunard royal mail steamer Scotia, from New
York, arrived at 2 a.m. to-day, with 90 cabin pas-
sengers and $5,000 in specie. She landed mails,
passengers, and despatches, and proceeded for
Liverpool at 2.50 a.m. All well.
GIBRALTAR, Sept. 2.

The Marseilles Company's steamer Bourgoyne
has arrived here, with 300 passengers. Her dates
are Buenos Ayres, 20th July ; Monte Video, 21 ;
and Rio Janeiro, 7th August 7. She brings no
news of importance.

TURKEY.

CONSTANTINOPLE, Sept. 2.

Daoud Pasha has arrived here with the draft of
a new provisional convention relative to the pro-
jected Roumanian Railway. It was submitted to a
Council of Ministers to-day, and it is said in official
circles only awaits the Sultan's signature.
Among the stipulations of the Grand Vizier's
letter to the Viceroy, which has just been dis-
patched to Alexandria, is one that his Highness
shall not contract any further loan in Europe
without the sanction of the Imperial Government.
It is understood that the settlement of the question
is mainly due to the good offices of England, France,
and Austria. At the outset representations were
made by. the English and French ambassadors,
Baron Prokesch-Osten, the Austrian ambassador,
having abstained from taking any part in the pro-
ceedings. Baron Prokesch-Osten, however, joined
M. Bource and Mr. Elliott, after receiving instruc-
tions from his Government, which followed an
exchange of communications between the Courts of
Paris and Vienna.

The Levairat 1 imes says that the Khedive will
shortly visit Constantinople, and will be received as
formerly.

THE CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACT.

The medical officer of the Privy Council, in his yearly
report, writes strongly against the proposed extension of the
7.lontagious Diseases Act to the civil population. In addi-
ion to the usual arguments against this change, Mr. Simon
points out that enormous cost would be involved in providing
hospitals. Taking what he considers a moderate estimate,
he says that the plan would require for London alone the
zreation and maintenance of new hospital accommodation
iearly equal to that which is now given by the twelve
general, hospitals of London for all bodily diseases put
together; accommodation, namely, for 3,000 patients.
The charge of maintaining (independently of the cost of
constructing) such lazarets as the above would probably
represent a first cost of little short of half a million
of money ; besides all which there would be the con-
siderable annual charges for police arrangements and
medical inspections. This for London alone"