The Sun.
London, England, 1857-03-19 00:00:00

THE ROY AL BLITISII BANK.

COURT OF BANKRUPTCY—YEsTimair.
(Before Mr. Commissioner Holroyd.)
The examination of Mr. Edward Esdaile, the
late governor of the bank, was continued at the
sitting of the court. The court was much crowded.
Mr. Yenning : Sir, Mr. Esdaile, in reading over
the transcript of the shorthand writer's notes of his
examination taken last week, finds that there are
certain parts of it which he is unwilling to sign,
because he has run into some errors in some of his
statements, and ho wishes your Honour to afford
him an opportunity of explaining.
The Commissioner : Yes, certainly.
The explanations having been given at great
length by Mr. Esdaile, his examination was re-
sumed as to the proposal in 1855 to get iu new men
as directors, and more . capital from new share-
holders, and how far Mr. Alderman Kennedy was a
party to such a suggestion. This was in May, 1855.
He bad no motive in carrying on the bank but for the
advantage of the bank itself. He was a man Of sub-
stance at that time, althinigh he stood indebted to his
father for his capital. He never paid a farthing of
the 501. call on the shares, but transferred 4,0001.
capital (after the doors of the bank were shut) off
his own books to his father. That was what his
father had supplied to him. In January, 1856, he
k•egan to wish to retire from the governorship of
the bank, and sent in his resignation, because he
saw some of the directors shirking attendance at the
board. He wrote a letter to Deputy-Governor,
Mr. Owen, on the 15th of January, 1857, in which
lie said—" Our highest policy is to present a solid
front to the public—mir weakest conduct is to dan-
gle a rope of sand before them. We want courage
and coolness, and with God's blessing all our diffi-
culties will be surmounted." After that, on the
Ist of February, they made a report to the share-
holders that the bank was flourishing ; declar-
ing a dividend of 6 per cent., announcing the com-
pletion of a second addition of a million to the sub-
scribed capital, and advising that 3,000 additional
shares of 501. each should be issued at a premium
-of Si. each. The new director, the Hon. Mr.
Stapleton, was not informed of the true condition
of the bank. On the Ist August, 1856, another
flattering and falsified report was issued to the
shareholders, and a dividend of 4 per cent. declared
"to enable them to make more than ordinary pro-
vision for bad and doubtful debts." Cameron,
who owed 20,0001., was at this time displaced by
the directors. Mr. Crawford, their general mana-
ger, refused to sign the report of 1856, as also did
Mr. Paddison. He had endeavoured in July,
1856, to get persons to take shares in the
bank. He had told Mr. Goddard, a share-
holder, who inqaired why the shares were
at a discount, that there was no cause
for it, and that if he would go into the
market and buy the shares, the bank would lend
him 1,0001. to do it with. The bank, of course,
supported the price of its own shares in the market.
It was not until Cameron left, in 1856, that Mr.
Owen and himself knew from examining the "green
pocket ledger" that Mr. Humphrey Brown owed
70,0001. to the bank. Whoa he assumed the chair
of governor, Mr. BroWn owed only 25,0001. ; when
the'bank closed, the debt had grown to 75,0001.
A gay letter to Cameron from witness was read,
speaking of the "game" to be brought down in his
journey to Scotland, and pointing out how Sir
James Mathewson might be brought in as a direc-
tor as well as a trustee. Mr. Humphrey Brown
said the witness bad pledged five ships to the bank,
and afterwards sold them himself without the bank's
sanction.
The case was then adjourned until Monday, at
eleven o'clock..

TBA. AND SILL—The Colingsturgh has arrived off St,
Alban's Head with 318,700 lbs, tea and 2,120 bales o
silk on freight.

►Spirit of the Public Journals.

(From the Daily New 3.)

