The Sun.
London, England, 1845-01-11 00:00:00

Tilr SUN, LONDON, SAVUIkDAir 'kir-ENING, JANUARY 11, 1845.

LITERATURE.,
VACATION RAMBLES. 2 Kits.
Muxua. I iii wa, 1 c 4.-).
The author of this work has been long known to
the public as one of the most successful dramatists of
the age, whose tragedies of lon, Glencoe, and the
Athenian Captive, recently re-issued by Moxon in a
cheap duodecimo form, have, we understand, been
circulated by thousands among the operative classes
—a striking proof of the rapid progress that education
and the refined tastes it engenders, have made among
them within the last twenty years. In the volumes
before us Mr. Sergeant Talfourd has essayed a far
less aspiring flight than in the popular productions to
which we have just referred. Quitting the lofty
walk of the drama—though, we trust, only for a
season—he has come forth as the unambitious
chronicler of three separate continental tours which he
made in the vacations of 1841, and the two subsequent
years. The route which he took is one with which
most Englishmen are familiar, but he has invested it
with all the charm of novelty by the freshness and
vivacity of his style, the racy vigour of his descriptions,
and the spirit of bonhommie and cordiality that per-
vades all his remarks. In this last respect his
volumes present a remarkable contrast to the majo-
rity of similar works with which we are acquainted;
for, however enterprising they may be, courting dif-
ficulties for the pleasure of grappling with and sur-
mounting them, Englishmen—the ungracious truth
must he told—do not, in general, make the most
agreeable travellers, more especially if they happen to
be travelling, not for scientific purposes, but merely
for amusement. In the first place, they are far too
easily put out of their way; secondly, they are im-
bued with too keen a sense of the snug comforts of
home, and take it as a sort of personal affront or
calamity if they do not meet with the same abroad;
thirdly, they are apt to be intolerant of all usages that
differ from their own ; and fourthly, their distrustful
fancy is always bristling up, " like quills upon the
fretful porcupine," from an apprehension that, go
where they will, they are pretty sure to be " taken in
and done for," to borrow the phraseology of lodging-
houses. Then their inveterate practice of grum-
bling ! " Think of that, Master Brook !" Without
a grievance John Bull is a fish out of water. If
he cannot find a 1 etty misery ready made to his
hand, he feels it to be a sort of duty to invent one, and
in this respect at least, his invention never plays him
false. Sterne has divided English travellers into two
classes—those who travel " from Dan to Beersheba "
for the perverse pleasure of discovering that " all is
barren," and those—the more rational, but limited
class—who are ready to he delighted with all they see
and hear, to take human nature as they find it, and
not to find fault with foreign customs, simply because
they may happen to differ widely from their own.
Mr. Sergeant Talfourd is a traveller of this last com-
plexion. Unlike Sterne's Smellfungus, he views
everything through a social, cheerful medium. Fluc-
tuating weather—indifferent accommodations—even
the vexatious passport system—fail to disturb the
sunny serenity of his mind. On he goes, hoping
for the best, and deriving comfort from the reflection,
that if to-day rain and fog shut out his view of the
Alps, the cloudless sun of to-morrow will enable him
to behold them in all their glory. There is an inex-
pressible charm in a book of travels penned in this
cordial, good-humoured, accommodating spirit. The
reader at once contracts a sort of personal friendship
for the author, and ever after associates his name
with the most pleasing recollections. But not only is
Mr. Talfourd a cordial, sunny-natured traveller, but
like all men endowed with high imaginative faculties,
he has a quick intuitive apprehension of the picturesque,
and nothing can surpass the mingled grandeur and
beauty of some of his descriptions of Alpine, Italian,
and Rhenish scenery, in which we here and there
meet with touches of genuine poetry, thrown out
quite unconsciously as it were, not unworthy the
author of /on. To his credit, also, it must be
added that he has a nice conception of creature com-
forts ; and the pleasant process of good eating and
drinking goes on in his social pages quite as actively
as in the inimitable Scotch novels. Though en-
raptured of course with the Alps, our author never
forgets the highland and lowland scenery of Scotland,
which he is continually reverting to with satisfaction,
and which seems to have made an impression on his
mind greater even than that produced by the monarch
of European mountains, the snow-crowned Mount
Blanc. Every one is aware that the ascent of this
lofty eminence is a task of no slight difficulty and
some peril, but Mr. Talfourd, undeterred by the
numerous failures of those who have attempted it,
boldly resolved to set his foot on the highest ground
in Europe ; and accordingly set out with a large
party from the inn at Chamouni, duly furnished with
c„nmides, porters, provisions, and all things needful for
the hazardous expedition. His aecount of this ascent
—of his passage across the glaciers—of his dinner on
a ledge of rock half way up—of his night's halt
among the snow—and his difficult transit across
an unfathomable chasm—these details are full of
the most romantic interest, and have, besides, a
dramatic force and truthful earnestness about them
that act on the reader's fancy like a spell. We regret
to be compelled to state that our author failed in his
attempt to reach the snowy summit of Mount Blanc.
