The Sun.
London, England, 1868-06-12 00:00:00

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LONDON, FRIDAY, JUNE 12, 1868.

Mr. HARDY may be congratulated upon having
fulfilled the promise given by the Ministry in a
most successful style, and apparently to the satis-
faction of all parties. The task is so difficult that
it is the more creditable to them to have accom-
plished it. The purport of the measure is to amend
the Law of It.,,gistration, so far as it relates to the
year 1868. At the same time the Government
have wisely borne in mind the importance of not
curtailing or abbreviating any of the " preliminary
processes" of making claims, olfjections, and such
like. To have done this would have offended the
prejudices of a great many, and certainly it would
have militated against the progress of the
Governinent scheme, and not have given the new
It form Bill a fair chance at starting. We think
we may safely affirm that Mr. llAnDy's proposition,
as yesterday submitted to the House, will prove ex-
tremely popular, and has every chance
.of speedily
passing through the Legislature. Some alterations
and emendations will be made on it, no doubt, but
the general principle of it will remain. Some hin-
drances
have been placed in the way of expeditious
progress by the clauses of the Scotch Bill which dis-
franchise seven of the English boroughs, and,
besides that, the Boundary Bill is not yet
completed, so that a large number of electors can-
not tell whether they will belong to borough or
county ; the lodger claims besides cannot be pre-
ferred until a late period. The " revision" is the
part which will have to be shortened, and this bill
proposes that the revision should commence in
September, both for towns and counties. This will
work a comprehensive change in the matter, and,
according to the arrangements proposed, the vaca-
tion Judge in Chambers will be empowered to have
additional revising barristers, should they be re-
quire], to one-third more the number than at present
exists. The period of three weeks will be given for it,
and in order to do away with the inconvenience that
might arise from numbering the lists from one end
to the other, it is proposed that they shall be num-
bered by polling districts, and by this means the
work can be completed by the last day of October.
Mr. HARDY said very truly that it would not be at
all expedient to shorten by any further change the
time allotted for the purpo,,e of registration, it
would not be just to the electors, especially the
new classe3 among them, and above all it
must be borne in mind that the object
desired by a speedy dissolution could be
effected before this time. The House would
have ample opportunity of settling the debateable
policy, and it will be very advisable that the new
Ministry, whoever they be, should have some weeks
afterwards to prepare their schemes for the regular
Session.

Mr. GLADSTONE, for a wonder, quite agreed with
the proposal of Mr. Manny, and he offered his
assistance in facilitating the progress of the bill
as much as possible. We are glad to see that the
right hon. gentleman also rendered ample justice
to the Government for the exertions which they
had nride to secure an early dissolution, and he
agreed as to the wisdom of clearing the stage
of revision for the powers of abbreviation.
The second reading is to take place on Monday,
and therefore we may now be under the impraision
that the new Parliament will meet at the beginning
of Decanb,tr, or if anything in the way of change
be effected in the present plan it may, perhaps,

assemble at an earlier p.ri ,d. After this i'uportant
matter of the Dissolution had been agreed upon
the house went into committee upon the B. lary
and Mr. lIInuEuT moved an amendment on
Clause 4 being taken into eDnsid.mation, which
was to the effect that the report of the Select
Committee should be adopted. The ikon member
showed very clearly that there was a good deal to

say on behalf of his proposition, and so successfully
did he urge his arguments that he carried the amend-
ment by a majority of thirty-six. It was unfortu-
nate that in the discussion which took place on this
subject the harmony that had till then prevailed
throughout the evening gave place to angry recri-
minations, and once again our model House of Com-
mons seemed eager to exchange its time-honoured
character for propriety, and to ape somewhat the
fashion of a transatlantic assembly. Mr. ADDERLEY
passed some very just strictures onMr.BRIGIIT'S policy,
and showed how that hon. member had acted in-
consistently by declaring that Birmingham ought
to have a third member, and then objecting to the
a -Iditions prefixed to its area. Of course this called
up Mr. BRIGHT, and he descanted in his most in
dignant manner about the policy which Mr. Dis-
RAELI had borrowed from Lord BOLINGBROKE.
The rival plans of the Committee and Commis-

sioners found able advocates in Mr. P. GURNEY
and Mr. BRUCE, while Mr. OSBORNE enlivenei
the dulness of the debate by one of his
characteristic speeches. The hon. member is
par excellence a JOB'S cJtuforter, and on
this occasion he predicted that the new Parlia-
ment woul I alter what they did with the " boun-
&ries." Good service was done to the cause of
progress by the succ.!ss of the amendment, and the
report of the bill is fixml for Monday, when Mr.
DISRAELI will bring in a clause with respect to
1 compound hcu3eholders. The Scotch Reform Bill

also recAved some finishing touches, and perhaps as
mnch was done yesterday by the House as any day
this session, which is satisfactory, for no time is to
be lost in getting through the necessary arrange-
ments.

