The Sun.
London, England, 1832-11-28 00:00:00

OF TUE PUDLIC JOUINALS•

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Both factions are fluttered by the notice .we have
drawn to their proceedings. They may depend upon
it that the public attention shall not be allowed to
nag. The • Times, as both parties know, will un-
flinchinely discharge its .duty. A system has been
got up by certain mountebanks, under the operation
of which no such thing as cool deliberation, or in-
dividual opinion, can henreforth have the slightest
influence in directing the votes of Parliament, but
the whole body of measures for- the next seven, or
five, or three years, or whatever may be
,the dura-
tion of that assembly, not merely in their outline,
but in all their progressive and intermediate stages,
down to the most minute details, are , now, on
the eve of the election, to be handed: over by
paltry knots of busy and conceited meddlers, seizing
the dictatorship upon every hustings throughout
the empire, handed over, we repeat, ready cut and
dry, by these Jack Cade grandees, who assume to
give orders to every candidate, in- the name of his
constituents generally, though without one particie
of authority from them ; in default of an entire-sub-
serviency to which commands no candidate must
dare to-hope for any thing but a contemptuous re-
jection of his claims, and a rancorous persecution
of his polit:cal character. The treatment expe-
rienced at the hands of such mob-jobbers by some
of the ablest and most upright members who have
ever maintained the rights of the people. of Eng-
land in Parliament, is a disgrace to the
.nation, and
if not res,sted and put to confusion by the collective
efforts of all reasonable Englishmen, must render
" representative government" itself a laughing-stock
to those nations which have not tried it, and a curse
to this, which it will have disappointed and de-
frauded. Sir Francis Burdett and Sir J. C. Hob-
house are well rewarded for the courage and con-
sistency of long political lives, by this notable en-
deavour of a slice of the rump of Westminater to
substitute for one of them a military man, whose
pretensions as a senator or statesman are not to
be named in comparison with the long services of
the old Members. The former Hon. Baronet well
ehatacterized the pledgemongers who are ready to
swallow whatever extravagance is proposed to them
as the condition of their seat in Parliament,as promis-
ing to cut short all discussion in a deliberative assem-
bly, by " declaring themselves either ao thought-
less or so wise as to have come beforehand to an
unalterable opinion on various difficult subjects."
It appears from the statement of Sir Francis, that
two persons whom he named, two forward bottle-
holders of Colonel Evans, and stout in their cham-
pionship of the pledging practice, were not long since
Anti-Reformers themselves ! Pretty partisans these
of a form of obligation which binds a man never to
change his opinions, or never to act upon them if he
does! The dishonest man, the hypocrite, says the
Hon. Baronet, will gulp down pledges ad infinitum,
while the man of high principle will reflect long
before he makes a promise, feeling himself bound
to the discharge it. And who are they that draw
so freely on their neighbour's conscience ? Men who
i2,equently, in their natural state, enjoy the happiest
insignificance, and only emerge from it when they
strut up to a candidate, and make a merit of putting
to him questions which no gentleman who regards
his own independence ought to answer, As for the
opposition to Sir John Hobhouse, because eshe is
nice," what does it amount to ? Why, to a de-
claration that there is no difference between an Anti-
Reform Government and a Government which has
carried the most extensive and valuable Reform that
ever was proposed or contemplated. He who ob-
jects to a colleague or fellow-labourer of Lord Grey,
on the same principles on which he would have con-
demned an officer of a boroughmonger Cabinet, al-
leges, in fact, that Reform is worth nothing to the
country,—that the clamour for it by these same per-
sons who now reproach Sir John Hobhouse was vile
hypocrisy on their part,—and that at all events,
and under all circumstances, to be concerned it,
administering the affairs of this country is a stigma
upon the functionary who conducts them. The
very statement of such a proposition is its refu-
tation. A letter in this day's Times makes men-
tion of the meeting summoned for to-day, to resolve
against the house and window-tax. We are no friends
to the window-tax, which is an outrage on mankind
in irs principle, nor to the house-tax, which, if les-
objectionable in principle, is in practice most ini-
quitous ; hut we like not some hints which have
reached us with regard to the proceedings of some
actors in this anti-window-tax meeting. What bu-
siness has Mr. Hume to announce himself as chair-
man of a meeting which has riot yet taken place,
and which has not yet therefore declared its sense
upon the question of who ought to be chairman ?