lie managed, however, to get within a few hundred
feet of it, and was then compelled to return, partly in
consequence of his own fast-increasing weakness, and
partly in consequance of the still greater exhaustion
of one of the more youthful members of the party.
But though he failed in his bold enterprise, he has
still the proud consolation of reflecting that he got
nearer to Heaven than lawyer ever got before, or, we
suspect, will ever get again ; and may boast that he
is the first Queen's Sergeant who ever stood within
three hundred feet of the topmost height of Mount
Blanc ! We subjoin a portion of his description of a
night's bivouack among the upper solitudes of this
majestic mountain:—

" When the first rage of hunger was appeased—but
before the tables were eaten or removed (which will not
be for some time)—the guides suggested the expediency
of arranging our dresses at once for the night and for the
ascent, by putting on the warm clothing suitable to both,
and which being once done, would enable us to start as
soon as we should be awakened for the upward march.
A smooth ledge in the next rock served us in turn for a
dressing-room, in which my huge stockings were, by
some magic, drawn on ; and the massive shoes which
had been dried in the sun, resumed ; and gaiters buttoned
over the trousers in strange fashion—in all which very
arduous accomplishments I was assisted by Julien, with
a delicate dexterity which would have done honour to a
French valet, and a mingled kindness, respect and com-
mand, like those blended in the manner of an old family
servant to a petted young master. I should have
thought the shoes, well saturated with snow, once re-
moved, could never have been put on over the tremen-
dous stockings ; but even this last miracle of the toilet
was happily accomplished ; and I was pronounced ready
to lie down for the night and to start on the morrow, or
rather at the midnight summons. So, after a cup of weak
brandy and water, which Julien recommended and
shared, I took my pole and picked my way over the pro
strate bodies of two young gentlemen who were already
asleep, and squeezed myself into my allotted niche, with
my head supported by a large comfortable stone, and my
feet pressed against the low fence edging the shelf—
figuring myself to myself as like an effigy on a monu-
ment. The position was in no respect, however, unplea-
sant, except in the confinement of the limbs and a very
slight feeling of cold ; and I was surprised to find how
very tolerable a couch it proved. The notion of the
ledge being a terrible place—overhanging or bordering a
frightful precipice, is entirely erroneous ; its height
above the snow on the side it fronts is not formidable ;
and the bristling irregularity of the rock prevents the
slightest sense of dizziness or danger. It is far beyond
all reach of avalanches—which are heard in the stillness
of the night thundering down the surrounding but dis-
tant precipices with no more possibility of reaching the
listener, than when he looks on the Jungfrau from the
platform of the Wengern Alp. It has been customary,
according to the published narrative of the ascent, to
erect a tent here, under which the travellers sleep ; and
Mr. Bosworth, early in the afternoon, put up an awning
against the rock and supported it by poles, under which
he proposed to sleep and to include us ;—which seemed
to justify me in applying to our position the wot ds of the
fated Richard—

Here pitch our tent ; even here in Bosworth field—
Up with my tent ; here will I lie to night ;
But where to-morrow ?—Well, all's one for that ;
Up with the tent!'
