The Sun.
London, England, 1835-10-17 00:00:00

us to free the Sultan from the mesh in which the

wily Russian has encompassed him. It is an insult
to Turkey to talk of her independence, when the
treaty which was wrung from her in her extremity,
places her under the dictation of Russia, at whose
bidding she is bound to close the Dardanelles when-
ever the schemes of the Autocrat may require the
adoption of such procedure. It is of little conse,
quence that England and France are not parties to
this treaty, and have declared it to be merely a " bit
of waste paper ;"—their honour and interests, as
well as Turkish independence, tan be secured only
by its total abrogation. Russia forms a different esti-
mate of the advantage of this treaty to her, as ap-
pears by the vaunt of the Frankfort organ, which
pronounces woe to any Power that would dare to
interfere witb. the key of the Emperor's house.
Our forbearance in this instance is disgraceful in
the extreme. It is asserted by those who defend
a dastard policy, that though Russia may be de-
sirous of sending her fleets by the shortest passage
to the Mediterranean, England can have no motive
for sending her men of-war into the Euxine, Such
a silly mode of argument is contemptible in any ma►►
having the least pretensions to enter upon a discussion
of the question. It is contendrzd 'that because Russia
has no right to enter the Bosphorus without the formal
invitation of the Sultan, England should content her-
self with preserving the static quo with regard to ships-
of-war, as the Sultan is not likely to give such invita-
tion under present circumstances. But the short-
sighted politicians who argue in this manner should
remember that Russia is not over-particular in waiting
a formal invitation when her interests suggest a disitn,n-
sation of ceremony. The interests of England should
not be left dependent on the contingency of the Sul-
tan's invitation—and though we are perfectly aware
that Russia is not to be controuled by treaties when-
ever her own interests prompt their violation, yet she
:should be left no pretext by which, at a future period,
she may attempt to justify aggression.—Morning
Advertiser.

We find that the late attempt of the Bank of En,- '
land to extinguish the circulation' of the Joint-stock
Banks of the kingdom, and to monopolise the whole
circulation to itself, continues to be the object of very
considerable discussion, both in the manufacturing dis-
tricts and the metropolis. An inquiry, therefore, is '
naturally suggested, as to its practicability, as well as '
to the important effect which such a daring proceeding,
if successful, would have over the commercial, manu-
facturing, and agricultural interests of the entire kingdom.
Our commercial and moneyed readers will remember
that this is the second attempt to accomplish this nefa-
rious measure, that it is a part of a fixed and decided
plan on the part of the Bank Direction, long since
contemplated, and only withheld from execution by
the just and natural alarm created in the public mind
at the bare idea of its awful consequences. The ac-
tual position of the Bank of England at the present
moment is this ;—The circulation of that establishment,
which we have reason to know has been reduced since
the last return one million, is now only seventeen mil-
lions ; during the war it was thirty millions ; and
yet, with this circulation, reduced and inadequate PA
it is to the wants of the expanding trade of the country,
even this amount it finds the greatest difficulty in main-
taining, owing to that Corporation being compelled to
pay its notes in gold at the antiquated standard of
3/. 17s. 101,d. per ounce ; yet it has the folly and teme-
rity to attempt engrossing the whole additional circula-
tion of the country—that is, ten millions beyond the
seventeen of their own, this being the amount of the
return of the issues of the country and Joint-stock Banks,
which would entail ruin upon itself and the whole
kingdom. We cannot illustrate this 'attempt better
than by assuming that the Bank Direction is like a
man who, though he cannot carry a weight of seventeen
stone, conceitedly imagines, nevertheless, that he can
carry twenty-seven. The monstrous absurdity that is
exhibited in the one case is precisely the same in the
other. But it is full time that another system should
be introduced for the management of this establish-
ment, and that the people of England should not have
their destiny depending on the ignorance or caprice of
any one man, or set of men, who may have been fortu-
nate enough to acquire the means of qualifying as
Directors of the Bank of England. From the spirit of
indignation which pervades the country at the very
attempt, we have reason to believe that meetings will
be held to petition the Legislature to abolish a charter,
the privileges of which are so shamefully abused. The
country can no more do without an expansion of its
circulation, in proportion to its increased capital, in-
dustry, and population, than a mill can be worked
without water ; and as every contraction of the circu-
lation not only feeds the grasping avidity of overgrown
capitalists and money dealers, and thus enables them
to prey upon the middle and lower classes, hut like-
wise endangers the welfare of the whole community,
the question demands the imperative attention of the
Government and the Legislature.—Morning Herald.
We give elsewhere, in an extract from the report of
the Post-office Commissioners, the sequel of the Duke
of Richmond's evidence. It relates chiefly to the re-
gistration of letters, which his Grace thinks impracti-
cable in this country. The point is not, after all, of
any material importance, and we dare say no injury
will be sustained by the public if the practice continue
as hitherto. In the same number of the Appendix,
of which we give a separate extract, we find the fol-
lowing questions put to and answers returned by the
Duke of Richmond, relative to the exchange of news-
papers between England and France free of any charge
of postage :
" Your Grace is aware that an Act passed last year, esta-
blishing a reciprocity as regarded the circulation of news-
papers in France and England ; you are aware also that
no step has been taken by the French Government to
make the declaration required by that Act previous to
our coming to a similar determination in this country ;
vas it your Grace's expectation, that immediately on
the passing of that Act, such a communication would be
made from the French Post-office to this country ?—I
proposed•the measure myself to the Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer, previous to the Bill having gone through the House
of Counmons ; I was in Paris, and spoke to the Director-
Genc2ral of the French Posts upon the subject, and he pro-
mised me to communicate with the Minister of Finance.
P•eior to my leaving Paris I saw the Director-General
again, who told me that the French Government would,
immediately upon our act being carried, permit the English
newspapers to go through France on my undertaking to
allow the French newspapers to go free through England.
I am therefore very much disappointed at hearing that the
French Government had not carried into execution that
pledge which they made to me as Postmaster-General.
" That pledge was made distinctly, separately from any
pledge on your part to execute any other proposition of
tl-,eirs which regarded the communication between the two
offices ?—Most decidedly ; I told the Director-General of
the Posts, after he had made the pledge to me, that if I
could do anything which would be of advantage to the
French, without being of detriment to this country, I
should be most happy to do so ; and that if there were any
points which I had deemed inadmissible before, if he would
give me stronger arguments than he had before, I should
have great pleasure in revising my former opinions : and I
think the English Government ought to call on the French
Government now to redeem that pledge without loss of
time."

