The Sun.
London, England, 1859-05-25 00:00:00

country • the wholesale profligacy and corruption
which has sought to purchase the. public virtue of
constituencies in the mass; and the base intimidation
which would fain have bullied into subjection all
whom it could not buy into silence and subserviency.
It is probable, nay, it is certain, that the Cabinet of
peers, romancists, squires, and rhetoricians who have
with shameless effrontery conspired to set the yoke
of Toryism on this realm for years to come, -who
have spared neither violence, nor fraud, nor foreign
intrigues, nor domestic jobbery, nor the pressure of
secret influences, nor complicity with anti-national
and anti-Protestant designs, nor appeals to ignor-
ance, prejudice, and passion, in the hope and expec-
tation of restoring the happy era of the Castlereaghs
and the Sidmouths among hnglishmen in the year
of grace 1859, will not survive in the Ministerial
flesh to meet that solemn inquiry into the electoral
transactions of the last two months which will
assuredly be demanded by the Legislature, as it is
already demanded by the voice of the nation. It
will have passed away—not, indeed, into forgetful-
ness, but into the impotent rage of a malignant
opposition, obstructive ever and aggressive, but
capable of insolence and obstruction only, not of
mischief and disaster. We trust the great Liberal
majority out of doors and the Liberal majority in
Parliament will not suffer so severe a warning to
slip unheeded from their memory. Twice in seven
years they have seen a forsworn but incurable fac-
tion clambering into office by Liberal aid, and after
a term of unexampled forbearance on the one side
and cringing falseness ou the other—after exhaust-
ing all the arts of treachery towards their friends,
and all the resources of trickery towards their foes,
sentenced to ignominious dismissal by a house of
their own creation. These narrow victories are
dearly won when all but the last, and greatest, and
most irreparable consequences of Tory supremacy
are accomplished—when we are trembling on the
verge of war, under the flimsy semblance of a neu-
trality which takes delight in rekindling the worst
passions of the worst times, and grasps at every
pretext for surrounding the monarchy with soldiers,
while it shrinks from entrusting a loyal people with
defensive arms. We do not affect to deny that
there are individual members of a Tory Cabinet
who are as honourable and high-minded gentlemen,
as sincere patriots, and as honest, if not as able,
administrators as any to be found in the ranks of
their rivals ; but as a Cabinet, steeped in the wis-
dom of Tory ancestors, professing the Nil/us of Tory
traditions, these excellent, men are hopelessly and
helplessly the tools of two or three more malignant
plotters, and more unscrupulous confederates. In
quiet times the worse men may do little harm, and
the better men may even do a little good; but let a
Reform Bill in arrear fall due at home—let a war
of principles spring up abroad—and all the heredi-
tary Tory taint comes festering to the surface of
public affairs like transmitted gout in the aristo-
cracy of the pantry.
Thanks to the generous and inspiring emulation
of those eminent men whose names, as liberal chiefs,
should never stand apart, and whose historic repu-
tations, in spite of all shortcomings, must ever and
inseparably be linked with liberal hopes, the knell
of a Government which, Austria-like, has thriven
on the divisions of its adversaries, has sounded—not
an hour too soon. If, without overstepping that
caution which a due sense of responsibility imposes
even on the servants of publicity, we could make
our readers understand the full significance of a
change of Ministry in this country at the present
moment. and the bearings of such a change upon
the vital questions of Reform and Peace, we are per-
suaded that the opening debates in the House of Com-
msns, the week after next, would be awaited with
more impatience than even the bulletins from the
banks of the Ticino and the Po.
Let one or two considerations suffice for the mo-
ment; we reserve the rest. England—if we do not
strangely misinterpret and misrepresent the feelings
of our countrymen England demands in the
present European crisis that her coasts shall be
unassailable, and invasion not improbable but im-
possible. She demands this, not from a mere blind
instinct of self-preservation, but because she desires
ample leisure and calm security for the internal
develoyment of those precious liberties which make
her the beacon light of civilisation to the world.
Now, it is not the desire of a Tory Government to.
enable us to laugh the idea of invasion to scorn. A
Tory Government will double and treble a Channel
fleet, will plant heavy ordnance here, there, and
everywhere ; will screw tighter and tighter the
wooden legs of pensioners, snatch at undersized
recruits for the ranks of the standing army, and
decimate our merchantmen for the service of the
fleet by prodigious bounties; yet it will not allow
the nation to bear arms, for if it did, the invasion
panic would not be worth six months' purchase, and
—no more panic, no more increase to the standing
army, no more seasonable diversions to Reform.
England demands Reform—such a measure of
Reform at least as shall last a generation, and
satisfy the majority of reasoning and responsible
Englishmen. A Tory Government proposes to
" setV. the question by removing it out of-harm's
way—in other words, by adapting it to the conve-
nience of dependent counties and rotten boroughs.
England demands absolute neutrality in the
present European war. But the strange Phonetic
dictionary which that eminent professor of calli-
graphy who still presides over the Foreign-office is
in the habit of consulting, discovers a strange and
ominous novelty in international law. A Tory
Government, inspired by the prudence of a Derby,
guided by the wisdom of a Malmesbury, teaches
us, to our amazement, that there are two sorts of
neutrality, as there are two sorts of warfare and
two sorts of alliance. As there is offensive warfare,
and defensive warfare, offensive alliance and de-
fensive alliance, so, too, it appears there is such
a thing as defensive neutrality, which is the
only sort of neutrality we have hitherto been ac-
quainted with, and such a thing as offensive neu-
trality taught and practised by a Tory Government.
We know what a strictly defensive neutrality
means. It means that England shall resolutely
hold her own all the world over, while despots
fight it out and freedom rushes in through the gap
of armies to vindicate her sacred cause, without
raising a hand in aid of the despots, and with all
her heart and soul bidding God speed to freedom
and the right. Offensive neutrality means a
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111IDDLE3EX SESSIONS —May 24.

