The Sun.
London, England, 1868-02-15 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JouRITALs,

The Times believes that Lord Mayo has acted wisely in
recommending that the Habeas Corpus Act be at once
,suspended for another year. It is a deplorable beginning
;of what is practically a new session, but it is a necessity.
The continued disturbances at Cork, and the frequent
!return to Ireland of the foreign instigators of rebellion
who have been set at liberty on condition of leaving the
!country and betaking themselves to their own shores, shew
ghat the time has not arrived when the sureties of per-
t
tsonal freedom usually enjoyed under the constitution can
be restored. Lord Mayo tells us that the Government
,possess information proving that the Fenian leaders
2iin America and on the Continent are still active.
'We do not, however, accept the conclusion that the
Mate of Ireland is worse now than it was twelve months
,since because the Government asks that the Habeas Corpus
Act may be suspended for twelve instead of three months.
1t has been ramie plain by experience that they under-
estimated the disaffection which prevailed last February,
sand a renewal of the Suspension Act for three months
only was an invitation to the organisers of the conspiracy
..o prepare for the time when the inclemency of spring
would give way to the milder weather of early summer.
With the very best intentions, the Government com-
mitted a double error. It was scarcely necessary for
Lord Mayo to protest against the insinuation that the
Government had wilfully shut their eyes to the con-
spiracy until it ripened in open revolt. No person of
intelligence could believe such a charge. The Govern.
ment simply made a mistake. They are wiser now.
They ask a renewal of suspension for twelve months
in the reasonable hope that the impossibility of success-
fully hatching plots against a Government possessing for
a whole year the power of imprisonment upon suspicion
may become so apparent that those who foment Fenianism
may at once abandon their designs. It is hopeless to fight
Against a Power which somehow or other is always well
informed beforehand of attempts against its peace, and
which has the irresponsible power of apprehending and
detaining whomsoever it will. If the Irish Americans be
'not totally devoid of acuteness) they must perceive that
they are playing a losing game, and seek employment in
the civil life they followed before the war of secession
broke out. The experience of the past year has deepened
the conviction that it is to those persons who claim
to belong to two nations at once, and to owe no allegiance
to either, that the active development of Fenianism must
be attributed. That there is some indifference to the
maintenance of the Crown, if not absolute discontent,
existing in Ireland as a support to the Fenian conspiracy
cannot be denied, but those who nurse this latent disaffec-
tion and try to fan it into flame are men of Irish origin
or descent who have transferred their allegiance to
the American Commonwealth. When their mischie-
vous activity ceases, and they are again absorbed
in peaceful pursuits, the interrupted progress of
Ireland in material progress will be resumed, and
:the sullenness of the lowest classes of the popula-
tion be converted into contentment. The evidence
Lord Mayo produced to the House of Commons last night
goes far to prove that the leaders of sedition have learnt.
the uselessness of attempts in Ireland while the Habeas
Corpus is suspended there, and that they have directed,
their energies to the propagation of Fenianism in England
and Scotland. They will soon find, if they have not
already found, that Great Britain is a soil very unfavour-
able to their designs ; and, persuaded of the hopelessness
of Fenian attempts in Ireland while the Habeas Corpus
.Act is suspended, and the impossibility of spreading
Fenianism in England under any circumstances, they must
perforce postpone, if they will not relinquish, the execu-
tion of their plans.
It is a matter of experience, remarks the Post, that t Ji
Most economical way of living is on the co-operative prii
ciple—several persons occupying a common dwelling-hot.
and dining at one table. The old saying that what
enough for one is enough for two expresses the principl
of economy which is thus practically capable of bein
'lreslised. Of course it is not literally meant that two
!Individuals clubbing together could live as cheaply as each
Vuid live alone ; but it is hardly an exaggeration to say
gat a hundred people clubbing resources could live for
hat it would cost to keep fifty if each had a separate
welling. The saving in rent and in food would be great in
roportion to the numbers uniting together in this house-
old co-operation. A necessary qualification, however,
ought to be mentioned here, namely, that the proposition
i'
pplies most forciby to the style of living in which the
ecessaries of life with moderate comforts are the end in
ew. In the case where such luxuries as rare wines at a
fancy price, or a large mansion and grounds all to one-
lf were required, the principle would not be applicable.
ut even here it is certain that if a number of persons
?whose rate of income would not admit of each living in
better style than a third-rate house in a third-rate loca-
pity chose to co-operate, they might live in, if not a first-
rate house, at least a much better one, and in a much
better neighbourhood.

