The Sun.
London, England, 1868-08-01 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOUItNALS.

According to the Saturday Ecriew, the prorogation
brought, not merely the end of the Parliament that has
just sat, but the close of an order of things that passe,,
away and gives place to a new order. The system of
government ushered in by the Reform Bill of '32 has come
to an end. The Parliaments that used to be called the
Reformed Parliaments will be no more. The reign of the
ten-pound householder is over, and a chapter of English
history is made up, and its roll sealed for good or eviL
In endeavouring to anticipate the verdict of history on
the pre sent epoch, the Saturday Review thinks it will be
corsidered remarkable for its astonishing Conservatism.
The. Reform Bill of '32 did not bring any alteration in the
three distinguishing characteristics of this country, which
were these—that she was a great Power, with all the
virtues and vices, the responsibilities and the energies, of
a great Power ; that monarchy, aristocracy, and demo-
cracy combined to make up the English political system;
and that the centre of public and social life was
in Parliament, and especially in the House of Commons.
How, then, does it happen that an order of things
marked by so decisive a conservatism, and inspired by
ideas so dear to this generation, and so great and noble in
themselves, has come to an end? The answer seems to
be that the causes which have wrought a revolution so
often elsewhere have wrought a revolution here also. The
men are no longer suited to the times. They cannot any
more keep themselves up to the level of thought and action
which what has already been done imposes on them. We may
not be going to have a better time ; in many respects we
muist expect to have a worse time. Many of the new
ideas that will force themselves into notice will be silly
and perverse, and must be combated in the interests of
truth and equity and right reason. But it was impossible
to adopt, sift, or reject them under a Parliamentary
system from which the virtue had departed. A new order
of things was wanted, and it has come ; and we may be
satisfied that it was right it should come, without thinking
that it is going to bring with it a golden age, or that all
that rash men ask for under it should be given them.

The Spectator says that on the whole Mr. Disraeli has
shown nothing like the cleverness and command of the
House which he sheaved last session, perhaps because he
has lowered the whole tone of the House by his ostenta-
tious " management," and though on the great subject of
the session he has displayed an unscrupulous solemnity of

Protestant zeal which has rendered him even nauseous

yet with all this he has struck a series of patient, skilful,
and, so far as they go, successful blo\vs at political cor
ruption, which impress us as earning for him almost his
very first true honour in political life. Mr. Gladstone
on: the other hand, has been singularly sagacious
as well as earnest in his larger statesmanship ;
he' has restored sincerity to one of the hollow
and traditional professions of his party, hitherto mere
idle words ; he has taken a great step towards convincing
the Irish nation that there are English statesmen who
sincerely wish to look at the political wants of Ireland
with Irish rather than English spectacles ; he has prose-
cuted this most delicate and difficult task with a gentle.

ness, a temper, a practical mastery of his subject, and an
earnest simplicity of treatment, which have taken all the
sting out of his policy to those who have had the wisdom
and capacity to judge it fairly ; he has been patient and
playful in brushing away the political mosquitoes which
have as usual attacked him in clouds ; in a word, on all
matters of the first weight he has grown as rapidly as his
rival has dwindled ; but, notwithstanding, on smaller
matters he has not been free from error of a vexatious
kind.

The London Peview, commenting on Mr. Leeman's
clause proposed on the Regulation of Railways Bill, con-
eiders that it cannot be said that we have too many gua-
rantees for the caution and diligence of our railway com-
panies. A long list of painful cases has shewn that we
should rather desire more of them than less. To ask us
to surrender the most efficient one we possess was a bold
step on the part of the railway companies ; and we must
do them the justice to say that they took that step with an
openness and candour which left nothing to be desired.
It would have been a public misfortune had Mr. Leeman's
clause been accepted by the House. But the truth is that
it was too essentially absurd to have any chance of success.
A man's life is to be estimated by its value to himself
and family, and there can hardly be a better criterion of
that value than the income he has been receiving, the
number of persons who are dependent upon it, and the
loss they will sustain through his being incapacitated by
death, or injury short of death, from earning it any
longer. The attempt to limit the liability of the com-
panies by an arbitrary line was unjust ; but to limit it by
a scale graduated according to the class in which the
aggrieved passenger might happen to ride was ridiculous.
The John Bull rebukes the apathy of some Conserva-
tives. Let us admit that electioneering at no time—
least of all in hot weather—is the occupation we should
choose. Public-houses, election agents, tiresome electors
with scruples and. crotchets, clamorous wives of others
anxious to have their rent paid up and their little bills
nettled, these no doubt are not visions which enchant the
imagination of those who know what an election is. But
it is useless to repine at the necessary price which must be
paid to obtain those mystic letters M.l'. which are the
title the people can confer. Woe betide the country when
her landed gentry cease to covet the proud distinction, and
retire into selfish privacy, while self-made pushing mercan•

