The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-30 00:00:00

._ .
Then as to Austria—well she, too, is surely and '
obviously powerless in the presence of the Italian
movement, With ten million Hungarians upon
her flank straining like bloodhounds in the slip—
with her coffers empty and her credit exhausted—
with all the military force at her command occupied
in holding down the few Italian provinces remain-
, ing to her, Venetia and the Quadrilateral, from
an insurrectionary outburst. Prussia has some-
how rather too many anxieties of her own upon
her hands to trouble herself, even if so disposed, by
interfering with the Italians in the dissipation of
theirs. England and France, we have already
seen are long sifice sufficiently conscious, have
clearly and unalterably pronounced in favour of

non-intervention. So much for the five great
Powers of Europe. As to the smaller Powers
those need scarcely be taken into account seriously
in a matter affecting so vitally the interests of all
Christendom. Even the most ambitious among
them, that kingdom of Spain that was once the
great ruling power in both hemispheres, even Spain
that actually aspired the other day to assume her
place among the chief powers of Europe, making a
sixth at the Council Board of Christendom—even
Spain who a year ago was dealing so haughtily in
arms with the warriors of the Emperor of MOROCCO
—has contented herself (and no wonder) with
sending a present of gunpowder to the young King
of GAETA in his beleaguered stronghold, forwarding
to FRANCIS 11. the assurances of her sympathy
with all that " villainous saltpetre." The Italians
in effect have all still pretty securely and pretty
comfortably to themselves. Upon themselves will
rest, therefore, in a great measure, almost entirely
their future destinies. They have already passed
through the ordeal of many battle-fields. They
have now to pass through another and a very
different ordeal, that of discussions and divisions in
Parliament. The representatives of the various
provinces in that Parliament are now fast mus-
tering—are being sent thither to that new legis-
lature of Italy rejuvinated—by the Piedmontese,
by the Lombards, by the Parmese, by the
Modenese, by the Tuscans, by the Romagnese,
by the Neapolitans. Let those representatives
but remember that local interests ought, at this
crisis of their destinies, to be subordinated by them
to the ulterior interests of the whole Italian Penin-
sula, and all will go as well and as smoothly in the
Italian Parliament, as it went well with the pro-
vinces themselves, when one after another they
were abandoned, for several months together, to
their own resources in self-government. Anarchy
alone was predicted then and anarchy
existed only in those sinister prophecies. So
may it be now in the bosom of the new Italian
Parliament. There, all jealousies and heartburnings
should be forgotten, The Italian alone ought in
each instance to be recognised, and not in any one
instance the mere provincial—not the Tuscan or
the Modenese, not the Lombard or the Par-
mese, not the Romagnese, the Piedmontese, or
the Neapolitan. It should be recollected, too,
by these new representatives of this new
nationality that, while Europe is watching
them closely, some with secret hatred, but the most
with sympathy—the first question of all that will
come before them to be answered plainly—Aye or
No—will, accordingly as it may be answered, give
the keynote for good or for evil to the future
peninsula.
of the whole Romalt is for-
tunately a question that is simple enough.
It is already put ; may we not say it is
already answered—[answered, though the Par-
liament by which it will have to be answered has
not yet assembled, though that Parliament has not
yet even had numbered up its full complement of
representatives]----it is the one root question to Italy
of her Unification.

Economy and Retrenchment is excellent advice
to most of us. Even the richest sometimes need it,
for we have all a strange facility for approaching
the margin of our incomes. And then the Re-
trenchment is not felt when Economy produces it;
for good management leaves us as good results as
we obtained by ill-advised prodigality. The diffi-
culty lies in teaching the good adminstration, from
which Retrenchment of expenditure follows rather
with pleasure and satisfaction than inconvenience.
Economy is not niggardliness and pinching; it is
doing all things in the best way, and it cannot be
the best if there be waste of resources. The highest
efficiency by the least expenditure necessary topro-
cure it, is what should be understood by Economy.
This, however, in national even more than in pri-
vate business, is a difficult problem ; and we do
not find that Mr. BRIGHT, who seems to have de-
livered such a long and passionate philippic against
our national expenditure last night, did much
towards its solution. It was but too easy to show
how we had gone on increasing our expenditure till
it reached the enormous amount, unparalleled
we believe in time of peace, at which it
arrived last year. The difficulty was to
shew how to get back again, without impair-
ing our defensive strength. Be it, as Mr.
BRIGHT thinks, delusion, or be it wisdom, while all
Europe eats, drinks, and sleeps on its arms, we do
not think the English nation will easily be pur-
suaded to go to sleep without pistols beneath its
pillow. We do not indeed imagine that any one
in particular thinks of attacking and robbing us ;
but when the nations all around us are accoutred
like brigands, we prefer to " keep our powder dry,"
as well as "to trust in God." Rather we should
say, it were impious to trust Him while we neg-
lected the plainest precautions for our safety.
There are two ways in which economy and
retrenchment might be taught to our governors,
and both have the sanction of precedent and expe-
rience. One is the regular orthodox House of
Commons one, of a Committee. The evil is that
Committees are of very slow operation, and waste
an immense amount of time and paper on irrele-
vant questions and answers. Still, if fairly
constructed, they do elicit a great deal of informa-
tion ; and a member of Parliament who devotes
himself to the subject, by the help of a good
Committee, and well arranged returns, may
let daylight into most of the dark corners
where our money is muddled away unobserved.
Mr. BRIGHT and his colleagues in opinion would
do excellent service, if they would resolutely devote
themselves to this work. Unless the general public
are much misinformed, the Admiralty in its man-
agement throughout, its Dockyard management
especially, is a most fertile source of waste. Now,
we want to know on authority. what is the true
state of things ; whether, as alleged, we might
have better built ships, and better equipped
and manned, at half the cost or so. No one
desires to pinch and save by grinding down
seamen's wages and the pay of efficient officers;
hut, some of the broad facts, such, for instance, as
those proclaimed by Lord C. PAGET, have persuaded
the public that half its money is spent not on ships
but on blunders in building them. We should like,
therefore, to have found Mr. BRIGHT and his friends
pledging themselves to move for two or three com-
mittees to overhaul the general management, and
the details of expenditure in the navy, at the Horse
Guards, and on the miscellaneous estimates also.
The prospect of having such committees to face
would alone have done much to keep down the