In the opinion of the Daily News it is important that
there should be no misunderstanding as to the motives of
the Oxford Convocation for refusing to grant a sum of
Inoney out of the university funds to an institution
strangely designated as " the University of the Souther
States of America." The movement for the foundation
of this institution, even if it was altogether free frost
political feeling, and had no tendency to perpetuate the
division between the Northern and Southern States, was
avowedly sectarian, and directed against the American
principle of united and undenominational education. The
quarter from which the proposal came, and the language
recently held by certain American bishops in this country,
left no doubt upon that subject. The University of
Oxford, in throwing out the motion for the pant to the-
" University of the Southern States," simply declined to,
be drawn into anything that might wear the aspect of an
,episcopal crusade against American institutions. In so
doing it shewed not only its moderation and just per-
ception of its own duties, but its right feeling towards the
American nation. Even the people of the South, the
'great masa of whom are not Episcopalians, would gain
little by the erection of an Episcopal University. The
defeat of the proposal will have a very salutary effect if
it prevents these party motions from being brought for the
future before a university the strict neutrality of which in
all party questions is an indispensable condition of its
national position and usefulness.

Nobody will question the sincerity of the zeal whici
Mr. Forster professes for the promotion of popular educa-
tion. The member for Bradford was a worker in the
cause long before the Reform Act passed. His anxietyfor
a grand, comprehensive, and compulsory Education Act is
not due, as it is with so many of his political allies, to the
calculation that popular education is a good cry with
which to seek the favour of working-class constituencies.
Still the Standard cannot believe that a single.minded zeal
for the extension of education alone actuated the honour-
able gentleman in the very unusual and mistaken course
he adopted last night. His question might have been put
without the preface of a speech raising nearly all the
points in controversy, and ought to have been put in that
simple and customary manner. That it was not so put
may fairly be ascribed V) the fact that much as Mr.
Forster cares for the education of the people, he cares
more for the fame and profit the ex-Under Secretary of
the Colonies. The Chancellor of the Exchequer declined
to follow Mr. Forster into the desultory discussion he had
invited. The Government were quite ready, the right
honourable gentleman declared, to state their views, if in-
vited to do so by any motion which would allow their
expression, with the fullness and freeness which the im-
portance of the question demanded ; but they would not
enter into it upon an occasion when other subjects;
might be imported into the discussion, and they were the
less disposed to explain their intentions then, as it was
their purpose to introduce a bill affecting the education of •
the people.

There are two classes of political subjects, says the
Saturday Review, which call for the attention of England
at present. There are great subjects, such as Ireland and
everything that relates to Ireland ; and there are subjects
of less immediate urgency, such as church rates, university
tests, education, and so forth. It so happens that with
regard to the first of these classes, what we want at presen
is
a. boi!t Ireland, to see what Irishmen really want, and what
t Übe good for them to have, to estimate the degree in'
which great changes would affect different sections
Irishmen, and what the reflex action of these change*
would be on England. For this kind of preliminary die.
office cussion the presence in of a Conservative Ministry is
•8
very convenient. If the Liberal leaders were in power
they would be expected to give effect to their views
ews before
they could at all tell how far the country wouldbensietpiort
them, or what changes would be practically
l.
As it is, they may, if they are wise, gain time, experience.
and many most useful hints. Discussions on Irish affairs
will be forced on the House by independent members, and
especially by the inferior sort of Irish Liberals. The
'eaders of that party ought to make good use of these dis-
cussions, showing a readiness to take the part of leaders
when the right time comes, attempting in a quiet and
inoffensive way to form the opinion of the country, in.
stilling the belief that they are capable of framing large
remedial measures if such measures are really needed, and,
above all things, avoiding all appearance of wishing to
embarrass or bully the Ministry. That Irish affairs
should not be discussed during the present session
is
impossible, and the Liberal leaders would be quite
false to their duties, and inferior to their position, if
they did not indicate the line of policy with regard to
Ireland which, in their opinion, ought to be pursued; but
they should use this year as a year of quiet preparation
for dealing with Ireland, and carefully avoid making
Ireland the source of party animosities, or the subject of
party triumphs. To do this requires undoubtedly fore-
sight' moderation, and good temper ; but, if they wish to

