The Sun.
London, England, 1866-05-07 00:00:00

FIRE BRIGADE.

The CHAIRMAN said the members of the Board had no
doubt become acquainted through the public press with
the fire in Bishopsgate-street, which had unhappily been
attended with the loss of life. Now, he thought, although
the fire escapes were not under the control of the Board,
that Captain Shaw, under the circumstances, would be
justified in reporting whether the persons having charge
of the fire-escapes had a perfect knowledge of the working
of them.

Mr. WESTERTON, in seconding the motion for Captain
Shaw to report, said that a fire broke out a few nights ago
in King-street,Kensington, the premises being immediately
contiguous to a police-station, a fire-engine station, and a
fire-escape-station ; and yet with all these appliances close
at hand for the purpose of saving life a child was burnt to
death, an aged man in endeavouring to escape had his arm
broken, and other persons very narrowly got out with their
lives. To ascertain some information upon the facts he
hoped that this fire would be also reported upon by Captain
Shaw, as well as the event to which the chairman had re-
ferred.

The CHAIRMAN concurred, and thought that in all cases
of loss of life by fire Captain Shaw should report, and he
might take that opportunity of stating that since the
Board had taken charge of the Fire Brigade he had taken
steps for the purpose of developing the resources of the
brigade, so as to increase the protection of the metropolis.
One part of the arrangements consisted of the purchase of
a large number of steam-engines for the purpose of more
effectually suppressing fire, and he had asked Captain
Shaw, after the great fire at the docks, to furnish him with
a statement as to the comparative power of steam and
manual engines. He had accordingly furnished him with
a very carefully-drawn table, showing the quantity of
water delivered, and the expense of coals and oil, of steam-
engines, and the number of manual engines, the number
of men, and the cost to produce the same results. At the
fire which took place at the East India Docks on April 27
the quantity of water delivered was 3,134,799 gallons, or
13,995 tons, and the cost of coals and oil was £l2 7s. 6d.,
whereas to produce the same results by manual engines
would require 204 engines, with 5,712 men, and the cost of
labour would be £1,428. Each manual engine worked at
the ordinary speedy of 20 strokes per minute by 28 men
for six hours would deliver 15,840 gallons of water at a
cost of £7. The proportion of the expense of working the
steamers as compared with that of working manual engines
had been on this occasion as Ito 115. In other words, for
each £1 expended the steamers had accomplished as much
work as the manual engines would have done for £ll5,
and the total saving in working expenses had been £1,415
12s. 6d. at this one fire alone.

In answer to a remark by Mr. COLLINSON,
The CHAIRMAN said the power theßoard had of suppress-
ing fires was now more than double what it was when the
brigade was in the hands of the fire companies.
The motion was then put and unanimously agreed to.
On a recommendation from the Main Drainage Commit-
tee, " That, in consideration of the good character and
length of service of late Sub-Engineer George Legg, the
Board do grant to his widow, in addition to the sum of
£22 9s. 6d. paid in by him to the Superannuation Fund, a
further sum of like amount, being a total sum of £44 195.,"
a discussion ensued as to the objections which were felt to
a public procession on the occasion of the funeral of the
deceased fireman Legg, but eventually the motion was
agreed to.
On a proposition that 15 new men be appointed as third-
class firemen,

Mr. ROCIIE objected to the piecemeal additions to the
staff of the brigade, and took occasion to remark on the
efficient services rendered by volunteer fire brigades in the
suburbs of the metropolis, and it was his opinion that the
board ought to encourage such voluntary exertions, and it
would be well for them to consider whether these bodies
ought not to be amalgamated with their own fire brigade.
The motion was then agreed to.
PROPOSED ESTABLISHMENT OF GASWORKS NEAR VICTORIA-

