The Sun.
London, England, 1859-10-18 00:00:00

•••••••^^.^.
him a rough outline of the days when the various
mails are expected,he (luckless Minister) knows not
upon any evening what may be in store for him
upon the morrow, what storm of docu-
ments may pour upon his devoted head from
those dreadful letter-bags landed at inter-
vals of frightful uncertainty, sometimes alter-
ately, sometimes simultaneously .0t Liverpool
or at Southampton. Now a douch of paiis7rs o
!l
British Columbia—now an avalanche from Hos 7
Kong—now a cataract from Corfu and Cephalonia.
His position is more breathless and embarrassing
in this particular than the ordinary recipient of a
shower-bath —he holds not the string him-
self ! In effect, the string is multiple—not
"one " but " fifty" and all the fifty held
in hands invisible, ever ready to pull fitfully
by turns, or, as the accident may be, together. So
of the rest respectively at the heads of their diverse
departments—but few, indeed, of those having
offices in any way exceptionally coming under the
category of mere sinecures ! Offices, for instance,
like those now held by Sir GEORGE GREY and
Mr. CARDWELL—the former in his official character
as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster taking
high rank among the more inscrutable mysteries
of the age—the latter in his conspicuous position
as Chief Secretary for Ireland. having such an
infinitesimally small quantity of work to do in
return for his salary—that one of his more
sensitively conscientious and outspoken pre-
decessors in' the office, Mr. Horts3lAN, to
wit, thew up the post in disgust at the
sheer frivolity of it, almost, we might say (re-
membering his manly and candid explanation to
the House of Commons), with feelings of shame
and indignation. The ;administrative toil, in
fact, there is hardly any doubt of this, is very
unequally distributed : so unequally distributed
that, as we all of us very well remember, it was
only two or three short years ago since the Colonial
Department in Downing-street, by one bold stroke
of Administrative Reform, was split into' two
Secretaryships—those of War and the Colonies—
yet leaving to each, but especially to the latter,
more work to get through habitually than
would suffice to exhaust the ordinary run of
continental statesmen and administrators. So
much, in fact, requires to be done month after
month, week after week, day after day, in the way
of mere administrative drudgery that Ministers
find ready excuse for evading upon that one plea,
the long obvious and even glaringly urgent neces-
sities for Reforms in the organisation of our whole
system of Government—reforms of all kinds,
legal, financial, sanitary, educational, and Par-
liamentary. Hence, in point of fact, Ministers
of the Crown have acquired, as it were, an incor-
rigible habit of meeting in Cabinet Council osten-
sibly for the purpose of preparing their measures,
but, in reality, to shirk—there is no other word for
it—absolutely to shirk the very questions most loudly
demanding their consideration. Hitherto the nation
has had no remedy for the evil of this systematic
evasion and postponement—and this simply because
of the prolonged disorganization of parties within
the walls of the Legislature. Again, however, we
possess now the old security that evasions of this
kind cannot so easily be persevered in by Minis-
ters—and that grand security is, it need hardly
be added, results from the strength, the energy,
and the discipline of her MAJESTY'S Opposition.

In the political game now playing on the chess-
board of Italy there are two parties who know dis-
tinctly what they want, who have, therefore, no
occasion for mystery or for hesitation. The four
united provinces of Central Italy say to VICTOR,
EMMANUEL, and to all Europe, We wish to be
united with each other and with Sardinia; and
England replies—lt is your unquestionable right;
do it then and prosper ! But what a complexity of
counsels and plannings north of the Alps, and south
of the Duchies too. The poor petty PONTlFF—petty
as a temporal ruler—is worried to death with his
ungrateful subjects, who, despite all Mr. BOWYER'S
proofs that they are the most blessed people in
Europe, persist in spurning the secular rule of the
very man whose spiritual office they superstitiously
venerate ; and, while PIUS utters bitter denuncia-
tions against the King of SARDINIA, and sends his
Ambassador his passports, the Romans would, if
the French would let them, make St. Peter's itself
resound with the vivas for VICTOR EMMANUEL;
and, because no demonstration is allowed, they
quietly pile ten thousand cards on the departing
Ambassador's table, and make silent signs of recog-
nition as he leaves the city which desires his mas-
ter as its Sovereign ! South of Rome there is he of
Naples longing to put down the Romagnese, but
fearing to be put down himself; and north-east are
the Romagnese and GARIBALDI waitiNg with
anxiety to see whether the POPE'S Perugians will
venture to renew, if they can, their holy atrocities
at Bologna. May GARIBALDI reward them ac
cording to their deeds if they do !
_ _ _

And then, again, north of the Alps, what would the
two arch-plotters be at ? Austria, poor, frightened,
bankrupt Austria, she must, of course, talk big—
and act pertinaciously; but how to secure what she
would like to get, but has no hope of gaining, she
cannot tell—though hopeless, she seems as if she
would try to the last. Zurich, however, seems to
be a failure, for all, at least, that the world is per-
mitted to know of it ; and if it did hatch anything
from the Villafranca preliminaries we should soon
know it. But it is to the oracle at Biarritz that
all the world is looking. His own press try to
draw him out, though almost in vain. Inch by
inch his will is allowed to appear, and the semi-
official Constitutionnel,and the authorised Honiteur,
inform us that the EMPEROR will not allow rest.)-
ration of runaway Sovereigns by arms ; or that
PLON-PLON was never intended to be hoisted to
Royalty on the backs of the poor Italians. Still
nothing positive can be learned. A Cardinal-
Archbishop and his clergy attempted to get
a response from the oracle only last
week, and they, indeed, got one, but it was the old
Aio to ./Eteidu Romanos vincere posse. They re-
minded him how he had said years ago, when en-
gaged in murdering the liberties of republican
Rome, that the "temporal sovereignty of the vener-
able head of the Church is intimately connected
with the fame of Catholicism and the liberty and
independence of Italy." "Yes," replied the Bor-
deaux APOLLO, " a new era of glory will arise for
the Church on the day when the whole world will
share my conviction that the temporal power of
the Holy Father is not opposed to the liberty and
Independence of Italy." When did the PYTHONESS
beat that ? Is the world to repent and believe
in the temporal power of the POPE as it stands ; or,
is his Holiness to repent and modify the exercise
of his power till his little domains become a model
of civil and religious liberty for the world ? A
hint indeed in this latter direction follows, for the
ecclesiastics are told. that Europe expects the
speedy withdrawal of French soldiers (who never
had any business there) ; and then " what will
they leave behind—anarchy, terror, or peace?"
And now, amidst all these frights and selfish

schemes and diplomatic perplexities, what should

hinder the two pfarties who have a clear and honest
cause from carrying their point ? Italy is wholly in
the right, England openly declares through her