(Bofore Mr. Pashley, .C., Assistant-Judge.)
A number of cases, in which prisoners pleaded
guilty, were disposed of, and several known thieves,
committed on trifling charges, were sentenced to
various terms of penal servitude.
The Court rose early, the learned judge being in
a state of bodily health which prevented his sitting
longer.

(Before Mr. Creasy.)
Thomas Cave, 30, a man of good appearance, was
indicted fir steeling a watch, value £lB, the pro-
perty of Xames Blenkinsopp, from the person-of
Wilhelmina, his wife.

Mr. Gent was counsel for the prosecution ; the
prisoner was defended by Mr. Ribton and Mr.
Daly.
This robbery was committed at the church of St.
Barnabas, during a confirmation. The evidence
clearly proved the guilt of the prisoner, and he was
convicted. A long list of previous convictions was
proved. His last sentence was four years'- penal
servitude.

Coombc3, an ex-policeman, said he had known
the prisoner as a thief for eighteen years.
Mr. Creasy said it was necessary to protect
society from such depredators, and he should there-
fore double the last sentence passed. upon him,
and pass upon him a sentence of eight years' penal
servitude.

John Moseley, 20, printer, and Frederick May,
21, brass-finisher, were indicted for hating stolen a
pair of trousers, the property of Edward Turvey.
Edward Turvey, a little boy, the son of Jesse
Turvey, a tailor, of No. 4, Amwell-street, Penton-
vine, was sent by his father with a pair of trousers,
wrapped up as a parcel, to the Seven-sisters-road
Holloway. 'Whilst passing through Penton-street
he was accosted by Moseley, who asked 'aim the way
td Bridgewater-square, and having directed him
they ,separated. Soon afterwards May came up
and spoke to him, asking him where he was going
to. Incautiously he told him, upon which he re-
marked that he had gone to the same school as the
boy, and that as he was going the same way he
would accompany him, and immediately afterwards
they were joined by Moseley. When they got
into the Seven Sisters-road Moseley said he
would give him a shilling a-piece for all the
birds' nests he could find, and sixpence a-piece fix
all the horse leeches and newts that he could
find in a pond in the field they were then in. Both
prisoners asked him to put dowi his parcel, and
May put his coat over it. The boy then went into
the pond to look for leeches,- followed by May, who
detained him there while Moseley ran away. The
boy said he would go and get his parcel, but whin
he got to the place where it had been left it had
disappeared. May tiled to run away, but the little