be thought statesmen they must display the elementary
qualities of statesmanship. Then, again, the minor class
of political subjects, which do not require discussion so
much as action, may perhaps be dealt with in an easy and
effectual manner this session. No one can say that this
will be so, but it is obvious that the present Parliament
and the Conservative party are strongly interested in

making such a settlement of the questions at issue as shall
be generally Lccepted as fair and reasonable, and shall re-
move them from the discussion of a new Parliament. It
may be possible to come to a reasonable compromise now

which next year would be out of the question. It is true
that on every one of these questions the Conservatives
will have to give way, and to give way largely. Those
who wish to uphold the Church precisely in its present
position cannot accept cordially a series of measures the
object of every one of which is to alter more or less the
position of the Church. Bet then they will have before
them the choice of two evils, and the evil of giving what
is asked for now may seem less than the evil of having
forced on them what will be asked for hereafter. Of all
imprudences of which the friends of the Constitution and
the Church could be guilty, scarcely any could rival that
of leaving a variety of questions touching the Church to be
the battlefield of perpetual conflicts between a Reformed
House of Commons and the House of Lords.
It seems to be generally admitted that Lord Derby is
holding office only as a pis alter. He is in really weak
health, wants quiet above everything, is quite unequal to
playing the part of a Prime Minister, which is always
very laborious, even though he sits in the Lords, and the
only reason that he cannot be allowed to resign is that
there is a delicate embarrassment as to who is to succeed
him. But where, asks the Spectator, does this delicate
embarrassment arise, and whose fault is it ? Everyone
knows, indeed no one for a moment attempts to dispute,
that whoever may be First Lord of the Treasury, Mr.
Disraeli must be both leader of the House of Commons
and virtually also the controlling mind of the Government.
Why cannot the latent fact be the obvious fact? What
reason can there be why the man who rules should not be
the ruler ? It is absolutely certain that the Tories have
trusted him so far as this, that against the wishes, and in
the face of the positive declarations of the great majority
of the party, they have, under his direction, abdicated
their old position, and taken up quite a new one with refe-
rence to the greatest constitutional question of the day,
and that they now loudly proclaim the wisdom of the leader
who has so " educated " them as thus to revolutionise their
faith. It is a grave and conspicuous fact, moreover, that
Mr. Disraeli in accomplishing this feat threw to the winds
the most positive declarations of the most trusted of his
colleagues— ignored Lord Stanley's emphatic declaration
that whatever her Majesty's Government passed it should
never be a " democratic " measure ignored Mr. Gathorne
Hardy's positive and indignant refusal to give up the
dual vote ; ignored 'Sir Stafford Northcote's emphatic
assertion that the new household, suffrage was to be only
a special suffrage under very peculiar limitations, and
by no means a mere general extension of the old
ten-pound suffrage to the lowest rating limit ; ignored the
earnest defence put forth by Sir John Pakington for the
two years' residence clause, and carried his own view calmly
over the heads of puzzled and confounded colleagues. If
the Tory party have trusted him when he thus passed
lightly by the most emphatic declarations of his colleagues
on the greatest and most permanent of all constitutional
questions, can it be doubted that they have trusted him
infinitely more than they have trusted all his colleagues
put together? If they have trusted him for a work of
revolution, will they not trust him for the duty of ordi-
nary government ? Will they act like the man who left
thousands of pounds in the hands of a trusted agent, and
then looked at him suspiciously when he borrowed a five-
pound note ? Deeds, not words, indicate real trust ; and
if ever deeds shewed real trust in a Minister, the Tory
deeds have shewn real trust in Mr. Disraeli. We do not
ourselves share that trust. We have more confidence in
almost any other man in the House of Commons, though
we admit that he has scarcely his match there in mere
ability. But we must say we feel a little wonder and a
good deal of shame when we see a great party trying to
hide the fact of their own confidence from themselves, and
