The Sun.
London, England, 1861-06-01 00:00:00

CATTLE.

There was a moderate supply of cattle, with a fair sale,
and last week's rates realised. Pork carcases were in good
supply.
1
Fat beef,p score, lls to 12s6d Ewes, per lb ....6/d to Od
Pork carcases, doles to lls Od Wethers, d 0...... 7d to Od
Lambs, per lb Od toNd Fat calves, d0...5fd to 61.
Rough fat, 41d per lb.

We are glad to receive this explanation of a
puzzle; but when Mr. Cobden proceeded, with an
iutolerance which neither travel nor diversion
pears to have mitigated, to denounce as self-seeking
and unscrupulous slanderers those who commented
on facts as they appeared to them, we submit that
the injustice of his complaints is established out of
his own mouth. It is perfectly plain from his own
words that both he himself and those with whom
he was dealing regarded the case exactly as it was
regarded over here. The French Government felt
that in proposing to retain the tax upon rags while
we remitted that upon paper, it had an explanation
to make which our representative would consider
his due, and it made that explanation accordingly.
Mr. Cobden felt also that such a proposal required
to be justified, and it was only after a full disclosure
of the case that he gave his " consent" to the reser-
vation which the French desired. Nothing can be
clearer than that both the parties engaged in the
negotiations saw the matter itself in the same light
as the papermakers and people of England ; but
they knew certain things which the British public
did not know, and which they took as their justifi-
cation for a seemingly unfair arrangement. Their
exculpation may be admitted, but with what ju,;:tics
6alii-We be denounced for arguing on the case as it ap-
peared to the world, in default of that information
which was possessed by the negotiators alone ? So far
from faultfinding, Mr. Cobden ought to applau'i
us for taking a course which he would have taken
himself, had he not been admitted to secrets from
which we were excluded. How were the people in
this country to divine the particulars which he now
discloses? They could only go by what they saw.
They saw a glaring partiality in these provisions of
the treaty, and Mr. Cobden saw it as well as they
did ; but he knew a secret which induced him to
" consent" to it, while we at home were all left in
the dark. This accounts for a difference of views ;
but it scarcely entitles Mr. Cobden to use such very
hard words against those who went, precisely as he
would have gone, by the only light they had.
But Mr. Cobden, after this explanation, reverts
to the general argument, and maintains that we were
bound by the true principles of free trade to remove
duties, apart from any consideration of reciprocity.
Free trade required that we should untax French
paper whether the French chose to tax their rags
or not. There is no doubt of this. That is the
policy which Peel practised and Cobden preached ;
but, unluckily for the argument, it is not the policy
which was represented in the particular mission
on which Mr. Cobden was engaged. We might, if
we pleased, have proceeded on these principles,
and removed or reduced the Customs duties on
wines, and silks, and paper simply for the sake of li
principle or profit, without any reference to the pro-
ceedings of France. But this was not the course
adopted. If it had been, we should not have needed
any treaty, or any plenipotentiary to frame one.
The decisions might all have been taken and car-
ried into effect at home, as in any other matter
of domestic concern. For some reason or other,
however, we chose to depart from these principles,
and to make the whole business a matter of nego-
tiation, reciprocity, and equivalents. Imports and
exports were to be balanced against each other, and
an elaborate Commercial Treaty was to ratify the
great international bargain. Under these eircurn•
stances the appeal to Free-trade principles becomes
inadmissible. We had given up those doc-
trines for the time, and it was because we had done
so, and because reciprocity had been recognised as
the new order of the day, that the papermakers
asked for their share of consideration. As the whole
affair was one of giving and taking, why should the
manufacturers of paper be debarred from privileges
which all other manufacturers were receiving, and
be compelled to give up everything while they got
nothing? Why should they alone be dealt with
upon the abstract principles of Free Trade, while
other classes enjoyed the protection of a Commer-
cial Treaty ? Mr. Cobden will not find much sup-
port in this branch of the argument .
A very few words from Mr. Baring explained
the mistakes into which Mr. Cobden had fallen
through long absence from this country and its
public discussions. He entirely misconceived the
position of the paper question and the state of popu-
lar feeling. Nobody is now thinking about penny
papers or untaxed knowledge. Those topics have
long been obsolete. The objection taken to the repeal
of a tax—an objection which Mr. Cobden thought
so extraordinary—has been based upon very
important and very intelligible principles.
At a moment when a heavy expenditure
is forced upon the nation people did
not like to see a productive tax gratuitously surren-
dered, on the condition that when its produce is
wanted again, as may any day be the case, the gap
should be filled by a fresh addition to the tax upon
incomes. That is the whole history of the late
opposition ; and so strongly, indeed, were these
views entertained, that if the repeal of the paper
duty bad been now brought forward for the first
time, and on its own merits alone, it is not likely
that it would have been carried. The actual case,
however, was far otherwise. The tax had been
con temned so repeatedly, and it had created em-
broihnents of such high political importance, that
it could not possibly stand. We are heartily glad
that it has been at length disposed of, and that a
question has been set at rest which it was impolitic
in the extreme to leave unsettled, and which could
never have been settled except by such a decision
as was taken on Thursday night.--Times.