It appears, then, by this' part of the Duke's evi-
dence, that the pi omise made by the Director of the
French Post-office in regard to the exchange of news-
papers free of postage, was both positive and specific,
and might have been acted upon independently of any
of the other points which had remained unsettled. We
are sorry to say, however, that although the English
Post-office Bill has long since passed, the English and
French newspapers exchanged between the two coun-
tries continue up to the present hour to pay a postage
of twopence in England, and ten sous (fivepence) in
France. By what the Duke of Richmond says on the
subject, we ought to infer that the fault of this is
chargeable on the French authorities. We think we
can show, however, that our own Post-office authori-
ties are chiefly to blame. But in order to do this, it is
necessary to go back to the state of matters previous to
the passing of the Post-office Bill to which the Duke
of Richmond's evidence refers. It is, probably,
still unknown to many of our readers, that until
the autumn of 1834, an Act of Parliament was in
force, which conferred on certain clerks of the London
Post-office (called clerks of the foreign department),
the exclusive privilege of exporting newspapers from
England, and of importing foreign ones from abroad.
This strange and inconceivable monopoly had firmly
withstood, for years, all the efforts which we, in com-

men with other parties equally interested, had used in-
cessantly to bring about its abolition. It was not
enough that half-a-dozen clerks of the Postoffice
should alone possess the right of eßporting our pro-
perty ; we had moi-eovet to subscribe to any terms they
chose to impose for the favour of being supplied by
them with copies of, or incomplete extracts from, the
Vrench and other papers of the Continent. Such a
state of dependence was not to be endured ; and, in
order to get out of it, we were driven to the necessity
of establishing—at an enormous expense-a line of
expresses of our own, between Paris and London,
so that this paper might supply the most ample,
as well as most recent, intelligence from the Continent.
The Duke of Richmond was the first Postthaster-Ge-
neral who perceived the monstrous absurdity of the prac-
tice of allowing any set of clerks of the Post-office
to keep up a regular traffic in newspapers, whereby
much of their time was necessarily diverted from their
public duties to be devoted to matters•with which they
ought to have nothing to do. After encountering the
customary routine of vexatious opposition, founded
upon the usual cant about long-established practice,
vested rights (! ! !), and so forth, his Grace at length
succeeded in bringing a Bill into Parliament, repeal-
ing the Newspaper Traffic Bill, throwing the t:ad„f
newspapers entirely open, allowing all fo.;•eign etas to
be received, and English one CO go abroad, by post,
on a charge of 2d. postage on each newspaper, Eng-
lish or foreign, 1.:ot which charge a clause in the Bill
empowered the Postmaster- General to act aside
whetr,tver he thought proper. This clause was in-
troduced in the Bill with a view to the arrangement
of a free exchange of newspapers, through the medium
of the Post-office, between England and France.
The Bill was in progress through Parliament when
the Duke of Richmond was in Paris. Soon after his
return to London, and before it had passed, his Grace
resigned. His successor was Lord Conyngham, who
had his six months' apprenticeship to go through be-
fore he could become acquainted with any of the intri-
cacies of his office. His Lordship gave no signs of a
disposition to renew any communications with the
French Post-office. He even carried his apathy so
far as to decline addressing any letter in his own
name to the French director, leaving that task on
one or two indispensable occasions to the assistant-
secretary, who wrote in the name of his father, the
secretary. This marked and almost offensive neglect
on the part of the new English Postmaster-General
was surely not calculated to keep up the cordiality
of intercourse which had previously existed between
the two establishments, and no regular agreement re-
specting the exchange of newspapers was entered into.
When urged to it afterwards by parties interested in
the issue, the French authorities declared it to be quite
useless that they should take any further trouble about
the matter, but still expressed a willingness to sub-
scribe to the four propositions left out of the conven-
tion of 1833, of which four propositions the exchange of
newspapersbetween the two countries, free of any charge
of postage, was one. The Duke of Richmond says that
the " English Government ought to call on the French
GeNernment now to redeem that pledge (regarding.
• newspapers) without loss of time." His Grace's evi-
dence was given on the 6th of November last, and
sent in to the Treasury by the Commissioners of Post-
office Inquiry, along with their report in December
following. Have any steps been since taken to enter
into an arrangement with the French Post-office ? If
not, why are they delayed, and whose fault is it that
the newspapers going from the one country to the
other are subjected to a charge of postage altogether
