The Sun.
London, England, 1861-12-11 00:00:00

‘THEi SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 11, 1861.

or wrongly, that although great results havo un-1
doubtedly arisen from the existing code, those re-
sults
are not tantamount to the sum of money given
for the purpose, and have in consequence proposed
a system by which they consider those results may
be augmented—l think it is worthy of your con-
sideration whether, under these circumstances, it is
desirable that we should revert entirely to the old
system of the Minute of 1846. I will not go into
details. In short, I abstain from making any pledge
whatever as to the course which her Majesty's Go-

vernment may pursue upon this subject. There is
only one point I would remark upon. In the pre-
sence of many gentlemen, the great majority of
whom are clergymen, I hardly expected to see, not-
withstanding the violence of the denunciations we
have heard as to the apprehended effect of the code,
the same charge repeated of danger to the religious
instruction of the people. Almost every great change

has been subject to some charge of that sort. At one
time the objection was lest we should inspect the

religious instruction given in the schools, and I do
not wonder that there is extreme jealousy on this

point, for it shows that in the mind of the great
majority of educationalists it is necessary that we
should in one way or another combine religious with
secular instruction—(hear)--but I cannot under-
stand, and I assure you I have given my best atten-
tion to the subject, how the new code can affect that
question. The very first deputation I received here
was a very interesting one of about a dozen or more

clergymenlabouring in schools in populous or poor
districts of the metropolis. They unquestionably
made out a strong case—a case unfortunately al-
most too strong for themselves—as to the pecuniary
results of the new code upon their schools. One gen-
tleman adverted to the injury that it would do to
the religious teaching, whereupon another clergy-
man got up and said he was sure every one present
would agree with him when he said that he did not
attach a feather's weight to the religious part of the
subject, and he added that he should be ashamed of
himself as a manager of schools—and the great ma-
jority of the clergy were, he believed, of the same
opinion—if he thought this code would enable them
or allow them to make the slightest alteration in

the religious instruction given them in the schools.
It is clear that as to teaching, reading and writing
are with us as much a part of the religious as of
secular education. If you keep a child at school for
a certain length of time, and do not teach him to
read and write, the religious instruction you may
give him would have but little effect upon that

MB. IiaRSMAN,JII.P., ON 2HE ,AME-

B NAN QUESTION.

STROUD, TUESDAY.
This afternoon the Right Hon. E. Horsman,

M.P., addressed his constituents in the Subscrip-
tion-room of this town. There was a very nume-
rous attendance, and the right hon. gentleman was
well received. Mr. Fowster occupied the chair.
Mr. HORSMAN addressed the meeting at consider-
able length. He commenced by saying—Gentle-
men, I thank you highly for the kind reception
you have given me, and I can assure you that it is
always a pleasure to me to find myself among my

constituents at Stroud. It is an event to which I

look with pleasing anticipation, and to which I look

back with agreeable recollections, because, although
there have been, and always will be, differences of
opinion between me and some of my constituents,
with whom I have been at political warfare since I

appeared amongst you, the only effect of those diffe-

rences has been to give a livelier and gayer cha-
racter to our public meetings, so that people at a
distance may consider my annual meeting with you
as one of the gaieties of the winter season.
(Laughter.) But I know that those differences are

not of such a character as to interfere with the ge-
neral satisfactory state of our relations, or in
the smallest degree to endanger our permanent

political connection. (Hear, and a laugh.)
I now become before you at a period of unusual
national solicitude, and on this occasion we shall
have to consider the future more than the past,

During the last session there were three principal
matters which occupied the attention of Parliament
—parliamentary reform, foreign policy, and finance.
The question of finance I will dismiss with this
single remark. Last year the repeal of the paper
duty, which had been postponed in 1860, was
again brought forward. I felt it my duty to repeat
the objections which I had advanced in 1860. But
Parliament took a different view ; the excise duty
on paper was repealed, the question was settled, the
controversy is over, and I have no wish to revive
it. (Hear, hear.) The question of parliamentary
reform was killed in 1860, and was buried in the
silence of the Queen's speech in 1861. The nation,
instead of indulging in a general meurning,indulged
in something that sounded like a general fit of mer-
riment ; and well it might, when it found that that
great demand for Parliamentary reform—that na-
tional, overpowering, and irresistible demand, that

had been in the mouths of every minister and states-
man—that had been the prominent topic of every
Queen's speech, the cause of so many cabinet coun-
cils, the subject of so many hustings speeches, was
by the unanimous testimony of his o Nn champions
and apostles, so far as regarded the constituencies,
such a delusion—so far as regarded the representa-
tives such a gigantic sham, that out of the 650 of
the deeply pledged members of the House of Com-
mons, only 46 could be found to enter even a formal
and unmeaning protest against a minister that he
stormed office upon a pledge of reform, abandoned
reform, and yet retained office. (Hear, hear.) Lord
John Russell was the only man whose sincerity was

undoubted. He had been for years persevering in

pendence." After tracing the struggle from the "
commencement to the present time, he expressed
his opinion that it was not a question of the resto-
ration of the Union. It was rather a question as
to the terms of separation, as to the boundary to be

established. That was a question for arbitration,
that could be more easily carried out before more

blood is shed and more exasperation caused than
after a long, pernicious, and calamitous war.
(Hear.) He next came to the affair of the Trent,

and coutinued :—As to the character of that out-

rage I say nothing of it. It has been fully dis-
cussed. People have formed their own opinions,
and we need not go into any of the circumstances
of that transaction. This only we know, that in
the first instance it created great astonishment and

great indignation, which, however, in a most cre-
ditable manner was instantly crushed from the feel-

in g that the gravity of the occurrence compelled the
people to be active, and with one voice they asked the
question, What does the law officers of the crown say
as to the law of the case? And so determined were the

people of England not to be incensed by the feeling or
sentiment, even under the violation of what they
considered the most sacred claim made by the English

nation—that of giving an asylum to political refu-
gees—the point of all others on which the English
nation has always been the most sensitive. So de-
termined were they not to set up any claim that

could not be vindicated by law, that I believe if the
law officers had stated it to be their opinion that

,he conduct of Capt. Wilks was in conformity with

international law, and if that opinion had been en-

dorsed by the profession at large, the people would
have acquiesced, I will not say without a murmur,
but certainly without any outward signs of resist-
ance. (Hear.) Well, the law officers of the Crown
have advised her Majesty that the act complained of

is a breach of international law, and, according to
some semi-official statements which havo been pub-
lished, the Government havo sent a despatch to
Lord Lyons laying down the terms on which ho is
instructed to demand reparation from the Cabinet
at Washington ; and I believe there are two charac-
teristics of that message which aro generally accept-
able to Europe. The first is that the demand is said