The Sun.
London, England, 1859-03-08 00:00:00

THE SUN.

TUESDAY. MARCH 8, 1859.
The manner in which the lonian difficulty has
recently terminated at Corfu reflects discredit alone
upon the lonians themselves. They have them-
selves alone wilfully thrown away a priceless
opportunity. That opportunity was nothing less
than the power, voluntarily proffered for their
acceptance, for the -working out of their own
reforms in their own Parliament, under the super-
vision of the Lord High Commissioner, as
the representative of the- Protecting SOVE-
REIGN. This tendered privilege they have per-
versely set aside, not merely with disdain, but
with an air of contumelious an d insolent indifference.
They have brought affairs by this means round
once more to the actual starting point. All the
turmoil, anxiety, and agitation of the last four
months go for nothing. Not a single abuse has
been got rid of in the meantime. Nothing, abso-
lutely nothing, has come of all this popular efferves-
cence—literally nothing, good, bad, or indifferent.
A preposterous appeal has been transmitted from
Corfu to the Queen Protectress—coolly beseeching
her MAJESTY to forego the rights of Sovereignty
over the septinsular republic entrusted to the
guardianship of the British Crown forty-four
years ago by the united Powers of Christendom.
This extravagantly absurd request has—as a
matter of course been declined definitely
and Peremptorily. Magnanimous efforts have
been made by the English /Government to con-
ciliate the lonian people and the lonian
Parliament so far as to induce them to undertake
themselves the delicate and difficult office of the
revision of their hitherto anomalous and ill-work-
ing Constitution. All in vain. The Hellenic
agitators . have only shown themselves to be
more and more irrate, insolent, and implacable.
Whatever advances have been made have been
repelled. Whatever suggestions have been offered
for their consideration have been refused. Sir
JOHN YOUNG failed, through no lack of assiduity
in his efforts, to disentangle the complicated knot
of the lonian difficulty, woven and ravelled into

iron.

many gordian involutions long anterior to his
nomination as Lord High Commissioner. Mr.
GLADSTONE, first of all, as his colleague,
and afterwards as his succcessor, found
even his elaborated endeavours to solve the
problem of Hellenic discontent, baffled, if that
could possibly be, even yet more summarily,
yet more provokingly. The upshot of all being
that after all that, has been said and done of late,
affairs revert at Corfu to the status quo ante fur-
glum !—for it has literally been nothing more
dignified from first to last than a squab-
bling jar and wrangle. The customary
biennial session began just a week ago,
according to usage, on the Ist of this present
month of March. By the arrival of midsummer,
it will, as usual, have been brought to a conclusion.
And, then, for a period of nearly two years his
Excellency the newly appointed Lord High Com-
sioner will have it entirely to himself to initiate and
inaugurate 'whatever reforms may appear to him to be
in any way most desirable, without being for a
moment embarrassed during the interval destined
to elapse between the two sessions—the session of
1859 and the session of 1861—by the perversity-of
a disingenious and impracticable legislature.
Sir HENRY STORKS gave fair Warning to the
lonian Assembly of what would be the inevitable
consequence of their own final perversity in re-
jecting the proposals of reforms submitted to their
consideration by his right hon. predecessor. His
Excellency acknowledged that he received with
regret that refusal of the Legislative Assembly,
brought to him by the President (FLAmßunum),
at the head of a deputation of the representatives
—adding significantly, " I believe a change in the
existing system would hare strengthened the
lonian Government and lightened the burdens of
the people." Reminding the members that the
question already answered by her MAJESTY, the
Sovereign Protectress of those States—namely, the
extravagant question about Greek annexation—had,
by reason of that Royal answer, been finally settled'
insomuch that it has become impossible to enter
upon it again " at any time or under any circum-
stances"—His Excellency added this expressive
intimation :—" My duty is to observe the Consti-
tuion and enforce obedience to the laws. I
shall never be found wanting in the dis-
charge of it." And further, "As the as•
sembly has refused its aid to England on this
occasion, the whole responsibility now rests with
that body." Sir HENRY adding yet more this
important declaration " Deprived of the sup-
port which the assembly might have given

to me, I shall, in prosecution of the bene-
volent intentions of the Protecting Sovereign,
labour in the work of improvement by a free.exer-
cise:of the powers which the Constitution has placed
in my hands." And those powers ? The history of
our four and forty years' rule over the United States
of the lonian Islands furnishes us with abundant

testimony that whenever a Lord High Commis-
sioner so pleases they may be stretched con-
stitutionally to the utmost limits of a military
despotism. A soldier like Sir HENRY STORKS will
know how to wield befittingly the viceregal
sceptre enttusted to his safe keeping—a magical
sceptre, none the less invested with a heavy re-
sponsibility, because, at any moment, at the will
and pleasure of its holder, an olive rod, or a rod of