"But the experiment did not answer; the tent was laid
aside, having served no purpose but associating a passage
of Shakspeare with our lot ; enough in itself to huma
nise the desolate snows ; and its owner, with that quiet
kindness which marked his demeanour finding that one
of the younger gentlemen needed the accommodation of
the best ledge more than himself', silently resigned it,
without the theatrical expression of Sir Philip Sidney,
and bivouacked on the second rock. We lay, therefore,
with no meaner covering than the heavens, on the ledge,
my son occupying the outer place, at his! particular de-
sire, and, for that night only,' and I resting beside him.
He did not, however, come to bed till long after I hud
taken up my station ; but was scrambling about the
rocks and breaking chicken bones with the guides, who
kept up the festivity of the evening till after sunset.
" Soon after I had thus set up my rest,' the grand
process of sun-setting began ; and solemn as have been
many sunsets to me, I never saw one—l will not say
merely equal to this—but one resembling it ; for the dif-
ference was not in degree, but in kind. Above and
around there was not a cloud—not a speck to dim the
deepening azure of the sky, nor a fleecy breath of mist
wafted or lingering about the towers or domes of the
mountain. These glowed for a few minutes in deeper
rose-colour than that which appeared to clothe them at
this hour from below ; the summit, as usual, retained it
last ; and when it faded, it left them in the cold white-

ness of the dawn, Thus far—with the grandeur above
us—all passed in its usual procession of glory ; but while
watched those receding tints, flocks of clouds arose be-
low ; tind filled up the valley of Chamouni to the brim
with tissues waving greyly, like floating shrouds. They
were then seen creeping up within the folds of the valley
beyond, till that also assumed, as far as it was revealed,
the same spectral
the top of the Breven, the
Aiguille V arens, and the head of the Buet, stood out like
islands in that solemn sea. But beyond—in the expanse
to the right of the Bi ken top, what glory was disclosed!
—a haven-tined eloudland, not to be gazed at from
below by a, subject may but to be looked down into

as from a purer seat—a subjected enchantment spread
beneath us—as if from some pinnacle of heaven, the eye
were permitted to eFize open its I,lwer glories. the habita
eons and the array of angels. The first appearance of
this vision was that of a celestial city, all of sapphire,
circling a lake of azure, while far away in measureless
distance, legions of angelic hosts—shapeless as those of
Rembrandt, descending on Jacob's slumbers, but giving
like them the sense of winged glories, wore ranged, while
tents and pavilions of violet and gold behind them, seemed
to bespeak a martial array. Presently these splendours
became all confused ; and then a sterner grandeur
reigned ; a scene of huge purple caverns and golden
rocks, but beside a sapphire sea studded with islands of
deeper gold ; and then the colours blended, and faded,
and nothing but one heap of purple clouds filled the place
of the gorgeous vision ; and I was alone with the rock,
the snow, and the stars."

MEMOIRS OF THE REIGN OF GEORGE
THE THIRD. 2 Vole. Bentley, London, 1845.