The " Palraers °plans and nothing else;" coolly
as.ume that the English people approved of till
Peace of Paris. It would be a more correct expres-
sion to say that they acquiesced in it. 11,-e g,ner al
sense of the nation at the time WM that Russia had
been Lt off too easily. It wal believed that the
Russian Government had not been sufficiently
humble i to teach it the necessity of restraining its
aggressive pripensitits in all time coming. It was
feared that the check it had experienced would only
irritate, and render it eager to embrace the first
opportunity to console its wounded vanity by some
dazzling encroachment on sows weaker ne'wihour.
The arguments by which the aversion to the treaty
inspired by these considerations was overcome were
twofold. It was insinuated, rather than asserted,
Vtat the exhausted state of the French Exchequer
had determined the Emperor to make - peace ; and
that if England resolved to carry on the war she
must carry it on without the aid of Franca. And
it was argued that Russia had been so much weak-
ened that she would be obliged to remain quiet for
many years ; and that before she could again be in

a condition to resume offensive operation-t, the
Turkish Government might, by a system of judi-
cious policy, render the Ottoman Empire teo strong
to be assailed with impunity. These considerations
were allowed to have so much weight that the
English people acquiesced, but reluctantly, in the
conditions of the treaty.
But a degree of eclat was undoubtedly given to
the Peace of Paris by an incident in the Conferences
which had no necessary connection with the war or
itstermination. The representatives of Sardinia—as
the representatives of the only independent State
of the Italian Peninsula, availed themselves of the
assembly of the Great European Powers in Congress
to invite their attention to the grievances of the
Italian people. They pointed out how the whole
of Italy, with the exception of the Sardinian terri-
tories, was in a state of chronic anarchy,-,bordering
on revolution. They showed that this was owing to
the misgovernment of the native princes, who were
encouraged to persevere in their migovernment by
the protection afforded by foreign bayonets. They
reminded the Congress that a revolution in Italy
would inevitably spread over the whole of Europe.
They called upon the Great Powers represented in
Congress to interpose their good offices, with a view
to save Italy and Europe from revolution. And
they declared that this could only be aecom-
plished by withdrawing all foreign armaments
from the independent States of Italy, and
thus teaching the native princes that the stability
of their thrones depended upon their adoption of
a more energetic, a more wise, and a more humane
system of domestic policy. The answer made to this
appeal by the representatives of France and Eng-
land in Congress was manly and generous. They
admitted the grave character of the grievances com-
plained of by the Italians. They recognised the
necessity of the adoption of a more humane policy
by the King of Naples ; and of the reform of the
Papal Government, by infusing a larger lay ad-
mixture into the composition of its Administration.
Above all, they recognised the urgent necessity for
the imme.liate adoption of measures having ii view
the ultimate withdrawal of all foretn troops—
Austrian and French—from all the naive Italian
States. The avowal of these views by the Go-
vernments of France and England breathed a new
life into the patriots of Italy. The moderate, prac-
tical Italian reformers, who had so long felt them-
selves in a position of the greatest difficulty between
absolutism on the one side, and ult. a-republicanism
on the other, looked forward with confidence to a

better future. The peas and prosperity of Italy
seemed assured by legitimate, peaceable means.
There was not a humane aid liberal heart in Eu-
rope that did not beat more freely. The honour
won by the representatives of France and England
in Congress, through their frauk, generous, and
humane declarations in favour of good governmeLt
and liberty in Italy, reflected a glory on the equi-
vocal peace they had concluded, and universal satis-
faction prevailed.
This was in the beginning of April, 1956. • In a
few weeks we shall have reached the beginuing of
April, 1857. What has been done for Italy during
the year that has nearly completed its circle ? We
say nothing at present of the proceedings in rela-
tion to Naples, the result of which. however, it
may be remarked, appears to be much more likely
to be the precipitating than the averting of an Ita-
lian revolution. But, we ask, what has bean done
for the centre and the north of Italy 'I Not a French
soldier has been withdrawn from Rome, not a
movement made indicating that they are about to
be withdrawn. The Austrian troops have evacu-
ated one or two unimportaut posts in the neigh-
bouring territories. But, on the other hand, Aus-
tria has increased her army in Lombardy and
'Venice ' • sho his strengthened her positions and in-
creased her garrisons all along tha line of the Po ;
she is rapidly completing those maritime fortifica-
..