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

---4 b---

THE " SATURDAY REVIEW " ON MR. DISRAELI.
—lt seems doubtful how the Conservative party, as
at present organised, can ever be able to do either
with Mr. Disraeli or without him. Alec possunt tecum
vivere, nec sine te. With the exception of Lord
Stanley, Lord Cranborne, and Sir Hugh Cairns, he
is the sole Conservative debater who has delivered
an intellectual speech upon Reform ; and the sight
of a Conservative Ministry under the honest
auspices of General Peel, and to the sound of Sir
Bulwer Lytton's ../Eolian lyre, grappling heavily
with the creation of a Reform Bill of their own,
would avenge Mr. Disraeli for his own exclusion
from a select Tory Cabinet. If he were wanted for
no other object, he would still be wanted to orga-
nise and chaperone his party. It is the ordinary lot
of chaperones to be disliked by the impetuous and
madcap bevy whose proceedings they are set to
moderate; and Mr. Disraeli is chiefly tolerated upon
the ground that the Conservatives cannot go into
public except under his eye. •A Liberal-Conserva-
tive coalition might govern the nation without his
help for the brief period that coalitions usually last,
but if the country gentlemen are to occupy the
Treasury benches iu force, Mr. Disraeli will be
wanted to sit by them. The difficulty is a place
suited at once to his capacities and to their fasti-
dious sense of his shortcomings. There is the House
of Peers. But Mr. Disraeli is possibly more
ambitious of being a country gentleman in a coun-
try where so many acres have never been violated
by the plough than of being an Earl, and following
Lord Russell to the natural cemetery of departed
leaders of the Commons. There is the Paris Em-
bassy, the hospitalities of which Lord Cowley must
be tired of dispensing. A younger man might not
dislike to be banished into such splendid exile ; but
.Mr. Disraeli in Paris, like M. Guizot in London,
would be a restless and home-sick Ambassador. He
would be sufficiently near Downing-street to em-
barrass his friends, without being near enough to
help them, and before the year was out he
would perhaps return, and return on his own
terms. A few weeks would probably con-
vince the Conservative ex-Chancellor that the
excitement of transmitting Lord -Malmesbury's de-
spatches, and of taking Lord Malmesbury's orders,
upon the state of the Continent was designed by
Providence for meaner mortals. That he may have
allowed his ambition to rest upon the Foreign Office
is not unlikely. The present Chancellor of the
Exchequer will leave few financial laurels behind
him to pluck ; nor is it agreeable to feel oneself
eternally confronted with the monuments of a rival's
genius. Mr. Disraeli's vindication of the peaceable
propensities of his party was meant, not so much
perhaps to prove that Conservatives have a horror
of war, as that they might be safely trusted by the
nation while the member for Buckinghamshire was
Foreign Secretary. It is difficult to argue about
the diplomatic prudence of a Cabinet like Lord
Derby's, which distinguishes itself chiefly by seldom
being in office • but the shadow of the great Euro-
pean war of the beginning of the century still rests
upon the popular fame of the party which Lord
Derby leads. It would be invidious, as well as idle,
to discuss the question whether the great towns or
the great rural districts of England are most likely
to be affected by the consideration of the commer-
cial blessings of peace. What the English public
fears about a Derby Government is not so much
that it would plunge us into war, as that it might
wish to plunge us into war upon the wrong side. If
Mr. Disraeli insists upon challenging criticism on
the epistolary feats of Lord Malmesbury, it may,
however, be observed that on the eve of the Italian
campaign Lord Malmesbury's despatches were
models of the true Foreign Office pedagogic style ;
and unkind critics pretend to be aware, in spite of
the secrecy in which the event was shrouded,
how within twenty-four hours of their advent
to power after the Conspiracy Bill debate, the
Derby Government managed to indite a de-
spatch to Paris which was subsequently
suppressed under threat of an instantaneous
rupture. The credit which Mr. Disraeli some-
what openly arrogates to himself, for having been
through the Danish and American conflicts less war-
like than his friends, is doubtless deserved. He has
been praised for it by Mr. Bright once, and his
speech of last week showed that he was quite ready
to be praised for it again. To the conduct of Eng-
lish foreign affairs he would bring both capacity
and coolness ; and he has this advantage over Lord
Russell, that he is capable of comprehending that
Lord Russell does occasionally go wrong. Yet at
moments like the present, when the Continent is
shaken by the rumours of European war, no Tory
Foreign Minister, whatever his deserts, could long
preserve the complete confidence of the public.
Even Mr. Disraeli would not escape suspicion.
Nobody would feel sure what he was driving at.
Before six weeks were over he would be understood
to have a future map of Europe in his pocket, and