These long-promised Memoirs, which close the
historical works of Horace Walpole, have at length
made their appearance, and will not, on the whole,
disappoint public expectation. They are printed from
a manuscript copy contained in the box of papers
which came into the possession of the late Earl of
Waldegrave, and were by him transferred to Lord
Holland, in the hope that they might have the benefit
of his editorial skill and judgment. Duties, how-
ever, official and otherwise, of a pressing character,
prevented his Lordship from executing the task, and
at his death it appeared that he had not even com-
menced it. Under these circumstances the present
Duke of Grafton, on whom, as Lord Waldegrave's
executor, the property of the Memoirs had devolved,
consulted Sir Denis Le Marchant on the subject,
who readily undertook the duty of Editor, and the
volumes now appear under his avowed superinten-
dence. His task has been no slight one, demanding
the union of great industry with proportionate re-
search and impartiality, and he has accomplished it
in a most satisfactory manner, clearing up all the
personal and party references in the text which the
lapse of years has rendered obscure, by brief, ex-
planatory notes, and carefully pointing out to the
reader every instance in which Horace Walpole--
who had strong political predilections and antipathies
—has allowed himself to he led astray by his preju-
dices. The period of which the Memoirs treat—
namely, the first twelve years of the reign of George
the Third—has hitherto been comparatively little
known, notwithstanding it was one of more than
ordinary moment, being marked by such stirring
events as the rise of the American revolution, and
the Parliamentary struggle respecting general war-
rants, out of which grew a spirit of free, bold,
active inquiry into the prerogatives of the Crown on
the one hand, and the privileges of the people on the
other. On this important period the Memoirs before
us shed a clear, steady light, and give us an insight
into the public and private peculiarities of George
the Third's character, the intrigues by which he was
surrounded, and the durance in which he was kept
on his first accession to the throne, which we may
vainly seek elsewhere. We always knew that he .was
an obstinate, self-willed, bigoted Monarch, with as
lofty a notion of his own prerogatives as ever was
possessed by the Stuarts, but we had no idea that he
was so astute, circumspect, and, we may even add,
sagacious, as he is here represented to have been. For
the first few years of his reign, during the inglorious
ascendancy of his favourite Minister, Lord Bute—a
man without the slightest capacity for public busi-
ness—he was kept in a state of thraldom and seclu-
sion by that statesman and his own mother, the
Princess of Wales, which is almost without parallel
in the annals of sovereignty. He was accessible to
none of his Court but at the stated hours of business
and ceremony ; nor was any man but the favourite,
and the creatures with whom he had garrisoned the
palace, allowed access to him. Of that lofty states-
man and orator, Lord Chatham, the Memoirs furnish
us with many curious sketches and anecdotes, not
one of which but tends to show the vast hold he had
acquired over the public mind, notwithstanding the
numerous errors and inconsistencies of which he was
guilty in the course of his political career. When he
resigned his seat in the Cabinet, in consequence of
his advice being overruled on the question of war
with Spain, not even his injudicious acceptance of a
Peerage for his wife, and a pension of three thousand
a year for three lives, could destroy his popularity
with the people. They grumbled, it is true, and re-
sented, for a time, his want of high-minded disin-
terestedness ; but they still clung to their favourite
Minister, who had gratified the National pride by
humbling France, and carrying the naval and mili-
tary glory of England to the highest point ; and
when, about a month after his resignation, he dined
with royalty in the City, he was received with en-
thusiastic acclamations, " and the distinctions," says
Horace Walpole, " paid in Guildhall to Mr. Pitt, to
the total neglect of the King, bestowed all the honour
of the triumph on the former." In reference to the
peace with France and Spain, which was the occasion
of Pitt's resigning office, the Memoirs before us state
that the most unblushing corruption was had re-
course to by Fox in the House of Commons in order
to secure a majority in its favour. " The elf-inte-
rest," we are told, " of each separate Member was
appealed to ; and this with so little decorum on the
part of either buyer or seller, that a shop was pub-
licly opened at the Pay- office, whither the Members
flocked, and received the wages of their venality in
bank-bills, even to so low a sum as two hundred
pounds for their votes on the treaty. Twenty five
thousand pounds, as Martin, Secretary of the Trea-
sury, afterwards owned, were issued in one morning ;
and in a single fortnight a vast majority was pur-
chased to approve the peace !" Truly, this is a happy
illustration of the wisdom of our ancestors—that wis-
dom of which the Tories are always vaunting, and
which they would gladly see restored among us ! In
closing our brief, hasty notice of the present portion
of these Memoirs, which terminate with the year
1767, we shall just simply state that they are
penned in that light, gossiping, anecdotical vein, of
which Horace Walpole is so consummate a master,
and blend history with biography in a very attractive
manner. As a specimen of the author's powers of
portraiture, we quote his sketches of the notorious
demagogue, John Wilkes, and his contemporary,
Churchill, the satirist :
" The North Briton proceeded with an acrimony, a
spirit, and a licentiousness unheard of before even in this
country. The highest names, whether of statesmen or
magistrates, were printed at length, and the insinuations
went still higher. In general, favouritism was the topic,
and the partiality of the Court to the Scots. Every
obsolete anecdote, every illiberal invective, was raked up
and set forth in strong and witty colours against Scotland.
