The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-07 00:00:00

gioUT OF THE PUBLIC) JOURNALS.

It might be, observes the Saturday Review, that if the
wishes of the majority of Irishmen are to be taken as the
guide to the future government of Ireland, the course
before those who adopt this view would be very simple,
because all they would have to do would be to let the
Trish have their own way. But their path does not really
lie so straight before them. For they limit their principle
of leaving Ireland to the Irish by another principle, that
Ireland is only to be left to the Irish so far as compatible
with the safety of England, and with the dignity and
,strength of the Imperial Parliament. And this limitation
very soon creates a host of difficulties, and separates off
into distinct sets those who all start from the same general
principles. The Catholic priests who met at Limerick, it
is true, saw no difficulty in reviving, as they called it, Irish
nationality, because they thought it was not their business
iv ask how the Government of England could go on with
an independent Government existing in Ireland. But
most Englishmen shrink from running the great risk which
they think is involved in having a separate Irish Govern-
ment, for the obvious reason, among others, that if the
two Governments quarrelled, which they easily might do,
very nearly the same evils would have to be encountered
that would arise were Ireland to set up for itself as an
independent Power. This reluctance to let the Irish
judge entirely for themselves what they shall do has led to a
great variety of propositions, according as different writers
think most of pleasing Ireland or of keeping England
safe. Mr. Butler Johnstone, for example, has published
a pamphlet in which he urges that it would not be neces-
sary to have a separate Parliament for Ireland, as the Irish
members elected to serve in the Imperial Parliament might
sit in the recess as an Irish Parliament, and have the
exclusive control of everything affecting or relating
to Ireland. He is sanguine enough to think that this
would give rise to no practical difficulties, and that every
one would easily agree as to what are Imperial questions
and what are only of local and Irish import. The ma-
jority, however, even of advanced Liberals in England
seem to recoil from the idea of giving Ireland any distinct
legislative existence, and think that, though the wishes of
-the majority of Irishmen ought to be gratified, they ought
to be gratified through the legislation of the Imperial Par-
liament, and in fact ought to be snubbed and thwarted so
far as they are directed towards a separate nationality.
Mr. Disraeli is, says the Spectator, obviously trying to
gain time. Either because he has not made up his mind,
or because he has not convinced his Cabinet that his mind
is the right mind, or because he thinks delay will disinte-
grate instead of uniting the Opposition, he evidently
avoids any exposition of the policy of his Government. It
will be, he told his party, when assembled in Downing-
street at two o'clock on Thursday, a truly Conservative
policy ; it will be, he told the House of Commons, three
hours later, a truly Liberal policy ; but on neither occa-
sion did he give any hint of what the policy would be. He
had been, he affirmed, Lord Derby's confidential friend
for twenty years, and he knew what Lord Derby thought,
but what Lord Derby did think he kept carefully to himself.
Recalling the history of the Reform Bill, how the present
Premier twice brought down to the House plans chsxged
within a day, it is impossible to avoid the suspicion that
the new First Lord is still engaged in educating his fol-
lowers, and does not yet know in the least how far he will
be allowed to go in dealing with his immediate diffi-
culty, the Irish Church ; whether he will indeed be
allowed to do anything beyond ordering another
" full and searching " inquiry into the whole matter.
We doubt very much whether this will do. Mr. Disraeli's
hold over his party is not strong enough to enable him to
continue the interregnum, or to get through another year
by mere House of Commons' adroitness, and his hold over
the country, such as it is, is mainly derived from a latent
notion that once in the saddle he will do something great.
He has admittedly no majority in the House, and his
great adversaries are evidently girding themselves up for
what Mr. Gladstone significant'y termed a "severe
session." Earl Russell, for example, in the LosC.s, has
declared openly that Mr. Disraeli's policy is one of
" deception," and that he has no confidence in the Govern-
ment. The Premier's one chance is to induce his
followers to endure measures so broad that the Radicals
can vote for them, and this policy he seems as yet unable
or unwilling to pursue. It is said that he relies much on
his power of dissolving before the new Reform Bill
becomes law; that is, of inflicting an enormous fine on
members of the House by two dissolutions in twelve
months ; but it seems to be forgotten that the fine would
fall as heavily on his own party as on his rivals, that every
election since the Reform Bill has resulted in a loss to his
party, and that till January he can have no aid from the
gratitude of the new electors. A dissolution would injure
him too much with his own people to be risked, and he
will, we imagine, find that unless his plans are very broad,
as broad almost as his ultimate Reform Bill, his tenure of
office will be but short. He, therefore, needs time, and
how, with his present Cabinet, even time is to help him in
Irish matters, it is hard to see.

