The Sun.
London, England, 1869-04-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The Times, in considering the recent decision of the
Privy Council with respect to Dr. Colenso, remarks that
the honour and peace of the Church are both concerned in
obtaining some legal settlement of the controversy.
Apart, however, from the case of Dr. Colenso, we beg the
reader to observe what is the state of the Colonial
:Episcopate as illustrated by:this opinion. It followsthat in
many cases a colonial bishop is independent of all authority
in the exercise of his episcopal functions. He may commit
ally enormities within his own diocese, and no one has any
jurisdiction over him. He may deny the essential

doctrines of Christianity, or even of religion, and,
if he pleases, he may still hold his post and
exercise the functions of his office. There could
not be a more discreditable instance of the confusion
of ecclesiastical law. The only satisfactory reflection
is that time must needs put an end to much of this con-
f,i,ion by removing the bishops who have been thus
" improvidently" appointed, and there is one obvious
v arii:ng which we have some confidence will be deduced
floni this history. It is that for the future, unless we are
yrcpa:ed for distinct and complete legislation upon the
stti,jcet, the Government must have nothing to do with
tie religious affairs of the colonies. The relations of
lurch and State are sufficiently complicated in this
olintry, where they have developed naturally; and
nothing but redoubled confusion can arise from artificial
imitation of them in countries where the whole framework
of society is different. If we are not prepared to take the
Church in the colonies under efficient home control, the
only thing we can do is to leave it alone.
The Post thinks that the discussion on the organisation
of the military forces of the country, originated by Lord
llonck in the House of Lords, was one of no little impor-
tance or interest. The question of maintaining the army
in India was discussed, but it was by no means satisfac-
torily disposed of. It appears to us that much
as Lord Northbrook objects to a local army for India, %
proposition to form one will yet have to be seriously
entertained. With seven-year terms of service the diffi-
culty might perhaps be surmounted, but then it seems
extremely doubtful if these terms would secure us the
great disideratum of an ample army reserve. On
the whole, the information elicited in the debate
indicated substantial progress in the theory and practice
of army reform. We are on the eve of having
short terms of service tried. The necessity for trained
reserves has been thoroughly admitted ; steps are about to
be taken for improving the character and augmenting the
supply of militia officers ; a committee is investigating
the difficult question of the volunteers ; and some of the
foremost officers of the force are to be consulted as to the
most suitable arrangements to be made ; soldiers are
to be employed in industrial pursuits ; and the entire
forces of the country are to be told off into district
armies. There are several questions, however, of
great importance still to be grappled with. Purchase
in the army will yet have to be discussed and dealt with ;
the promotion in the non-purchase corps is in a highly
unsatisfactory condition ; and the maintenance of an
European army in India will, with short service, be a
much more difficult question to solve than Lord North-
brook seems to imagine. But nevertheless there can be
question as to effective vigour having been infused into
the administration of the army, and that there will soon
be practical demonstration of military reform having
advanced beyond the stage of mere discussion, where it
has stuck so long.

The Hcrald declares that amongst the grievances now
in process of establishment is one having reference to an
institution which prudent Radicals are not yet prepared
to attack in front. The House of Lords is becoming a
debating society. It has not been enabled, in spite of
preternatural activity, to accomplish more than one piece
of tangible work this year. Radicals benevolently
theorising on the subject are sometimes inclined to think
that the hereditary character of the peerage accounts for
the political weakness of the House of Lords. With a
system of life peerages the House might be elevated into
the condition of a Senate. What an elevation ! Some-
thing ought to be done for the House of Lords ; they are
sure of that at all events. Who could wish that it should
remain inactive and useless—a mere excrescence on the
Constitution ; a relic of antiquity ; an assembly with
powers which cannot be exercised in an age of progress,
and shadowy privileges which forbid it from adopting
any career of humble usefulness? What is the meaning
of this hypocritical anxiety that the House of Lords
should be invested with some new attributes which would
make it, what it is assumed not to be at present, a power
in the State ? What hidden change lies wrapped in these
professions of fear lest the House of Lords should degene-
rate into a mere debating society? Surely, we can scarcely
telieve that those who are thus professing anxiety that
something should be done to invigorate the House of Lords
are the most sincere in their wish to see it strengthened
and induced to assert its dignity and power in opposition
to the growing supremacy of the Commons. We have
lighted upon times when no Democratic movement can be
altogether despised ; when the earnestnees of Radical
attack must be encountered by equal earnestness in Con-
servative defence, and when people who hate revolution
as much as they love liberty, instead of contenting
themselves with silently thanking God that we have
a lionse of Lords, should be prepared, by voice and pen,
at all times to justify and explain their thankfulness.