This single fact smells of the insolence of certain
" rump" dictators. These people have nothing it,
their conduct fair and manly. They get their half-
dozen pates together in a corner—scrawl the out-
line of what proceedings they desire to have car-
ried—pack. the hall, or other place of assembly,
with tools of their own faction—hoot and bellow
down every man who has spirit enough to speak or
think for himself, and then impudently palm upon die
world the result of their own miserable machina-
tions, as a free-will offering of whole bodies of respect-
able Englishmen upon the altar of their country. It
seas but yesterday that a gentleman, who is a candi-
date for a new borough, received a proposal whiel,
was designed to entrap him into a participation in the
demagogue practice of mating up self-constituted
" provincial committees" on public questions, and
arrogating for their members the honour due to the
freely elected depositaries of a imbue trust. The
Hon. Candidate very properly rejected the solicita-
tion, knowing well that a cause so unworthily
managed can never eventually prosper. We shall
watch these" Destructives"—these worst and mos!
malignant enemies of all free Government, and it
will not be our fault if the people of this country be
not taught how to estimate--how, moreover, to
render them harmless. We are nevertheless
bound to add, that the Conservatives are worthy
of such magnanimous allies. A correspondent,
" Justitia," describes the resolutions of a Dutch
anti-English meeting at Norwich. From 60 to 70
saersons attended; no public voice,—no dissen-
;ienS therefore was heard within their strictly
onarded walls. The haters of war were no other
than the patriotic supporters of Lord Stormont, and
the " public" of Norwich was, by a trick, con-
ducted to a different place of meeting. The poor
devils are working hard for signatures, It is with
great pleasure we turn from the oppressive or im-
pertinent proceedings of the two miserable factions
here described, to the account of a meeting fairly
and regularly assembled, and calmly and deliberately
discussing the means of constitutional rebel. A,
the meeting of the deputations for the various pa-
rishes of Westminster last night, we see no as-
=lllation of power, no attempt at dictation —no in-
solent messages issued to independent men, to obey
their summons and adopt their opinions,—but re-
spectable and experienced householders rationally
executing the undoubted right of English subjects—
the preparation of a remonstrance against what they
feel to be a grievance,—Times.
Did we not know from other sources the factious
motives of the Tories in the treasonable support
which they are at present lending to the obstinacy
of the Dutch against their own Government, it
would appear to us a mystery how any set of
British men or British merchants should have cho-
sen the very time of countenancing the fling of
Holland when that King was opposing the interests
of their own nation as well as those of Belgium
and of justice. We have again and again asked
those Conservatives who profess to know anything
on the subject to say, " would they abet the King
of Holland in his design of closing the Scheldt ?"
They have never dated to answer our question, be-
cause they well know that if they did so honestly,
the illusion which they wished to create in favour
of Holland would insurntly vanish, and that their
hoodwinked supporters would desert them. For
them, therefore, we need produce no facts, because,
though ignorant enough of all political or commer-
cial history, and therefore requiring information,

they will noo
. profit by any statements which are op-
nem to their direct interests or party prejudices.
