The Sun.
London, England, 1850-03-23 00:00:00

J?_ : intim, 4m

LONDON, SATURDAY, MARCH 23, 1850.

Slowly as the Australian Government Bill pro-
gresses through Committee, there is really some
chance of the Honourable Gentleman the Member for
Exeter finding his prediction realised. The present ses-
sion may, according to the present rate of progress, have
elapsed before even this instalment of justice to our
colonists can have been imparted—a circumstance
over which we should deeply lament, seeing the ne-
cessity for a series of such large ameliorative enact-
ments. After exciting the hopes of the population of
Australia, it would be deplorable for the
Legislature to damp the ardour just now
evinced by the Government for colonial re-
form by an unnecessary and captious procras-
tination, not, of course, that we would desire to
witness anything at all approximating to precipitate
legislation upon a matter requiring such profound
preparative meditation. What we are solicitous
to observe in the conduct of the Parliament, in re-
gard to this bold and in many respects most excel-
lent measure, relating to the future administration of
affairs in Australia, is that laudable and attainable
blending of caution and rapidity in its acceptance which
may best promote the interest of our colonists and
afford at the same time the best stimulus to the co-
lonial reform movement now at length adventured
upon by the Cabiaet.
So earnest, we are satisfied, is the general solici-
tude in this regard, so real is the interest felt in the
advancement of the reasonable ambition of our co-
lonial dominions, so sincere is the popular goodwill to-
ward this particular step, now promising to confer
a constitution upon the Australians, that a large
share of public curiosity will be directed,
bas already been directed to the perusal of last
evening's proceedings in the House of Commons
when the Bill in question was unthr examination in
Committee. Even with the strong rival attraction
of the discussions in the House of Peers, we are con-
vinced that the usually dry and tedious business of
the Committee in the Commons will be turned to
with peculiar relish by the more reflective portion of
the community. Lord OVERSTONE'S very successful
debzU as a speaker, being his first public appearance
since his recent elevation to the Peerage, and the
brilliant and entertaining altercation between my Lord
BROUGHAM and my Lord STANLEY—two of the most
distinguished orators in the British Parliament—will
of course demand the notice of the more attentive
observer of the reported sayings and doings of the
Legislature. But even, we repeat, with these power-
ful distractions for public attention, the inquiring
gaze of the people will be turned immediately and
searchingly upon the progress of the proposed boon
for Australia.

Unhappily the advance movement in the way
colonial improvement has hitherto been slow, de-
plorably slow, resembling in this, as in other respects,
the inductive pace of the " Traveller :"
" Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow."

Remote it unquestionably has been from imparting
any advantage to the unfortunate colonists. Un-
friended it has been until now, saving by one or two
staunch philanthropists, such as the Honourable Re-
presentative of Southwark. Melancholy it has been,
too, melancholy and forlorn as JACQUES himself—
doomed to a lonely and almost unnoticed existence.
That its progress, even in its best moments, has merited
the epithet " slow," we rather conjecture to be
tolerably well demonstrated by the course pursued
last evening in the Committee of the Commons.
Hours were exhausted in wrangling and hag-
gling over the tendency and phraseology of the two
first clauses—over we should say, most strictly speak-
ing, the second of the two first clauses, the first having
been agreed to without opposition. According to that
preliminary enactment, it was decided that the district
of Port Philip should form a separate colony, and be
known as the colony of Victoria. Coinciding, how-
ever, as the House did, in the reasonableness of
that, the first proposition, the Members were by no
means disposed to become unanimous upon the
second, every one having some crotchetty notion as
to the advisability or non-advisability of the mode of
constituting the legislative councils of New South
Wales, and of the new colony of Victoria. Some
were for this decision, some for that, and some for
another altogether different. One person advo-
cated two chambers, and a second was earnestly in
favour of one. So wide and various were
the fluctuations of opinion upon this point, that one
of the more conscientious Members, the Noble Lord,
the representative of Arundel, fairly acknowledged
that he had gone down to the House strongly pre-
possessed in favour of a second chamber, but that his
opinion had been entirely changed from all he had
listened to during the course of the discussion. Upon
this head, we conceive that the argument is reduce-
able, as it was nearly a couple of years age in
France, to a single inquiry. If you say that
an upper chamber is necessary, where would you
find the materials for its formation ? In France,
with the debris of three aristocracies scattered prodi-
gally throughout the country, the parvenu peers of
the Orleans dynasty, the nobles of the empire, and
the ancient aristocrats, tracing back their pedigree to
a period in some instances anterior to the rise of the
BOURBONS—in France, we say, with the ruins of
three aristocracies visible in all directions, the ques-
tion proved altogether incapable of a response indi-
cative of the possibility of such a fabrication.
Consequently, such being the case in France, in
France, we repeat emphatically, of all the countries
of the earth, how much mbre obvious that the diffi-
culty should prove insurmountable in the new and
scantily populated provinces of Australia! Happy
would it
,be for our unfortunate colonists if our
Legislature, upon such features of their new consti-
tution, would prove a trifle more, quick of apprehen-
sion. Were such the case the country would no
longer be distressed by witnessing the exhaustion of
a whole evening in a debate as futile as it was irk-
some and protracted.

