The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-30 00:00:00

there had cleared outwards from our ports 430,000
tons of British shipping ; and in the year 1810,
or 90 years later, there had cleared outwards
1,600,000 tons, showing an increase of 1,170,000
tons. Now," continues the hon. member, "con-
sidering that we had enjoyed througliout that
period the command of the whole carrying trade of
the seas, that was not a very considerable increase,
but might be fairly regarded as a very small one.
In the year 1820, under the operation of the
reciprocity system, there had cleared outwards from
our ports 1,670,000 tons of British shipping. We
abolished our navigation laws in the year 1849,
and in the year 1850 there had cleared outwards
of British shipping 4,700,000 tons, which gave an
increase of upwards of 3,000,000 tons as compared
with the year 1820. In the year 1858 the amount
of our shipping clearing outwards was 6,400,000
tons, or an increase of 1,700,000 tons as compared
with the year 1850 ; so that in these eight years of
free trade," Mr. LINDSAY exclaimed last night with
an allowable exultation, " there had been a greater
increase than during ninety years of a close pro-
tection." Those facts alone, with what NAPOLEON
himself has called their " inexorable logic," con-
stitute an almost irresistible inducement for
France to put an end to the old blundering
scheme of differential duties, and enter
resolutely upon the path which England has
already traversed so far with such astonishing ad-
vantages to herself. Happily by the decision of
last night the first step has been taken by the
House of Commons. The sequel now rests, with
all its solemn responsibilities, in the hands of her
Britannic MAJEsTY's Government.

There must be more in the Reform Bill than we
had thought. The Opposition is disposing us to
rub our eyes a little. They are, we know, notwith-
standing all. professions, really anti-Reformers.
Their bill last year was produced only as a neces-
sity of their situation ; they did not, they said, want
a Reform Bill, they were content with things as
they were ; but Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S restlessness
had compelled them to bid their best terms ; and,
not so bad were they, for Conservatives, after all.
Still, at least, they were then, and are now, opposed
to increasing popular power. When, therefore, we
find them straining every nerve to put off the
second reading of the Reform Bill till after Easter,
and when we also find noble lords asking for hos-
tile returns, and proposing to appoint a select com-
mittee to investigate the probable working of pro-
posed extensions of the franchise, all this looks like
an opinion, on the part of the opponents of Reform,
that the Bill does contain some considerable mea-
sure of that desideratum, Fat est ab host. doceri;
and though we have hitherto seen but an insignifi-
cant minimum of Reform in the bill, the movements of
the enemy would indicate that there must be a great
deal.