The House of Lords has often drawn upon itself
a good deal of unpopularity by its reluctance to
sanction changes and innovations whether good or
bad. The very name of change is so unwelcome to
some of its older members that they take it for
granted that any alteration in the regular course of
things must be for the worse, and accordingly duty
and inclination combine to make them immovable.
Wo see less of this now-a-days than our forefathers
did, but the caution and immobility.of the Upper
House often proves extremely irritating to
enthusiAstic reformers and eager innovators;
who are convinced that they could promptly
set the world to rights if they were only
allowed to carry out their theories uninterruptedly.
At the same time it must be acknowledged that the
Lords have often done the people good service, for
which they have not always been thanked. They
have the advantage of the preliminary debates in
the Commons, which not only elicit the whole facts
of a case, but test public opinion, and call forth the
comments of the Press. Thus the decisions too
ha: tily arrived at in a thin or indifferent House of
Commons are often subjoeted to a timely re-
vision in the House of Lords. The Upper
House, too, is naturally more independent, not
of direct corruption, which is happily unknown in
our Parliamentary existence, but of those indirect
influences which must naturally affect more or less
a body so constituted as the Commons. Where
there are many members representing the same kind
of constituencies or occupied in the same profes-
sions, there muit naturally be a good deal of sym-
pathy between them, and some interests are un-

doubtedly very strong in the Commons. The rail-
way interest is unduly powerful, and more than
once it has happened that the public, who take
little notice of the host of minor measures daily
discussed by Parliament, have been surprised to find
that bills which materially affect their comfort have
gone through all the preliminary stages. Chairmen
and directors of railway companies do not always
see with the eyes of their passengers, and
what may appear to the one side very
fair and reasonable may be altogether objected to
by the other. We have a notable instance of such
a difference of opinion in the case of the amalga-
mation of the South-Eastern railways, and it is very
fortunate for the public at large that railway bills,
like other bills, must pass through the House of
Lords before they become law. The M trquis of
CLANRICARDE last evening gave notice that, on the
motion for the sec )ndi reading of the South-Eastern
and London, Brighton, and South Coast Railways
Bill this day, he should move that the second read-
ing be postponel for six months. Public opinion
has been freely expressed since the bill passed the
Commons, an I therefore we may hope the Lords
will arrest its progress in its present objectionable
form. The Sou kern railways are for many reasons
very convenient for those whose daily business calls
them to London, and the Charing-cross terminus
enhances the advantages which they always pos-
sessed. Those who were in the habit of travelling
by these lines, and of enduring the martyrdom of
trying to catch a train at the London-bridge sta-
tions on a busy afternoon in the season,
vainly deluded themselves with the expecta-
tion of a great increase of comfort and
convenience, and the saving, perhaps, of their
cab or omnibus fare to the City. Mistaken mor-
tals! They find that they must s..t off against these
possible gains a very decided addition to their
yearly expenses, and suburban residents who have
taken houses a few miles out of London, allowing
so much a year for their railway expenses, now
begin to find that they must alter their calculations.
The good old custom of meeting friends or seeing
them off on their journeys is likely to prove an
expensive luxury, according to the regulation by
which every one who enters a station must pay 61
If a parcel whose transit has cost sixpence is
delayed in its transmission, and the owner has to
enter the station to ask for it, he must pay another
sixpence, we presume, for asking the question. The
increase of fares is, however, the great evil of the
new bill, and as the Lords have interfered once or
twice before to guard the working man's rights
against the encroachments of railway companies
we hope they will do so now. Three-halfpence a
mile for third-class passengers makes a serious addi-
tion to a poor man's rent, and so, too, does the
proposal to charge every distance under six
miles as six miles. Thus ninepence will be the
minimum charge for a third-class passenger by one
of these Southern lines. IVhat the express train
passengers are to pay is as yet mercifully concealed
from them ; but, judging from the specimens
afforded us, it must be something alarming. How-
ever, we must hope the Lords will take the trouble
to inquire a little more closely into the rights of
the matter than the Commons have done, and that
they will eff •ct some substantial alterations in the
bill before it is too late.

The news from Sydney informs us that before
O'FARRELL paid the penalty of his crime he con-
fessed the justice of his sentence. Ile left a letter,
in which .he stated that he was so certai❑ of the
success of his atrocious attempt that he sent an ac-
count of the as3assina.ion and an address to the
Irish people to the proprietors of two Irish papers.
This goes far to confirm his own assertion that he
was a Fenian, and we hope that the colonists will
be well on their guard againit his associates. The
Duke of EDINBURG:I, with a humanity which
does him credit, was very averse to the
execution of his would be murderer, and
requested that the case should be referred
home. The Sydney Executive, however, felt
they could not consent to this, as the guilt of
the criminal was so unmistakeable, and so entirely
without palliation. The names of the papers with
which he WaS in communication are not stated, but
it may well be asked which they were. We are
glad to find that before leaving Sydney the PRINCE
was able to take part in another public entertain-
ment, and laid the foundation stone of the New
Town Hall on the 4th, sailing for England two
days later, where we may hope very shortly to wel-
come him among us.