The Sun.
London, England, 1859-04-29 00:00:00

..

English pock_ets the _means of assailing, Or,
honour, dignity, and security of Great Britai n.
France goes still higher in her demands. Five
hundred millions of francs, or twenty millions of
pounds sterling, is her little demand. We trust,
however, that it will prove as unacceptable as those
of Austria and Russia. There ought, indeed, to be
immediate steps taken to prevent the exportation of
gold at a fixed price, and the inevitable calamities
that result therefrom. We have long urged this
on every Ministry that has been in office. We
believe that the time has at last arrived when it
must be adopted, if we do not desire to see the
United Kingdom enter on the contest that may be
forced upon her with exhausted means, having
supplied her adversaries with what may be truly
termed " the sinews of war."
Already there have been numerous failures on the
Stock Exchange. The ursine fraternity would
triumph, if the bull speculators had not been
thoroughly deprived of the means of paying their
demand. We must say that we cannot greatly
sympathise with any hopes that may be sustained
by those investing money so much wanted
at home ; but from henceforward any man
dabbling with new Austrian, French, or Russian
loans, will be a criminal, meriting severe punish-
ment. The painful lesson that has been received
may, however, prevent the mania that has hitherto
influenced men possessed of money to fling it away
to any plausible pretenders, while they disregard
projects that would be very remunerative to them-
selves and highly advantageous to their country.

Within nine days from this there will have been
an end of the whore remaining 287 nominations.
Those nominations, it must be acknowledged, have
been distributed over exactly nine days rather
unequally. They range from a maximum of 164
to a minimum of 2. Beginning on Thursday, the
28th of April, they will end on Friday, the 7th of
May. The trumpet of electioneering excitement,
it is true, was sounded betimes on Wednesday, the
27th instant, at the hustings of Marylebone. But
the last echo of the political tantarra cannot die out
until Saturday se'nnight, and it will then resound
simultaneously over the West Riding of Yorkshire
and over Radnorshire ; so that the signal given
to the electors by one of the most important of the
political constituencies of England will be taken
up rapidly until the whole of the remaining Eng-
lish constituencies but one have responded—and
that one the most important of all of them, numeri-
cally. Marylebone, with its 400,000 inhabitants
and its 20,000 registered electors, has begun the
movement, not inappropriately to be closed,
as already intimated, by the West Riding of York-
shire, with nearly double the number of electors,
viz., sonic 40,000, and with considerably more than
three times the extent of population,namely, a grand
total not far short of 1,400,000. The electors of
Marylebone, to be precise, being 19,700—those of
the West Riding 37,300. The inhabitants of the
former, according to the last census, making an
aggregate of 370,9,57—thc5e of the latter, according
to the same authority, attaining a grand total of
1,315,896. Altogether we cannot but regard the
fixtures for the different nominations as sufficiently
prompt—even under existing circumstances. Even
with all the urgency of the present extraordinary
crisis pressing heavily upon us—we may surely
estimate as something approaching to a nine day's
wonder, this compression within the compass of
merely nine days of as many as 287 distinct nomi-
nations. Twenty-two nominations on Thursday,
the 28th-164 on Friday, the 29th—nine on
Saturday, the 30th—thirty-three next Monday,
twenty-seven next Tuesday, eighteen next Wed-
nesday. The number gradually becoming " small
by degrees and beautifully less" from that time
forth until the end, as before specified—nine next
Thursday, three the following Friday, and two on
the final Saturday. There is everything, at the
present general election, to agitate the popular feel-
ing to the very uttermost. It is, beyond a doubt
of it, this time to an intense degree a party struggle.
It is a party struggle, moreover, in the midst of
that last great movement for the reform of the
representative system and the legislative organisa-
tion. There is obviously, moreover, so rapid an
approach of the ballot as eventually one of our
established institutions, that now possibly for the
last time may be brought into play on all sides
without distinction, upon all sides indiscriminately,
the evil influences of bribery and corruption. We

may take it for granted, indeed, that now, during
this present election of 1859, if ever money has
been scattered about with lavish prodigality, it will
be during this brief gold-silver•and-copper age of
electioneering excitement. There will be as

small an attendance, of course, as possible,

of gentlemen in green spectacles but the
cash bags, however carefully concealed, we may
rest assured will here and there give forth a melo-

dious chinking. From whatever is easily accom-
plished thus during the elections, we may at any
rate obtain our last and crowning argument for the
Ballot as a security, on the one hand, against
Bribery, and on the other against Intimidation.
Throughout the whole of the turmoil, of course,
there will be a wonderful amount of plain-speaking