preferring almost any conceivable "figure-head" Ministry
which would leave Mr. Disraeli master without seeming
to make him so, to a frank confession of the reliance they
have placed in him, and will continue to place, so long as
he leads them on to victory. We do not admire their
faith, but when their actions shew it so conspicuously, we
think it very wretched taste to try and disguise it from
themselves. Mr. Disraeli has all the real glory and
responsibility of their recent victory. What can be more
shabby than to put younger and feebler colleagues over
him, only in order to avoid the appearance of saying
openly to the world that to Mr. Disraeli, above all others,
they have committed, and wish to commit, the honour of
England ?
The John Bull gives us its opinion of the two candidates for
the representation of Cambridge Univerity. Mr. Cleasby,
it says, is eminently respectable, even to the extreme limit
of dullness ; he has passed an uneventful life, in which
juvenile promise has been fulfilled in spiritless and very
moderate success. Early in maturing, the fruit has
never become thoroughly ripe and juicy ; and verging on
his grand climacteric, one of the present candidates has
attained a name occasionally heard of in the dullest
circles of chamber practice, and now and then appealed
to in uninteresting arbitrations. This is hardly the
career of a leader of thought ; scarcely the eminence from
which a man can claim to represent a seat of learning
which looks back upon six or seven centuries of honour
and lame, The advantage which Mr. Cleasby has over
Mr. Hope in the present contest we cheerfully concede to
him. He has passed through forty years of what might
have been public life ; but beyond the amiable circle of
his private friends, no single voter knew till the end of
last week his opinions on any subject of human, still
less of academical, interest. He might have been a dis-
ciple of Comte, or Joe Smith, an adherent of Cardinal
Manning or Dr. Cumming, a follower of Mr. Bright or
an admirer of Mr. Whalley. He may, for aught we know,
or the university knows, be one of those things even now.
When a man has passed his sixtieth year, we have quite
enough ground to decide upon his claims to represent the
university;l but all we know, or ever heard about Mr.
Cleasby, is contained within the four corners of an elec-
tioneering address. It is rather an unpromising omen for
a public man to have to begin life when most people are
thinking of quitting it, and to have to describe himself
as just beginning to proclaim his willingness to lead
the world when, if he ever had any inclination for his
task, he would long since have set his mark upon society.
Mr. Beresford Hope, on the other hand, has the sad
misfortune to be about as well known, and has as familiar
a name, as any man in England. For good or for evil
he is one of the men of our time. His private and
most rancorous enemies can write out an accurate chro-
nology of his life. They can say that he has always
been at the head of something or other ; counselling here,
directing there, speaking, and debating, and writing
on this and that subject ; encouraging one or other art
or science ; employed in some service, public or private ;
concerned in the religion, the improvement, the education,
the politics, the social questions of the day ; ranging over
the subjects which belong to the past and present of either
hemispheres; concerned with many schools of thought, and
involved in many controversies, many disputes, many
problems. His eager activity of mind, his munificence,
his many-sidedness, present copious annals of his life. He
is vulnerable because he is a public man; he is commen-
dable or reprehensible because he has not dozed away the
difficult task of life in that luxury and ease to which he
was born.

Mr. M. W. Thompson, M.P. for Bradford, has
presented to the inhabitants of Guiseley a Town Hall,
built at a cost of upwards of £3,000.
PRINCE LEOPOLD.—Prince Leopold has continued
during the week to make rapid progress to convalescence.
The tendency to accidental haemorrhage, from which the
prince has now suffered severely on more than one occa-
sion, is one of those anomalous conditions which, sometimes
unaccountably affect persons otherwise perfectly sound
in constitution, as it is the good fortune of all our royal
princes to be. But this condition will undoubtedly, and
throughout life, require Prince Leopold to abstain from
violent exertion of any kind, or from indulging inthe more
active departments of professional activity selected by the
Duke of Edinburgh and Prince Arthur.—British Medical
Journal.