Cons on the east coast of the Adriatic which are a
"standing menace to Italy;" she has established a
fortified tete de pont at Ancona for the Steam bridge
with which she has bridged the Adriatic. Instead
of preparing to evacuate the independent States of
Italy, the Austrian troops are intreuching them-
selves more strongly in their territories. No re-
forms have been made in the Papal Government ;
the persecution of liberal politicians is persevered
in ; the chronic anarchy of society is on the in-
crease. In vain has the Sardinian Government
called the attention of France and England to this
melancholy state of affairs. Its importunities ate
disregarded, replied to—if at all—with discour-
teous impatience. Austria, taking heart of grace
at the obvious coldness of France and England,
seeks to fasten a quarrel on Sardinia. And
this is the moment embraced by an English
Minister to boast in the House of Lords of the
growing cordiality of the English and Austrian
Governments, and to laud the policy of Austria in
Italy. A. conviction is rapidly gaining ground
throughout Italy that it has been betrayed by the
Western Powers. Indignation at such treatment is
driving the most judicious and temperate Italians
frantic. The risk of a revolutionary crisis in Itlly
is daily increasing. The condition and prospects of
that country are worse than they were on the Bth of
April, 1856 ; and they have been rendered worse
by the disappointment of the legitimate hopes which
the language used on that day by the representa-
tives of France and England awakened.
We this day publish a document, which throws
a melancholy light on the apathy and inaction of
the last twelve months, which have been pregnant
with such fatal results to Italy. It is a Report on
the condition and prospects of the States of the
Church, and of Italy in general, addressed by the
French envoy at Rome to the French Minister of
Foreign Affairs, on the 14th of May of 1846. It is
a laboured and Jesuitical attempt to demonstrate
that the Italians are incapable of constitutional go-
vernment • and that the time never can arrive
when it ;sill be safe to withdraw the troops of
France from Civita Vecchia, or those of Austria
from Ancona. We are in daily expectation of a
reply to this document, prepared by several Italians
of world-acknowledged ability and experience in
the affairs of state, exposing the utter falsity of the
alleged facts on which the arguments of the Report
rest. But, in fact, no answer is needed. The
puerility of the theory of races upon which its rea-
soning rests is transparent ; and the fear and ha-
tred of constitutional government by which the
judgment of the writer is biassed cannot escape the
most obtuse. The damning fact is incontrover-
tible, that one little month after the French Gov-
ernment had publicly declared its adherence to a

just, wise, and humane policy as regards Italy, the
French Minister at Rome was strenuously apologia•
ing for all the shortcomings of the Roman Govern-
ment, calumniouslyaspersing Piedmont, advocating
the permanent occupation of Italy by foreign troops,
and all this in a confident and complacent tone,
which betrays what good grounds he had for feeling
assured that in the Emperor and his Minister for
Foreign Affairs he had two sympathising and ap-
proving auditors. In short, it is clear to demon-
stration that in little more than a month after the
French Minister of Foreign Affairs had publicly
declared that Governmental reforms and the re-
moval of foreign troops from Italy were necessary
to prevent an Italian, a European revolution, the
French Government and its agents were secretly
exerting themselves to prevent the carrying of these
views into effect.
The conduct or motives of the French Govern-
ment are for us a matter of only secondary concern.
The latter, it is true, 'are sufficiently apparent.
The anxious craving of the French Emperor to have
himself crowned—a la Charlemagne—at Rheims
by the Pope, is notorious. The tergiversation of
the French Government, and its truckling to the
Holy See, is sufficiently accounted for on this
ground. Whether it has been successful
orwhe-
whe-
ther, as is now currently reported, Austrian
diplo-
macy has out-generalled French diplomacy at the
Court of Rotne, is to us a matter of utter indiff. er-
once. It is with our own Government we have to
do.