One of the first numbers was one of the most outrageous,
the theme taken from the loves of the Queen Isabella
and Mortimer. No doubt but it lay open enough to
prosecution, and the intention was to seize the author.
But on reflecti,)n it was not thought advisable to enter
on the discussion of such a subject in Westminster Hall ;
and, as the daring audaciousness of the writer promised
little decorum, it was held prudent to wait till he should
furnish a less delicate handle to vengeance : a circum-
spection that deceived and fell heavy on the author,
who, being advised to more caution in his compositions,
replied, he had tried the temper of the Court by the
paper on Mortimer, and found they did not dare to
touch him.

" This author, who must be so often mentioned in the
following pages, was John Wilkes, Member of Parlia-
ment for Aylesbury. He was of a plebeian family (his
father was a distiller), but inherited a tolerable fortune
in Buckinghamshire, and had been bred at Oxford,
where he distinguished himself by humorous attacks on
whatever was esteemed must holy and respectable.
Unrestrained either in his conduct or conversation, he
was allowed to have more wit than in truth he possessed ;
and, living with rakes and second-rate authors, he had
acquired tame, such as it was, in the middling sphere of
life, before his name was so much as known to the public.
His appearance as an orator had by no means conspired
i
to
pdml
ya, ke
thoughhim more
with
impertinencenoticed.
; his
me
ann coldlyer aidwas
poor,n s i
and his countenance horrid. When his pen, which pos-
sessed an easy impudent style, had drawn the attention
of mankind towards him, and it was asked, who this
saucy writer was ? Fame, that had adopted him, could
furnish but scurvy anecdotes of his private life. He had
married a woman of fortune, used her ill, and at last
promise of marriage,
and
cruelly, to extort from her the provision he had made
for her separate maintenance ; ho had debauched a
maidentarntld s. t ha
Yetd been
to of
e eie familyln mg uabinlyt,yb oft ai nt e
ri
othernfao
gr informal
hef r
was in his politicalas and breaches of
l
writings, was commonly not ill-natured or acrimonious.
Wantonness, rather than ambition or vengeance, guided
his hand ; and, though he became the martyr of the
best cause, there was nothing in his principles or morals
that led him to care under what Government he lived.
To laugh and riot and scatter firebrands, with him was
liberty. Despotism will for ever reproach Freedom with
the profligacy of such a saint
" Associated with Wilkes in pleasure and in the com-
position of the North Briton was a clergyman named
Churchill, who stepped out of obscurity about the same
period, and was as open a contemner of decency as
Wilkes himself, but far his superior in the endowments
of his mind. Adapted to the bear-garden by his athletic
mould, Churchill had frequented no school so much as
the theatres. He had existed by the lowest drudgery of
his function, while poetry amused what leisure he could
spare, or rather what leisure he Would enjoy ; for his
Muse, and his mistress, and his bottle were so essential
to his existence, that they engrossed all but the refuse of
his time. Yet for some years his poetry had proved as
indifferent as his sermons, till a cruel and ill-natured
satire on the actors had, in the first year of this reign,
handed him up to public regard. Having caught the
taste of the town, he proceeded rapidly, and in a few
mere publications started forth a giant in numbers,
approaching as nearly as possible to his model, Dryden,
and flinging again on the wild neck of Pegasus the reins
which Pope had held with so tight and cautious a hand.