tile men sit in the seat of council. But our contention is

that the people infinitely prefer the gentleman to the
liovus homo, however full his purse ; and that the aristo-

cracy ;and the country gentry may win in a canter.
We thank Mr. Horsman for his bold address to the
electors of Stroud. It may be that it is a mere
device to bring back to himself the support of the extreme
Radicals in the borough, but it is none the less significant.
His plan to reform the House of Lords is, we may
rely on it, but the foreshadowing of many a
similar and yet bolder flight. Shall Englishmen con-
tinue their slumbers so long that the piecemeal attack
on our most .cherished institutions shall succeed ?
Our enemies "are far too wise to propose the disestablish-
ment of the English Church, the abolition of the House of
Peers, or the division of the land at once. But let therebe
no mistake. These are the aims of the revolutionary party.
Nonconformity and Liberalism have ever been allied.
Shall the miserable dissensions among Churchmen and
Conservatives, arising out of an idolatrous worship of the
clever leader of the Liberals, whom the Dissenters are
using for their own purposes, allow the altar and the
throne to be laid low? We trow not.

The Imperial Review sketches the movements of the
'session, and says that the accession to the Premiership of
Mr. Disraeli, rather than of either Lord Stanley—whose
name had at times been suggested—or of one of those
members of the Cabinet who occupy the Treasury Bench
of the House of Lords, seamed, at first, to give general
satisfaction. Mr. Bouverie, after speaking of his own
party as a rabble, with leaders who would not lead, and
followers who would not follow, and severely condemning
the proposed legislation on the land question in Ireland,
which had found favour with many of the extreme
members of his own party, regretted that the Premier
had not attempted to form a coalition, as there could
be no question of principle to prevent it. Sir George.
Bowyer's tone was markedly conciliatory. The ad-
vanced Liberals seemed to approve the elevation of a
man who, without powerful or wealthy connections, had
gained the highest place by genius. Bat it soon appeared
that, misinterpreting the Conservative policy of last year,
they anticipated from Mr. Disraeli the sacrifice of all the
cherished views of the Conservative party. The Irish
debates brought the matter to the test. The Opposition
had demanded an Irish policy from Ministers, on the
ground that the necessary measures of coercion required
measures of conciliation. Mr. Disraeli, therefore, could
not be charged with having been the first to challenge the
'opinions of Parliament on the affairs of that country. As
none of the grievances of Ireland, be they what they may,
were in any way new, it might have been felt that what
had for years baffled the wisdom of Parliament was not
to be cured satisfactorily in the short interval before the
Reform Bill came into operation. Mr. Disraeli, however,
when called upon to act, shewed a sufficiently liberal
spirit towards the Irish Homan Catholics. But he was
not prepared to attack the existing rights of the Pro-
testant Church, and the overthrow of that Church became
the rallying-cry on which all sections of the Oppositio-
were united against him.

. Samuel Ellis, a labourer, has been taken before
the St. Asaph magistrates for cutting a donkey's throat.
He had previously cut off one of its ears. It is rumoured
that the poor brute disturbed him by braying when he
went courting a woman living next door. He pleaded
insanity. _

TREATUENT OF SUNSTROXE. —The patient should
oe placed in a recumbent position in the coolest possibl*
place, with a free current of air. The clothes should be re-
moved, and cold water applied to the whole surface ; or, if
the symptoml bJ url.-,o,nt, the defiler; should immediately'
be saturated with cold water without waith to removf
them. If the respiratory movements be Line and feebl,.
the cold douche is a powerful excitor ; but if the breathing
b repil and laborious, it is better to envelope VI.; body is
a wet sheet, and to quicken evaporation and (;),:ling by •-t
fan or a pair of bellows. If the patient call swallow, Ic;
him drink iced water freely. Whether he' Oall swallow o:
not, iced water may from time to time be injected. Thsx
marvellous effect of hot venous injections in cholera
collapse, and the urgent need for cooling the blood in
beat-apncca, suggest the expediency, in extreme cases,
of injecting into a vein the same saline solution as has
so frequently been employed in cholera, only injecting
it cold instead of hot.—British 11I:dical Journal.