AN IRISH IDEA OF " DEsronsrs."7-The Cionmel
Chronicle mentions that a few days since, in the midst of
Fenians alarms, and while the Government were in posses-
sion of such information as necessitated the adoption of
precautionary measures in several.
.districts of 1i
to
Tipperary,
an application was made by the military authorities the
i
local Poor Law Board for accommodation n the Th urles
Workhouse for troops, there being no other place in the
town available. An extraordinary meeting of the board,
according to the journal named, was held, and it proceeds:
" As we learn, the rural guardians mustered strongly upon
the occasion, and actually outvoted the members who were
anxious to meet tl.e wishes of the Government," as the
gua.rdians of the Tipperary Union had before done, in
gtan2 up a wing of their workhouse for the troops. "As
night naturally be expected, their decision created much
Indignation outside, and we are left to suppose that an in-
fluential portion of the inhabitants took immediate action
upon the matter, and called upon the authorities to enforce
a demand made in the interests of the safety of the public
Be this as it may, the Government lost no time in issuing
:
a military commission to take such steps as might be
deemed necessary for the temporary accommodation of a
sufficient number of troops" in the workhouse. A local
paper of another form of politics describes this as a
.‘ shameless and unscrupulous act of despotism, which
no Goverment in Europe, save the British, would per-
petrate."

ROMAN AFFAIRS.

:From the Roman Correspondent of the Westminster Gazette.)

ROME, February 8.
On Saturday, being St. Ignatius's day, the
Pope went to San Clemente to visit the new
shrine I spoke of last week. On Sunday, the
Purification, he assisted Pontifically at the
Grand High Mass at St. Peter's. It was as
crowded as usual. Nothing gives one a better
idea of the vast numbers attending the func-
tion than seeing, as a bell for a Low Mass
rings in one of the side chapels, a congregation
of some half a thousand tell itself off once

and again, without effecting anysensible change
in the appearance of the main throng as ob-
served from one of the lofty galleries or
loggie. At the end of the Mass on this day, the
Pope recites the Te Deum. After the Mass a
solemn Te Deum is sung in memory of the pre-
servation of the city from destruction in an
earthquake which occurred in 1703. For the
same reason Saturday was observed here by
annual custom as a " black fast." The first

rumblings were felt on the 14th of January,
and during several shocks which succeeded,
the churches were filled with the townspeople,

uniting their earnest supplications for deli-
verance from the danger which threatened
them. On the 2nd. of February, the worst
shock was sustained, almost destroying the little
towns of Norcia and Cascia; but Rome escaped
unscathed. In the alarm of the time there

were not wanting fanatics, who declared it a
sign of the approaching fall of Rome. Among
others, a certain Fra Giorgio, a Flemish hermit,
who had long resided in Rome, had to be
banished on account of the excitement he kept

alive by his wild. rhapsodies on the subject.
But the danger passed away, and with it the
memory of Fra Giorgio and his fellows, while
the Eternal City remains to sing her Te Dewms
with head erect.

Monday was the feast of St. Blaise, the
patron against sore throats, and is a very
popular commemoration here. All day long at
the churches which possess his relics, people
may be seen kneeling to be touched by them,
and. many were the Zouaves so applying the
sailor-like uncollared throats, doubtless ren-

dering them particularly needy of such patron-
age when first adopting their uniform.
To-day is the anniversary of St. John of
Malta, founder of an order dedicated to one of
the noblest purposes ever conceived—the re-
demption of captives. The cell in which he died
in his ruined convent on the Ccelian, built into
the arches of the Claudian Aqueduct, is decked
for its festa. When reached by its narrow stair,
it affords one of the finest of the splendid pano-
ramas which all the hills of Rome command ;
so homogeneous in character, so various in in-
cident. Little now remains besides the saint's
cell and a very curious mediaeval mosaic of a
subject symbolizing the object of the order,
in good preservation.
I hear the English papers have been dili-