They even effect to think that the Dutch are ma-
king no unreasonable demands on Belgium, and
that the close of-the-Scheldt is not the bribe which
King William holds out to tempt the cupidity of the
merchants of Amsterdam and Rotterdim, who have
opened their purses to support the war. The•
fed-
lowing details will undeceive their followers, as they
will show the importanee which the Dutch have at
all times attached to the question of the Scheldt, the
measures which they have taken at different epochs
to interrupt . its navigation, and their alarms
lest the trade of Antwerp, under an independent
Government, should materially injure that of their
. own commercial capital. The rivalship between
Antwerp and Amsterdam, it is well known, began
in their youth, and under their subjection to the
same Government. • Towards the end of the 15th
century they both shared in the spoils of Bruges,
which was then the richest emporium of Europe,
and which could only be suddenly checked in its
career of prosperity- or reduced in its magnificent
wealth by a rebellion against its Sovereign, and by
the assistance which he received in punishing its
disobedience from the merchants of the two hostile
cities. 4 Antwerp being better situated for trade
than either Bruges, Amsterdam, or any town in the
Netherlands, soon outstripped them all in extent
of traffic, in amount of shipping, in activity of
business, and in the accumulation of wealth. The
accounts of its riches and magnificence in the
zenith of its power and prosperity, though well au-
thenticated, almost exceed credibility. Guicciar-
dini's description of the Netherlands (quoted in An-
derson'. History of Commerce), we find it stated that
" about 2,500 ships were sometimes seen lying at
anchor in the Scheldt before the city,—that it
was usual for .500 ships to come in and go out
in one day, and 400 to come up the Scheldt at
one tide, that 10,000 carts were constantly employed
in carrying merchandise to and from the neigh-
bouring countries, besides many hundreds of wag-
. eons daily corning and going with passengers, and
500 coaches used by people of distinction," Wa
have then an enumeration of the different nations
which had their factories in Antwerp, of the kinds
and amount of articles in which they traded to all
countries, and of the variety of professions practised
in the city, with the persons engaged in each,—a
-pecies of statistic which tends to give credibility to
the more startling anti apparently exaggerated parts
of the description. The date to which this immense
prosperity is referable is from 15-10 to 1560, but its
destruction was at hand. In the troubles of
the Netherlands, which began a few years
afterwards, it took part with the side of tole-
ration and freedom. It was in consequence
sacked by the Duke of Alba's barbarous soldiery in
1576, when, as is stated by Camden, " this most
excellent of cities, this most flourishing mart town
without exception in all Europe, was plundered by
the Spanish garrison, who mutinied for want of
pay." But this was nothing to what it endured in
1585, when it was entered after a siege by the
Duke of Parma, arid was plundered by his army
three successive days—when more than 3,000 of
its inhabitants were put to the sword, and as many
more were burnt in the conflagration of the city or
thrown into the Scheldt. Even this blow it might
have recovered, but having been retained by the
Spaniards when the seven Dutch provinces asserted
their independence, its trade was as cruelly perse-
cuted by its Dutch rivals as its rights were de-
stroyed by its domestic oppressors. The Dutch
soon became powerful at sea, They every where
attacked the maritime dominion, and interrupted the
maritime trade, of their former masters. The Fle-
mings were stripped of all their commercial im-
portance, which was transferred to Holland ;
and Dutch ports, though inferior in all respects
to Antwerp, deprived it of all its trade. Am-
sterdam, which cannot be compared with Ant-
werp for advantage of position, soon rose to be
one of the greatest trading ports in the world, and
was destined to maintain its superiority for centu-
ies, chiefly by the continued oppression of its rival.
" Although," says Sir William Temple, " Amster-
dam triumphs in the spoils of Lisbon and Antwerp,
it is a very incommodious haven, being seated on
such shallow waters,—so as that ordinary ships
cannot come up to it without the advantage of
ides, nor great ones without unlading, the entrance
into the Texel and the passage over the Zuyder
Zee being more dangerous than a voyage to
Spain, lying all in blind and narrow channels;—
so that it is not a haven that draws trade, but
trade that fills a haven, and brings it into vogue."