The Daily Hews reminds us that the House of Commons
has now spent four evenings in committee on the Irish
Church Bill. A good stroke of work has been done ;
and the manner in which it has been performed is
creditable to both sides of the House. Mr. Gladstone
has been firm without ceasing to be conciliatory.
Mr. Disraeli has gone, rather wearily, and appa-
rently more as a matter of convention than of
conviction, though the business cut out for him by Dr.
Ball, who, on the Irish Church question, is viceroy over
his chief. As the rate of progress increases day by day,
by the decision of questions of principle, which practi-
cally carry with them subsequent provisions ; and as
many of the late amendments set down by the
leaders of the Opposition are only development;
of earlier amendments which have been rejected, it is
likely that a large amount of the controversy which
the notice paper seems to threaten will be avoided.
The most important clauses which remain tobe considered,
and are likely to give rise to controversy, relate to the
disposal of the Church fabrics, burial-grounds, and eccle-
siastical residences, the adjustment of building charger,
the title of the Church to private and mixed en-
dowments, and to royal grants, the sale of the
tithe-rent charge, the amount of compensation to
be given to the recipients of the Maynooth grant
and the Regium Donurn,and the appropriation of
the surplus to the relief of
va
calamity and suffering, forms of unavoidable
On aflotuhese points the subtlety
of the leaders of the Op. position has been exercised ; and it
will require the constantviilance of the Government and
the fidelity of its supporters
prevent the friends of
religions inequality inlrelando from slyly taking back
with one hand that which they affect to surrender with
the other.
The Standard says that a Minister's influence extends
tot only to his personal action, or the effect of his
counsels upon the action of his colleagues • a most
momentous part of it is that which his known opinions
and supposed authority exert upon the expectations,
hopes, and fears of others. And in the case of Mr. Bright
this influence is very wide, very deep, and very dangerous.
His opinions are known to be extreme, and his
violent
Tr!.'sde of expressing them has led people imperfectly
acquainted with English politics to fancy them more
extreme than they are. Hearing that a Minister of the
Crown had proposed to divide some of the largest and hest
managed estates in Ireland among the tenantry ; that
the property of the Church was to be confiscated ;
that the property of the London companies was fiercely
attacked and scarcely defended by the Government
and that a speedy and satisfactory solution of the land
question—the real gravamen of which is the objection of
the tenant to recognise the landlord's proprietary rights—
' was promised by the Ministry, the Irish peasantry hurried
to the conclusion that the land was very soon to be theirs
by law, and that in the meantime all proprietary acts on
the part of the landlord—even to the exaction of rent—
were an injustice to the tenant. We know that such
ideas are widely prevalent—bow widely we cannot fully
estimate—and that they have led to the most dangerous
consequences. Another consequence of Mr. Bright's pre-
sence in the Cabinet is that foreign States believe that
England has adopted his views. France and Russia fancy
that they may pursue designs of aggrandisement without
taking England into account. America believes that she
may impose what terms she pleases; that no humiliation
can be too abject for the men who have consented to serve
in the same Government with Mr. Bright. And this belief
has already exercised a very serious influence on the
course of negotiation.
The Star suggests that Mr. Gladstone, in disposing of
the funds of the Irish Church, should extend his aid to a
class which is grievously and hopelessly afflicted. If the
relief of unavoidable suffering constitutes a special claim
upon the surplus of the Irish ecclesiastical property, the
want for which we plead is qualified by an indisputable
claim. It stands in all respects uponthe same footing, as
regards its fitness for the aid of the State, with the claims
of lunatic asylums, county infirmaries, asylums for the
blind, for the deaf and dumb, and for idiots. There is in
Ireland no systematic provision whatever for the treat-
ment and relief of incurables ; and yet there is no country
in the world where the want of such a provision occasions
more bitter and more wide-sprcad suffering among the
poorer claszes of the community. It is this urgent and crying
want that we plead for. We ask that out of the dis-
posable surplus in the hands of the commissioners a
certain small proportion shall be allotted to
.t h‘,2 flot,i4 lada-
ton and maintenance of hospitals for incurain... i
in Ireland. The concession of this boon wo:ild not
largely subtract from the I,3venties at the disposal of the
Clovernment for the support of those institutions u.W
charged upon the county cess, while it
the
would relieve
great classes—we in
might say every class
country—of the intolerable burden of human suffer.ng
which cannot be alleviated or taken away. It might be
fitting to establish a distinction between incurables whose
relatives might be able to pay something towards their
maintenance, and pauper incurables who are now forced
to the chilling protection of the workhouse. But this is a
mere question of detail. In any case the establishment
of the institutions we have described would lead to the
mitigation of an immense masa of acute and hopeless
suffering which now is allowed to afflict the poor without
check or relief, and which presses most keenly upon those
wb9 arc leapt Able,Den•