We know of but one counter supposition of our
logic, and that is, that even a minimum of Reform
• will always encounter Conservative opposition ;
and, that party feeling is strong enough to prompt
one political section to reject, when proposed by
. another, what is as near as it well can be to its
own proposals. There is much, we allow, in all
this. Still the Opposition would not admit its ap-
plication to them. The precise tactics of the Lords
show, also, that it is the extension of the suffrage
which is the grievance. If the introduction of the
fancy franchises, which Lord JOHN himself pro-
posed in 1854, and which, with slight modifica-
tions, Mr. DISRAELI proposed last year, were the
improvement desired, it would, of course, be easy
to add all these in committee; nor do we conceive
that any party would care to oppose them. A
lodger franchise seems to be approved by most,
and will probably find a place in the bill. Against
the others there is nothing to be said, but that they
could nearly all be included in the new franchises.
So nearly so that, for the sake of the few to be
added, it seems scarcely worth while to complicate
yet further the grounds of a right to vote.
It is equally hopeful that our great Conservative
morning contemporary is doing its best to get rid
of, or, at least, to spoil, the bill if it can. Now it is
that nobody wants it, which is, of course, a very
accurate expression of the opinion of one important
person not unconnected with Berkshire. Now it
is that the new electors are to swamp and dis-
franchise the old ones. Surely there must be some-
thing in Extensions of the• Franchise which call
forth such alternate contempt and vaticination ;
the latter showing that the former is but ill-quired
fear. As to the dis-franchisement, which we are
pertinaciously told is involved in every en-franchise.
ment, we can hardly comprehend it, at least in a
free country. Have we, then, been increasing and
extending our liberties ever since the times of
CASTLEIIEAGII and SIDMOUTII, only to regard, with
a selfish envy and jealousy, all who rise to share
our privileges ? Do we really prize a vote
the less because many more can join
us in giving one ? Has all our zeal
for education and enlightenment come to
this, that instead of rejoicing that a hundred or a
thousand more of our neighbours are educated up
to the electoral mark, we are to go about trembling,
wailing, and deploring that, alas, we are now only
one of two thousand, when formerly we were one
of a thousand ? Away, we say, with such exclu-
siveness ! The more the merrier in merry Old
England. We enjoy the sight of a good shilling
day at the Crystal Palace ; it is a heartier affair
than the half-crown day. And we enjoy, too, a
good soul-stirring constituency at an election.
Not too large a one, as in a few boroughs—there
is a difference between a cheerful number and a
squeezing crowd—but enough to show that all
classes are welcome, all interested. Not like one
of the tame Arundels, Woodstocks, or Thetfords—
not one of the landlord-ridden counties—saunter-
ing to the poll to vote to a superior's ordor.
Glancing again at the new bill, we should not,
ourselves, find out much to frighten Conservatives.
To us it would seem singularly innocuous. The
boroughs whose constituencies will be considerably
enlarged, already, nearly all of them, return Li-
berals, most of them advanced Liberals—and to
take counties, their new voters will be found, we
are persuaded, of the most manageable quality.
They will consist of just the classes whom the
country parish clergy have just led forth to holy
war, and most unholy defeat, in the Church-rate
petition battle. Blacksmiths, wheelwrights, vil-
lage shopkeepers, parish clerks, job-work farmers,
country cobblers, earriers,:with a few retired trades-
mentde (not Radicals they) who have retired into the
n tryina neatfora
po brickny. house,
Such
with a t end
garden
a paddockr
we can tell the Lords' Select Committee beforehand,
country
their r a
n dday -
s
will be the chief of their new county constituents--
electors who will give the squires only larger regi-
ments, but equally well in hand, and equally ready
with the present county electors to vote for those,
whom they mast please, to live.
We repeat, therefore, that the opposition in the
Commons, the preparations in the Lords, and the
tin e Its of the Tories, give us a better opinion of the
Reform Bill than we should otherwise have. There
must be some good in what is thus resisted or de
nounced. May it prove so ?

Toe allowance on deposits has been raised by all
the joint-stock banks to 3;1, per cent. except the I.(4ndon and
Westminster, which allows on sums of £5OO and up-
wards, and 21 only on sum; below £5OO. The discount
establishments have already increased their terms, the al-
lowance for money- at call being 21 per cent., and, with
seven days' notice, 4,

LATEST NEWS.

The following telegrams have been received at
Mr. Reuter's office :

ROME, THURSDAY, 1.45 P.M.

To-day the act of major excothmunication pro-
nounced against those who have either promised to
aid or who have counselled rebellion, invasion, or
usurpation in the Romagna, has been published.
The act has been posted up in several quarters of
Rome.

ROME, MARCH 29.

This morning a proclamation, dated March 26,
was posted up in five different quarters of Rome,
by which the Pope hurls the major excommunica-
tion, and other ecclesiastical penalties, against all
actors, promoters, coadjutors, councillors, and sup-
porters of the rebellion, usurpation, and invasion
of the States of the Church.

ANCONA, MARCH 29.

General Lamoriciere arrived here three days ago
by an Austrian Lloyd's steamer, and immediately
left again for Rome.

ROME, MARCH 29.

On Tuesday last the Papal Government for-
warded to the whole of the diplomatic corps a pro-
test against the annexation of th© Legations to
Sardinia.

TRIESTE, MARCH 29.

The Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, who has
returned from the Brazils, will proceed with his
wife to Vienna, having been summoned by the
Emperor to sit in the Council of the Empire.

MADRID, MARCH 29.

It is asserted that the Court will leave an Tues-
day next for Araujuez. Marshall O'Donnell will
return immediately. As soon as he arrives hero
the Cort2s will be convoked.

MADRID, MARCH 29.