The announcement made on Friday evening in
the House of Commons, by the right hon. baronet
the First Lord of the Admiralty, in answer to the
inquiries addressed to him by the noble lord the
member for Woodstock, cannot but be accepted at
once as in the highest degree satisfactory. It is the
intention of the Lords of the Admiralty to have a sepa-
rate naval station for the defence of the Australian
Colonies. The design was originally that of Lord
AUCKLAND—and that design is at length to be
realised. Negotiations have already commenced
with the Government of Sydney with a view to
the establishment in its immediate neighbourhood
of this independent command. An island called
Garden Island, situated in Sydney Harbour, is
about to be appropriated by the Admiralty for the
reception of stores for the benefit and assistance of
her MAJESTY'S vessels in these seas. Meanwhile,
as an indication of the solicitude felt by the Lords
of the Admiralty under the present Administra-
tion, to do whatever may be most advisable for
the protection of British interests at our
antipodes, it will be sufficient to note that whereas
on the advent of Lord DERBY'S Cabinet to power
only a twelvemonth since, the whole of our naval
force in those seas amounted to just one vessel, it has
within this year been increased to an efficient
SQUADRON of four men-of-war, two of them
moreover being screw steamers ! There is obviously
no apathy in this matter to be charged against the
existing Government. Even as far as provi-
sional arrangements have yet proceeded, enough
has been already accomplished by Sir JOHN
PAKINGTON and his colleagues at the Ad-
miralty to relieve their lordships from
the weight of any such accusation. Indeed, Capt.
LAURIE, the commanding officer of the. squadron
already specified, has but very recently written to
the First Lord of the Admiralty, as Sir JOHN him-
self intimated to the House on Friday, assur-
suring the Admiralty that in his (Captain
LAURIE'S) opinion that squadron was amply suffi-
cient for any emergency which could arise within the
colonies. Nevertheless, excellent though all these
arrangements are in themselves, they are avowedly
only temporary—they are merely makeshifts
for the time being, until the day-dream of
Lord AUCKLAND, the substantial project of
Sir JOHN PAKINGTON shall have been actually
realised. The squadron of four men-of-war under
the command of Captain LAURIE, the occupation
and appropriation to Admiralty purposes of Garden
Island in the harbour of Sydney, are merely antici-
patory of the organization in the Australian Seas
of an independent naval establishment. Though the
arrangements at present are in their infancy, says
Sir SOHN PAKINGTON, "I mention it to show my
noble friend that we are not unmindful of the
necessity of having some naval establishment in
those seas, and I hope that it will soon be so far
maturedfleet.:: I asnd
et
eod
,mteheet
Fall s
tthe
rrequirements e
do
ifa
toeulyr,
ds afterwarexplicitly in so many words, " The
Board of Admiralty have come to the determination
that the Australian colonies ought not to be nomi-
nally attached to the India and China station, and
we therefore propose to make it an independent
command." Thereupon, a little pater during this
discussion on Friday evening, Mr. BRIGHT, in a
burst of vituperative eloquence altogether uncalled-
for,
"loading
e repudiated the notion (a notion never for
ui a.
.
moment entertained by the Government) f
o
the industry of the people of England
pose, whether of protecting our rich and prosperous
colonies, or of merely gratifying the taste and
sentiment of persons living at the other side of the
world." Let us go on in this way, said the hon. member
for Birmingham, adding as we have done during the
last twenty years at the rate of ' £10,000,000 or
£12,000,000. per annum to the expense of our mili-
tary and naval estimates, and we shall have
an opportunity of witnessing that " ugly rush,"
spoken of the other evening by the Right
Ron. Member for Oxfordshire ! "It is one of the