The Sun.
London, England, 1850-02-08 00:00:00

given voice to unremittingly, ardently, and we might
almost say passionately, I,:eom the first rise of the
great Magyar movement up to the days of its calami-
tous termination—Viscount PALMERSTON said, last
night, thus emphatically in the House of Commons—
" I can only observe that those feelings and opinions
which I knew were entertained upon
matter by the great mass cf the people
of this country are opinions and feelings
which have done great credit to this ceuntry, and
which I trust—and I almost wish—no Englishman
would differ from in any respect whatever."
Those expressions, it is true, are only cor-
roborative of the sentiments already expressed
by the Noble Lord the Foreign Secretary,
immediately before the close of the last Parliamen-
tary session, and are, consequently, far from causing
us any agreeable surprise ; but the reiteration of
this acknowledged coincidence of his own feelings
and opinions with the feelings and opinions enter-
tained by the bulk of the British nation towards the
patriotic Hungarians must necessarily be grateful to
all those individuals who might even for a moment
have continued dubious as to the sentiments of the
Administration. Henceforth, upon this point, there
can be no longer any uncertainty whatever. Hence-
forth, the whole world must recognise that not
without avail have we and our brother sympathisers
in the cause of Hungary kept alive in our own
bosoms, and kindled in the bosoms of others, this
sacred light of enthusiasm, that not ineffectual have
been those speeches and leading articles, those meet-
ings in the provinces and in the metropolis, which
woke an echo in every corner of the land and in every
section of the community. No 1 the sympathisers
with Hungary are not, as was pretended by the apc-
logists of Austria, and proclaimed by the reactionary
journalists, a merely isolated and Quixotic band of
political fanatics ; they are proved by the manly and
honourable avowals of the Noble Lord her MAJESTY'S
Foreign Secretary to be "the great mass of the
people," whose views throughout have been in ac-
cordance with the views of her MAJESTY'S Govern-
ment! Happily for England it has so fallen out
that the rulers of the State during the period of the
terrible struggle between the heroes of Hungary and
the combined armies of Austrian assassins and Rus-
sian barbarians were not drawn from that Conserve-
tive minority which even at this time dares to lift its
voice in vindication of the murderers of BATTIIYANy,
and to advocate the cause of a Cabinet rendered in-
famous by its unparalleled atrocities ! Upon the head
of an English nobleman has devolved the disgrace of
that unblushing effrontery which presumes to speak
in the language of panegyric of a Government whose
very name has become a synonym for treachery, and
bloodshed, and barbarism, and assassination. To
Lord CLAUD HAMILTON belongs the odium of de-
fending an Administration whose unexampled in-
famies have made it the abhorrence of Christendom.
0 fur the days of chivalry and true nobility if such
are the feelings of the aristocracy of the nineteenth
century ! That the language of extenuation
-uttered in regard to the Austrian Govern-
ment— the Government of lying and butchery,
the Government of the poison-bo al and
the dagger, the Government of the turnkey and the
hangman—should have been tolerated in the British
House of Commons, is a circumstance that casts
shame upon the people of these islands through the
parsons of their representatives. Base, indeed, must
be that heart, or clouded that intellect which can re-
cognise any subject for homage and admiration in the
Cabinet that celebrated the victories obtained by the
hordes of the Russian AUTOCRAT with the scourging
of noble ladies, with the confiscation of the fortunes of
the innocent, with the shooting of heroes like dogs,
and the hanging of great statesmen like malefactors!
Saturnine, indeed, must be that temperament which
does not revolt with unspeakable horror on the dis-
covery of conspiracies to stab a noble enemy in the
sanctuary of his refuge, and to poison the food of an
unfortunate driven from the land of his nativity !
That such conspiracies are no mere old wives' tales,
but the bloody embryos :of crimes that have been
actually discovered, are facts adequately attested by
the authorised avowals of the Turkish administrators
—and yet there are men in the English House
of Commons who have not sufficient nobility-
im their disposition to recoil from the detes-
table office of vindicating a Government alto-
gether infamous for its atrocities, and from
eulogizing a Cabinet which is little less than a
Gabinet of assassins. Thank GOD ! however, if my
Lord CLAUD HAMILTON does not shrink from thus
calling down upon his own head the detestation of " the
great mass of the people" of England, the character
of the House of Commons is preserved by the gener-
ous opinions expressed by Lord DUDLEY STUART
and by the noble sentiments articulated by the lips o
V iscount PALMERSTON.