THE STOR►Y ABOUT HARE, THE

" BURKER."

On Saturday, at the Bow-street Police-court, William
Hawkes, a blind man, of somewhat remarkable appearance
from his tall stature and Herculean proportions, and well-
known at the court as having been repeatedly charged
with begging in the streets, applied to the sitting magis-
trate, Mr. Flowers, for advice.

The applicant said he had been subject to a great deal
of annoyance in consequence of the following paragraph
having appeared in a daily paper:—" Hare the Burker,Still
Alive.—Persons accustomed to pass through Trafalgar-
square will have noticed from time to time a sturdy and
disreputable beggar who is blind of both eyes. This fellow
is a notorious scoundrel. He is no other than Hare, the
associate of Burke, in the Edinburgh murders, who
originated the term `Barking' forty-one years ago. Hare
turned King's evidence, and saved his own neck from the
gallows. Subsequently he went to work under a borrowed
name, but his fe low-workmen discovered who he was, and
threw him into a I:me-pit, and there both his eyes were
burnt out. He now appeals to the charity of the public,
who have, of course, no idea who he is." Since the publi-
cation of this paragraph many persons had conceived an
impression that he was the blind beggar referred to, and
he bad been annoyed by people asking if his name was
Hare. He wished to know whether he had not some
remedy against those who had so injured him.
Mr. Flowers asked how he knew that he was the-person
meant.

The applicant said be knew by the description.
Mr. Flowers : I see the description is " a sturdy and dis-
reputable beggar." (A laugh). But there might be other
beggars, and they might be sturdy and disreputable.
A woman who accompanied the applicant said it was
mentioned that he stood in Trafalgar-square.

Mr. Flowers: Yes, and you stand there, too—to beg?
The Woman : He stands there, and is asking alms.
Applicant : No, Ido not beg. I do not ask for alms.
I stand there, if anybody gives me anything—
Mr. Flowers : You do not refuse it ? (A laughl.
Applicant : No, Ido not. (Laughter.)

Mr. Flowers : I thought not. (Renewed laughter.) But
I presume—though I really have no right to ask you, and
you axe not bound to answer unless you like—you arc not
Hare, are you?

Applicant : No, sir, I aint him. (A laugh.) He used to
beg there, but he is dead.
Mr. Flowers : Then you clearly are not the man. (A
laugh.) If you can shew that the paragraph was levelled
at you, you have an action for libel against the papers that
inserted it. (Laughter.)
The Applicant: That is too dear a way for me.
(Laughter.)
Mr. Flowers : Then write to each paper that inserted
the paragraph to say you are not the man.

The applicant left the court muttering something to the
effect that he only wanted to vindicate his character, and
that there ought to be justice for a poor man.