Imagination, harmony, wit, satire, strength, fire, and
sense crowded on his compositions ; and they were
welcome for him—he neither sought nor invited their
company. Careless of matter and manner, he added
grace to sense, or beauty to nonsense, just as they came
in his way ; and he could not help being sonorous, even
when he was unintelligible. He advertised the titles of
poems, but neither planned nor began them till his book •
sellers, or his want of money, forced him to thrust out
the crude but glorious sallies of his uncorrected fancy.

This hecehanalian priest, now mouthing patriotism, and
now venting liberfuthra,.....the "Scourge _of bad men, and
scarce better than the worst, debauching wives, and pro-
tecting his gown by the weight of his fist, engaged with
Wilkes in his war on the Scots ; and sometimes learn-
ing, and as often not knowing, the characters he attacked,
set himself up as the Hercules that was to cleanse the
State, and punish its oppressors ; and, trua it is. the
storm that saved us was raised in taverns and night-
cellars ; so much more effectual were the orgies of
Churchill and Wilkes than the daggers of Cato and
Brutus. The two former saved their country, while
Catiline could not ruin his—a work to which such
worthies seemed much better adapted."

VALENTINE APCLUTCHY. 3 Vols.
Duffy, Dublin, 1845.
This story is from the pen of Mr. Carleton, already
favourably known to the public by his admirable
sketches of Irish character, in which there was more
of truth and force, and less of exaggeration, than in
any similar sketches yet given to the public, with the
sole exception, perhaps, of those by Mrs. Hall. In
the volumes before us, Mr. Carleton reads a useful
moral lesson to the hardhearted Irish landlord and
the flagitious agent; and we would specially recom-
mend .his story to the attention of all Irish absentees,
for it will show them how often their poorer tenantry
are in the habit of being oppressed and despoiled
while they are absent from their estates, on which
they ought to be frequent, if not constant residents.
The tale is written with point and spirit, and is full of
characteristic sketches, not the least amusing of which
is the sketch of an Irish Squire of the Old School. The
third volume is the most entertaining; in the second,
the interest flags occasionally, and there are some
irrelevant matters introduced, which might have been
omitted, or at any rate curtailed with advantage.

TAXATION.
That the current expesenses of every Government
Trust ho met by a correspendints,-taxation is an admitted
truism, but it is one of the highest proofs of political sa-
gacity and prudence to apply the burden in such a
manner and in such proportions as will suit the con tin
gencies of the different classes who contribute to it. This,
however, it may be said, looks admirable in theory, but
it would be extremely difficult to reduce to actual prac-
tice, since there are so many interests to be consulted in
making laws, and the representatives of those interests
are themselves legislators. Yet what is unreasonable or
disproportionate, and obviously so to all, must impera-
tively claim attention when brought out into open day,
nor can any Administration refuse to entertain the sub-
ject. Among the imposts to which these remarks will
refer, there is, probably, not one more unfairly allotted,
more bitterly felt, or more unwittingly borne, than the
legacy duty. It falls with peculiar severity upon
families with scanty incomes, and it cruelly aggra-
vates the calamity they may have sustained, in the
loss of a parent, whose industry, when living, was
their main support. It is, besides, repeatedly evaded
and it is apparently beyond the reach of fiscal ingenuity
to prevent or detect the evasion. At any rate, the re-
missness with which this acknowledged fraud upon the
revenue is regarded and visited, while the amount sup-
plied to Government falls avowedly so far shot of what
is due, sufficiently proves that it is in all eyes a con-
fessedly obnoxious and unjust tax. We have been led
to this topic by the appearance of a Parliamentary paper
respecting " taxes on succession to property abroad,"
which is chiefly valuable as showing how this question
is treated in foreign countries. According to this report,
it seems that in almost all states where the legacy duty
is charged (and several are entirely exempt from it),
there is no difference made in the species of property
upon which it is levied; and even in France, where such
di,tinction exists, the heavier load is placed upon im-
moveable property. The land, therefore, in the latter
kingdom supports the larger share of this burden; and
it is ono of the inexplicable problems of our own
Constitution tbat the reverse prevails among us. Upon
what strange plea this difference has been established, it
is hard to say; but it is much harder to defend the cus-
tom by any sophistries which the landed proprietors can
produce on its behalf. In Prussia, Holland, Saxon),
Sweden, and Tuscany, all property is equally and in-
differently affected by the tax on succession. Each pays
its part, and the tax falls fairly upon all members of the
community. There is nowhere a privileged exemption
for any one favoured class ; but while the necessities of
the Exchequer are thought to require the aid of this
measure, no cause of complaint of inequality or injustice
can attend the infliction of it. Our Legislature, then,
has yet something to learn as to the duty of equalising
those branches of the revenue which depend wholly
upon the contributions of the people, and in this instance
most particularly. That the land should be discharged
of payment, and that personalty alone should be respon
Bible, seems a forced and unnatural condition of things,
and one that we certainly hope will not be allowed
to continue long—not longer, at least, than will
give time for a candid admission of the merits of the
question among men of all parties in Parliament.