The treaty,of Westphalia, which, after a war of half
a century, made a new arrangement of Europe as
remarkable as that made by the treaty of Vienna
established the independence, the naval power, and
the commercial prosperity of the Dutch United
Provinces on the new basis of universal recog-
uition. These seven provinces had long been as
independent of Spain, as Belgium now is of Hol-
land. From the year 1570, when they laid the
toundation of their liberties, till 1648, when Spain
acknowledged their independent existence, they had
made wars,—they had formed alliances,—they had
discovered and engrossed new channels of trade,—they
had effected conquests in the new and old worlds, and
had established colonies in both,—they had treated
on equal terms with the greatest States of Europe,
and had even been applied to to assist by their ship-
ping the very Monarch who offensively regarded
them as his " rebel subjects." But no sooner did
they secure their own independence than they re-
solved to destroy the pretensions of any commercial
Poe er which might become a rival. Accordingly,
as they were in a situation to dictate the terms of
the treaty of Westphalia to Philip IV., they resolved
that Antwerp, remaining under the dominion of his
House, should not be allowed to rise final the ashes
:n which it had been buried by the civil wars, and in
which it had been kept enveloped since the rise of
the Dutch republic. By the 14th article of the
treaty, therefore, they stipulated for the perpetual
close of the Scheldt, together with that of the
canals of the Sas and the Swyn, and all the other
mouths of rivers discharging themselves into the sea
in the neighbourhood of Zealand. Thus was the trade
of Antwerp effectually destroyed by the jealousy of
the merchants of Amsterdam and _Rotterdam, and
thus, amid all the wars anti revolutions which
happened during 1.50 years, Dutch jealousy kept
one of the great rivers of Europe hermetically sealed
against all commercial intercourse from abroad. To
show the inconsistency of the trading spirit, as
well as the fanatical rage of commercial monopoly
which distinguished our Dutch friends at that period,
we need only mention that they refused to admit
the Grand Duke of Oldenburg into the treaty of
Westphalia as a sharer in its commercial rights, be-
cause he had demanded a toll upon the Weser,
while they actually guaranteed for the total close of
the Scheldt ! Another instance of the same exclu-
sive commercial bigotry is to be found in their
stipulations at a subsequent period to abolish the
Ostend East India Company. The Scheldt, thus
closed by the treaty of Westphalia, was lost to ma-
ritime trade under the dominion of the house of
Austria, till the Austrian Netherlands were overrun
by the Freneh in 1793 and 1794. One of the first
acts of the French conquest was to declare the na-
vigation of the Scheldt free, and hence the opening
of the river was one of the necessary charges which,
as the allies of Holland, anti the supporters of ex-
isting treaties (even the treaty of Westphalia), the
British Government brought against the French as
a justification of the long war which ensued. The
treaty of Vienna, which opened to the commerce of
all nations all rivers dividing or traversing different
states, would have revers, d, of course, the provi-
sions of former restrictive treaties with regard to the

* " The fisheries and manufactures of Holland," says the
Pensionary De Witt, " increased more and snore with the
traffic by sea to Bruges, which lasted to the year 1432, when
Flanders had wars with the Archduke Maximilian about the
guardianship of his son and his dominions, which continued
for 10 years ; meanwhile Sluri, the seaport of Bruges, being
for the most part infested, those of Antwerp and Amsterdam,
in order to draw the trade to their own cities, assisted the
Grand Duke
.in his unbridled tyranny and destruction of the
CountrY, and thereby pined their own ends

It will be recollected that, a few days ago, seve-
ral of the inhabitants of the out-ward (Pimlico) of
St. George's, Hanover-square, were summoned to
Queen-square police-office by the collector of the
paving, lighting, and watering rates, under the
local statute, commonly called the Grosvenor Act,
for the non-payment of the rates. We have since
looked into the Act of Parliament, and that such
an Act should have been allowed to pass through
the Legislature, without exciting the patriotic ani-
madversion of those who have undertaken the great
trust of watching over the people's interests, is in
itself a pretty strong practical commentary upon
the efficiency of the representation of IVestminster.