Unfortunately, accidental circumstances have
prevented our giving publicity to the report of the
French Minister at Rome until it is too late for any
movement to be taken upon it in Parliament. But
the country ought to insist upon knowing, and Re
hope it will insist upon knowing, whether theEnic,e_
lish Government has been aware of
in
do_aulle_
faced game which their Imperial ally the:tnd ries has been playing. Lords Palmerstonse a Cla-
rendonre-
putation succeeded in building for
t6eedniwith regard
putation upon the course they p
od AN e materially
apathy they have Ping e display
to Italy in the Paris Conferences. The
sloth and

dimmed that reputation. But if they have been
I cognisant of the despatch which we now present to
the Eug public—if they have allowed the French
Government to aflt. al a remora upon the r argon
in regard to Italy, knowing its objets—England,
It thy, the world, w;11 have a far more seri,ms cause
of qu"rrel with them. This Italiin question has
bean far too long neglected by Englishm4n. Frank
and unreserved exploitation's on this head ought to
b 3 demanded at the hustings from every candidate
who presents himself as a pat tisan of Lord Palmer-
ston on account of his Foreign Policy.

(Prom the Times.)

er reading forty or fifty electioneering ad-
dresses in succession one arrives at some interesting
general results. One is, that no two of them -
are—
inc. edible as it may appear—exactly alike. Even
the same precise past and the same precise future,
the same acts and the same promises, the self-same
opinions on Parliamentary Reform, Ballot, the
Maynooth- question, Church rates, and Sir John
Bowling, assume a different external mould and
form. Some adopt the short, pithy, and other. the
long, sonorous style. Some have obviously read
the Spectator at one time of their lives, and affect
elegance. Frankness, humility, zeal, and discre-
tion we find to be all in their turn electioneering
virtues, and each is represented. The poet talks of
the seven ages of man, but the ages of electioneer-
ing man may, perhaps, be reduced to three. There
is, in the first place, the ardour of first courtship,
when the untried candidate breathes the freshness
of early promise, and longs for the opportunity of
exhibiting proofs of his generous devotion. To this
class belongs the address of Mr. Neat; at Oxford,
who runs full tilt at " the increasing power and the
increasing selfishness of the aristocracy of wealth,'
which have made it almost impossible " for honest
industry to batter its lot, or unendowed talent to
rise to its proper level." He is prepared to
lead a crusade against this monster abuse, and
repeat the combat of St. George with the
Dragon in right earnest. These spring candidates
are in keeping with the time of the year; but there
are varieties of them, and the young heir-apparent
who comes forward at the age of 21 to supply the
place of a retiring father or grandfather is the early
snowdrop or crocus of electioneering horticulture.
The ardour of first courtship is succeeded again by
the sober affection of wedded love, when the cand=-
date has represented the constituency in some three
or four Parliament.. This is the second elec-
tioneering age, when the hon. member alludes
modestly to past services, regular attendance at the
house, judicious votes, and, at any rate, the very
beat intentions. The third and last age is repre-
sented in the address of Sir Charles Burrell to the
electors of Shoreham, in which he says that, "hav-
ing represented the constituency upwards of 50
years, there is no occa.sion)for him to enter into any
explanation of his political principles."

