The Sun.
London, England, 1850-10-10 00:00:00

the rights and privileges of free citizenship ; tl- e
English franchise imperatively demands extension;
the affairs of our Ceylon colony must be adjusted ;
railway audits must be placed under proper control ;
and there is scarcely any department of the law which
does not require practical reform. These are the
measures to which we would call the attention of the
people of England ; they are measures which must
receive the attention of the Legislature in the next
session of Parliament, and upon which the public mind
should be prepared and instructed. We shall, per-
haps, refer to them more in detail on some future oc-
casion. Just now our attention naturally turns to
the great difficulty—lreland.

England has no doubt many social and political
grievances to redress. But it is the unfortunate story
of the fair land of Ireland that has ever " blotted the
leaves" of British history. The richness of her soil,
and the sufferings of her people, have been for ages
the themes of praise and pity throughout Europe;
while the anomalous state of her social and physical
condition has imperilled the fame of every statesman
from STRAFFOED to Lord CLARENDON. No doubt
the Irish Elective Franchise Bill will make some ad-
dition to the present number of electors, but nothing
like a just or fair proportion comparatively with her
population and resources, and one totally inadequate
to any emended system of constitutional representa-
tion. The Security for Advances Bill, with some few
amendments, we should like to see receive the sanc-
tion of Parliament, as we think it would eminently
tea(' to secure the efficiency of the Bill for the Sale of
Encumbered Estates.
Of the Bill for the Sale of Encumbered Estates our
opinion has been fully and frequently given to the
public. We fully agreed in the wisdom and policy
of a measure which we thought calculated to exchange
an embarrassed proprietary for a wealthy one by a
cheap, simple, and speedy process. We indulged in
the sanguine hope that English capital would have
flowed into Ireland, but up to this moment we have
been unable to discover that any English capitalist
has vested a single shilling in any purchase under the
provisions of this Bill, and we have seen that sales in
several eases could be effected by the entire sacrifice
of the interest of both the inheritor and puisne creditor.
Upon this subject we have seen a most startling
manifesto from Mr. THOMAS O'BaIEN, late stipendiary
magistrate for the North Riding of Tipperary,
addressed " to the Tenantry of Fairfield, Kilmore,
and Cloyboy." It may be natural that Mr. O'BRIEN
should feel sore at the prospect of losing the ancient in-
heritance of hi 3 fathers, but we think he has pursued
a very unwise course in issuing to his tenantry this
inflammatory and incautious document. If the -pro-
perty of Mr. O'BRIEN be in the market, and must be
sold, surely it is most imprudent to stick up this
scarecrow to frighten away purchasers already too
timid. It is notorious that Englishmen have hitherto
refrained from investing money in Ireland from the
strong notion that life and property are . not suffi-
ciently secure in that unfortunate country, and we
must say that Mr. O'BRIEN'S appeal to the feudal
feelings of his excitable tenantry will not by any
means tend to remove this feeling from the minds of
cautious Englishmen. Indeed we will candidly con-
fess that we should deem him a bold man who would,
under the circumstances, bid for Fairfield, and we
cannot for the life of us see how this can at all sub-
serve the interest of either creditor or inheritor.
"'To await the coming of the stranger at the old gate-
way during the short days and long nights" is, in-
deed, but small inducement to the capitalist, and we
trust Mr. O'BRIEN will either disavow the document
or re-consider his rash resolves. Our space will not
permit us to-day to enter into the consideration
of the monster grievance of Ireland—that griev-
ance which nearly absorbs all others in the
magnitude of its importance the land ques-
tion; for until the relations between land-
lords and tenants be fully and fairly adjusted, by
the interposition of Parliarnent, there can be no hope
of peace or prosperity in that ill-fated land.