We do not hesitate to say that this local Act, which
does not appear to have excited any of the indig-
nant remonstrances of Sir Francis Burdett or Sir
John Hobhouse, establishes as snug a system of ar-
bitrary power, within the limits to which it applies,
as can be well supposed capable of existing under
the protection of the " free Constitution" of Eng-
land; nor can we wonder that such things con-
tinually occur, and that the people of this country
are plundered of their substantial rights, while they
are more captivated by the nicknames and pro-
fessions of party than attentive to the principles
and actual practice of public men. It would ex-
ceed the limits which we can at present spare for
the purpose to go into marry of the objectionable
provisions of this very prolix and most clumsily
drawn-up Act of Parliament. We shall have op-
portunities of recurring to it again. At present we
shall principally confine ourselves to the parts of the
Act which bear upon the proceedings at Queen-
square office, premising that the principle and foun-
dation of the Act are bad, in giving such an extraor-
dinary power to a few trustees by a local authority,
in derogation of the general law of the land. By
his Statute all the powers vested in the trustees,
of whom, we observe, a Mr. Henry Hobhouse is one,
may be exercised by the major part of them present
at the meetings, the number of trustees present at
such meetings not being less than five. Now the
majority of five, according to Cocker, being three,
the whole district to which this Act applies is, in
reality, placed under the almost absolute authority
of a triumvirate, for the important purposes of mak-
ing rates or contracts, granting annuities, borrowing
money, &c. The trustees may sue or be sued in
the name of their clerk; and the clerk, when sued
or sueing, is allowed to be a witness, which is the
same thing as the plaintiff or defendant being a wit-
ness for himself. Nor is there an exception made
when the action or suit arises from the neglect or
wilful default of the clerk, though in that case he is
personally responsible for costs and damages, and so
is directly interested, in a pecuniary sense, in
the result of the action or auir. As to the
proceedings at Queen-square Police-office, our
readers will remember that one of the persons sum-
moned was a Mr. Collett who said that his objection
to the rate was two-fold; that in the first place the
trustees had not fulfilled their duty ; and in the next
place be was over-rated. As to the former plea, it
is not a sufficient defence for the non-payment of a
rate, nor in other mutters, unconnected with the rate,
do we know whether the trustees fulfilled their duty
or not. They may be, for what we can tell, " all
honourable men ;" but we have more to do with
the Act of Parliament under which they profess to
act than with themselves, and certainly we would
not trust any junta of men in England with such
powers as they are invested with by this job-en-
couraging Statute. As to being over-rated, Mr.
Collett said that, when he first took his house, he
was rated by the trustees at the rent of 2201., but
they had now rated him at 2601. He added, that
the Act of Parliament enacted that no person
should be rated at more than four-fiths of the rack-
rent." He contended that it was most unjust and
unfair that they sould rate him at what sum they
pleased : for aught he knew, they might next year
rate him at 3601. per annum. He went on to
say that he thought the Magistrate (Mr. White)
had the power to withhold a distress-warrant
against him, as the claim was so monstrously
unjust ;—he only paid 2451., per annum for
his house, though the trustees had thought
proper to rate his house at 2601., being 121.
per annum more than the rack-rent, instead of
being one•fifth less. In supposing that the Magis-
trate had the power to refuse the distress-warrant,
either on account of the injustice or the illegality of
the rate, Mr. Collett was mistaken. The Magistrate
has no such power—he is, in this instance, what the
law calls a ministerial ojicer, who has no judicial
discretion. He cannot inquire into the justice or
injustice, the validity or invalidity, of the rate. The
law provides another tr.bttnal for that purpose; but
first let its see what the mode of rating under this
Act really is. The 76th section of the Act provides
that no rates to be levied or assessed shall exceed,
in any one year, the several sums of money next
hereinafter mentioned; that is to say, for paving,
stoning, gravelling, repairing, and keeping in repair,
cleansing and !ighting, the several roads, streets,
and places, 1.5. it hin the limits of this Act, after the
rate of two shillings in the pound, according to the
//early rent or varue of such houses, shops, ware-
houses, coach-houses, stables, lands, tenements, &c.;