There is one very pleasing instance of the unwillingness
of a Sovereign to approach this source of revenue in the
pages before us, which gives additional weight to the
argument against its imposition in any country, and
which, we think, will gratify our readers. In the En-
closure 3, No. 14 (from Sardinia, where the succession
to real property only is affected), is is stated, in excuse
for the imposition of the tax, that—" The extraordinary
necessities in which the late disturbances have placed
the Royal Treasury render inevitable extraordinary dis-
positions for augmenting the receipts thereof, and for
equalising them with the expenses, the amount of which
has been considerably increased by those disorders,
either on their own account, or on account of the con-
sequences which they bring with them. His Majesty
being obliged to authorise an act, which is, however, re-
pugnant to his paternal feelings, has ordered us to render
it as little burdensome as possible to his beloved subjects."
So much expressed repugnance to adopt the measure,
except from imperious necessity, shows how distasteful it
is generally, and how freely the objections to its collec-
tion are recognised even by an almost absolute Monarch.
This hint will not, we hope, be lost on those at whose
command these returns were printed, and for whose
special information they are intended. We trust they
will bear some fruit in the soil on which they have
fallen, and that the experience and usage of foreigners
will not be entirely despised in framing future statutes
respecting the tax that we have been discussing. No
good reason can there be why one species of inheritance
should be absolutely aad in its degree exempt from the
costs to which others are subjected, but there is every
reason why, in a well-ordered and paternal Government,
the pressure of taxation should descend impartially and
equitably on all.— Times.

PRESENT POSITION OF THE
ANTI-SLAVERY CAUSE.
(From tiffs Anti-Slavery-Reporter.)
The returning season engages us to take a mo-
mentary retrospect, and a cursory glance at our pre-
sent position.
During the past year we have seen, with regret,
the formation and partial execution, by the British
Government, of an extended plan for transporting
labourers from Africa and the East to the West India
colonies ; but we have to record, with satisfaction, the
stand taken by the Government against those pro-
visions of the colonial ordinances by which the pecu-
niary burden inseparable from the importation of
labourers would have been thrown on the population
at large. And we are not altogether without hope
that the experimental proof furnished to the Govern-
ment of the inefficacy in practice of the most skil-
fully devised regulations for securing the freedom of
emigration, and the aggravated mischiefs which are
resulting from the vast amount of emigration to
Mauritius, may induce an alteration of their course.
At home we have witnessed with high satisfaction
the introduction into British legislation of a principle
of fiscal regulation favouring the produce of free
labour, from the practical operation of which we feel
warranted in anticipating the happiest effects.
The last year exhibits two new features of an en-
couraging kind in France. On the one hand we have
witnessed the origination of a monthly publication,
the French Abolitionist, devoted to the cause of eman-
cipation, and adapted to enlighten and interest the
public mind. On the other we have seen the public
mind itself for the first time roused to action. The
presentation to the Chamber of Deputies of petitions,
both numerously and respectably signed by the inha-
bitants of Paris and Lyons, calling for the imme-
diate and complete emancipation of the slaves in the
French colonies, which took place in the spring of
last year, constitutes a new epoch in the history of
anti-slavery effort in France ; and the commence-
ment, as we hope, of a series of efforts which cannot
but be crowned with ultimate success. The debate
which ensued on those petitions witnessed the conse-
cration to this great cause of some of the most distin-
guished talents in that kingdom.