—apparently. An extraordinary degree of can-
dour will be affected among the candidates and
among the electors themselves. Yet here, in mat-
ters political, not one jot less than in matters social,
as the Great Observer of our Age has recently said
at the commencement of his new fiction—" A won-
derful fact to reflect upon, that every human crea-
ture is con4-ituted to he that profound secret and
mystery to every other." Adding, " A solemn con-
sideration, when I enter a great city by night, that
every one of those darkly-clustered houses ineloses
its own secret ; that every room in every one of
them ineloses its own secret; that every beating
heart in the hundreds of thousands of breasts
there is, in some of its imaginings, a secret
to the heart nearest it !" What is said by Boz, in
his " Tale of Two Cities," in reference to Paris and
London a hundred years:ago, may be said as truly
nowadays at this very moment, when there is ap-
parently so much vociferous plain speaking, in re-
ference to all our loud talking constituencies. One of
seemingly the veryplainest speakers of all, the witty
candidate for the suffrages of the electors of Dover,
claimed for himself at the outset of the very best
speech, delivered by him down there to his political
supporters—claimed for himself distinctly and em-
phatically, the credit of having made Tong since a
clean breast of it to them, and explained his views,
avowed his opinions, and enunciated his principles,
clearly and unmistakeably, to every one's comprehen-
sion. Another humorous oration down at Carlisle,
the right hon. baronet the Master ofNetherby, in an
equally grotesque harangue, and one in every way as
charmingly candid and outspoken, arrogated to
himself credit for being alike explicit as to the
nature of kis views, opinions, and principles. Yet
when all has been said thus delightfully—we do
venture to assert that perhaps no two politicians
stand before the country in a position more entirely
and radically ambiguous than Sir JAMES GRAHAM
and Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE. As to the former, we
have only to bear in mind any portion we please
of the chequered career of Sir JAMES GRAHAM, and
then to contrast that with any other portion—to
I find his political colours vary like the fluctuations

in the hues of a chameleon. As to the comic ex-
Secretary of the Admiralty, we need scarcely com-
pare for an instant the three years during which
he sat, to the grief of the House and the country,
entirely mumchance among the subordinate
members of the Palmerstonian Administration—
and the fourteen months which have elapsed since
that " wild shriek of liberty" with which, accord-
ing to Mr. DISRAELI, the member for Dover cele-
brated his emancipation from the thraldom of
office. What would either Sir JAMES GRAHAM or
Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE be at if they were enabled
to carry out their designs ? We believe they
would each have yet to make their own selection
—or yet, more probably, would require to have it
made for them. To guide themselves, therefore,
as they do Reform, their candour and plain-
speaking is really to all intents and purposes
simply preposterous. And Mr. OSBORNE adds,
with a sneer, that Her MAJESTY'S present Mi-
nistry make no promises—he thereby pronounces
their eulogium rather than their condemnation.
We have had quite enough for many years.to e,gme
of idle and most illusory promises. We want now,
instead of vague promises, substantial performances.
What was not Lord JOHN to do. before he became
Premier ? He remained in supreme power as the
head of a Liberal and Reforming Government
during upwards of five years, and yet those five
years and 239 days—beginning with the 26th of
June, 1846, and ending with the 22d of February,
1852—came to an end at last ; and Lord JOHN
RUSSELL during all that boasted and protracted
Premiership and done just exactly Nothing—for
the general advancement. Lord PALMERSTON
came into office afterwards at the head of another
Liberal and Reforming Administration. He
remained in at its head during three whole years,
and we all know perfectly well how much during
that interval he accomplished in the way of im-
provement. No—we are sick of looking only to
men ; we want measures. We are tired to death
of Promises—we want Performances.