for watching the said roads, streets, and places, after
the rate of ninepenee in the pound, according to the
yearly rent or value of such houses, shops, &c.; and
for the watering of the said loads, streets, and places,
after the rate of threepence in the pound, according
to theyectity rent or value of such houses, &c. Here
the rating is clearly on the yearly rent orvalue,leaving
it optional with the trustees to go upon either, which is
' highly objectionable, and admits of a latitude of
taxation which may be most oppressively and par-
tially exercised. The 82d section, however, which
allows the compounding of rates in certain cases,
enacts that when the yearly rent or value of any
house, tenement, or hereditament, shall not exceed
201., or where any house, &c., shall be let to any
weekly or monthly tenants, in separate apartments,
furnished or unfurnished, and the rents thereof shall
become payable, and be collected at any shorter
period than quarterly, then, and in every such case,
it shall and may be lawful for the trustees to com-
pound with the landlords, owners, or lessees of
surh houses, &c., for the payment of the rates at
such a reduced yearly rental as the said trustees shall
think reasonable, so that no house or tenement be
rated at less than two-thirds or more than/our:fifths
of the rack-rent at which the same alien be then let,
or of the annual value of the
i said premises re-
spectively. Thus we see that t is in the case of
houses of which the yearly rent, or annual value,
does not exceed 20/., or are let in lodgings, and
which are compounded for by the landlords, the

maximum of rating is fixed at four-fifths of the yearly
rent or value. But it is worth observing that
in the 10th section, which speaks of the qualifica -
tions of persons eligible to be appointed trus-
tees, one of the qualifications laid down is, that th e
person so appointed, if an inhabitant householder re-
siding within the limits of the Act, must be, either
in his own right or in that of his wife, in the actual
possession or receipt of the rents and profits of some
building, land, tenement, or hereditament, situate
within the limits of the Act, of the clear yearly
value of 1501.; and must also be assessed to the
rates hereby directed to be made for the purposes
of this Act at the rate of 120/. per annum or up-
wards, which is an assessment of rates, in the case
of a trustee, in the ratio of only four-fifths of the
clear yearly value. Mr. Collett was perfectly correct
in stating that by this statute it is enacted that all
untenanted houses should pay half-rates—and if, as
he says, there are a number of untenanted houses on
which no rate is paid, that, we think, would be a
valid objection to the rate which he was called upon
to pay ; for, if those landlords who should pay half-
rates are not assessed to any, other persons must be
over-rated to make up the deficiency. This brings us
to the point, what is the remedy against a bad rate ?
The 121st section of the Act provides that if any
person shall think himself aggrieved or over-rated by
any rate or assessment, or any matter or thing to be
made or done in pursuance of this Act, he may ap-
peal to the trustees, at one of their meetings, within
four calendar months of the rate or cause of grievance
arising, and the trustees may examine the appellant
and witnesses on oath, and grant or refuse relief.
Here we see the appeal is from the trustees, in their
rate-making character, to the same trustees in their
appellate jurisdiction, being judges in their own
case. Mr. Collett asserted that, when he went to
the Board for redress, they were sitting, and they
told him to leave the room. Mr. Tuck stated that
he made a similar application when six of them were
sittitig, and they used him worse than they did Mr.
Collett—they fairly barked him out of the room.
Whether these statements are over-coloured, we
know not, but we do know that the appeal ought
not to be to the party that makes the rate. There
is also another appeal given to the Westminster or
Middlesex Sessions within specified periods, but
then we find it enacted, by the 119th section, that
ail such trustees as are Justices of Peace may act as
Justices in all matters under the authority of the
Act, notwithstanding their being trustees—so that
they make rates as trustees, and confirm them as
Justices. Have we not stated enough to show that
this Act must be repealed ?—]Horning Herald.
A meeting took place last night at the Quadrant
Hotel, of the inhabitants of a number of parishes of
Westminster. Our readers will see a report in
another column. There can be no question that the
assessed taxes press with undue severity on the
middle classes ; and that their severity is greatly
heightened by the partiality with which they are
levied. We are glad to see the determination now
evinced to obtain a remedy for this crying evil.