In Holland an effort to advance the work of eman-
cipation has been made by the publication of a peri-
odical, entitled Contributions to a Knowledge of the
Dutch and Foreign Colonies, from the influence of
which much good may be expected. And we have
some reason to believe that, although no overt mea-
sure has yet been taken on the subject, the Govern-
ment is seriously directing its attention to the extinc-
tion of slavery in the Dutch colonies.
Of Sweden, happily, more than this can be said.
King Oscar, setting the first example on the part of
the crowned heads of Europe, of an act so noble, has
sent to the assembled States of that c aintry an inti-
mation of his desire to emancipate the slaves under
his dominion; and it may be hoped that ways will
shortly be found to overcome the practical difficulties
of the question.
In Denmark, during the past year, an Anti-
Slavery Committee has been formed, consisting of
highly influential and respectable men. This body
have already presented a petition to the assembled
States, for the early abolition of slavery in the Da-
nish colonies. This petition has, with the full con-
sent of the Government, been referred to a Committee,
whose report upon it is expected with interest.
Of Spain we have as usual to speak in terms of
regret. It is true that, at the present moment, there
is before the Cortes of that country a proposition for
annexing new penalties to the prosecution of the
slave-trade ; but experience forbids us to hope that
such a law, if passed, would prove anything else than
a dead letter.
In Portugal the same enlightened and patriotic men
who in the preceding year brought forward the ques-
tion of emancipation in the eastern possessions of that
country, have, during the past year, renewed the
discussion of it; thus doing themselves honour, and
authorising an anticipation of success at no distant
period.
The progress of the cause in the United States, we
rejoice to say, is beyond question. The recent Pre-
sidential election has called into vigorous action the
body of abolitionists now known as the Liberty party,
and has exhibited a most cheering increase in their
numbers and influence. Acquiring the respect of
both great parties in the Union, it is not too much
to expect that the balance of power may, ere long, be
in their hands.
Another cheering indication in the United States
is the progress of anti-slavery sentiment in ecclesias-
tical bodies. Very important proceedings have taken
place, in relation to slavery, in the Methodist Epis-
copal Church, in the Presbyterian, and several other
communions ; all of them making it evident that the
consciences of religious professors are extensively
touched by the appeals which have been made to
them, and wqrranting the assurance that the leaven
will rapidly leaven the whole lump.
It is an additional ground of encouragement, that,
after many battles (not fought in vain), the Legisla-
ture of the United States is at length open to the dis-
cussion of the great question of slavery; the rule of
Congress which required peti:ions all anti-slavery to
be laid on the table, commonly called the gag rule,
having, among the earliest acts of the present session,
been rescinded. It cannot be doubted that the friends
of freedom will avail themselves of the open door thus
set before them.
%Ve can scarcely think it less than favourable to the
anti-slavery cause in the United States, that the pro-
slavery party have pursued with so much acrimony
the system of vexatious prosecution and revengeful
punishment, on the charge of aiding slaves to escape ;
since these proceedings must tend to awaken universal
disgust, and to combine humane persons of all parties
in opposition to a system requiring for its support
such detestable measures.
On the whole, the anti-slavery cause wears, we
think, a favourable aspect. The work to which we
apply ourselves, indeed, is vast, and the opposing in-
fluences we have to encounter are both powerful and
obstinate. Better elements, however, are in effective
operation ; and slavery is everywhere, by the deplor-
able mischiefs which it produces, aiding their progress.
No slave colony is prosperous or contented. We are
confident that none can be so ; and we believe that, in
the end, emancipation will be accepted as the best
and only remedy for the many ills inseparabl ad-
junct to the institution of slavery.