gently giving circulation to the account of a
lad, calling himself Dunn, who alleges that his
reason for refusing to join the Papal army,
after putting the committee to the expense of
standing him out, was that he found the hard-
ships of the service too great. I have not been
able to find that there was very certainly any
one of the name of Dunn among the English
recruits ; but let that pass. The articula-
tions of our Northern speech are not quickly
caught by those used to

tThat siren tongue, whose sounds are song ;"
and I may have failed to recognize the patro-
nymic as travestied by a foreign orthogra-
phy. I wish, however, to assume that the
statement was framed by some person who has
had actual experience of the life of a recruit
here, because it proves two facts—first, the de-
votion to the Church, which is yet to be found
in our day, since there are so many thousands
ready to embrace in its service the accommo-
dation it is able to offer them, even though it
involve hardships, which seem so deterrent to
one used to no more luxurious fare than the
cold charity of an English
.workhouse ; and,
secondly, the fairness and solicitude of the Pon-
tifical Government in dealing even with those
whose hearts fail them, and who wish to turn
back. Dunn is not even made to pretend that
any pressure was put upon him to make him
fulfil his engagement to enter the army, and
he acknowledges that he has had the enjoyment
of one of the most favourite tours in Europe,
free of all expense. Moreover, that far from
any deception being exercised to allure the life
as the men see it in the first month after arri-
val, in depot is far rougher than for the rest
of their time in barracks.
After discounting for the natural exaggera-
tions of a self-exculpatory statement, the truth
that remains from his experience is—and it is
trite enough—that the soldier's life is rough.
May it suffice to keep away all who have not
the cause they come to defend sufficiently at
heart to accept some sacrifice for it ! The
British Empire is supplying week byweeknum-
bers who are of the right stuff, and we do not
fear but that there are many more yet to
come. There appears no likelihood of any lack,
so it is well to keep up the chivalry of the
army by endeavouring to admit only those who
are actuated by a spirit of pure devotion. At
the same time I must say, with regard to our
own fellowsubjects, that in some instances
complaints were understood au grand sjrieux,
which were never so intended. I know of
some at least who did not conceal from their
comrades their bitter regret at going back.
There was a moment when the principle of the
grand national safety-valve was not correctly
appreciated ; that is all.
The spectacle of a vast body cohering by one
single bond, and sinking all the rivalries of
i race in the common love of a holy cause, s
of all admiration ; but, as long as
menworthy
ar.e
defectible, and their idioms various,
the manipulation of the machinery by which
they are governed will always be a most de-
licate and arduous task.
Father Delany, whose return to England
this week is much regretted, was most useful
during his short stay in making the new
soldiers and their superiors better acquainted
with each other.
Nor can anything exceed the patience in the
same work of Mgr. Stonor. Since he accepted
the office of army chaplain he can have known
but little rest, between paying visits of en-
couragement to recruits in depot, and of spiri-
tual aid to the sick in hospital, hearing the
confessions of the pious and the complaints of
the restless, and all the multifarious good offi-
ces which result from having earned the con-
fidence of both commanders and commanded.
Indeed, his zeal has subjected him to serious
medical reproof this week, and obliged him at
last to give in for two or three days. He
has now in hand a work which is calculated
to be of immense service to the men ; and I
hope he may be sufficiently restored to preside
to-morrow at his first committee meeting of
an English library and reading-room which
he intends to open next week, having secured
a suitable apartment in a central situation
for it.

The hours absorbed by the military service
are not few, and Rome affords an exhaustless
store of objects for " a walk " calculated to
elevate and improve ; but there is still much
unoccupied time for those who have not their
homes to resort to, which they will gladly
spend, when the opportunity is given them,
in learning home news from the English papers,
and instructing themselves by acquaintance
with entertaining literature, and, perhaps, as
time goes on and funds increase, in suitable
amusements also.
I understand a sufficient number of chasse-
pots have been received, or are on their way,
to arm the Roman Legion ; when the rifles
England was to send the Zouaves are to
come, you will probably know better than I.
I only know many of the men are impatient
enough to see them, and thought it a long
time to look forward to, when the middle of
March was mentioned for their coming. One
of the English who have sent in their subscrip-
tions here appends the following address in
Italian to his offering :—" . in the lively