Let Ministers beware of court influence. In
Mr. D. 0. MADDYN's " Chiefs of Parties"—an
interesting and valuable little work—be notices
how " the court always had a daunting influence
over Sir ROBERT PEEL, to an extent the reverse of
praiseworthy in a British statesman." He shows
that Catholic emancipation and the repeal of the
corn laws were striking illustrations of this painful
fact. In recent times we have had too many proofs
that our court has exercised a very powerful Ger-
man and Austro- Ger man influence. Lords PALMER-
STON
and JOHN RUSSELL, even were, there is every
reason to believe, more or less victims to it, and we
fear the indications are but too plain that our
present Government is exposed to the same danger.
It was impossible to mistake the Austrian leaning 3
of the Ministry in their explanations to Parlia-
ment on Monday week ; and, though a different
tone was adopted at the Mansion-house, this must
be attributed to the manifestation of public opinion
and its being the eve of the elections. Not that
we suspect the present Ministers, any more than
those who preceded them, of natural or personal
leanings to a Power detested by their countrymen
more than any in Europe, Naples itself not ex-
cepted, but that neither they, nor any Ministry,
can easily resist the strong influences which a
court can bring to bear on them, unless the nation
enables them to do it. No Ministry can afford to
oppose a court if it has not the nation at its back.

It cannot be doubted that, when both Prussia
and Austria incurred, during the late war, the eons-
tempt and hatred of this country, said of all free
countries, yet both Lord PALMERSTON and Lord
JOHN RUSSELL, almost openly, as DE3IOSTHENES
would have said, Austrianized. The latter so
much so that he had to leave the Ministry, as a
propitiation to the people ; though it was suspected
then, and is still suspected, that Lord JOHN could,
if his tongue had been liberated, have given a
version of the affair which would have reduced
his culpability almost to nothing. This, however,
Would have been at the cost of one, over whom he
is understood, magnanimously to this day, to hold
his shield. We fear Lord DERBY and Mr. Dls-
RAELI had nearly fallen into the same trap. But
they must be firm. Nothing would be so fatal to
their popularity as to be suspected, still more to be
convicted, of Austrianizing. Not that we have any
sympathy with the French attack on Austria, not
that we expect any substantial benefit to Italy
from it, especially when France hunts in couples
with Russia ; but, it cannot concern us to uphold a
Power which has exercised such a brutal sway
over Hungary and Italy so long, and which is

answerable for all the atrocities of FERDINAND and
of the Roman Cardinals ; indeed, in all the mis-
government of Italy. England will never consent
to befriend in her difficulties the odious gaoler of
SiLvio PELLICO, the executioner of hundreds of the
noblest Italian patriots, the flogger of patriotic wo-
men, the cool blooded murderer of Hungarian patriots
at Arad, the con cocter of the concordat, the perse-
cutor of Protestantism, the savage repressor of con-
stitutionalism in Italy, and its ruthless destroyer
whenever it was obtained by the people.
_ _

It may be said we must sustain Austria to balance
the power of Russia or of France. Let us balance
things for-ourselves. It is infinitely cheaper for us
to husband our :strength than to lean on despotic
Governments like Austria, which hate and perse-
cute institutions such as our own. Let all Europe
combine ; let .Russia and France build navies, while
they have a merely conscript naval service, if they
please. We can always ontbuild them, and always
leave them something better to think of than med.
dling with us. The Balance of Power is a balance
we can never adjust. If France and Russsia divided
all the continent between them, it is doubtful
whether they would be the more powerful for that.
They must gain the good-will of all the nations
they had appropriated, before they would be really
stroilger. Indeed, let these military oppressors ex-
tend their dominions as they may, they will find
them, as Hungary and Lombardy now are to Austria,
sources of weakness rather than strength ; if con-
quest multiplies the number of their fortresses, and
swells their revenues, it multiplies also their vul-
nerable points, and swells their expenses beyond
their revenues. They are just the countries which

. .
ask in vain for a loan on the Exchanges of Europe.

Let it never be forgotten that, strongly as we
may suspect, or even denounce the ambition and
Cunning of Louis NAPOLEON, and though we may
be far from commending Sardinia in everything she
has done, yet that Austria is the real cause of the
tear. She it is who has so doggedly and savagely
refused to limit her Italian rule to the portion of
the country to which she has a treaty right, though
no moral right. But for her vile treaties with Italian
Princes against Italian liberties—but for her illegal
and overbearing occupation of countries south of
the Po, solely for the purpose of forcing her own
oppressive principles of Government on States with
whom she has no more right to interfere than she
had with Britain—but for her proud refusal to con-
form herself to the obligations of treaties, in virtue
of which alone she had a footing in Italy at. all—
but for all this there could have been no war. Sar•
dinia and France could have found no pretext for
movement had Austria kept within leer own
doing:ls, aud esveciall7 had she adivinistered them