The official Gazette publishes the preliminaries
of peace agreed upon between Spain and Morocco.
Morocco cedes to Spain the whole territory from
the sea to the hollow road of Anghera, and also a
certain portion of territory at Santa Cruz. The
convention of 1859, referring to Melilla, Penow,
and Albueemas, is ratified. Au indemnity of
20,000,000 of piastres is to be paid to Spain. Tetuan
will be kept by Spain until this payment is effected.
A treaty of commerce is also to be concluded,
guaranteeing privileges to Spain as to the most
favoured nation. A representative of Spain and a
missionary establishment to be permitted at Fez.
The treaty of peace is to be signed at Tetuan before
the 25th April. All hostilities to cease. The
Spanish army, however, to be allowed to chastise
the Kabyles.

PARIS, MARCH 30.
The Itloniteur publishes the treaty of cession of
Savoy and Nice by Sardinia to France.
This treaty is according to the summary already
published, and has, besides, the following
articles :

A mixed Commission will determine what Savoy
and Nice shall contribute to the payment of the
public debt of Sardinia, and to the execution of
several public contracts. The Sardinian Govern-
ment reserves to itself to finish alone the boring of
Mount Cenis.

The treaty will become executive for Sardinia
after receiving the sanction of Parliament.
The Moniteur also announces that the Senate has
rejected by pass!ng to the order of the day—and
with 116 against 16 votes—several petitions respect-
ing the intervention of the Senate in favour of the
temporal power of the Pope.
The Constitutionnel publishes a summary of the
proclamation of Victor Emmanuel-releasing the in-
habitants of Savoy and Nice from continuing sub-
jects of his Majesty.
The King, in conclusion, says—" France and
Italy are two sister nations, whose destiny is to
march at the head of civilization."

The Petrie of Thursday states that the French
regiMents in returning from Italy will stop succes-
sively at Chambery and Nice, but that a military
occupation will only take place when the necessary
formalities of the treaty have been fulfilled. The
districts of Chablais and Faucigny will provisionally
receive no garrison.

ITALY.
TURIN, MACH 29.

Although the treaty for the cession of Savoy and
Nice has to be sanctioned by the Sardinian Cham-
bers, the exchange of the ratifications will take
place before the opening of the Chambers, in the
same manner as adopted in regard to the Treaty of
Commerce between France and England.

Private messages received here from Rome con-
fir.m the statement that the allocution pronounced
by the Pope in the Secret Consistory of the 26th
inst. included the excommunication of the King of
Sardinia. Without naming King Victor Emma-
nuel the allocution specifies his acts, which, it says,
have incurred the censures pronounced by the Coun-
cil against the plunderers of the Church.
By arrangements between France and Sardinia
the civil and military functionaries of the provinces
ceded to France, on passing under the French
dominion, will preserve their rank and pay as un-
der the Sardinian Government. General Garibaldi
would therefore obtain the grade of General of
Division in the French army ; but he has already
declared his choice to be Italy, and his intention to
remain a subject of King Victor Emmanuel.

LEGHORN', MARCH 29.

Prince Carignan has arrived here, and has met
with an enthusiastic reception. His Royal High.
ness is expected to enter Florence this evening,
where a splendid reception awaits him.

RAVENNA, MARCH 28.

The Papal Carabineers have taken off the esco-
cheon of the King of Sardinia from the house of
the Sardinian Vice-Consul at Pesaro.

BERNE, MARCH 29.

The Federal Assembly has appointed a commis-
sion of 23 members, who will examine the report of
the Federal Council, and will propose their resolu-

ions to-morrow morning.

ZURICH, MARCH 29.

The followir.g is a summary of the report ad-
dressed by the Federal Council to the Federal
Assembly :

" The interests, the safety, independence, and
neutrality of Switzerland, demand that her right
in reference to the neutralised provinces of Savoy
should not be encroached upon by the annexation
to France. Even admitting that the neutrality of
these provinces should continue, their annexation
would still be against the treaties, and would
threaten the rights and interests of Switzerland.
The expectation of the good offices of the Powers
concerning these questions reassures Switzerland,
on condition that no occupation of those provinces