The Sun.
London, England, 1857-11-06 00:00:00

LONDON, FRIDAY, NOV. 6, 1857.

The Bank of England has again raised its
minimums rate of discount, which now stands at
Dper cent. And it is said that other restrictive
measures are under consideration, as well as a
further advance, possibly to ten or even twelve per
cent. How is it possible that domestic transac-
tions can be carried on with such an exorbitant
and usurious rate of discount The bullionist
organs preach submission to the sufferers—de-
clare that no really sound establishments can be
affected by the high price of money. This is all
bosh. It is very well for money lenders and
usurers, who would look with satisfaction on 20
or 40 per cent, but it is ruin to the real crea-
tors and producers of national wealth, who will,
if employers, be compelled to suspend payments
and close their factories, and, if operatives, to
appeal with their families to the tender mercies
of the union workhouses ; and all through they
are, according to the Times and its servile
flock of imitators, to play the game of the
moneyocracy, and offer themselves up as volun-
tary sacrifices at the shrine of Mammon !
We do not—we cannot believe, that the indus-
trious classes are such fools—or that they can be
misled by such specious fallacies, and pompous
platitudes. The evil has come home to every man's
door, and unless adequate remedies be forthwith
administered, it is impossible to form any accurate
estimate of the results—which may be more ter-
rible than has yet been anticipated. The Times
and its disciples preach against panic—why, there
must be a panic. Money at 9 per cent. at head-
quarters, and nearly double that rate to parties
who have not extraordinary facilities for obtaining
discounts at Lombard-street or Threadneedle-
street, must necessarily produce not merely a panic,
but a well grounded conviction of approaching
ruin. They have the example of New York
before them. Eighteen, twenty-four, thirty-six
per cent. was demanded and paid, on unexcep-
tionable paper, and the grievance would have
gone on increasing had not the commercial com-
munity, purely in self-defence, carried the war
into the enemy's camp, and, by a run on the
banks, enforced a suspension of cash payments.
The people of England must do likewise. It is
obvious that no relief will be afforded until the
Bank itself is pressed to the utmost. Let them
run for gold, let them withdraw their deposits,
and the Moneyoornoy will speedily be brought to
their senses. In 1830 the cry was, " If you
would stop the Duke, go for gold ;" and now we
say, if you would get rid of the iniquitous and
impolitic monetary code, go for bullion. If the
bank-notes are but " worthless rags," don't keep
them. Lot there be a purely metallic currency,
so far as you are concerned, and by sternly insist-
ing on it for a brief period, you will get rid of
the incubus that has been preying on the vitals of
industry, and paralysing its energies. The Times
says that "the Bank can undertake to provide
for wants, not fears.,/ This is pure bombast. It
is an exhibition of its own apprehensions—
a mere attempt to disguise the unequivocal
failure of the OVERSTONE enactment. If these
regulations be good for anything, they otwht .c,
bear the strain. The anchors by which a vessel
is preserved from shipwreck are nor.- proPoNVe
merely for fair weather they must bear the
Ammo strain that can reasonably be anticipated,
cid) it pot suited for the emergency, they should I

be discarded as worse than useless. In like manner
the act that has once been suspended, and must
now again be set aside, should never again be
restored. It has been thrice " weighed in the
balance and found wanting," and must, therefore,
be completely abrogated.

The emergency is great, so also should
be the remedy. The mere authority to
issue additional notes will not now be suffi-
cient as it was in 1847. There is a con-
tinuous drain to India, to the Continent, and to
America. Any bullion that may arrive from
Australia—the only quarter from whence it can
be expected, will be purchased over our heads in
our own markets. The Bank of England cannot
compete with parties willing to pay a handsome
premium. They must yield, and involve the en-
tire community in suffering and distress. An
issue of 1/. notes would probably suffice ; but the
only certain cure would be the establishment of
a domestic currency, receivable in payment
of every national impost. This would at once
afford the necessary relief. Millions, aye, tens
of millions of sovereigns, now required for the
transactions of every-day life, would at once be
liberated, and flow into the public treasury or the
coffers of the Bank, and general ease would be
restored within a few days, or weeks at the out-
side.

Let monetary reformers then take advantage of
the opportunity. Let the industrious classes
shake off the apathy which has permitted and pro-
duced such untoward results. The game is in
their own hands, they hold the winning cards,
and if they do not choose to play them, they have
only themselves to thank for the consequences,
whatever tney may be. In America the amount of
failures, officially reported since Ist August, has
been nine hundred firms, with liabilities amount-
ing to ninety millions of dollars, or eighteen
millions of pounds sterling. In this country the
amount will be far greater, unless summary and
decisive measures be adopted to check the grow-
ing evil.