It is impossible to estimate too highly the import-
ance of the motion brought forward by the Hon.
Gentleman the Member for East Surrey, on Thurs-
day evening. There are, perhaps, no subjects on
which the feelings of the middle classes are more
deeply concerned than on the two branches of Mr.
LOCEE KING'S proposition. The points, too, are so
intimately connected with each other that the second,
at least, could not well be carried out without the
adoption of the first also. It is only astonishing that,
considering the altered circumstances of the
nation, and that England is now eminently
a commercial country, no regular or organized
agitation has ever been made for the substitution of
a more just and equitable system in place of that now
in existence. It is to that circumstance alone that
the rejection of the motion can be attributed. Mr.
KING should not, however, be discouraged thereby.
Few reforms of any real importance have been carried
on their first introduction. They must be hrought
prominently under the public consideration, and fully
canvassed before a favourable result can be antici-

pated. If the Hon. Gentleman should persevere zea-
lously and energetically, we have no doubt that he will
be rewarded by eventual success, and by the
pleasing reflection that he will have materially
contributed to the welfare and prosperity of his
country, and to the happiness and independence of
thousands of his fellow-subjects, who would otherwise
have been left unprovided for through an absurd ad•
herence to the principles of the feudal law.
The first point alluded to by Mr. KING refers to
the restrictions affecting the free transfer of real
estates. The tedious delays and enormous expenses
attending a close and accurate investigation into title,
and the doubt and insecurity to which the purchaser
is exposed, notwithstanding the adoption of every
possible precaution, act as a virtual prohibition to the
subdivision of landed property, or to the acquirement
of small estates, and these delays and expenses are
enormously increased at every additional dealing or
transaction to which the property is subjected. It
is true that, as stated by Sir EDWARD SUGDEN, " in
forty-nine cases out of fifty, the present expense in
regard to titles is superfluous," but still it is no less
certainly incurred. No man will advance his money,
either by way of purchase or on mortgage, until every
matter connected with the property has been
thoroughly investigated and considered by a con-
veyancer of his own selection, in whose soundness
of judgment and competency he entertains full
confidence. The most willing purchaser will insist
on the clearest and most satisfactory evidence with re-
spect to every point in the vendor's title. Every fact,
though undisputed, must be affirmatively proved, and
that proof must be repeated do novo on every new
transaction. The result is, that to use the language
of the Society for Promoting the Amendment of
the Law, in their admirable report on Registry, " the
time is fast approaching when the expense of any
dealing with real property will be so great
as utterly to preclude the poorer classes from
the acquisition of land. Practically speak-
ing, small properties cannot be dealt with ex•
cept as matters of luxury ; the large proprietor is de-
barred from selling, and the poor man from buying,
by the expense of the transfer. Retrospective titles,
then, are not merely a legal inconvenience, but a
great social evil."
Mr. KING desires to grapple with this " great
social evil," to establish what Mc. JAMES STEWART,
the eminent conveyancer, happily termed " a free
trade in land," and to enable every man to
dispose of his savings in the purchase of real
property, without the certainty of himself or
his children being " fleeced," if it should be
necessary to bring it again into the market. A
greater boon could not be conferred on the owners of
real estate than the carrying his proposal into full
and practical operation. The Honourable Gentle-
man did not enter into any details ; he did not
specify the means by which his object could be
effectuated, he merely called upon his brother
legislators to declare " that it is expedient now to
adopt measures for diminishing the existing restric-
tions on the ffee transfer of landed pro-
perty;" and that almost self-evident propo-
sition they thought proper to reject by a majority
of 58, the numbers being in favour of the motion 52,
against it 110. We trust that the several consti-
tuencies will closely scan the division lists and see
how their representatives have voted on the occason.
The names of the supporters of the present system,
of those who think the restrictions affecting the
transfer of land beneficial, and that no measures
should be adopted for their diminution, should be
well known to the public.
The second point referred to by the Honorable
Gentleman must appeal directly to the heart of every
parent. By the present law, if he should be suddenly
or unexpectedly called away from this transitory scene,
if he should die without any will being discovered, or
if there should be any flaw or technical error in that
important document, the eldest son would inherit all
his real estates, while the younger children, who have
equal claims on his consideration and affection, might
remain totally unprovided for, in a state of the
greatest poverty and destitution. His daughters,
brought up in the enjoyment of every comfort and
luxury, might be driven to earn their daily
bread as governesses, or reduced to the hu-
miliating condition of becoming dependents upon
r the charity of the " heir," or of other relatives.
It is impossible to contemplate a situation so painful
without the deepest regret, and yet such cases are of
almost daily occurrence, and there is, perhaps, not a
single person in the entire community who could not
mention specific instances of such a character
which have occurred within his or her own
knowledge. Mr. KING, following in the footsteps
of Mr. EWART, who fifteen years since brought
the subject under the consideration of Par-
liament, desires to correct this anomaly, and to place
real estate upon the same footing as personal property
in cases of intestacy.
This just and salutary principle was, however,
construed into an attack upon
.the law of primogeni-
ture, as if it was a revolutionary attempt to disturb
the existing settlements of property, and to prevent a
man from " doing as he wished; with his own,"
as a covert blow, directed against the territorial
aristocracy. Never was there a greater mistake or a
more erroneous interpretation of a perfectly simple
and intelligible proposition. Mr. KING did not de-
sire in any degree to interfere with the full con-
trol which every man should exercise over
' his own property. If any man was so im-
bued with the absurd ambition of "founding
a family," that he was willing to disregard
the interests of his younger children that the
' elder might wallow in wealth, while the others were
sunk in poverty, he might do so with impunity. All
that was required was, that his wishes to that effect
should be clearly and explicitly declared in due form
or law. He might make any disposition or settlement
he pleased by deed or will, and no impediment or ob-
stacle would be interposed to the perfect realisation of
his fancy. But if, through any negligence or accident'
his desires with respect to his real estate could
not be known, then, and then only, could the resolu-
tion have any effect ; and we venture to say that
the distribution which would take place under the
new law would meet the wishes of ninety-nine per-
sem cut of a hundred who possessed the ordinary
feelings of humanity, or who were imbued with the
natural instincts of parents. Away, then, with the
specious sophisms by which the resolution was op-
posed. Away with the ridiculous pretext that it was
intended as a heavy blow and great discouragement
to the territorial aristocracy, or to produce a social
revolution, and a change in the depository of power
in the country. The law arraigned is, as the Hon.
Member for Montrose truly observed, " impolitic,
unnatural, and disastrous in its effects," and as such
it cannot long be sanctioned and tolerated by the
British Parliament.