Those who had formed extravagant expectations of sen-
sational disclosures to be made by the new Premier, on
meeting Parliament for the first time in his new capacity,
are undoubtedly, says the Imperial Review, not a little out
of humour. Those, on the other hand, who have sincerely
shared the regret which has been generally expressed for
the circumstances which have rendered necessary the re-
construction of the Ministry have abundant reason to be
satisfied with the simple declaration that, little as the
personnel of the Cabinet has been changed, there is even
less modification in the course of 'its general policy. One
of the most influential of 'the independent members of the
Hcaise of Commons is reported to have observed, at the
meeting of Mr. Disraeli's supporters, that Conservatives
might almost find reason to be gratified by Lord
Derby's resignation if, in consequence of that
step, they might hope to enjoy a continuance
of his lordship's counsel and direction, of which
any further exposure to the routine of public busi-
ness would have been only too likely to deprive them
altogether. Nor could those who listened to the modest
and graceful homage which Lord Derby's successor paid
to his late chief, both in Downing-street and in the House
of Commons, find any reason to doubt his assurances that
for the future he would be guided by the same considera-
tions as had shaped the course of his predecessor. As Mr.
Disraeli most truly observed, the late and the present
leaders of the Constitutional party have acted together in
public life for the last twenty years in unbroken harmony
and unison. If there is anybody. in England who must
thoroughly understand Lord Derby's rules of political
conduct, it must be the man who has acted as his lieute-
nant in the House of Commons ever since the death of
Lord G. Bentinek. And if the course hitherto followed
by Lord Derby has been influenced in a great degree, as
the world is disposed to believe, by the suggestions of his
most distinguished colleague, it would be idle to suppose,
as some of our contemporaries would appear to have sup-
posed, that the change in the actual holders of the first
place in the Administration should be accompanied by a
sudden revolution in the policy of the Cabinet.

The John Ball has an article on private asylums, divopos
of the conviction of Mr. Shaw, of Elstree. It chews how
easy a thing it is to ill-treat a patient, and bow the com-
missioners may quite as easily be hoodwinked. Even if the
quasi-lunatic tells the commissioner, the keeper is always
ready to say that the patient is " under a delusion."
What is the remedy for this sort of thing? Our con-
temporary says boldly that the most thorough reform
would be to abolish private asylums altogether, and let
patients of the better classs, when not taken care of at
home by medical attendants or nurses, be placed ill
superior wards of public asylums, where there would
be no object •in detaining them, and yet where they
could have every possible advantage and luxury. But
the least that should be done is to enact that all private
houses should be open to inspection, not at a definite time
by a few persons however high in character and position,
but by every justice of the peace in the county or borough
where the asylum is situated, and by the clergyman of th(
parish at any time and without any notice. But even thi:
desirable reform will not probably he effected till a mem
ber of Parliament has been kidnapped and kept n ithout a
cause in durance vile.

Mr. H. W. Peek, of Wimbledon House, Surrey,
and a member of the well-km wa firm of Peek Brothers
and Co., tea-dealers, Eastcheap, has intimated his inten-

- .
tion of building a chapel for the Surrey County Schoo:
Cranley, at a cost of about £5,000.

VESUVIUS AND THE GEOLOGISTS.—The Professor
of Geology at Oxford, Mr. Phillips, has started for Naples,
with an intention to visit and examine Vesuvius, and to
test, by actual observation, certain views concerning vol-
canic phenomena to which he has been led. We shall
probably be informed of the result some three months
hence.— Athenceum.
. _

DEFRAUDING BURIAL SOCIETIES.—At the Liver-
pool Police-court two women, named Julia Regan and
Margaret Cotten, were charged with having wilfully
defrauded the Royal Liver Burial Society.
It appeared
that each prisoner had insured a relation the
one a child,
the other a husband—in the society in question, and, by
producing to the officers false certificates of death, obtained
each the sum of O. The prisoners were remanded for a

week.
THE QUEEN'S JOURNAL IN WELSH. —Her Ma-
Testy the Queen, knowing that there are still great
numbers of people in the Principality of Wales whose
ordinary speech is that of the ancient Cymry, has desired
that her lately published " Journal " should be translated
into that tongue. Sir T. M. Biddulph has, by her com-
mand, requested the Rev. J. Jones, rector of Llandissil.),
near New Quay, Cardiganshire, and who is known as an
eminent Welsh scholar, to undertake the work of trans-
la! kt