The Sun.
London, England, 1850-07-06 00:00:00

DfCO3IE.

Customs . • • •
Excise . • • • • •
Stamps •.. ..... ......
Taxes
Post-office • • • • •
Crown Lands . • .• ...... • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Miscellaneous • .........
Imprest and other Moneys • •
Produce of the sale of Old Stores .. • •
Repayments of AdYances

12,454,601

13,4114,050

Lord ASHLEY between the days of the Oaks and the
Derby, when the Members of the Legislature were
otherwise engaged. It is most earnestly to be hoped
that the Commons, rendered indignant by the trick
played upon them by the sanctimonious assistants of
the Noble Lord the Member for Batb, will con-
gregate in such numbers as to demonstrate by their
attendance, and subsequently by their votes on the
division, the disgust with which they have viewed
these recent proceedings—especially seeing how
much the country has already suffered from the
alteration—yet more especially from the un-
doubted illegality of the change—and most
especially because of the indignity there-
by brought upon the Government and the
SOVEREIGN. As to the inconveniences devolving upon
the population in consequence of the cessation of all
Sunday deliveries, our columns, ever since the 23d
ultimo, have been crowded with instances. In refer-
ence to this the satirical artists of Punch have af-
forded yet more striking illustrations, showing how
the devotion of the worshipper may be interrupted
by anxieties in regard to a bill overdue, how the
heart of an aged parent may be agonized by fears as
to the health of a beloved daughter, how the
swindler may be enabled to escape scot-
free from the --clutches of his victims, and how
the artisan may be driven from his home to
the alehouse by the lack of his weekly newspaper.
All these, and innumerable other evils, arising from
the closing of the post-offices and the stoppage of the
deliveries on the Sunday ! Regarding the illegality
of the order issued by the direction of the Crown, in
accordance with the recommendation of the Cabinet,
there can no longer be any doubt whatever. The
illegality, first hinted at in the House of Peers by
Lord BROUGHAM, has been since then seriously inves-
tigated by the highest legal authorities, and no reason-
able man can any longer hesitate as to whether or
not the change now summarily effected in obedience
to the importunity of the Sabbatarians, required, in
order to render it valid in operation, the deliberate
decision of both Houses, confirmed by the assent of
the SOVEREIGN. Finally, respecting the indignity
said to have been cast upon the Crown and upon the
Government by this precipitate movement of her
MAJESTY'S Ministers, it must be sufficiently obvious
that such must necessarily be the case when-
ever the Monarch is hurried by her poli-
tical advisers to the performance of an act
which immediately afterwards proves to have been
effected in direct antagonism to the principles of the
Constitution. More particularly must this be the
case when the Prime Minister avows, as Lord JOHN
RUSSELL has actually avowed in regard to this un-
fortunate business, that the Cabinet has been pro-
ceeding in its advice to the SOVEREIGN in direct op
position to its own convictions. However, these
three considerations admit of not one moments argu-
ment. Common sense and experience prove as clearly
as anything can ever be proved that indignity has
been cast upon the Crown and upon the Government,
that illegality has characterised the order recently ap-
plied to the Post-office department, and that inconve-
nience has been the result in regard to its effects upon
the community. All these consequences of the late
ill-advised alteration have by this time become noto-
rious, and to remove them as speedily as possible, by
countermanding the original order, Mr. LOCKE will
bring forward on Tuesday his motion for its re-
scission.

Every individual, therefore, who may be solicitous
to aid the humane scheme of the Hon. Gentleman the
Member for Honiton should bear in recollection that
petitions in support of his motion should be forwarded
not later that Monday evening. Indifference
upon the subject simply upon the 'score that personal
efforts are not required in a matter respecting which
the feelings of the House and of the country are all
but unanimous, will, to our thinking, be in the
highest degree culpable. In testimony of the injus-
tice accruing to large numbers of our fellow-subjects
by reason of the late contrivance of the Sabbatarians,
we would briefly but significantly direct attention to
the following circular issued last night by the Post-
office authorities :

" TO ALL POSTMASTERS.

" General Post-office, sth July, 1850.
" To enable the Postmaster-General to decide what
reduction shall be made in the wages of letter-carriers
and rural post messengers, in consequence of the dimi-
nution of their labour effected by the new regulations
which came into operation on Sunday, the 23d ultimo, I
have to desire you will immediately furnish the follow-
ing information, viz.:—
" How many deliveries were made by each letter-
carrier attached to your office, in a week, previously to
the 23d ultimo; and how many are made at present?

" What are the wages of each letter•carrier?
" What rural post messengers have been relieved
from work on Sunday, within the last twelve months,
without any reduction being made in their wages?
" What are the wages of such messengers?
" The question cf the relief n bleb may have been
afforded to clerks will be the subject of a future com-
munication. _ _ _

" JOHN TILLEY, Assistant Secretary."
So that it appears these saints have not only brought
indignity upon the Crown, disgrace upon the Go-
vernment, and a multitude of miseries and annoy-
ances upon the population by their absurd and fanati-
cal machinations, but they have brought about the
reduction of the wages of some of the most useful
and not the most generously remunerated of the pub
lic servants—all to allay the qualms of a few morbid
consciences, and to effect the revival in the nineteenth
century of an abominable and obsolete superstition!
To say nothing of the cruelty of this proceeding in
its operation upon the comforts of the letter-carriers
throughout
the United Kingdom, the whole contri-
vance,to l,injudicious. To underpay men intrusted
with
oa fr
eba,rlargebi
aenot amountnothing
negmb
lee
embezzlement.
property,etom oeunour mind
mnna
ds
order
thanrhdeesre
to render property so situated secure, its guardians
should of course be placed altogether without the
id theln letter-carriers
a o care
ut a merely
miserably economical point of view, is most
reach of temptation. But arguments are idle when
addressed to bigotry, and tte duty consequently
devolves upon the Legislature to take a matter,
affecting so intimately the dearest interests of the
community, at once and entirely out of the bands of
the Sabbatarians. By a reference to the " Court
Circular" it will be observed that these gentlemen
are still active in their appeals to the Government
through the medium of pious deputations to the
Home Secretary. Happily their example has been
contagious among their antagonists, and what with
counter-petitions and counter-deputations, from the
Anti-Sabbatarian majority outside the walls of Par-
liament, we are sanguine that the Anti- Sabbatarian
majority Oka the viiil4of Figgalact may bring