The Sun.
London, England, 1861-11-21 00:00:00

public dealing with the estimates, and indeed the
way in which they are now managed is
the very burlesque of voting them through
the representatives, such as they are, of the people.
A a correspondent in a contemporary thus describes
the present process—" The Budget is afterwards
submitted to the Legislative Chamber by Mini-
sterial departments, so that the Chamber, which
cannot present an amendment, cannot exercise
the right of rejection but on the entire Budget
of each Minister. Should they object, for in-
stance, to the expenses of any single office in
the department of the Minister of Finance, they
cannot reject the item without rejecting the whole
of the estimates of that department, including those
for the payment of the interest on the national debt.
With this alternative no deputy will venture to exer-
cise his right. When the Budget has passed through
these various trials it is put to the vote as a whole,
and, of course, passed, and it is after this last opera-
tion that the supplementary and extraordinary
credits are decreed. The first reform of this system
of voting the supplies will be proposed, and, no
doubt, adopted, by the Senate in its sitting an-
nounced for the 2d, and the Budget will in future
be voted by what is called chapters' instead of by
' Ministries."

What will be the form and working of the pro-
posed alteration it is useless to consider till we see
it—but though we have much faith in the power of
discussion and publicity, we must acknowledge,
with the Journal des Debats, that the vote by
chapters, and the abolition of supplementary credits
cannot in themselves be enough. But two modes
are known to any of us —to individuals and nations
alike—of rectifying our annual balance-sheet, either
obtaining more money, or diminishing our expenses.
The first seems difficult indeed, if we may judge by
the 'proposal which is chiefly talked of. ,When
a tax on Lucifer matches is the first expedient
proposed for raising the wind, one might sup-
pose that the second would be a resort to the being
whose name they bear ; in other words that French
finance was going whither it would not be quite

polite to say.
When LUCIFER has, however, done his best in
response to M. FOULD'S supplications, we cannot
doubt that retrenchment will be the only one left
of the two remedies. To this or to revolution it will
come at last ; if the former be preferred, it must be
as M. FOULD himself appears to see, by giving up
the office of arbitrator for all Europe. An army
and navy not for defiance, bat for defence merely,
is the principle which can alone save France finan•
cially. It will be long, we fear, before national as
well as Imperial pride will submit to this necessity.
Some evasion will be found—some crooked policy
resorted to—if LUCIFER will not do, SATAN him-
self would be invoked rather than the grand policy
of disquieting all Europe should be given up.

It must certainly be recognised as a very extra-
ordinary turning of the tables indeed when Sir DE
LACY EVANS (of all men in England!) can look con-
fidently to Sir ROBERT PEEL (of all men in Ire-
land !) for the rousing at last of the sister island to

a tardy but energetic participation in the Volunteer

Movement. Sir DE LACY EVANS—who can say

with justice, "I believe I was the first person who

had the honour of presiding at a metropolitan mew

ng for the formation of a Volunteer force !" Sir

ROBERT PEEL—who, on the contrary, was, not so

very long ago, conspicuous among those who strove

to turn that same movement into the uttermost
ridicule! Yet, so it is. The gallant old veteran
the member for the City of Westminster does look
confidently to the right hon. baronet the Secretary
for Ireland for the extension of that patriotic act i
vity to the Irish people which has now been mani-
fested, with such admirable results, during the last

two years among all ranks and classes of English•

men and Scotchmen. And no wonder, say we, tha

he should do so—no wonder that the member for
Westminister should look with this confidence to
the present Irish Secretary in this matter, because

th® third Sir ROBERT PEEL already has so far emu-
lated his illustrious father in respect to one of his
very noblest characteristics—in that he never hesi-

totes to acknowlelge an error of judgment on his
own part so soon as he himself has come to recog-
nise it. He did this, right manfully, he did precisely
this some months back in regard to what he had pre-
viously said and thought derisively about the Volun-

teer movement. And so it came to pass, we repeat
quite naturally, almost as a matter of course, that'
General Sir DE LACY EVANS, one of the original
promoters of the Volunteer movement in England,
turns hopefully to Sir ROBERT PEEL for the fur-
therance of that same movement now in Ireland.

Referring to the actual state of things in regard
to this movement in the three great divisions of
the United Kingdom, the member for the City of
Westminster has recently observed, in his very able
and comprehensive address to his constituents,—
In England and Scotland the more public-spirited
of the nobles, gentry, middle classes, and others
have induced the Government to acquiesce in, and
even give some support to, the patriotic armament
which has thus sprung up throughout the length and
breadth of Great Britain." Adding thereupon—
" The people of Ireland have not been hitherto
thought wanting in vigour, good faith, or military
aptitude. In my humble opinion it is now the duty
of the same classes in the sister island to emulate the
patriotic conduct in this matter of their fellow sub-
jects on this side the Channel. 1 venture to believe
that, instead of sectarian differences being the real
cause of this affronting exclusion, it is more likely
to be attributable to the bureaucracy of the Vice-
regal Government, whose repugnance to deviate
from their habitual routine, as is usually the case
with other bureaucracies, led them to thwart this
movement." And thereupon it is that Sir DE
LACY EVANS turns confidently to the sometime
derider of the Volunteer movement—turns with im-
plicit reliance to the present Irish Secretary—
looking to him especially for the breaking
down of the barrier of " habituable routine "
recognizable in this, as in so many other
things in the Hibernian Bureaucracy ! Nothing
could be more explicit or more directly to
the purpose than the words applied to this subject
by the member for the City of Westminster. He
`writes—" Sir ROBERT PEEL, however, I am glad
to find, at present fills the office formerly held by

Sir ARTHUR WELLESLET. I conclude that he has
duly weighed the statements on this subject of his
great predecessor ; and I have too high an estima-
tion of his intelligence and vigour to doubt of his
setting this whole matter right, by which he will
free his colleagues from deserved reproach, and in-
augurate advantageously his own official career."
Ay, have great confidence ourselves that in
LACY
these anticipations Sir DE
13,- doomed to disappointment.
-
I Sir ROBERT PEEL'S manly character is coming
I out every day more brightly and more agreeably in
the estimation of his fellow countrymen. He is
showing his intelligence repeatedly. He is always
as frank and as outspoken as we could wish him to
be, in his responsible capacity as a public adminis-
trator. His speech the other day at Belfast—
whatever else may be thought of it by some—was
as manly as well could be.
In was a speech, remember, uttered in some re-
k 'Teets under circumstances of much delicacy. For

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