to have arranged, in concert with Napoleon 111.,
some splendid scheme for settling the Pope at Rome
and Sir Moses Montefiore at Jerusalem. The
one thing against his chance of success is that a
clumsy British public is hardly fitted to admire or
tolerate great strokes of genius at the Foreign-
office. Vivian Grey intriguing with Emperors,
and manipulating frontiers, and putting loose na-
tionalities into their places, would be scarcely
appreciated by an English House of Commons ;
though it is the sort of splendid business to which
Vivian Grey might look in his maturer years to
retire. He would at least have the proud oppor-
tunity of pitting himself against an Imperial states-
man whose talents are not altogether dissimilar to
his own. The boom of their rival despatches could
not fail to be the most interesting. For the first
time for some years the Foreign-office would be
able to thunder at the Tuileries and at Europe in
tones as.majestie and mysterious as those of Napo-
leon 111. It would be Deep answering to Deep—
the Caucasian mystery pitted against the Corsican ;
and the only prayer that the the English public can
offer up is that the eventful affair may take place
in a time of profound peace.
TILE COSMOPOLITAN ON MR. DISRAELI.—NO
English Statesman in modern times has occupied a
more trying position than Mr. Disraeli, Ile has
been called upon to lead, in the House of Commons,
'that party which is pre-eminently jealous of heredi-
tary rights, and yet he has no hereditary claims
whatever to the post. He does not owe his position
in any degree to birth, but entirely to his command-
ing genius. Mr. Disraeli is, indeed, the most extra-
ordinary success of the age. It is quite on the cards
that a man born in the upper-middle class shall,
by fortune and Providence, become the Premier of
England, but it is vastly more surprising, that such
a man should become the chief of the Conservative
party. When Mr. Disraeli succeeded to office---for
the leader of her Majesty's Opposition has an oner-
ous and laborious office—he found the Conservative
party completely disorganised. By skill, by patience,
by self-abnegation, Mr. Disraeli has done more than
any other man to reconstruct and consolidate that
party. And his splendid services will be thoroughly
appreciated. Vulgar and venal scribes, who can see
no merit in any patriotism that does not yield the
patriot an immediate return in hard cash, abuse
Mr. Disraeli with all the venom and nastiness of
their petty and venial minds. They charge him
with being inconsistent, but if we compare his career
with that of Sir R. Peel or of Mr. Gladstone, we
shall be struck with the comparative fewness of
the changes that his political views have under-
gone. " Coningsby" was published many years
ago, but we know not of a passage in it that is in
antagonism to Mr. Disraeli's present course. These
press free lances also charge him with being an enemy
to the rights of the people, yet in 1859 he introduced
a liberal measure of reform, and it is not likely that
the Russell-Gladstone measure will be more liberal.
Th, we are told that he is self-seeking. What
prof have we of that ? When has he manifeaed
an undue eagerness to snatch at office ? How often
have some of his most impetuous followers grumbled
because he would not lead them to the attack ? If
Mr. Disraeli had not loved his principles better than
office he might year after year have been basking in
the sunshine of Downing-street. He might, like his
illustrious rival, Mr. Gladstone, have been converted
at the right moment, and taken his seat on the first
bench on the right of the Speaker. It is almost
absurd to refer to these things. Mr. Disraeli cannot
be injured by the virulence of a faction. We sup-
pose that, sooner or later, the Conservatives will
have their innings, and we doubt not that Mr.
Disraeli, who has been so statesmanlike in Opposi-
tion, will crown his political fame by the wisdom of
his policy in office. We owe no allegiance to Mr.
Disraeli, or to any other party leader. We differ
from him on many important questions, but we are
utterly disgusted at the way so eminent a politician
and statesman is treated by Bohemians and Billings-
gates of the English Fourth Estate.
THE ANGLO-AMERICAN TIMES ON THE COPPER-
HEADS.—It is strange to find that with all the
wonderful variety of nature, it seldom or never
changes in any of its intrinsic attributes. This
is true of the nature of man—it is equally true
of the beasts and reptiles of the earth. The
changes in the outward appearance may be start-
ling indeed. Yet, if we search into the hidden
motives which actuate the soul we ultimately
discover them to be almost unalterably the same.
These, or similar ideas, will often occur to any
thoughtful man. Just now they are suggested to
us by the wonderful changes, and the still evident
living identity, in body and soul, of the Copper-
heads of the Northern States. There is still the
same devious, crawling, and venomous nature, but
the circumstances are changed, and the perverted
talents of the creatures have invented marvellous
transformations in their outward appearance,lheyvetroe
suit the modified conditions of the day.