[ADVERTISEMENT.]—HoIIoway's Pills and Ointment.—
Bilious Disorders.—ln no organ of the body does disease
present itself so frequently and in such varied forms as in
the liver, and in no affections is it more important to apply
immediate and safe treatment. Holloway's remedies
happily places the means of cure within the reach of all;
his pills, aided by energetic friction with his ointment 00
the right side, will soon relieve the troublesome dyspeptic
symptoms, and perseverance with these preparations will
insure perfect recovery, without any great restrictions in
habit or diet. This treatment safely reduces the enlarged
liver, so often indicative of too great indulgence in the
pleasures of the table ; nor is it less efficient in promoting
perfect digestion,

So what is to be done ? The Marquis of Tweeddale
calls the attention of Government to the cultivation
of cotton in India, the making of roads, and all the
other ways by which India, which now grows
cotton enough to clothe 200,000,000 of people, may
do the like for the rest of the world. It is a very
old calculation that, if India clothes a fifth of the
human race, she can with a little more trouble and
skill clothe half; and the best division of labour is
that India should grow the cotton, and England
should spin and weave it into cloth. Any
year this century there have been memorials sent
up by this or that enthusiast to this or that autho-
rity, up to the Governor-General, praying for the
encouragement of cotton. But the roads were
always bad ; the means of conveyance were
bad ; the cleaning bad ; the implements were
bad ; the plant itself bad ; and everything was so
had that it was a matter of demonstration cotton
must pay if there was the most moderate improve-
ment in these respects. If so much is achieved with
so little system, what may we not expect with the
application of our energies and talents to the ob-
ject ? But the Anglo-Indian authorities, Lord
Ellenborough among them, are against the pur-
chase of soil in India and the establishment of free-
holds. They warn the British capitalist not to bury
his money in the land, but to keep it free for culti-
vation, carriage, and manufacture. This must depend
upon arguments peculiar to India, for all over the
world nothing tends so much to the improvement of
the soil and the establishment of works upon it as
its absolute possession by wealthy, enlightened, and
enterprising men. In England there is many an
a.a-e that would not be worth a pound under a
limited tenure which becomes worth £3O or -1:30
us soon as it is really a man's own, to do what he
likes with. When Indians tells us this is im-
possible, or very 'inadvisable in India, we are
tempted to ask, what have they to say in favour
of the present state of things ? Are their objections
more than the expression of a certain phase of
national development ? For centuries almost every
man whose opinion was worth anything would have
objected to the full emancipation of the soil, to the
formation of good roads, to canals, to the extension
of manufacture in England; and now we find that
the advice was certainly wrong, and that these
things are not only useful, but a sort of necessity,
or rather gifts of Providence which it behoves us
to accept at the earliest opportunity.
Perhaps this is a case where the disease must
work its own cure. If the American war, and
blockade, and bankruptcy, and loss of slave labour
should raise the price of cotton wool as much as is
feared, and if this staple is made to pay the cost of
the war on both sides by an immense export duty, we
shall then see the pressure which is to make India
do its part in the family of nations. Dearth is the
great stimulus of industry, whether in corn, wine,
or cotton. Dearth will soon test the value of any
calculations as to the friendliness of climates and
the capacity of soils. Lord Brougham tells us that
the British Wrest Indies will grow any quantity of
cotton. We shall see whether it be so when the
American blockade has doubled the price, and left
us uncertain whether to keep the mills open.
Unless the " United States" settle their differences,
or agree to disagree, and divide the land between
them, they will see the great Indian Peninsula
fretted with railways and canals, and discharging
at every outlet piles of cotton worthy of Charleston
or New Orleans. As to the %Vest Indies, the pro-
ducing power of Jamaica must depend on the popu-
lation, and on the inducement it may have to do
regular work. It is not generally believed to be a
formidable rival to the Southern States. But who
shall say what changes will not take place in the
course of the next few years ? Lore we:have,lndia
re-conquered, the Chinese Empire in the process of
dissolution, the Old World sick at heart, and now
the United States at the end of their brief history.
All the countries of the world are newly opened, and
all the currents of population set flowing here and
there, where a vacuum is to be filled, an accumula-
tion discharged, or a channel to be found. Under
these circumstances neither cotton nor any other
cultivation will be tied to one spot. It will follow
labour, capital, and enterprise. After what we
have seen of its growth in the States, in Egypt, and
even in India, we will not venture to say where next
it will establish itself.—Tinies.

711 E BANK ROBBERY AT PORTS-

AIOUTI3.

COMMITTAL OF THEAKSTONE.
It will be remembered that in the month of
March last, Charles Edwin Theakstone, aged, 47
years, a clerk in a responsible position in the Branch
Bank of England at Portsmouth, absconded from
his situation with a large sum of money. He left
a note behind addressed to a fellow clerk, in which
he stated that he intended to destroy himself. A
reward of £lOO was offered for his apprehension by
the Bank, but nothing was heard of his where-
abouts till Monday, the 27th of April, when two
of the London detectives, named Webb and Hug-
gett, succeeded in tracing the offender to No. 24,
Palace-place, Lambeth, where, on being discovered,
he attempted suicide by cutting his throat with a
razor. He was taken to the Westminster Hospital.
There he has remained until Thursday, when be
was brought down to Portsmouth, and was ex-
amined before the magistrates of the boroug_h‘,Les
terday, on a charge of embezzling the sum of A,kuo,
on
of
England.
the2othof 'Alarch last, the property of the
Bank
Theofprisonero
gaol
two
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apeopueratresduptpoorbtee di
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to remain seated,
hands during nearly t
been given in support of the
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whole rested
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proEsveciduLetinoewne,
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behalfin of the defence, said he had
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e
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Offer on this occasion further than there
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Prisoner, who reserved his defence,
was then
committed for trial at then next other
ex Borough Sessions in
the usual way.

Advices from Italy state that the harvest thii
year,the gathering of which in Naples and Sicily will com-
mence in the course of a week or two, promises to be of
the most favourable character.