The able and efficient Chief- S2.cretary for Ireland
h as given notice of his intention to introduce, for the
c onsideration of Parliament, a measure eminently
calculated to improve the moral, social, and political
'condition of that portion of the empire. This even-
ing, in accordance with the :recommendation in her
Gracious MAJESTY'S Speech, it is announced that he
will ask leave to introduce a Bill to restrain party
processions in Ireland, and wa think we may anti-
cipate for his proposition :the hearty concurrence of
every Member of both llouses of the Legislature
anxious for the peace and prosperity of that unfor-
tunate country.
The history of Ireland for ages has been the dark
record of the atrocities resulting from party feuds.
The demon of religious discord maddened men's
minds, and ruled with a baleful supremacy in the
land, and no measure, however wise or salutary,
could improve the condition of a people while the
social elements were in such antagonism and dis-
order. We are no advocates for any unnecessary
restraints upon the rational liberty of the people.
We are no advocates for curfew bells or domiciliary
visits; we would place no hindrance upon their
sports or amusements, and least cf all would we pre-
vent assemblages cf the people for legal and consti-
tutional purpcses ; but we would " curb those cruel
devils of their wills," who would perpetuate the me-
mory of bygone feuds, and who, to indulge their
folly and wickedness by an annual exhibition of
mummery on, the 12th of July, or any other anni-
versary, would re-enact the revolting tragedy of
Dolly's Brae. Yes, we would prevent the recurrence
of scenes like those by wholesome restraint, and we
therefore hail as a boon to Ireland, in common we
believe with every good and wise man in the empire,
the announcement of the Bill by Sir WILLIAM

SOMERVILLE.
It may be said by some gentlemen, sensitive on the
point of constitutional freedom, and tenacious of the
liberty of the subject, that there is no necessity for
this Bill, and that the common law of the land is
quite sufficient for the purpose, but the answer to
those gentlemen appears to us sufficiently
There are, it would seem, in Ireland certain persons
entrusted with high and important legal functions,
who are, or affect to be, so ignorant of legal know-
ledge as not to know what constitutes an illegal
assembly. Even one of the Peers of °rangeland,
with the experience of two branches of the Legisla-
ture, boldly outstepped his compeers in ignorance,
and at one fell swoop extinguished the whole com-
mon law of the land. This enlightened nobleman
would have the Ulster Orangemen bound by no law,
save one made specially for themselves. His Lord-
ship, perhaps, thinks that laws to bind Orangemen
should be as exclusive as their principles. The lex
non scripta is unknown and unhonoured in Down.
It is this real or affected ignorance that has pro-
duced the necessity for the Bill of Sir WILLIAM
SOMERVILLE. It is because the Orange magistrates
of Ulster have refused to act upon the constitutional
law of the land as it is—and which would be all-
sufficient if they properly discharged their duties—
that it has become imperative on the Legislature to
make the law on this sut ject more stringent and in-
* telligible ; and the country will have to thank the
bigotted recusants of Castlewellan for any infringe-
: ment on its rights and libt rties imposed by this, per-
: haps, unconstitutional but necessary law.
But a strong necessity calls for this measure
Toeyond the ignorance or obstinacy of magisterial
bigotry, a necessity written in deep red characters of
fire and blood. Desolate hearth., desecrated altars,
murdered innocence, the peace of Ireland, all alike
demand this measure as one of stern necessity,
Without some such measure it would be impossible
' to prevent the annual repetition of the Dolly's Brae
,tragedy, without such a measure all attempts to