amounting to 7d. on each ?—Times.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, it will be recol-
lected, received with much complacency the compliments
which were offered to him by some of the supporters
of the Administration in the House of Commons, on
his able and successful management of the West India
Compensation Loan, or, to speak more correctly,
boasted of the great advantages of the contract so
loudly as to extort from his partizans the anticipated
and desired tribute of applause. There is reason,
however, to believe, that the self-gratulations of Mr.
Spring Rice, and the loud commendations of his
friends were upon this occasion misapplied. It appears
now that there never was a financial operation which,
in proportion to its magnitude, produced so great
a derangement of the circulation, or exposed the
commercial interests to so much inconvenience and
risk, as the petty loan of fifteen millions, for the nego-
tiation of which the Chancellor of the Exchequer
claimed and received so much praise. Instead of being
entitled to the unbounded panegyrics so eagerly de-
manded and so unsparingly bestowed, it is quite evi-
dent, from the present state of the money market, that
the transaction ought to have been denounced as an
extrao:dmary example of improvidence and incapacity.
A. Chancellor of the Exchequer competent to discharge
the duties of his office would have taken care to ascer-
tain at what periods, and to what amount, the Com-
pensation Commissioners would require advances from
Government for the purpose of making payments to
the parties entitled to compensation ; and would have
adjusted, with some approach to accuracy the sucessive
instalments of the loan to the calculated series of de-
mands upon the fund. To a competent Chancellor of
the Exchequer it would have been evident that, by
neglecting to adjust with all possible care the sums
to be paid by the loan contractors to the amount to
be distributed from time to time to the compensa-
tion claimants, and returned through their hands
to the geueral currency of the country, the danger
would be incurred of a sudden contraction of the cir-
culation, which could not fail to be deeply injurious
to the interests of individuals and of the community,
and which might, in certain not improbable circum-
stances, give a violent and disastrous shock to public
and private credit. Against this evil any but the most
ignorant or careless Finance Minister would have taken
adequate precautions. No such precautions, however,
seem to have been thought of by Mr. Spring Rice.
A large proportion of the circulating medium of the
country is locked up, partly in consequence of the in-
stalments of the loan falling due before the Com-
pensation Commissioners have made such progress
in their investigation of claims as to be ready to
distribute the amount thus provided; and partly
in consequence of the option afforded to the sub-
scribers to the loan of anticipating the stipulated
periods of payment, and thus entitling themselves
to a discount. The Money Market has been ex-
posed to much inconvenient and unnecessary pressure,
which would have been still more severe had not the
Bank of England, by a liberal extension of its accom-
modation to the mercantile world, successfully endea-
voured to mitigate the evil consequences of the egre-
gious blunder committed by the Chancellor of the
Exchequer. The amount of evil which has been ac-
tually produced by this blunder is, however, not in-
considerable. The Bank of England has always shown
the most praiseworthy alacrity in relieving the tempo-
rary pressure to which, from various causes, the com-
mercial world is perpetually subject. But it ought to
be the study of Government to prevent, so far as it
depends upon them, the recurrence of such emer-
gencies as are calculated to place, for however
short a period, the commercial classes in a state
of too absolute dependence upon the Bank. Such
emergencies never fail to produce injury to many
individuals, and ruin to some. They are unavoid-
ably attended by much painful and injurious expo-
sure—by an anxious sifting of the circumstances of
individuals engaged in commercial affairs—by the sus-
pension and consequent defeat of many mercantile
speculations and enterprises, which, had no such crisis
intervened, would have proved advantageous to their
projectors and beneficial to the public. A much better
plan of liquidating the claims of the West India pro-
prietors would undoubtedly have been to authorize the
Commissioners, after adjudicating in favour of any of
them, to issue a debenture of equivalent amount, and
to have provided by loan for the extinction of the new
description of unfunded debt thus created, whenever it
reached a predetermined extent. Good faith to the
colonists would thus have been equally maintained,
without the least probability of any additional cost to
the nation ; and the monetary system would not have
been exposed to the chance of inconvenient and inju-
rious fluctuation.—Morning Post.

PARIS WORKAlEN.—According to a late census,
there are in the furnished lodging-houses of Paris 28,334
workmen, of whom 27,214 are employed, and only 1,120
without employment.—Paris Advertiser.