CABINET COUNCIL (THIS DAY).—A Cabinet Council
was held this afternoon, at two o'clock, at the Foreign-
office. There were present Lord John Russell, the
Marquis of Clanricarde, the Earl of Minto, the Earl
of Carlisle, the Marquis of Lansdowne, Earl Grey, Sir
George Grey, Viscount Palmerston, Mr. Labouchere,
Sir Francis T. Baring, Sir John Cam Hobhouse, and
Mr. Fox Maule. The Lord Chancellor was absent
through indisposition. The Ministers will dine this
evening with the East India Directors, at the grand
banquet to be given to Lord Gough.
CORN, CURRENCY, CONSOLS, AND TRADE.—The
fluctuations in these, between the years 1790 and
1839, are cleverly and compactly indicated in a "fly
sheet," just published, by Mr. Wyld, of Charing-
cross. The sketch must prove inestimable to every
mercantile man in the United Kingdom.
ST. JAMES'S THEATRE.—The season of French
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which Samson will sustain the chief character. The
other principal artists engaged are Mdlle. Denain
Mdllc. Nathalie, M. Regnier, and M. Lafont..
The re-
pertoireincludes some very attractive pieces; amongst
which, the more prominent will be Scribe's comedy La
Cameraderie. Rachel appears on the lat of July.
SACRED HARMONIC SOCIETY.—Last evening the
performance of sacred music by this society, at Exeter
!hill was must successful, the hall being crowded to ex-
cess. The programme exhibited
. more variety than
Haydn's " Third Service," Mendels-
.e.traaisceingJebovah " (Lauda Sion), and Spohr's
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Ilay es Mr.. Lockey, and Mr.
THE AGAPEMONITES.—It is said that there is a
general split amongst the deluded sect at their abode
mar Bridgewater. Many, seeing their folly, and dis-
gusted with their course of life, have intimated their in-
tention of returning to :heir homes and families,— Wor-
cester Chronicle.