It ought not to be forgotten for an instant, in
regard to these 80,000 or 100,000 Bengal
Sepoys who have suddenly turned their brands
upon us as mutineers, that their ingratitude is,
in a manner, quadruple.
Recollect, in the first place, that their enlist-
ment was voluntary.

Remember, in the next place, that their pay
was at once secure and munificent.

Bear in mind that they had retiring pensions
insured to them—sufficient to guarantee for the
evening of their lives the solace of competence, and
consequently of contentment.
And hold in memory, beyond all this, the fact
that they possessed absolute assurance, not less
than their European officers, of—promotion by
seniority. Always, of course, upon the proviso
that they did not forfeit all claim to the boon by
neglect of duty or misconduct.
Yet, these are the men who have suddenly, by
one flagrant and insensate act of revolt, scattered
to the winds—their "voluntary" service i—their
"ample " pay f—their "inevitable" pension !
and their " promotion" by seniority ! These are
She men who have, in recompense for being thus
pampered, perpetrated in cold blood atrocities,
for a parallel to which we may search in vain the
pages of evan Asiatic History.
It is startling enough to remember the precise
words formally written no less than a full quarter
of a century since by Sir CH.A.B.zsa Marrohaars—
words exactly bearing upon this present calamity
~wworas which may still be found in a state paper
penned in 1832 by the hand of that eminent man,
a paper relating in its very title to the Machinery
of Indian Government.

Quoth Sir CHARLES METCALFE five and twenty
years ago in that memorable passage of that news-
paper—" Our whole real strength consists [the
tense applies equally to 1857 and 1832 ! J in the
few European regiments, speaking comparatively,
that are scattered singly over the vast extent of
subjugated India." In the QUEEN'S troops—not
in the native regiments. Not in the dark-blooded
&Toy bands loitering away their time down those
long parallel rows of matted huts termed the
" lines " of their regiments in the chosen sites of
their military cantonment—sprawling in oriental
indolence along the rude cushions of their ca ar-
poys until the hour at last strikes transforming
them from the semblance of men into a grimly
horde, seemingly midway between demons and
ourang-outangs.
The peril encountered at such a juncture
being to a certain extent of course easily calculable
by the Europeans. Calculable for instance so far
That we may have in recollection the fact that every
regiment of Native Infantry had nominally at-
tached to it 25 European officers—several of them
with families. Every regiment besides this con-
sisting of tea companies—each company being
composed of two commissioned native officers,
the captain and lieutenant, otherwise the
Soubhadar and Jemadar ; with twelve non-c.-ma-
missioned native officers, viz., six sergeants or
havildars, and six corporals or naiks—with 100
Soper, rank and file. Such literally were the
explosive materials among which in the spring of
this year the sparks of revolt were abruptly and
mysteriously scattered broadcast. The Maho-
medan and Hindoo elements—both equally ini-
mical to ourselves—being at the outbreak in the
Bengali army as one to fifteen ; that is to say,
fifteen Hindoos, (and these for the most part
high-caste Brahmins and Rajpoots) to one Maho-
medan. For years and years the danger had
been lying dormant under those suspicious pre-
portions. It had often been suspected. It had
occasionally been clearly recognised, and pointedly
indicated, and boldly and explicitly prophesied,
as already shown by our extract from that State
paper, written in 1832 by Sir CHARLES MET-
CALTE. But earlier than that date, as far back
as the July of 1824, Sir JOHN MALCOLM
had bluntly declared in so many words,
" The native soldiers are always appealed
to [are, observe, in 1824 1] and the advice to
them is [is, mark, in 1824 1] in all instances I have
met with, the same." And that advice—note it
well, every syllable of it !—" Your European
Tyrants are few in number ; kill them t" it is
precisely, literally, actually the very self-same
advice addressed far and wide in 1857 to the
Bengal mutineers 1 It is the epitome, in one in-
stance, of the policy of old MEERZA. ABOO &MI: cm
—the fugitive octogenarian Prince, who assumes
to himself the title of King of DELHI, styling him-

self in
GH
thatfAinAix l I
capacityti
s h
Meli Apa uponOIeMEDS which AJ-OODEII
tine
E
Rebels are everywhere sumnumed around the
green standard of the Mogul, insurgents. It is,
to sum up all in one phrase, the gist of the advice
given to his followers by the monster of Ca,wnpore,
the sleek and infamous SREEIRTNT NIIRSO. PUN;
the adopted son of the late ex-Peishwab, BADJEE
h
RAo, the eldest among i$ adopted sons, now
known and execrated far and wide over the sur-
-2,,ee of iho earth by the abhorred name of NANA.
..;AEf[l3 ! Few, however, though the Europa.
Ttrants" of India have been, comparatively they I.* e-% •
tstipeeiaeksitingp,r(i)vnedpotmoo
many
numbers,' av erver-
any for their murderous as-1
sailants—those only being killed " off-hand" who