There can be no valid reason why the inhabitants
of the metropolis should he forced to pay one-half
of the assessed taxes of the whole island. Of one
thing, however, they may be certain ; namely, that
so long as they are willing to submit to the injustice,
it will not be remedied. Some other means must be
devised for raising the funds necessary for the service
of the State. We know very well that the higher
orders will not submit to be placed on a foot-
ing of equality with the middle classes. They
will call out, wa cannot keep our country
mansions if we are to be made to pay at the
rate of the middle classes. This may be a very good
reason for the substitution of some other tax for the
assessed taxes; but it cannot surely be a reason
for continuing to oppress the middle classes, because
they have been hitherto subjected to the most
flagrant injustice and oppression. To show how
much even the best of men are influenced by their
particular interests, we may observe, that Sir Henry
Parnell, in his excellent volume on Financial Re-
form, would hardly have spoken as he does of as-
sessed taxes, had he, instead of being an Irish
landlord, not subject to them, been one of the suf-
fering middle classes. " It is natural and becoming
(he says) to feel deeply for the sufferings of the
poor; but to overlook all rules of science, and
to neglect, in dealing in matters of finance, all esta-
blis`sed principles, and to act on feelings, and not
on reasons, as the ground-work of legislation, will
never fail to be followed by great loss of revenue,
without any adequate public good. The effort
which was made in 1825 to obtain a repeal of the
assessed taxes, was founded on a total misconcep-
tion of the comparative effects of different kinds
of taxes on the interests of the people. No ad-
vantages would have arisen from the repeal of those
taxes beyond the mere relief from so much
taxation ; while, on the other hand, the
repeal of the taxes on raw materials and manufac-
tures, arid the reduction of the enormously high
duties on tobacco and foreign spirits, would be pro-
ductive of considerable benefit to the consumer,
would put an end to smuggling, and would increase
the employment of capital and labour, and foreign
commerce. Lord Goderich is entitled to the greatest
praise, for having had the firmness, in 1825, to resist
the temptation of sacrificing a sound principle to the
acquisition of temporary popularity ; he has the
merit of being the first Chancellor of the Exchequer
who reduced to practice those principles which are
the only secure basis of national prosperity." Sir
Henry puts out of consideration the severity with
which the assessed taxes, press on particular
classes. But if we are to disregard feeling, and to
look on unmoved, while constant revolutions are
taking place in the fortunes of numerous individuals,
from inability to bear up against the burdens on
them—if we are to view with an eye of unconcern
the decent tradesman stripped of his little all to
meet the demands of the tax-gatherer, and consigned
to a prison or a workhouse—because these revolu-
tions in the fortunes of individuals do not affect
production or prevent the employment of capital—
we may ask Sir Henry, if production would be at
all affected by what would, no doubt, be hard to-
wards many deserving families, namely, exactina
one-half of the rent of all the land in the kingdom'?
This would be merely an affair of feeling ; merely
an affair of injustice; for assuredly production and
commerce would go on as well as before, whether
Lord A. or Sir John lived in a prison or a palace.
But the middle classes have, we trust, more spirit
than to submit any longer to see themselves singled
out as the victims of unequal taxation. If the
assessed taxes must be continued, let the Nobility
and Gentry, at all events, su',rnit to their fair share.
That they will not du; and, therefore, the assessed
taxes must be annihilated.—Morning Chronicle.
We hear with pleasure of the decisive proofs
which Mr. Hume has everywhere received of the de-
termination of the electors of Middlesex to insure
his triumphant return. The foul attack made upon
his character has been duly appreciated, and now
meets with its proper reward. It has stirred up
friends in the remotest parts of the kingdom, where-
ever there was a Middlesex voter. We have seen a
letter from a highly respectable gentleman, at the
advanced age of 79, residing in Shropshire, who,
though old and infirm, avows his determination, if
his presence be required, at his Own expense to come
up to render his vote effective. We understand that
powerful body of Quakers, in the metropolis, held,
last week, a meeting on the subject of Mr. Hume's
return, at which they passed resolutions approving
of his conduct, and avowing their determination to
support him. This alone speaks volumes. Nothing
has tended to disgust the electors of Middlesex so
much as the interference of the clergy in this affair.
As usual, their zeal has greatly outrun their charity.
Again : although Mr. Byng himself has not directly
coalesced with Lord Henley, yet, whenever Mr.
Byng's friends were to be seen, they were canvassing
for Lord Henley. The dirtiest and paltriest means
have been resorted to, in order to frustrate and im-
pede the object of Mr. Hume's friends ; for instance,
the innkeeper at the Black Dog, at Bedfont, where
the Tories met with signal a defeat on Friday

last, announced to Mr. Hume's Committee, that the
room they had engaged to meet at on the following
day, he could not let them have. This, no question,
proceeded from the instructions he had received from
his landlord, who lives close by, and is a " thorough-
paced Conservative." However, notwithstanding
this notice, Mr. Hume's friends persisted in their de-
termination to hold a meeting of the Committee, and
the tenant saw the prudence of not attempting to
resist them.—Morning Chronicle.

ROLLS COURT, Nov. 27.