The Chinese question is of course prominent,
and after one or two vague generalities the can-
didate usually begins his Chinese paragraph. But
here we note a great difference. The supporter
of Government evidently lakes the subject, as
being, in the electioneering sense, a good
one. He appeals at once to great national
principles, on which he knows the popular feel-
ing will be with him ; he denounces fact'ous c ali-
tion wi'h a swing, and his sentence goes off like
the crick of a whip. He feels his advantage
on that question with a constituency of which the
leading and moving part is perfe,tly able to see
through the thin humanitarian disguise which the
s`ruggle for office has assumed. But the member
who has voted iu the majority as evidently does
not like the subject, though he knows he must face
it. He swallows the pill by an effort, and is very
glad to get it over. Thera ar-, however, different
ways even of doing this. There is the prosy apolo-
getic, like Mr. Rust's, who goes over the Chinese
question again with the electors of Huntingdon-
shire, and concludes with a great deal about can-
sci-ntious conviction, sense of duty, impartial con-
sidetation of the subject, and the like, the value of
which, when it all happens exactly to coincide with
the Opposition side of the house, is very obvious.
There is the short apologetic, when the candidate
disposes of a disagreeable subject by one uneasy
bolt, such as Colonel Stuart adopts to the electors
of Cardiff. "On the Chinese question he is not
ashamed to find himself agreeing with Mr. Cobden."
This is short and summary, and the Colonel has mas-
tered the policy so often recommended of stating a
conclusion without giving the reasons. But, though
it is only one mouthful, it is obviously an unplea-
sant one. Why does Colonel Stuart say he is "not
ashamed" of his vote? That is a very poor thing
to say; he ought by rights to be proud of it, to
be glad to point to it, to wear it as a feather in his
cap. Is this all that a man who has just aided in a
groat philanthropic triumph, a splendid victory of
benevolence and justice over unprincipled cruelty,
can say—that be is " not ashamed" of it ? There
could not be a clearer sign that Col. Stuart was
ashamed of his vote ; indeed, as a rule, when a
man assures us he is not ashamed, it may generally.
be inferred that he is. Nor has it less the appear-
ance of this when the Colonel attempts, as he does,
to cover his obnoxious vote with a_ whole cloud of
liberal promises and cries—the Ballot, Extension
of the Suffrage, and Abolition of Church rates. We
must observe that even Mr. Bright is short on this
subject :—" I entirely approve the resolution moved
by Mr. Cobden and seconded by Mr. Gibson on the
subject of the melancholy events at Canton." We
might have expected something more from Mr.
Bright upon a great philanthropic triumph than
the very short matter-of-fact statement, which
he words with a sort of dry exac' ness, " the reso-
lution moved by Mr. Cobden and seconded by
Mr. Gibson." This is not quite the way in
which a man alludei to a topic which he loves.
Why does not Mr. Bright enlarge upon this
" glorious victory," this bright spot in the annals of
Parliament, when a majority of the House of Com-
mons generously declared for the right 3 of humanity,
and protected the defenceless against the strong.
What is it which holds his pen, and stops the
steam of congratulatory eloquence ? Surely, having
been prevented by a reason which we must all
lament from expressing himself in Parliament on
this question, he was the more bound to use the
opportunity which an address to his constituents
afforded ; but be rather ungraciously disposes of the
whole subject in these two words, and immediately
goes off to the Persian war, upon which he spends
a long paragraph. Is Mr. Bright aware that a large
part of the constituency of Manchester shares to
feeling which a great mercantile nation must have
on this subject, and resents the insult offered to
British commerce in making our commercial con:

nexions with the vast empireof China the mere tool
for a party move and advancement to office ? And
why, wo ask with some surprise, does Mr. Cobden
himself wholly omit his own subject in his farewell
address to the West Riding 7 Was it from bashful
reluctance to allude to his own victory, or because
he did. not think it would be a very pleasant one ?
It is very symptomatic that several candidates
in their addresses immediately rush from the
disagreeable subject of the vote by which the
Ministry was left in a minority in this Par-
liament to general promises of support to Lord.
Palmerston's Government in the next Parlia-
ment. Sir Henry Meux promises Lord Palmerston
" his unhesitating support in any measure which
may ba necessary for the speedy and effectual ter-
mination of the war in China and the conclusion
of peace upon terms which will be consistent with
the dignity of Great Britain,"—an announcement
which leaves the hon. member as much room as the
most devoted supporter of Lord Palmerston could
want. Messrs. Ker Seymer, Moyer, and Start, in
their joint address, assure the electors of Dorsetehile
that " since the formation of the Government of
Lord Palmerston they have on many occasions given
him their support, and have no intention of chang-
ing the course hitherto pursued by them." In ex-
plaining their vote against Ministers candidates feel
raonoetiveeosnwtinhuicahl
ditisise rungaimb beir a
nadg nsn x
itotuhsed
sraavi
on
w,
ai tl
oi sf
they know nine-tenths of the world will attribute to
them. If they , then, about a
support in promise for Lord Palmerston, they take
immediate refuge. in the future as a harbour r of safety
and protection from the past, where in still water
they can at last enjoy a little repose and not be
tossed about by the adverse winds of popes''
gust.

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